Daniel Willcocks is an international bestselling author and award-nominated podcaster of dark fiction. He is one fifth of digital story studio, Hawk & Cleaver; co-founder of iTunes-busting fiction podcast, 'The Other Stories';’ CEO of horror imprint, Devil’s Rock Publishing; as well as the lead host of the 'Great Writers Share' podcast, and the co-host of the ‘Next Level Authors’ podcast Willcocks is furiously passionate about all things story. He has written 40+ books in four years for hims...
Feb 26, 2021•34 min
“We jumped into this life by watching other people on YouTube who were doing it,” Taylor Cluster told me, after her boyfriend Scott proposed they sell everything and move into a van to travel full-time. While on the road, Scott also encouraged Taylor to pursue her first love: writing. The former teacher decided to give writing another shot and actually created her first novel, ‘The #Vanlife Murders.’ In the novel, Hailey Andrews loses her job and decides to make a change in her life. She sells e...
Feb 24, 2021•34 min
In 2013, author James McBride published a remarkable book about Henry Shackleford, an enslaved person who united with John Brown and his abolitionist mission. The book was called 'The Good Lord Bird.' Producer Jeremy Gold (Sharp Objects) encouraged 'Hell on Wheels' screenwriter Mark Richard to read the book. “He put the book in my hands, and I read it in one sitting,” said Richard. Little did Richard know, Gold had also spoken to actor Ethan Hawke (Training Day, Before Sunrise) about the book, w...
Feb 22, 2021•27 min
Screenwriter/Director Anna Kerrigan grew up in a creative home. Her dad worked in visual effects. Her mom worked as a poet. After working in the theatre for a few years, eventually, Kerrigan’s journey led her back to Los Angeles in what she would describe as a “calling.” She made a handful of shorts, including The Rub, Hot Seat, The Jury, and Fridays. In Kerrigan’s film debut, Cowboys stars Steve Zahn, Jillian Bell, and Sasha Knight. The movie follows a troubled but well-intentioned father who r...
Feb 20, 2021•17 min
Here’s the description for Body Brokers: Brought to Los Angeles for treatment, a recovering junkie soon learns that the rehab center is not about helping people, but a cover for a multi-billion-dollar fraud operation that enlists addicts to recruit other addicts. If you’re a listener of the show, you can probably tell I’m starting this episode a little different, because this story is so insane, especially since it’s true. Here’s a statement from writer-director John Swab: “I was a street junky ...
Feb 19, 2021•18 min
Eve Hewson, daughter of U2’s Bono and Ali Hewson, is an Irish actress who landed her first major role in 2011’s This Must Be the Place, opposite Sean Penn. Since this role, she’s been in an array of films and shows, like Enough Said, Bridge of Spies, The Knick, Robin Hood, Tesla, and The Luminaries. Eve’s most recent project is called Behind Her Eyes. Simona Brown plays Louise, a single mother who has an affair with her psychiatrist boss David (Tom Bateman). Her life takes a strange turn when sh...
Feb 17, 2021•25 min
In the femme fatale genre, an attractive or seductive woman is often the protagonist. Her goal? To cause distress or disaster to a man who becomes involved with her. This is the underlying subject of the new dark comedy Me You Madness from Louise Linton. The film stars Louise, where she’s also the screenwriter and director. The second half of this two-hander, Ed Westwick (Gossip Girl, White Gold) plays Tyler Jones, the unfortunate prey of the protagonist. Officially, the description reads, “ A y...
Feb 14, 2021•14 min
Dana Kaye, founder of Kaye Publicity, is a life-long entrepreneur who believes in the power of storytelling and authentic personal branding. Known for her innovative ideas and knowledge of current trends, she coaches her clients on how to identify and establish their unique personal brands. Dana is also the author of two books - Your Book, Your Brand: The Step-by-Step Guide to Launching Your Book and Boosting Your Sales and The Personal Brand Workbook - and serves on the advisory board of Propel...
Feb 11, 2021•33 min
What separates the hobbyist writer from the prolific professional? That’s the question my new book, Ink by the Barrel, aspires to answer, thanks to a decade of research, and these 250 episodes on the podcast. Here’s a quick teaser for this audiobook sampler: For the first decade of my career, I felt like a hobbyist, posing as a professional. If you enjoy writing - or even despise it but feel drawn to the page - you probably know the feeling. Incomplete scripts and outlines fill your computer... ...
Feb 11, 2021•27 min
Writer-Director Mike Cahill credits his early fascination with filmmaking to the Fisher-Price Pixelvision, better known as the PXL-2000, a black-and-white toy camcorder from the late 1980s. “I totally loved it,” he joked. “It was my favorite toy of all time. No one was teaching me how movies or film, or how the medium worked, but I was discovering you hold down the button, it records, and you let go, and it stops recording. Then, there’s a natural edit to the way it works.” Describing this early...
