GARY GOLDSTEIN

2003 2nd Place Winner
2004 Honorable Mention

I WRITE
By Gary Goldstein

Years back, when I decided to become a professional screenwriter, someone older and wiser asked, "Why are you doing this?" He wasn't being critical or judgmental--he was genuinely curious. After all, everyone knows it's a tough business, one filled with head-banging rejection and endless disappointment (along with great creative and financial potential, of course). I thought for a moment and answered, "Because I love to write," though knew it would be a question that would haunt me for a long time.

After many years riding the screenwriting rollercoaster, the answer to "why I write" continues to be no less pressing. With so much more experience--and success--under my belt than when the question was first posed, I can happily still say, "I love to write." The difference is that I've discovered many other reasons why I've devoted so much of my life to the fine art of screenwriting. Here are a few: I have so many stories to tell--and now places to tell them; it's gratifying to move and entertain people (on a screen or just on the page); it's a career that offers significant creative and emotional freedom. Most importantly, though, writing is something no one can ever take away or stop me from doing. Ever. How many professions can you say that about?


GARY GOLDSTEIN has sold or optioned many original screenplays including the comedy Manhattan Transfer, which was bought by 20th Century Fox, and If You Only Knew, a romantic comedy produced by Eternity Pictures and Moonstone Entertainment. Gary's stage plays have crossed-over to film and television, with the adaptation of his wedding comedy, Three Grooms and a Bride, winning the 2003 One in Ten Screenplay Contest and his family comedy, Parental Discretion, being developed by Warner Bros. TV, with Jennifer Aniston executive producing. The screenplay version of another play, Just Men, also won Honorable Mention in One in Ten's 2004 competition. Gary recently wrote a comedy pilot for NBC entitled Heel!