Today we’d like to introduce you to Drew Yanno.
So, before we jump into specific questions about the business, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
I was born and raised in a small town in upstate New York. Like most boys my age back then, I was obsessed with sports and played them constantly. But I also developed a love of reading. In particular, I found myself fascinated by and somewhat in awe of anyone who could write a novel. It simply amazed me that someone could create an entire story “out of thin air” and entertain a reader. I read all the popular classics back then, and still consider To Kill a Mockingbird the finest novel I ever read (and the only one that when I finished it, I turned back to page one and read it again).
As much as I was intrigued by the idea of writing books myself, I didn’t really think of it as a career possibility. Like a lot of people, I followed the usual path and went off to college after high school, in my case to Syracuse University where I earned both my undergraduate and law degrees.
After graduating from law school there, I served a clerkship in Albany, New York for two years before joining a large law firm in Boston where I worked before founding my own firm. I also taught law in the Carroll School of Management at Boston College for eleven years while I was practicing.
During those years of practice, I decided to try my hand at writing a novel and did so. Soon after, I got an agent in New York who thought it was pretty great and sent it off to all the big publishers back then. To no avail. It was rejected by all of them. That’s when I learned the first lesson of writing which was all about rejection. Something every writer has to encounter at some point in his or her career.
A few years later, I was approached by a friend (actually the real estate broker who found the lease space for my law firm) who, after reading that unpublished novel, asked me if I ever considered writing a screenplay. And so I began writing screenplays with this friend. It seemed like an interesting diversion from writing a novel and a fun thing to do while I was practicing. It turned out to be a little more than that as, two years later, our screenplay NO SAFE HAVEN was purchased by Universal Studios after an eight hour bidding war. It was quite an exhilarating experience to get welcomed suddenly into the film world out in Hollywood. I like to joke that we were the hottest screenwriters in Hollywood for about three months.
Unfortunately, despite a lot of interest and a big star being attached to the film, the movie was never made. That wasn’t (and still isn’t) a rare occurrence in Hollywood. Fewer than five percent of the scripts they buy actually get made. Getting one produced and into the theaters is about as likely an occurrence as getting struck by lightning and the holy grail for every screenwriter.
After that disappointment, my writing partner went off to resume his real estate career, and I went on to write a number of screenplays, both on spec and for hire.
In 2000 I left the legal world and founded the screenwriting program in the Film Department at Boston College, literally switching from teaching law one semester to teaching screenwriting the next, which folks seem to find pretty interesting. While there at BC, I created four courses, which included not only writing a screenplay from start to finish, but also a survey course in adaptation where students learned the process of adapting source material – short stories, plays and books – into film. Overall, I taught in the Film Department for eleven years.
While doing so, in 2006, my book THE THIRD ACT: WRITING A GREAT ENDING TO YOUR SCREENPLAY was published. It remains the only screenwriting book dedicated to writing the ending of a film and, I’m told, has helped countless aspiring screenwriters, producers and novelists. Fortunately for me, the book caught the attention of Will Smith, with whom I worked as a script consultant on a number of projects in connection with his production company Overbrook Entertainment.
During my time at Boston College, I was also asked to serve as a moderator at the Austin Film Festival screenwriting conference for several years. Austin is one of, if not the most prestigious and well-regarded screenwriting conferences in the world, attracting producers, directors, actors and writers every year to share their knowledge and experience with aspiring screenwriters. In addition to all of that, I also served for a number of years as a contributing columnist to SCRIPT MAGAZINE.
In the latter part of my time teaching at BC, I turned back to my first love – novels – and started writing a historical thriller loosely inspired by the drowning of an 8 year old boy back in my upstate New York hometown. I did so because I didn’t envision it as a film. In my mind, that story had to be told as a novel. That book – IN THE MATTER OF MICHAEL VOGEL was published in 2013 and was a best-selling historical thriller for a time. Kirkus Reviews called it “…page turning… unique… (a)n ambitious, cleverly plotted thriller.”
I followed that up with a second thriller THE SMART ONE, which was published in October of 2016. This novel received a starred review in Publishers Weekly which called it an “outstanding Hitchcockian thriller.” All of which was humbling and rewarding and more than I could have ever thought possible when I was that boy back in upstate New York reading in my bed before going to sleep every night.
These days I’m still working as an attorney, this time around as the vice president and general counsel of a management consulting firm in Wellesley, Massachusetts. I still love to watch movies and read novels, particularly mysteries and thrillers, and have recently finished the first draft of a third thriller.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Rejection is always a struggle and something every writer has to deal with on some level throughout their career. Seeing your book in the book store or on Amazon doesn’t tell the whole story. Somewhere along the line, that writer has been rejected, and usually a fair number of times.
The ups and downs of making money as a writer is another difficulty, as is balancing two different careers, which I have had to do at various points in my professional life.
Drew Yanno – what should we know? What do you guys do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
As a novelist, I write exclusively in the mystery/thriller genre. I’m most proud of the reviews I’ve received, both from the review services, as well as from readers.
As a screenwriter, despite never having had a movie made from my work, I was fortunate to get to work with the biggest star in Hollywood at the time, who just happens to be one of the hardest working people I’ve ever met, along with one of the nicest.
What moment in your career do you look back most fondly on?
Seeing my first novel in print.
Contact Info:
- Email: drew@drewyanno.com
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pg/InTheMatterOfMichaelVogel/; https://www.facebook.com/TheSmartOnebyDrewYanno/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/drewyanno
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