Photo by Ash Daniel
Ramona Taylor wrote her first screenplay as a form of therapy after she went through a painful divorce. “But soon it was my relaxation,” says the Virginia assistant attorney general, who serves as legal counsel for Virginia State University.
Taylor, a winner of the 2018 Virginia Screenwriting Competition, is a self-admitted science fiction nerd who began her writing career exploring futuristic themes — early work that, in her mind, was not ready for prime time. “But I was learning,” she says, and gaining confidence (she received some validation after being named a finalist in the 2008 Virginia Screenwriting Competition). “That’s something that I had to get over before I entered competitions. Do not be ashamed of your writing. If it’s good enough to be put down on paper, it’s good enough for someone to read. You have to believe that.”
Balancing a legal career with her filmmaking pursuits, the 55-year-old scribe now has her own production company, Shockoe Films, that has released several award-winning short movies she has penned and directed — such as “Mistaken Identity,” about a mugging gone hilariously wrong, and “Third Eye,” which follows a serial killer targeting clairvoyants — and Taylor has also worked as a scriptwriter on low-budget feature films such as 2005’s “Camp D.O.A.,” a dystopian horror flick shot in Alabama.
Taylor’s winning script in this year’s screenwriting competition, “Blind Justice,” was a bit of a departure — it’s set in the 1920s and based on the true-life story of sightless African-American lawyer George Washington Fields. “I did a lot of research on him, and on the time period, before I even started writing,” Taylor says.
Her advice to budding scenarists? “Commit to knowing the tools of the craft. I have Final Draft software, and there’s all kinds of screenwriting software available. Don’t just use Microsoft Word and think you are formatting it the right way. That can kill you, and can be the difference between looking like an amateur and looking like a pro.”
She also discovered a couple of invaluable texts that helped to guide her writing, such as the well-circulated film industry guides “The Hero’s Journey” and “Aristotle’s Poetics for Screenwriters.”
“The other thing you should get is a group of friends — writers and nonwriters — that you can bounce your ideas off of. You have to have honest friends who will tell you when something works or doesn’t work.”
A 1985 graduate of Duke University, she started her legal career after her divorce, too, and graduated from the University of Richmond’s T.C. Williams School of Law in 2000. Taylor recently completed “Days of Togetherness,” a short film about an unusual wedding, and she’s working on a feature-length screenplay about a little-known chapter in the life of boxing great Muhammad Ali. “The most important advice I can give to prospective writers is to know why you’re doing it,” she instructs. “Because if it’s not fun for you, maybe you shouldn’t be writing.”
What’s the best decision you made?
“I took [an online] master class by [TV and movie writer] Aaron Sorkin. I wish I’d taken it when I first started. Many of the things he taught were things that I learned the hard way through trial and error.”
What’s something you’d do differently?
“The biggest mistake was sending a teleplay that was not quite unique enough for the networks.”
