Michael Tabb is a working screenwriter, decade-long current and active member of the WGA (the Writers Guild of America, West is the Hollywood screenwriters’ union), a multiple-award-winning screenwriting educator, and author of a film-festival-winning Best Screenplay. His new book, Prewriting Your Screenplay: A Step-By-Step Guide To Generating Stories, explains how he develops great, cohesive script ideas that continue to get him work, released by Focal Press, the entertainment-business division of Routledge, America’s #1 textbook publisher and a subsidiary of Taylor & Francis, the #1 textbook publisher on Earth.

Michael has written two produced screenplays for Universal Studios and is currently writing a new project for a brand new WGA-signatory production company. Recent collaborations include a new one-hour television pilot with Hivemind (The Expanse, The Witcher), fellow writer Evan Spiliotopoulos (Snake Eyes, Charlie’s Angels, The Huntsman, and Disney’s 2018 Academy-Award-nominated film, Beauty & The Beast), and Director Thor Freudenthal (Percy Jackson: Sea Of Monsters, Diary Of A Wimpy Kid, TV’s Flash and Green Arrow), taking his first steps into television. He has three new, original TV pilots, one with Endgame Entertainment.

He has developed feature film and episodic projects for and with Disney Feature Animation, The Canton Company at Warner Brothers, Imagine Entertainment, Mandeville Entertainment, Intrepid Pictures, Paradox Studios, newer WGA-signatory companies like Paragon Pictures and Mystery Road Films, Producers Lawrence Bender, Branko Lustig, Paul Schiff, Sean Daniel, writer/director Jonathan Hensleigh, Director Mike Newell, actor/producer Dustin Hoffman, and legendary comic book icon Stan Lee. He also served for several years as a reader and script analyst for Alcon Entertainment (put deal at Warner Brothers) for three years after college.

In his spare time, Michael is dedicated to giving back to fellow filmmakers, from novice to career professionals. He serves on the WGA’s Writer’s Education Committee, formally served on the New Members’ Committee, co-created the screenwriter’s union’s first ever Mentor Program, and has assisted the Writers’ Guild Foundation Community Outreach Program by guest instructing on his craft to underprivileged youth in the Los Angeles area. He serves as a mentor for fellow NYU TSOA alumni, the Missouri Film Office’s Missouri Stories Scriptwriting Fellowship. has lectured on screenwriting at The Screenwriters World Conference, StoryExpo, east and west coast writer conferences, the 2021 Next Generation of Visual Storytellers Conference, FSU, UCLA, and USC, invited by institutions, friends, instructors, and associates.

He is  a multiple-award-winning, graduate-level, online professor of screenwriting now teaching internationally at EEI Creative Arts: School of Film and Entertainment whenever he can. Michael has spoken on and moderated web-casts and industry panels for San Diego’s Comic-Con International, local Los Angeles film festivals, film schools including New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, and the Writers’ Guild of America, West.

His education includes two years as a USC undergrad, a B.F.A. from New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, and graduated from UCLA’s School of Film and Television, professional screenwriting program.  

RESUME

THE CAR
Universal Studios

WEREWOLF
Universal Studios

FINDING RESILIENCE
Mystery Road Films

VULTURES
Paradox Studios

UNCATCHABLE COWGIRL BANDITS
Intrepid Pictures

IN THE FALL
Sojourn Films Productions

THE CASANOVAS
Punch Productions

THE KNIGHTS OF THE 40 ISLANDS
Run Entertainment, Ltd.

KID BANDITS
Lawrence Bender Productions

RING AROUND THE ROSIE
Strategic Film Partners

TROY
Senator Films (Mandate) / Canton Company

7^th PORTAL
Stan Lee Media / Canton Company

MR. POPPER’S PENGUINS
Walt Disney Feature Animation

THE LIONEL
Mandeville Entertainment

PEPPER IN THE BLOOD
Hippofilms

CHRISTMAS MISFITS
Burning Tree Films, Inc.

TV DEVELOPMENT

CAPITOL
Paragon Pictures

SAWYER & FINN
Hivemind

RISE OF THE DEADMEN
Endgame Entertainment

STAGE MUSICAL

THE EMPIRE STATE
Feerst Media Group

Various Organizations, Nationwide                                                                      1999-Present

