Playwright & Screenwriter Hal Ackerman to Talk Revised Edition of 'WRITE SCREENPLAYS THAT SELL...' at the Drama Book Shop

Over the last three decades, popular UCLA screenwriting professor, co-head of the university's acclaimed screenwriting program and author, Hal Ackerman has nurtured, mentored and collaborated with hundreds of aspiring screenwriting students, many of whom have gone on to successful, award-winning careers in the industry.

Having recently retired from his regular classroom assignments, Ackerman has turned his focus to impacting a wider, global audience of both aspiring and already-working writers with the revised and updated just-published 15th Anniversary Edition of his heralded book Write Screenplays That Sell - the Ackerman Way, from Tallfellow Press.

Ackerman will hold a discussion and signing event in New York City on Thursday evening, October 12th, at 6:00PM, at The Drama Book Shop (250 West 40th Street).

This updated edition includes historical and reference information on Academy Award-winning writers from 1927 through the most recent awardees, as well as some of the most popular recent film and television hits, including La La Land, Moonlight, Arrival, Better Call Saul, Big Little Lies and The Mindy Kaling Project.

Ackerman's long list of student screenwriter successes also includes Sacha Gervasi (The Terminal, directed by Steven Spielberg, starring Tom Hanks), Scott Rosenberg (the features High Fidelity, Con Air, Gone in Sixty Seconds and the television series Zoo, Happy Town, Life on Mars and October Road), Allison Anders (Gas Food Lodging, starring Brooke Adams and James Brolin and Grace of My Heart, executive produced by Martin Scorsese), Eric Wald (View From the Top, starring Gwyneth Paltrow, Christina Applegate and Mark Ruffalo), John Sweet (The Affair of the Necklace, starring Hilary Swank and Christopher Walken), Phillip Railsback (The Stars Fell on Henrietta, starring Robert Duval, Aidan Quinn and Frances Fisher), Pamela Grey (A Walk on the Moon, starring Diane Lane, Anna Paquin and Liev Shreiber) and Felicia D. Henderson (executive producer and writer of the television series Soul Food).

Ackerman himself is also an accomplished screenwriter, playwright, long-form television writer and novelist. His credits include the theatrical feature screenplays Second Wind (starring James Naughton and Lindsay Wagner) and Holmeyer's Bridge, as well as the feature adaptions of I'll Get There, It Better Be Worth the Trip, Slave Stealer, Star Witness and Homer's Odyssey (directed by John Lithgow).

He is author of the produced plays It Ain't Nuthin Nice and the award winning Testosterone: How Prostate Cancer Made a Man of Me. Ackerman's novels include the award-winning Stein, Stoned and The Boy Who Had a Peach Tree Growing Out of His Head.

Ackerman's Write Screenplays That Sell ... has become required reading in numerous college and university screenwriting programs across the country.