Former Altona resident Monica Foley has received acclaim for her work in Hollywood.
The former Mount St Joseph Girls’ College student won the Best Television Script award in the Los Angeles Film Awards for her hour-long drama pilot ‘Bearcats’.
Mrs Foley and her husband Mark Harris was also named as finalists in the Storyline Screenwriting Competition for their feature script for a thriller film named ‘Affliction’.
In 2022, Monica helped develop and has been an associate producer on a film currently in development at Disney.
Mrs Foley said she was inspired to become a screenwriter after her initial trip to Los Angeles.
“After I completed my bachelors degree at Swinburne University, I was eligible (like anyone who has recently completed a bachelors degree) to receive a “working holiday” visa for one year in the USA,” she said.
“I took the opportunity, for some life experience, and Los Angeles seemed like the most familiar environment to what I knew in Australia.
“I was also attracted by the prospect of working in a creative field, like Hollywood.
Mrs Foley said it was “very challenging field” to get into because there is a significant amount of competition.
“Upon returning to Australia, I enrolled in a Creative Writing Masters program at Swinburne University and had my sights set on being a screenwriter,” she said.
Mrs Foley said the key to writing a good script was being succinct.
“You don’t need to write a 500 page novel necessarily to tell a wonderful story,” she said.
“It also doesn’t take an overly long time to write a script, which allows you to develop and write many projects.”
Mrs Foley said that the key to refining one’s skills is practice.
“Your first ever screenplay may be a great idea, but it will most likely not be very well-written, and that’s totally normal,” she said.
“You need to keep writing to sharpen your tools.”
