The Quidditas Factor

The Dynamic Duo Elizabeth Martin and Lauren Hynek on Creating and Writing Magic.

November 30, 2021 Michael J. Arbouet Season 3 Episode 19
The Quidditas Factor
The Dynamic Duo Elizabeth Martin and Lauren Hynek on Creating and Writing Magic.
Show Notes

Elizabeth Martin and Lauren Hynek both started writing their first plays at the age of about seven. Lauren fell in love with the magic of movies visiting her dad (visual effects supervisor Joel Hynek) on the set of Predator as a little kid. Elizabeth spent her tween years writing (badly formatted) fan fiction episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation. In high school, we joined forces while working at the same Shakespeare theater in the summers. We continued to work in classical theater together after college, producing plays on shoestring budgets and getting paid out of a passed hat. However, frustrated with the limited roles for women in Shakespeare’s work, we started to dream of creating our own stories — ones that featured strong women that our little girl selves could look up to. We let our imaginations run to tales that couldn’t be tackled on the stage, they demanded the big screen. After spending a few years teaching ourselves how to write (and properly format) a screenplay, we swung for the fences and wrote a live action Mulan on spec. Disney bought it and it’s due out in March of 2020. In the meantime, we’ve won a handful of writing contests, wrote a Lifetime movie Christmas Perfection, and were hired to adapt a NY Times bestseller into an hour-long drama series for Alcon Entertainment. Currently, we’re working on a biopic about computer pioneer GRACE HOPPER for Middleton Media as well as rewriting an action flick for a trio of companies. In our spare time, we strive to make the world a more equal place as co-chairs of the Committee of Women Writers at the WGAW.

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