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The 4th annual Baltimore Screenwriters Competition

Final Deadline: Friday, January 9, 2009

The Baltimore Film Office at the Baltimore Office of Promotion & The Arts announces judges for the fourth annual Baltimore Screenwriters Competition. This year’s judges include film and television veterans Grant Curtis, Nina Noble, and Richard Walter. The competition, in conjunction with Morgan State University’s Film and Television Writing Program and Johns Hopkins University’s Film and Media Studies Program, is seeking aspiring film writers.  The Baltimore Screenwriters Competition is designed to create awareness of screenplay as a literary art form and to encourage new screenwriters into the entertainment industry. The final deadline is Friday, January 9, 2009 with a $50 application fee.  The Baltimore Screenwriting Competition is project of Mayor Sheila Dixon and the Baltimore Office of Promotion & The Arts’ Baltimore Film Office and sponsored by Municipal Employees Credit Union of Baltimore (MECU), Maryland Film Festival, Baltimore Theatre Alliance, Baltimore Area Convention and Visitors Association and the Creative Alliance at the Patterson.

Grant Curtis, producer, writer and actor is best known for his work in the Spider-Man sequels.  He assisted in producing Spider-Man 3 and was the co-producer of Spider-Man and Spider-Man 2.  Curtis will add to his impressive résumé the highly anticipated 2011 release of Spider-Man 4, which he will also produce.

Nina Noble, executive producer of “The Wire,” was virtually raised on film sets. As a freelance assistant director on feature films, Noble worked with prominent directors such as Alan Parker, Paul Mazursky and Ron Shelton. Later, her career shifted to producing and production managing television pilots and made-for-TV movies. While producing and managing television projects for the Levinson/Fontana Company, she met David Simon and Bob Colesberry, with whom she would later collaborate to develop and produce the HBO series, “The Wire.”

Richard Walter is head of UCLA’s Department of Film and Television and author of “Screenwriting: The Art, Craft and Business of Film and Television Writing.” A member of the Screen Writers Guild of America for more than 20 years, he has written numerous feature assignments for the major studios and has sold material to the “big three” television networks.

Interested writers can submit applications and original feature length screenplays that must be set in or can be filmed in Baltimore.  Materials can be mailed or delivered to the Baltimore Screenwriters Competition, Baltimore Office of Promotion & The Arts, 7 East Redwood Street, Suite 500, Baltimore, Maryland 21202. All eligible scripts will receive coverage by local screenwriters, and final scripts will be judged by film industry professionals.  Winning prizes include cash and all access passes to the Maryland Film Festival.

To download the Baltimore Screenwriters Competition application, visit www.baltimorefilm.com or call 410-752-8632.

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