Feb 10, 2021•21 min
Thomas Sadoski describes his path to acting as an “accumulation of growing up reading big epic stories.” His father read epic myths and he grew up in Texas, a natural storytelling culture. This, along with an obsession with actors like Jimmy Stewart and Charlie Chaplin guided his journey. The actor is known for roles in movies like ‘Wild’ and ‘John Wick,’ along with television work such as ‘The Newsroom’ and ‘Life in Pieces,’ but his most recent film is ‘The Mimic.’ In the feature written and di...
Feb 04, 2021•22 min
Fisher Stevens grew up with an acting class in his living room. The teacher invited him to attend, so by age 15, he was already auditioning and working in the business. These days, Fisher is known for Short Circuit, Lost, Damages, Hail Caesar!, The Night Of, Succession and The Blacklist. But, the actor is also making a name for himself behind the camera, winning an Oscar for the documentary The Cove, and Directing Stand Up Guys and now, Apple’s Palmer. In Palmer, Justin Timberlake plays an ex-co...
Feb 02, 2021•24 min
For the bulk of Cheryl Guerriero’s life, she was involved heavily with sports. She was a Nation Lacrosse Champion, then worked for a sports agent, and a sports apparel company. Despite this success, Guerriero felt unfulfilled and wanted to move back to her true passion: writing. Guerriero got the idea for Palmer in 2007. The description reads, “An ex-convict strikes up a friendship with a boy from a troubled home.” Since the initial concept, however, there’s been many ups and downs to get the mo...
Feb 01, 2021•31 min
Before he entered filmmaking Cinematographer Sam Levy would not have described himself as a technical person. He didn’t have the J.J. Abrams Super 8 childhood that many other creatives grew up with. Instead, Levy pitched this missing piece as an asset, not a liability. Levy’s ability to leap without worry of what was underneath him has lead to an impressive career, where he’s shot for directors like Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach, and worked on projects for Jerry Seinfeld, Judd Apatow, Norman Le...
Jan 31, 2021•34 min
As a kid, Cooper Raiff thought he was merely a fan of movies, but when he wrote his first story, he realized he had an ear for dialogue. These days, he’s known for being the star, screenwriter, and director of the film Sh*thouse, loosely based on his time in college. Cooper stars as Alex Maimquist, a homesick college freshman who goes to a party at Sh*thouse, where he spends the evening with a sophomore RA, played by Dylan Gelula. In this interview, Cooper talks about his protege-like relationsh...
Jan 14, 2021•22 min
From an early age, April Mullen was obsessed with the idea of storytelling. Originally an actress (88, A History of Violence), Mullen soon realized her state of mind was better in the Director’s Chair. For her latest film, Wander, she’s crafting a story about a man hired to probe about a suspicious death in the small town of Wander. This conspiracy film stars Aaron Eckhart and Tommy Lee Jones. In this interview, Mullen discusses the instincts as a Director, how to collaborate with actors (from t...
Jan 13, 2021•21 min
As a script-reader, Scott Kroopf read thousands of scripts before he started to climb the ladder in Hollywood, ironically thanks to the original movie, ‘Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure.’ Kroopf suggested the script in an interview, not knowing the company he was interviewing with had just optioned the screenplay. Thanks to this lucky break, Kroopf took his knowledge of producing a play into the world of movie making. In this interview, the producer talks about how Bill & Ted Face the Mu...
Jan 13, 2021•27 min
Xan Parker is a seasoned documentary producer, obsessed with character. Across her career, she’s worked on projects like The Hill, Racing Dreams, Big Men, Tigerland, and most recently, Rebuilding Paradise. The latest story, directed by Ron Howard, focuses on the community of Paradise, California, a town in the Sierra Nevada foothills and their attempt to rebuild after the wildfires of 2018. In this interview, Parker talks about the history of documentary filmmaking, how to quickly make decisions...
Jan 11, 2021•20 min
I’m Your Woman is a 1970s-set crime drama that stars The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel’s Rachel Brosnahan. The story follows a woman when she’s forced to go on the run with her baby when her husband betrays his partners. The film is directed by Julia Hart, and co-written by Hart and her husband Jordan Horowitz. The duo have also created films like Fast Color, Miss Stevens, and Stargirl, among others. In this exclusive interview, Julia and Jordan discuss how their writing partnership works logistically, ...
Dec 01, 2020•27 min
A self-described theater brat, Tara Miele realized there was a storyteller behind her favorite films when a friend invited her to come watch a series of student films. “I grew up a blue-collar kid in Long Island and never assumed that was a job you could do.” At the event, however, she said “it was like somebody pulled back the curtain on Oz. I just knew I was going to be a filmmaker.” The following week, she marched into the Film Studies office and announced she wanted to make a movie. Her firs...
