Western Colorado University Graduate Program in Creative Writing Announces New Screenwriting Director

Western Colorado University’s Graduate Program in Creative Writing (GPCW) is excited to announce the hiring of veteran screenwriter James Napoli as the program’s new Screenwriting Director.

Napoli is a filmmaker, performer, and screenwriting educator who earned his MFA in Film from the London Film School and taught screenwriting at National University in Los Angeles and Columbia College Hollywood.

In his role as a professional story analyst for Los Angeles production companies, Napoli has read and evaluated nearly a thousand works for the screen. His screenplay Nick & Vin was a top ten percent finisher in the Academy Nicholl Fellowships, and he is currently developing an original one-hour television pilot project, Nightside.

He has optioned three original screenplays and has written and directed the festival award-winning dramatic short films The Priests and Nobody Gets Hurt. He co-created and co-hosted the cinema-themed podcast Movies Not Movies, and, as Head Writer for the Sirius/XM audio drama program New Frequency, he created over fifty original plays in every genre.

Napoli’s scholarly work includes contributions to The Handbook of Script Development (Palgrave Macmillan), Perform: Succeeding as a Creative Professional (Focal Press), and Routledge Research in Higher Education’s Globally Networked Teaching in the Humanities: Theories and Practices. For many years, he also contributed articles on screenplay craft to Creative Screenwriting Magazine.

“I am delighted to take on this new role as part of a remarkable program that nurtures artistry and develops the unique, individual voices writers will need to stand out in their professions,” Napoli said. “I cannot imagine a community of students and colleagues that could be more wonderfully aligned with my approach to screenwriting, teaching, learning and life.”

The GPCW is thrilled to welcome Napoli into the program and enthusiastic about how his leadership will help grow the Screenwriting concentration. CMarie Fuhrman, Associate Director of the GPCW and Chair of the Screenwriting Director Search Committee, said, “James’s eagerness, congeniality, approachability, and industry and craft knowledge, coupled with his desire to find a home for his career and passion, make us confident that he will build the Screenwriting program to nationwide visibility and be a valuable and wonderful teacher and colleague.”

For more information about Western’s graduate-level screenwriting program, contact GPCW Program Support Coordinator Sarah Goettsch at gpcw@western.edu.

 

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Author Credit: Seth Mensing

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