Program Director of the Nashville Film Institute

Screenwriting Instructor / Lecturer 

• Program Advisor and Professor of screenwriting for cinema and episodic content at the international School of Film and Entertainment at EEI Creative Arts in conjunction with MBC, the largest media provider of television content throughout the Middle East. His students stem from throughout North America, Europe, Asia, Egypt, and the Middle East. Diversity is gorgeous.
• Course Director/Professor, Full-Time Online Faculty for the Creative Writing Master of Fine Arts program. Winner of Full Sail University’s the highest honors by administrators and peer recognition voted on by fellow educators, for his unwavering commitment to excellence in 2014’s Pilot Award, 2016’s Supporting the Student, and 2017’s Award of Instructional Excellence.
• Guest lectured about screenwriting upon request of instructors in film schools for classes at, UCLA, USC & FSU about the business and techniques of being a career WGAw professional screenwriter, as well as local Los Angeles film festivals, StoryExpo, and the Next Generation of Visual Storytellers Conference 2021.
• Lectured and served on panels for the 2015 & 2017 Florida Writers Conference. His lectures included the tricks of Going From Zero To Story without writer’s block, Pitching Hollywood, and a class full of tales from the trenches about The Hollywood Writer’s Life. The panels included Story to Screen and The Writer’s Process. He will also be speaking and serving on panels at their 2021 conference.
• Taught at San Diego’s Writers Conference on the subjects of: adapting other intellectual properties into feature film screenplays, the business side of show business, how to pitch in Hollywood, and creating a screenplay from nothing: conception, outline & character.
• Mentor for the Missouri Film Office’s 2019 & 2021 Missouri Stories Scriptwriting Fellowship.
• Taught screenplay structure for various screenwriting websites, such as The Writer’s Building and Million Dollar Screenwriting.
• Guest lectured at Chicago’s Columbia University’s summer in Los Angeles program about the “dos and don’ts” in creating a web series in transmedia and the craft of adaptation of other mediums (novels, toys, games, comic books, video games, etc.) into feature film screenplays.
• Donated time to assistant teach underprivileged, inner-city youths of the Los Angeles area, screenwriting as a part of the Writers’ Guild Foundation Community Outreach Program.
• Other examples include:
  https://floridawriters.net/conferences/florida-writers-conference/faculty/michael-tabb/ and listed alphabetically at
  http://www.screenwritersworld.com/ehome/screenwritersworldconference.com/121424/

Panelist

• Participated in numerous panels at world famous entertainment themed venues, such as San Diego Comic Con, Comikaze Convention, Screenwriters World Conference, and the Writers’ Guild of America, about various screenwriting related topics, including: breaking into the industry, writing genre, getting paid work as a screenwriter internationally, plot verses character, and The Future of Television to name a few.
• Moderated numerous panels for NYU Tisch alumni and the WGA about: transmedia (selling your idea across multiple platforms), getting your script from spec sale to greenlight at major studios, one-on-one interviews with screenwriters for the WGA Film Society, and pitching feature films to the current studio marketplace.
• Winner “Best Screenplay” and Panelist, 2011 New Mexico International Film Festival screenplay competition.

WGA Service

• Spoke on news stations, radio broadcasts, and online on behalf of the WGA during the writers’ labor strike of 2007/8 and has been a WGA Captain since that time.
• Serves on the WGAw’s Writers’ Education and New Members Committees alongside TV showrunners and renowned screenwriters including David Shore and Billy Ray.
• Co-founded and supervised the new mentor program for New Members Committee at the WGA, personally recruiting top industry mentors, including the enormously talented and successful: Aaron Sorkin, David S. Goyer, Ted Elliott, Roberto Orci, Craig Mazin, Nancy Meyers, Marc Guggenheim, Bill Prady, Jeff Melvoin, Damon Lindelof, Alex Litvak, Katherine Fugate, Matthew Nix, John August and Oscar Winner Eric Roth to name a few. 

PUBLISHED WORK

Prewriting Your Screenplay: A Step-by-Step Guide to Generating Stories 

Author

• Prewriting cements all the bricks of a story’s foundations together and forms a single, organic story-growing technique, starting with a blank slate. Prewriting shows writers how to design each element so that they perfectly interlock together like pieces of a puzzle, creating a stronger story foundation that does not leave gaps and holes for readers to find. This construction process is performed one piece at a time, one character at a time, building and incorporating each element into the whole. This book is an ideal tool for any creative dealing with writer’s block.
• Published by Routledge Publishing, America’s #1 textbook publisher. Focal Press, the film and television subdivision of Routledge supervised. Routledge is now owned by Taylor and Francis, an academic textbook publishing company out of the UK.
• Please read the Editorial Reviews on Amazon for what top Hollywood writers and educators say about this book.
• To Purchase the book:  CLICK_HERE

Script Magazine, Los Angeles, CA   

Published Columnist

• Recently offered the ongoing position writing articles about the entertainment writing in Hollywood from the professional writer’s point-of-view. The focus will eventually cover a wide range of topics, including screenwriting craft and business strategies. The first article of a monthly column launched late 2014. Script Magazine is one of the foremost publications about scriptwriting in America.
• There have been talks and contractual negotiations for F+W Media (owner of Script Magazine) to publish a book by Michael on the craft of scriptwriting.
• LINKS:  CLICK_HERE and CLICK_HERE

Instructor’s Corner, Winter Park, FL   

Article/Blog Writer

• Writes articles and blogs about the entertainment writing practices and business strategies for Hollywood writers with advice on how to handle the industry modern challenges.

Shooting People, London, England 

Article Writer

• Wrote a three article column about the WGA Writers’ union strike for an online publication explaining the details/reasons for the work stoppage that cost hundreds of Hollywood employees their livelihoods and jobs.

Ingénue Magazine, Beverly Hills, CA   

Columnist / Contributing Writer

• Wrote a reoccurring column about the business and art of the screenwriting trade entitled Script Notes, consisting of perspective and topic stories, including My first Joband Selling the Spec.
• Consulted with editors regarding content and was selected to rewrite other writers' articles for publication.

UCLA - University of California, Los Angeles
Graduate Professional Program in Screenwriting (School of Theatre, Film & Television)

NYU - New York University
Bachelor of Fine Arts - 1995 (Tisch School of the Arts)

USC - University of Southern California
Arts & Sciences (Two Years)

Representation

Authentic Talent + Literary Management - BOB SOBHANI

The Cartel - RYAN L. SAUL (hailing from APA / Paradigm Agencies)