Nov 30, 2020•25 min
When Sarah Goldfinger saw her first play produced, she knew she wanted to become a screenwriter. She decided to move to Los Angeles (because it’s better to be poor in warm weather), where she worked as a nanny until earning her first job on a new show called CSI. Goldfinger wanted to write character-driven stories, which led her to a spec script and then on other shows like Brothers & Sisters, Hawaii Five-O, Grimm, Parenthood, then Jane the Virgin, Charmed and now, Trinkets. In the latest se...
Sep 23, 2020•38 min
As a teenager, Sam Boyd would make short films and write screenplays with friends. This led him to eventually making the short “In a Relationship” at NYU with Nicholas Braun (Succession) and Dakota Johnson (50 Shades of Grey). “That was where I learned to cut stuff together, how to Direct, and I was able to make it into a feature a couple years later with Emma Roberts (We’re the Millers) and Michael Angarano (Almost Famous).” This work eventually led him to the spec script for Love Life, which i...
Sep 16, 2020•26 min
Natalie Krinsky always knew she wanted to become a writer. In college, she started writing a column at the Yale Daily News. Since it was 2002 at the time, these sex-column articles were published online, sort of like a blog. Readers enjoyed the articles so much they started to forward the column to friends at other colleges. “I sort of began to have this real following based on my silly student sex column. So I then I wrote a novel based on the column.” The novel was called Chloe Does Yale, whic...
Sep 15, 2020•30 min
As a kid, Richard Tanne was rewarded for good behavior with a movie on the weekend. He quickly developed a love for Tim Burton films, then short stories, then plays, but the entire time, he knew he wanted to one day become a filmmaker. In this interview, Tanne discusses his first two features, Southside With You, about when the Obamas met in 1989 Chicago, and his latest film, Chemical Hearts, a high school romance built around pain and mortality. In this interview, the writer-director discusses ...
Aug 27, 2020•31 min
As a kid, Mattson Tomlin felt like he was the last one of his friends to give up on the idea of play. While they were chasing girls or getting into sports, he still wanted to run around in the woods in a Batman costume. Luckily, he discovered that if he made movies, he could inspire his friends to stick around, because they had a new reason to play. He then made a career out of this. As of 2020, the screenwriter has credits on the Jamie Foxx action-thriller Project Power, with additional credits...
Aug 16, 2020•30 min
Steve Blackman was working as an attorney when he decided to use his experience and turn the environment into a spec script. When he sold the script, he quit his job that day to pursue his dream of becoming a professional screenwriter. Over the past two decades, Blackman has written for shows like Wild Card, Bones, Las Vegas, Private Practice, Fargo, Legion, and Altered Carbon. He’s also the creator behind Netflix’s Umbrella Academy. The latest series comes from a graphic novel by the same name,...
Jul 31, 2020•31 min
Alex Winter got started on Broadway at a very early age, where he landed roles in productions of The King and I and Peter Pan, which led him to NYU Film School and eventually to Hollywood. These days, Winter is best known for his role in the Bill & Ted franchise, where the most recent film Bill & Ted Face the Music comes out this year. However, when Winter is not playing a role, he’s often behind the camera, working on documentaries such as The Panama Papers, Zappa and HBO’s latest film,...
Jul 22, 2020•24 min
Early in his career, Gavin Rothery’s goal was to have two jobs: one that pays your bills and you that you enjoy. Then, simply transition the one you enjoy into the one that pays your bills. Starting in the Art Department, Rothery worked on games like Grand Theft Auto III, Battalion Wars, and movies like Moon, which starred Sam Rockwell. All of this, of course, led to Rothery writing and directing his first feature. In Archive, Theo James and Rhona Mitra unlock the year 2038. In the film, “George...
Jul 22, 2020•18 min
Last time we spoke with Eric Newman (Ep 162), we discussed his work on ‘Dawn of the Dead,’ ‘Children of Men,’ ‘In Time,’ ‘RoboCop,’ and ‘Hemlock Grove.’ This time, we break down his fascination with the world of ‘Narcos.’ The new series stars Diego Luna and Scoot McNairy. It focuses on “The rise of the Guadalajara Cartel as an American DEA agent learns the danger of targeting narcos in Mexico.” In this interview, Newman discusses bad guys and very bad guys, self-preservation versus self-elevatio...
Jul 13, 2020•34 min
Lenny Abrahamson describes his path to filmmaking as a “wandering” journey. Obsessed with books and storytelling, a few friends inspired him to create a “filmmaking society” at Trinity College near Dublin, Ireland. Abrahamson is known for the Brie Larson film ‘Room,’ the Michael Fassbender film ‘Frank,’ and now, the BBC romance series ‘Normal People,’ which is set in Ireland. The new series follows “Marianne and Connell, from different backgrounds but the same small town in Ireland, as they weav...
Jul 13, 2020•24 min
