Inside the Writers Room
Iowa screenwriters make a scene in Hollywood.
Four Iowa alumni gather at a Hollywood lounge accented with textured walls and lanterns that emit golden light. We see SAM SHAW (04MFA), LILA BYOCK (04MFA), MARK LAFFERTY (04MFA), and VINNIE WILHELM (04MFA), a group of charismatic, hilarious, and whip-smart writers who arrived at the Iowa Writers' Workshop in 2002 and quickly became lifelong friends. Together, they've created, written, and produced award-winning television in Hollywood, using the lessons in storytelling and collaboration they honed at the University of Iowa.
Get to know these screenwriters, who have worked on shows like Hulu's Castle Rock, Disney+'s The Right Stuff, WGN America's Manhattan, and HBO's Watchmen. Watch Act One for the scoop on their time at Iowa, hear their musings about the creative process in Act Two, and watch them dissect a scene from Manhattan in Act Three.
Act One: Training Grounds
Iowa City proved to be the birthplace of a legendary set of relationships that would lead Shaw, Byock, Lafferty, and Wilhelm from the Iowa Writers' Workshop to the lights of Hollywood. Over a game of pool, the friends reminisce about their time at Iowa, which they say left them uniquely equipped to meet the needs of the TV industry.
Act Two: Hollywood Magic
Behind-the-scenes work on a TV show can be grueling, but it's the time spent elbow-deep in the mechanics of storytelling that continues to bring Shaw, Byock, Lafferty, and Wilhelm back to both writing and producing. There's an element of magic inherent in the way a story can come together when the writers room gets going, and it's those experiences of almost otherworldly collaboration that invigorate the group.
Act Three: Secrets of the Script
Shaw created Manhattan, a historical drama about scientists working on the top-secret Manhattan Project in the 1940s, and brought on Lafferty, Byock, and Wilhelm to join the writers room. The show, which ran on WGN America in 2014-15, reunited the four friends almost a decade after their graduation and led to many subsequent collaborations. Here, the writers analyze how two scenes came together from season two of Manhattan.
Behind the Scenes
Discover the Iowa connections hidden inside these popular series.
DID YOU KNOW...?
- In Manhattan, actor Jefferson White (pictured above) played Private First Class Cole Dunlavey, a Jones County native whose nickname is "Iowa."
- In episode 102 of Manhattan, Occam (played by actor Richard Schiff) mentions the Fox Head Steakhouse during an interrogation of scientist Sidney Liao (played by actor Eddie Shin). The name pays tribute to the Fox Head Tavern in Iowa City where Sam Shaw says the writers spent a lot of time as students.
MAKING OF MANHATTAN
Read Lila Byock's blog from the making of Manhattan, which includes exclusive photos from the set.
Photo Gallery
View photos of some of the most memorable moments of the screenwriters' careers.
The Writers Guild of America honored the Iowa grads in 2019 for their work on Hulu's Castle Rock, a TV series based on Stephen King's novels.
The writers' creative chemistry comes through in these outtakes from the Iowa Magazine cover photo shoot.
The close friendships that now enrich the screenwriters' careers were first formed at the Iowa Writers' Workshop.
Lila Byock's Emmy, which quickly became her all-time favorite FedEx delivery, is safely buckled in on the way to the Iowa Magazine video shoot.
Peek inside show creator Sam Shaw's journal from Manhattan.
Credits
DIRECTION: Seth Friedman
VIDEO: Lemonlight
VIDEO EDITING: John Emigh
PHOTOGRAPHY: John Orchard
WRITING: Lulu Dewey, Shelbi Thomas
WEBSITE DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT: Nick Beecher, Jimmy Losasso, Mike Miersen, Zack Schmidt
DIGITAL PROMOTION: Karla Hurley, Nicole Knoll, Katie Linder
Special Thanks
Mario Anzuoni, Reuters-stock.adobe.com
Valerie Bobo
Lila Byock
Jenn Coleman
Disney+
Debbie Dreusicke
Twila Dusterhoft
Sherri Furman
HBO
Benjamin Hill
Mark Hill, HBO
Hulu
Kelly Huston
Colin Hutton, HBO
Isabel Ivey
Danny Kitzinger
Richard Klatt
Mark Lafferty
Dana Larson
Daniel Marlow
Jeremy Meltzer
Anton Mink
Henry Nicholls, Reuters-stock.adobe.com
Beth Nicholson
Jared Salasberry
Sam Shaw
Jane Van Voorhis
WGN America
Wikipedia Commons
Vinnie Wilhelm
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