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Scriptapalooza Interviews 3rd place winner Keli Rowley

Scriptapalooza interviews writer Keli Rowley, whose script Danny LongLegs finished 3rd in the 2006 Scriptapalooza competition.

Scriptapalooza: How did you come up with your story idea?

When I lived in my apartment in Redondo Beach, I had a pretty bad ant problem. You couldn't leave any dishes in the sink or you'd have a line of ants the next morning. But, when I went to clean the ants off the plate, a big spider would always appear on the wall like he was trying to distract me from the ants so they could collect more food. That led me to the idea of each house having a whole world of bugs, and then the idea grew from there.

Scriptapalooza: How long did it take you to write it?

It's kind of hard to say. It started out as a young-adult novel. Then, I decided it would work better as an animated feature, so I wrote a first draft of it for Writer's Boot Camp when I first moved to L.A. I got a good response from it, but for some reason, turned to other projects for awhile. But, I really liked the idea and it was always in the back of my mind to finish it. Finally, after dabbling in a couple of other ideas, I decided to go back to it, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Scriptapalooza: Is this your first script that you have written?

No. I dabbled in a few different genres trying to decide which one I liked and thought I could write best. When I decided to concentrate on animation, I wrote three TV animation specs for SpongeBob SquarePants, The Fairly Oddparents and Kim Possible. That gave me a good foundation for story, which helped me in writing the feature.

Scriptapalooza: Have you entered other screenwriting competitions?

Yes.

Scriptapalooza: Have you been successful?

This script also placed in the Top 10 of the Writers on the Storm screenwriting contest and is currently being read for a couple of others. I also placed second in the Creative Screenwriting Open Writing Tournament at the Screenwriting Expo in 2004 and got to have one of my scenes performed by SAG actors at the closing ceremonies.

Scriptapalooza: Why did you enter Scriptapalooza?

When I first moved to L.A. as a naïve, starry-eyed writer, the first job I got was reading scripts at a screenwriting agency, and the first contest I got to judge was Scriptapalooza. It seemed like a really big and important contest and I was thrilled to see what people were writing. That experience stuck with me, so once I had a completed screenplay of my own, I decided I had to submit it to the contest I had once read.

Scriptapalooza: Advice to other screenwriters? The two P's - Persistence and Patience. When I first started pursuing screenwriting as a career, I had no idea of the complexities of writing a really good script, or how long it takes to perfect the craft. There was a time when I wanted to quit, but I pushed through that and decided instead to do whatever it took to get better. That's how I think about writing every day now. What can I do to improve?

Scriptapalooza: How did you feel when you saw your name as one of the winners?

I was thrilled to do so well, especially in a big, established competition like this one with so many entries. I actually looked at the Top 10 first hoping just to have made it that far, and when I saw my name in third place, I had to read it twice just to make sure I wasn't seeing things!

Updated: 09/01/2006

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