podcast
intermediate ?
Both
Scriptnotes
A Podcast About Screenwriting and Things That Are Interesting
“The best way to learn screenwriting is hearing two working professionals think through craft and business problems together — with radical candor.”
Two working screenwriters discuss craft, business, and the full ecosystem of professional screenwriting — from three-page feedback to deep-dive film analysis to industry realities.
Weekly podcast conversations about craft, business, and creative process, plus direct feedback on listener screenplay pages through the Three Page Challenge.
Won't help with: systematic step-by-step process, structured curriculum, or exercises to complete. This is ambient professional education, not a course.
Listen on johnaugust.com
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Key Insights
1 takeaway from this resource — click to expand
When someone says your tone is off, they're not giving you a vague note. They're telling you the invisible architecture of your script has a crack in it.
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August and Mazin return to tone constantly because it's the element screenwriters understand least. Most writers think of tone as something that happens naturally when the writing is good — but tone is actually a designed system. It's the contract between the script and the audience about what kind of story this is: how serious the stakes are, what kind of humor is permitted, how heightened the world is, what emotional range the characters occupy. When a comedy suddenly has a scene of genuine brutality, or a drama inserts a broad joke, the audience feels a tonal break — not because the individual scene is bad, but because it violates the contract the rest of the script established. Tone must be designed as deliberately as structure.
Check Your Script
Describe your screenplay's tone in three specific rules: what kind of humor is allowed? How far can violence go? How heightened is the dialogue? Now check your script for scenes that break those rules. Each break is a tonal crack that the audience will feel even if they can't name it.
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How It Teaches
Encoding fingerprint and cognitive approach
Cognitive Mode
Te
+ Ne
Teaches through practical professional experience externalized as craft principles (Te) combined with wide-ranging exploration of screenwriting from multiple angles (Ne). August's systematic production mindset and Mazin's philosophical depth create a dual-lens approach where every topic gets both practical application and conceptual depth.
The Te+Ne combination means the podcast teaches through professional credibility AND intellectual breadth. You trust the advice because it comes from working writers, and you discover connections across topics that no single-focus resource provides.
What It Teaches
Central thesis and key premises
Screenwriting encompasses both craft mastery and business acumen, and the best way to learn both is through candid conversation between working professionals who demystify the full ecosystem — from first draft through production and distribution.
Teaching Modality
Peer Mentor
Approach
Two working screenwriters discuss craft and business as peers, not professors. Topics arise organically, get explored through professional experience, and land in actionable insights. The Three Page Challenge provides direct feedback on listener work.
Three Page Challenge
Listeners submit three pages of screenplay for public analysis. The hosts diagnose what works and what doesn't at the page level — world-building, character introduction, dramatic tension, formatting. The constraint of three pages forces writers to make every line count.
Tone as Invisible Architecture
Tone is the most frequently discussed and least understood element of screenwriting. August and Mazin return to it constantly — how to establish tone on the page, how tonal inconsistency kills scripts, how genre expectations create tonal contracts with the audience.
Craft-Business Integration
Screenwriting is both an art and a profession. The podcast insists that understanding the business ecosystem — pitching, rights, residuals, staffing, agent relationships — is inseparable from craft mastery. You cannot succeed on craft alone.
Deep-Dive Film Analysis
Episodic deconstruction of specific films — Raiders of the Lost Ark, Frozen, Groundhog Day, Ghost, Unforgiven — revealing structural, tonal, and character choices that make them work. Analysis from professionals who understand what it costs to execute these choices.
Writing With Professional Authority
The podcast models what professional-level screenwriting thinking sounds like — how working writers assess problems, prioritize solutions, and make decisions under production constraints. This meta-skill is caught, not taught.
Career Architecture for Screenwriters
Beyond individual scripts — how to build a sustainable screenwriting career. Agent selection, manager relationships, negotiation strategy, navigating strikes, protecting creative rights. The business infrastructure that keeps writers writing.
Put these ideas to work on your screenplay
Upload your script and get detailed AI analysis on structure, dialogue, characters, and more — see exactly where your draft stands and what to fix next.