MovieBytes Interview:
Screenwriter Brian Price

An interview with screenwriter Brian Price regarding the Scriptapalooza Writing Competition.

A: Whale Farts -

When loveable loser Skip Shaw challenges his ultra-competitive father to a Caribbean deep sea fishing tournament, he finds himself floundering in the deep end, forced to face his fear of the water, a maniacal sea captain, a blood-thirsty albino whale, and most daunting of all, himself.

Because seriously, who hasn't read Moby Dick and thought it would greatly benefit from more fart jokes?

A: My writing partner Sam Gailey and I decided to enter this particular contest when we discovered, on the same day we lost our agent (over how much she hated this script) that it was the day of Scriptapalooza's final deadline. We thought, what the Hell, nothing else is going to happen with this script, might as well give this contest thing a try. It helped too (and eased the pain of the forty buck fee) that we'd heard such good things about Scriptapalooza and that win or lose, they got your script read by industry professionals.

We hadn't entered any other contests before with this script, preferring to spend potential registration fees on porn.

A: We were very pleased with the administration of the contest. We won. Why wouldn't we be?

They met all deadlines and we received all the awards as promised. But of course, our timing couldn't have been worse. Through no fault of Scriptapalooza, the industry shut down with the WGA strike soon after our win, so we probably didn't get to take as much advantage of our sudden notoriety as we'd have liked. We hope to soon remedy that situation though as the strike has ended and we hope to get our script out into the world.

A: No feedback -- except "You guys are good!" But we already knew that. What can I say, we're rockstars.

A: We were contacted by agents, managers and producers, and eventually hooked up with managers as a result of this contest, and the managers led to lawyers, which hopefully, now that the strike is finally over, will lead to even bigger and better things.

A: I graduated from UCLA's school in Theatre, Film, and Television with an MFA in screenwriting. And I currently teach screenwriting there, as well as at Brooks Institute in Ventura. I've written many screenplays, some specs, some assignments. Sam has also written many features and has had several teleplays produced.

A: Sam and I both live in Los Angeles, with our respective spouses.

A: Sam and I are working on our follow-up script, another outrageous comedy. We hope to go out with it as a pitch as soon as the meetings start rolling in.

Finger's crossed Whale Farts Two: Electric Boogaloo will be showing in a multiplex near you.

Posted Wednesday, March 19, 2008