Script Apart with Al Horner

Welcome to the party, listeners. On this very special festive episode, we’re celebrating the holidays the only way we possibly could: with a deep dive into the writing of Die Hard, courtesy of none o…

Carol is a modern Christmas classic. American director, screenwriter and playwright Phyllis Nagy fought for decades to bring this heart-wrenching tale to the screen. The film is a story of forbidden …

This week we’re welcoming back the wonderful Caroline Thompson, who joined us a few weeks ago to discuss her script for The Nightmare Before Christmas. Today, we’re celebrating the 30th anniversary o…

This week we’re joined by the excellent James Vanderbilt, screenwriter of the 2007 David Fincher thriller, Zodiac. James has had an impressively eclectic Hollywood career: on top of writing action ad…

Kirsten ‘Kiwi’ Smith and Karen McCullah are the writers behind the timeless high school comedy 10 Things I Hate About You. Released in 1999, their Gil Junger-directed teen reworking of Shakespeare’s …

In this very special Halloween episode of Script Apart, we step inside the ghoulish, gothic holiday musical that’s enchanted millions worldwide since its release in 1993. We’re talking of course abou…

Derek Kolstad is the writer responsible for one of the biggest action franchises in cinema today. 2014’s John Wick was a gripping neo-noir revenge flick that saw Keanu Reeves play a retired assassin …

This week’s guest is Al Jean, long-time showrunner of The Simpsons and co-writer of 2007’s The Simpsons Movie. Homer, Lisa, Bart, Marge and Maggie’s big-screen debut was a long time in the making. By…

Armando Iannucci is one of the defining voices in British contemporary comedy. You might know him as the creator of Veep, the co-creator of Alan Partridge or as the writer-director behind 2017’s supe…

This week, we’re joined by David Rabinowitz and Charlie Wachtel, writers of 2018’s incredible BlacKkKlansman. Directed by the one and only Spike Lee, the film told the true-life tale of Ron Stallwort…

Scott Beck and Bryan Woods are two childhood friends from Iowa who, in 2018, scored a box office smash with A Quiet Place – a sensory horror movie unlike anything before. Directed by John Krasinski, …

Adapted from an unpublished play by Tarell Alvin McCraney, Barry Jenkins’ Moonlight was a mesmerising three-part journey through the young adult life of Chiron, a boy grappling with his identity and …

Every now and again, we’re going to be spotlighting a new film or lesser-known gem that we love, chatting to the talented screenwriter behind it to uncover its first-draft secrets. This episode, we h…

There aren’t many first-time screenwriters who sit down to write a script, and soon find themselves on set with Steven Spielberg, Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks, bringing that script to life. That’s what…

In 2009, David Hayter realised a decades-long dream: writing a movie adaptation of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ seminal graphic novel, Watchmen. Co-written by Alex Tse, Hayter’s Watchmen told the sto…

In 2019, The Office co-creator Stephen Merchant scored a big-screen smash with Fighting With My Family – a heartfelt wrestling comedy set in Norwich, England. Telling the true-life tale of WWE athlet…

Script Apart is a podcast about the first-draft secrets behind great movies. Each episode, the screenwriter behind a beloved film shares with us their initial screenplay for that movie. We then talk …