Writing Your Story for the Big Screen

This book is for any writer who wants to tell a story for the screen. I guide you with specific step by step instructions on how to write a full length feature screenplay. This book is designed as a workshop for either inspiring or veteran screenplay writers who wish to develop the tools necessary to write a full length screenplay from conception to completion. I want you to be able to develop fully dimensional characters whose actions stem from what we know of them from the script and who speak in voices specific to their character. If the writer knows the character down to every last detail of his or her core, when it's time for the character to take action or deliver a line of dialogue, it's the character who writes for the writer - never the other way around.

Shawn Fornari, a Western Pennsylvania native, has been directing films since he was 8 years old. At that tender age, Mr. Fornari fell in love with the art of storytelling through the lens of a camera... a love which has grown stronger through the years. In his youth, his dream of making movies often found him in tricky situations, including getting kicked out of a cemetery by an irate grounds keeper. Not to be deterred, his almost obsessive film attraction led the twenty-one year old kid from Nanty-Glo, PA to New York City for an internship with American Masters at WNET/Thirteen. During his tenure at the station, Fornari gained extensive knowledge in documentary film making and narrative storytelling. He was a production assistant on several biographies, one of which was of the late Rod Serling of The Twilight Zone. While an intern at PBS, Shawn worked on respected programs such as the Charlie Rose Show and The MacNeil/Lehrer News Hour. In addition, he worked with Director Mathew Diamond (Golden Girls) on a show entitled Dinner with Balanchine at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in Manhattan. In 1994, Mr. Fornari moved to Florida and began working for both Disney and Universal Studios in a variety of production capacities. He earned a reputation for being one of the top assistant directors in central Florida. The year 1999 saw Shawn moving to Los Angeles to further pursue his dream of directing. During his years in the film capital of the world, he would create over a dozen film projects and work with many top industry artists including Tom Hanks, Rod Lurie, Martin Sheen, Ryan O’Neal, and Dustin Hoffman. He continued his formal education and received an M.F.A. in film with a concentration on screenwriting at Chapman University. While at Chapman, he had the opportunity to study under action film director John Badham (Saturday Night Fever, War Games, Blue Thunder, Short Circuit, and The Jack Bull) and tv director Gilbert Bettman (Knight Rider, The Fall Guy, B.J. and the Bear and the Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries). Dr. Fornari currently resides in Hollywood, CA