5AM StoryTalk Reflections: What I've Learned as an Artist...So Far

A collection of essays about my life as a professional screenwriter and novelist so you can learn from my triumphs, many traumas, and many, many mistakes

Me, training through the English countryside about a decade ago before my kids turned my hair gray

5AM StoryTalk has been debuting some new features this August. Today, I’m introducing the last of them - 5AM StoryTalk Reflections, which will appear in your inbox on the fourth Friday morning (EST/PST) of every month. In this series — which admittedly sounds like a super-sad line of Hallmark cards for people experiencing life crises — I’m going to shine a spotlight on a single theme that this Substack has explored during its existence. Meaning, I’m going to look back and collect everything I’ve written about it. I’ll sometimes add supplementary material from others and/or reading suggestions that might further expand upon the subject for you.

This month’s Reflections theme is a rather narcissistic one on its surface, as it’s about me: my story as an artist…so far. I’ve chosen this theme because it provides an opportunity for my newest readers to better understand who I am and how I acquired any of the experience, philosophy, wisdom, whatever you want to call it that I’m sharing here regarding the arts. But more importantly, I believe this biography (of sorts) offers a blow-by-blow accounting of breaking into Hollywood, what I learned along the way through a lot of trials and tribulations, the worst shit that happened to me, and how I came out the other side of it a better artist and, I think, human being.

As always, I want to remind you that nothing I provide here is intended to be instruction. I don’t really believe in it, even though sometimes my language bends that direction out of necessity. Instead, I’m sharing experiences in case you glean anything valuable from them — hopefully some of what I lacked when I started in the business — and, in turn, they help prepare you for what’s coming your direction on your own creative journeys.

Please feel free to pop into the comments section here or on the individual articles/essays shared here with ideas, thoughts, or questions of your own. As long as my other obligations permit, I will try to reply as thoughtfully as possible.

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ADDITIONAL READING/LISTENING

The Screenwriting Life: Why Tone and Genre ≠ Plot (ft. Cole Haddon)

I’m a guest on my dear friend Meg LeFauve’s excellent screenwriting podcast, which she co-hosts with the wonderful Lorien McKenna. This has proven to be a very popular episode around the globe, as professional writers and producers in different markets keep bringing it up to me.

The Writing Community: An interview with author, screenwriter and journalist, Cole Haddon

I’m a guest on The Writing Community chat show. Here, you get to see me be interviewed completely unaware of how out of control my hair had become due to the general deficit of good hairstylists in Australia’s Blue Mountains (I’ve since found a very good one, but if he decides to move, I’m fucked).

Inspired Minds: Cole Haddon

I’m a guest on the Inspired Minds podcast.

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