Interview with Tony Grisoni, Screenplay Author: Advice for Aspiring Screenwriters
Tony Grisoni, a renowned screenwriter known for his work on projects like Red Riding and The City & The City, offers valuable insights into the world of screenwriting. His unique approach encourages writers and producers to be resilient, prioritise emotional stakes, and build stories around characters under pressure.
Grisoni emphasises the importance of setting micro-goals for every writing session. Whether it's writing 600 new words or overhauling one scene, completion drives confidence and momentum. He also advocates anchoring each scene to a clear change moment, such as a decision, a reveal, or a lost opportunity.
Emotional resonance over visual spectacle is a key aspect of Grisoni's creative process. He uses place and process as fuel, valuing curiosity and vulnerability. His scripts often feature character contradiction, which drives arc, and layers conflicts to shape characters' next moves.
Grisoni's approach includes selecting material with passion, adapting source work with creative flexibility, and using feedback for script improvement. He encourages collaboration and testing of work by inviting trusted voices to read it and asking: Where is my script confusing? Which moments stick?
Power questions turn vague ideas into visceral scenes. Grisoni demands specifics from his story at every stage. He suggests letting procedural details like deadlines, investigations, and social norms put pressure on the hero, causing stakes to rise and urgency to spike.
Grisoni's strategies for turning complex worlds into compelling drama include translating abstract concepts into specific rules, behaviours, and small moments, and prioritising clear protagonist goals and moral consequences. He rewards iteration and honest introspection, using feedback and rejection for growth.
Grisoni's career highlights include tackling high-stakes adaptations, building international credentials, balancing original and adapted worlds, earning industry-wide respect, and modelling a thinking-forward path. He encourages writers to translate theme into action, showing secrets through physical behaviour, and sticking with daily writing rituals.
Grisoni's process also includes archiving micro-wins, such as lines that spark, notes that land, and scenes that connect. He suggests returning to them when the rewriting gets tough. He encourages asking questions that clarify intention and dig into the core of the story, such as: What does your protagonist perceive that everyone else misses? What is the cost of failure for your main character? What rules or social forces drive characters to make hard choices?
Lastly, Grisoni suggests keeping a "problem log" - a living document where you jot issues and partial solutions. It's proof you're chipping away at each challenge, day by day. Adopting Tony Grisoni's mindset puts you in the professional lane - curious, tough, proactive, and clear.
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