Wordplay

Wordplay
URL	http://www.wordplayer.com
Slogan	Screenwriting Secrets from Working Screenwriters Terry Rossio & Ted Elliott
Type	Personal website
Language(s)	English
Created by	Terry Rossio Ted Elliott
Maintained by	Ann Garretson
Launched	May 31, 1997
Current status	Active

"Have to mention our Wordplay site, a place for screenwriters to hang out: amid the madness, it's nice to have something out there that represents your true creative sensibilities. That's www.wordplayer.com. We constantly get a lot of praise regarding the site from writers, so maybe I'll allow myself to think that it's pretty good."

―Terry Rossio

Wordplay is a film website created by screenwriters Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio, along with Wordplay's webmaster Ann Garretson. Founded on May 31, 1997, Wordplay provides screenwriting secrets from working screenwriters to beginner writers.

History

Although it originally began in 1995 as a weekly column, Wordplay was founded on May 31, 1997, and became one of the first websites run by professional film writers with the goal of sharing the techniques of their craft. At the time, Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio had only four produced film credits, of which only Disney's Aladdin was a commercial and critical success. Since then, the pair had received an Oscar nomination and written several of the following decade's top-grossing films (including DreamWorks's Shrek), making them one of Hollywood's most successful writer teams. They also manage to find the time for continued participation in the Wordplay website.

In the website's intro and disclaimer, Rossio maintains that Wordplay is "about discovery -- that search to find one or two tools or techniques that are in fact helpful in the terrible, terrific effort it takes to complete a script." The columns are about giving away professional secrets from working screenwriters to beginner writers, in which they have at least one bit of advice, technique, or a new way of thinking about writing in order to try to provide useful content or have a better understanding of the business of screenwriting.

The Wordplay website features: columns by Rossio (and occasionally Elliott) on the business and craft of screenwriting; guest columns by industry professionals such as Frank Darabont, Walter Parkes, Zak Penn and Stephen King; and a discussion board open to industry professionals and aspiring writers alike. Notable participants in the forum and discussion boards have included Charles Pogue, Josh Olson, and Cheryl Heuton. There are also screenplays (online & downloadable) available from such films like Little Monsters, Godzilla, The Mask of Zorro, and Déjà Vu as well as unproduced projects like Sandman.

Pirates of the Caribbean

Archives

Because of Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio's involvement as screenwriters and executive producers for the first five films of Disney's Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, Wordplay also has a substantial amount of content related to the series. Rossio had written "Tales from the Set" blog entries which chronicles details from the set of the Pirates films as well as providing behind the scenes or personal information or experiences. Spanning across the first four films, the "Tales from the Set" include:

1. On Location (April 30, 2003)
2. Caribbean Tales (2005)
3. Trying to Reason with Hurricane Season (2005)
4. Walking the Plank (2005)
5. Nine Pieces of Eight (2006)
6. Ends of the Earth (2006/2007)
7. We Sail With the Tide (2010)

Wordplay also provided the screenplays from the Pirates of the Caribbean series, some being first drafts, revisions or late production drafts. The screenplays were available for free at no charge and for educational purposes to allow interested fans to track the progression from script to screen. There are some differences compared to what appeared in the final cut of each film; most of the changes are due to improvisations, last second rewrites, editing choices, for content as well as running time.

1. (POTC) Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (POTC) (FIRST DRAFT; Sep. 1, 2002) - an early draft of the Pirates of the Caribbean screenplay. Completed about the time Disney CEO Michael Eisner attempted to pull the plug on the project, this screenplay had more references to the Disney ride until Eisner ordered to remove some of the more obvious references from the script.
2. (POTC2) Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (REVISION; Jan. 19, 2006) - one of the last (if not the last) production drafts written in the spring and summer of 2005 in Los Angeles, and on location on the islands of Saint Vincent, Dominica, and the Bahamas.
3. (POTC3) Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (GREEN REVISION; Jan. 31, 2006) - a late production draft with a different subtitle, Calypso's Fury, which was simply a working title, until marketing deadlines forced the eventual title to be determined.
4. (POTC4) Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (2nd CHERRY REVISION; Nov. 1, 2010) - a late production draft.
5. (POTC5) Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (August 15, 2012) - a proposed story draft written with the studio and producer guideline that Keira Knightley and Orlando Bloom would not return to the series. This draft includes a supplemental document with extensive footnotes.

Columns

In addition, Rossio wrote columns, intended to be 100 essays covering all facets of screenwriting, written by working screenwriters, and a full course in writing screenplays from an insider's perspective. Notable columns that focused or at least mentioned the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise:

• Column 54 "Phone Tag": Some weird and noteworthy calls or snippets of a screenwriting carer. Memorable call #5 detailed how actor Lee Arenberg had arranged a round of golf for some of the film crew on a Sunday at the Grand Lucayan Resort Reef Course. Memorable call #7 detailed one of the few times Rossio ever genuinely stormed out of a meeting, namely on the first Pirates of the Caribbean film. Memorable call #7: Rossio recounted his one and only interaction to Michael Eisner, a phone call made as Pirates of the Caribbean was in post-production and after word came down from the marketing department that the title was to be called Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl.
• Column 55 "Time Risk": #28: Sue the Bastard briefly detailed how Disney was hit with no less than six plagiarism suits for The Curse of the Black Pearl. #27: World Creation Subject to Whim Destruction detailed how Rossio's version of Dead Men Tell No Tales was set aside because it featured a female villain, and Johnny Depp was worried that would be redundant to Dark Shadows, which also featured a female villain.

External links

• Wordplayer.com a.k.a. Wordplay - Official website
• Wordplayer.com - Facebook
• Wordplay Wordplayer - Facebook
• Wordplayer.com (@Wordplayercom) / Twitter
• Wordplay on Wikipedia