About Us - ScreenWriting Science

About the Company

ScreenWriting Science is based on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. The domain (www.screenwritingscience) and company (ScreenWriting Science) is solely owned and operated by Melvyn P. Heyes, Ph.D. The domain name was registered on September 8th, 2008. The company registered at the New York State Department of Taxation and Finance on October 6th, 2008. www.screenwritingscience.com became active on November 18th, 2008. The website uses an X-cart format. The hosting server is located in Athens, Ohio.

The company focuses on presenting my scientific analysis of successful movies and screenplays in the form of individual Screenplay Summaries. The goal of the Summaries is to understand and present the Sequence-Scene structure and event road maps of successful movies in a standardized template format to guide screenwriters in their own writing and to facilitate scholarly analysis. ScreenWriting Science utilizes a highly secure and encrypted PayPal payment system to process all payments for the Screenplay Summaries. In addition, DVDs, books, posters and published screenplays can be purchased through our affiliation with Amazon.com . Please write questions, and comments to ScreenWriting Science through this website or mail@screenwritingscience.com. Your input is always welcome.

About me
For the past four years I have been applying established scientific principles and statistical techniques to understanding the art of screenwriting. I am a British-American neuroscience researcher with 25-years of laboratory and research program management experience. Much of my work focused on the identification of structure, links, organization and function within biological and psychological systems. My interest in human behavior and particularly personality disorders has been particularly useful in understanding character motivation and the emotional experiences of audiences.

After obtaining a B.Sc. in physiology from the University of Newcastle Upon Tyne in England, an M.A. degree in physiology from Indiana University in Bloomington, a Ph.D. in Medical Sciences from McMaster University in Hamilton Ontario, Canada, with pre- and post-doctoral fellowships from the Huntington Society of Canada, I worked at the National Institute of Mental Health in Bethesda, MD from 1985-2001 as a laboratory research scientist. My work focused on immune-mediated neurological and psychiatric disorders, and the identification of therapeutic targets. I transferred into the biotechnology industry for 5-years. There I led teams that utilized molecular approaches to identify therapeutic targets, particularly for psychiatric conditions, neurogenetic disorders and pediatric neurodevelopmental disorders . I have published 124 peer-reviewed scientific papers viewable through PubMed. From 2005-2008, I worked as an independent consultant advising private industry, not-for-profit patient advocacy organizations (including the Spinal Muscular Atrophy Foundation) and venture capitalist companies. This work included programs to develop medicines to treat patients with spinal muscular atrophy, spinal cord and head injury, multiple sclerosis, schizophrenia, addiction, depression, anxiety and autism. I also worked on a project to identify new mechanisms of action for a new class of anti-cancer drugs. In 2009, I also worked with a clinical psychotherapy service to obtain funding for a program to treat students in New York City, particularly young writers, actors and other artists.

I currently work at the Atlantic Neuroscience Institute analyzing clinical neurology outcome data patients with stroke, developing a program in narrative medicine for patients with Parkinson's disease and assessment of education strategies in the prevention of post operative delirium. I have also provided psychotherapy treatments to adult clients with emotional disturbances, personality disorders, anxiety, depression, work- and family-related stress, and to victims of abuse and post-traumatic stress disorder. In May 2010, I graduated with a Master of Science in Social Work from the clinical practice program at Columbia University School of Social Work.

My interest in creative screenwriting and story-telling is equally long! My formal education includes courses in screenwriting and creative writing at New School University and New York University in Manhattan. It made an interesting challenge to apply my scientific skills to a process based more in spontaneous creativity. The fact that there are so many books on 'How to Write a Screenplay' and script structure tells us that many professional screenwriters and movie-makers believe that screenwriting is, indeed, understandable by a scientific method. While the overwhelming majority of books, websites, blogs, courses and workshops are presented by screenwriters and movie-makers, my approach is of a trained and experienced research scientist. My background is not a claim of superiority over teaching by members of the movie industry, simply an offer of a novel perspective on a multi-faceted domain.

I look forward to establishing a discussion board, feature articles and a newsletter over the next few months on my site. I also welcome authors who wish to contribute articles. I would be happy to review your screenplay for structure and scientific content. I would also appreciate your comments!

Enjoy my scientific Screenplay Summaries and welcome to ScreenWriting Science!