Screenwriting Department

Department overview by Philippe Lasry and Yves Thomas, Heads of the Screenwriting Department.

"Training in screenwriting at La Fémis explores every genre and every narrative style, steered by the particular sensibility of each student.

Teaching is based around writing four full-length screenplays. For each one, the student has to respond to a commission under the direction of a ’workshop leader’ who is there to encourage the student to explore and further their imagination and suggest the dramatic composition tools they might need to create their story.

To guide the writing projects, a refresher of classic dramatic composition is offered to help each student find his or her own style.
Several practical workshops are organised around the texts with the participation of actors to allow the students to find the structure and tone of their story and make sure the characters can exist off the page.

We also introduce students to co-screenwriting with the directing students and set them the task of producing short films as a team.

At the end of the four-year programme, screenwriting students should be able to initiate a story of any length, structure it, master subtext and analyse it to spot any essential rewrites before submitting the final version."