Blog

Life Lessons I Learned in the Writers' Room

26 February 2023 by Jeremy Hungry Ghosts, screenwriting, television, things I've learned, TV, Vietnamese-Australian

Tonight, after more effort than I could have ever imagined, a television series I wrote for, Hungry Ghosts, has its broadcast debut. It wasn’t that long ago that my brother, Alan Nguyen, and I were in our first television writers’ room (this wasn’t the show that debuts tonight, this was a few years ago): every night, after coming home from a day of trying to calibrate caffeine versus coherence, and seeing which ideas would stick to the whiteboard–I’d then stay up until 3 or 4 am, trying to catch up: reading library books on screenwriting, character, structure, listening to John August podcasts, watching show-runners interviewed on Youtube.

How I Nearly Torpedoed a Perfectly Good Writing Career

18 February 2023 by Jeremy screenwriting, television, things I've learned, TV

When I was in my 20s, the only thing I wanted was to be a writer. I got lucky. I connected with a mentor. Someone who would win the Pulitzer Prize. He’d actually go on to chair the Pulitzer Committee. He found me a scholarship, flew me from Australia to the US. He personally mentored me, one on one. I had to pinch myself: I was talking shop with my favourite author in the world.

You Don't Have To "Sit Your Butt Down and Write"

18 January 2023 by Jeremy screenwriting, storytelling, writing process, things I've learned

“Jeremy, I’ve got all of these ideas, but when I sit down to write them, nothing comes out” People ask me for advice when they get stuck with their writing. Maybe because: (1) I was “blocked” for more than ten years. Every weekend I’d go to writers groups. I’d plug away, stuck on an unfinished novel. (2) Now I write for a Disney+ TV show, previously NBC Universal. Producers are asking me to come in and do a rewrite on a feature film.

THE KING AND THE STORYTELLER

18 December 2022 by Jeremy screenwriting, storytelling, parables, things I've learned

Thousands of years ago there was a very wealthy king. He was neutral. Neither very good nor very bad. To be wealthy he needed his subjects to work hard for him. He was neither very good nor very bad. His problem was twofold: His best workers didn’t work very hard. They were so productive that they could finish their work in an hour or two. They could take naps.

How Do I Get My Screenplay Made? (15 word answer at end)

18 November 2022 by Jeremy screenwriting, television, things I've learned, TV

My brother and I wrote for a new Disney+ TV show. It’s being filmed right now. Alan got to go visit the set, but I did everything via Zoom because of my immune system. Six years ago, I was about to turn 40: an aspiring writer with nothing published, nothing produced. “If I were meant to be a writer, wouldn’t it have happened by now?” I turned 40.

Hungry Ghosts Nominated for a Writers' Guild Award!

28 September 2020 Hungry Ghosts, AWGIES, Writers' Guild, Awards

The Hungry Ghosts screenwriting team (Timothy Hobart, John Ridley, me and my brother (Alan Nguyen) and Michele Lee) just got nominated for an Australian Writer’s Guild award for Best Writing on a Television Miniseries! It turns out Alan and I aren’t even the only writer-brothers nominated for awards. In a different category (Children’s Television), nominations have gone to the the Bondi Hipsters for The New Legends of Monkey! You want to to know three things about the Bondi Hipsters that I just found out?

Inside the Hungry Ghosts Writers Room

27 September 2020 Hungry Ghosts, Vietnamese-Australian, screenwriting, tv, television, interview, SBS

I was interviewed on SBS’s The Playlist, chatting with Fiona Williams and Ben Nguyen (no relation), about writing Hungry Ghosts: The Playlist Interview on SBS