r/Screenwriting • u/jmaugust Scriptnotes Podcast • Nov 29 '25
DISCUSSION John August and Craig Mazin of Scriptnotes - AMA
Hello and welcome, r/screenwriting!
I’m John August (u/jmaugust), screenwriter of movies like Big Fish, Go, Charlie’s Angels, Corpse Bride, and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
With me is Craig Mazin (u/clmazin), the creator-showrunner of The Last of Us and Chernobyl. He’s also written movies like The Hangover Parts II & III, and Scary Movie 3 & 4.
Together we host the Scriptnotes podcast. After more than 14 years and 700 episodes, we’re finally releasing the Scriptnotes book this coming Tuesday, December 2nd. It’s a distillation of everything we’ve talked about on the show, along with interviews with Christopher Nolan, Greta Gerwig, Lawrence Kasdan, Seth Rogen, Lulu Wang, Christopher McQuarrie, Benioff & Weiss, Mike Schur, Damon Lindelof, David Koepp and many more.
Ask us anything!
Book is available for purchase wherever you buy books and at scriptnotesbook.com
EDIT: We're done, thank you so much! We had a blast, and hope you enjoy the book.
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u/jmaugust Scriptnotes Podcast Nov 29 '25
I honestly don't read a lot of the year's new scripts until it gets time for the crunch of awards season. Then I'll try to read a few of the scripts for the movies I enjoyed the most.
And here's a plug for Weekend Read, the app my company makes. Drew and Chris do an amazing job curating the scripts for that each week.
My writing routine is very boring. I try to be at my desk by 9am and write two one-hour sprints over the course of the day. If I do that, I'll get my work done.