MIDPOINT Writers' Room 2022

As the creator of a drama series project, you may be tasked with setting up and running a writers' room. As a freelancer, you may be asked to enter a writers' room as a hired writer to follow the creator’s voice. Either way, you become part of a team. In this lecture, we’ll be looking at the foundations and practicalities of this team work. In the process, we’ll be demystifying the notion of the writers' room, and explore how it is viable within the European industry, especially in countries with nascent drama series markets and tight development budgets.

A look at behind the scenes of these sacred spots where tv series are conceived, written and refined, where you give birth to the characters and define the story, the structure and all aspects of writing for original dramas. After focusing on what happens and who works in a writer's room, we'll then focus on the differences with the writing for cinema and how the creative process unfolds in a television series.

What do Tom Shelby of Peaky Blinders and Toni Hamadi of Four Blocks have in common? Both men are morally ambivalent crime bosses who lead a gang of die-hard followers in crummy but colorful neighborhoods, 1920s Birmingham and contemporary Berlin-Neukölln respectively. But as each man seeks a more respectable life, they also carry the narrative genes of Tony Soprano (and Michael Corleone before him): no matter how hard he tries, the main character cannot escape his family’s entanglements with the business of crime or shed his own craving for power.

Every TV series lives off the interplay between its specific style on the one hand and the genre elements that motor its narrative and thematic conflicts on the other. Whether it’s the hospital drama, the investigative thriller, the superhero show or the family soap, almost any modern TV drama draws from certain narrative, thematic and even stylistic building blocks of successful progenitors. However, rather than fencing the writer in, genres should be seen as a handy toolbox that writers can use to craft their own series concepts. As a result, genres are also constantly in motion: each new show adds something different to the genre and inspires a fresh generation of writers.

The US Writers’ Room is undeniably an extremely successful and efficient working model. Even though narrative cultures and prerequisites across Europe are very diverse, it still serves as a model and forms the starting point for various forms of collaborative writing. In a concise lecture, Katrin explains the market conditions under which this system has developed and explains how the US Writers’ Room works: mindset, working methods, positions and the central development tools.

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