Screenwriter Ken Rance, co-writer of the 2009 film “New in Town,” starring Renee Zellweger and Harry Connick, Jr., will be the celebrity judge who will pick the grand prize winner of the Wisconsin Screenwriters Forum script contest.
Rance will announce his choice from among three finalists, to be announced Jan. 4. The top script will receive $1,000 cash and other prizes.
Contest judges have whittled submissions from around the country to five semi-finalists. They are participating in mock industry meetings mirroring L.A. industry meetings led by WSF president Ken Miyamoto, who has a writing deal with Lionsgate.
The purpose of the meetings is to help writers facilitating getting their scripts into the hands of entertainment industry contacts.
Minneapolis native Rance can relate to the arduous journey of a screenwriter. It took him 16 years until his story about a Miami businesswoman who adjusts to her new life in a tiny Minnesota town made it to the big screen.
Rance went to L.A. in 1992 and landed production assistant work on the Fox Series “Roc,” and later on features and shorts. He coordinated the first annual CBS/WGA-W Television Writers Workshop for minority writers.
The five semi-finalists are:
Fran Kaplan and Aaron Greer, “Fruit of the Tree,” a drama about James Cameron, the only known survivor of t a lynching; Tom Dunn and Phil Heckman, “Just Deserts,” a comedy about brothers who set out to help settle a relative’s estate; Rebecca Williams Spindler, “Lifeguard,” a comedy about a unqualified lifeguard who goes through a series of training to keep his job;
JoAnn Mills, “Papa’s Hand,” a mystery/drama about a white drifter who poses as an African American to legally marry a mixed race woman in segregated 1920s Virginia; Baron Reed, “Sweet William,” a sports drama.
WSF’s next meeting will be Dec. 2, 7-9 p.m., at UW Lowell Center, 610 Langdon St., Madison. Annual membership is $50. Membership is open to screenwriters from anywhere in the U.S.
See www.wiscreenwritersfroum.org.
