Theater Student Takes First Place in Top Screenplay Contest

By Vanessa Bronte I November 7, 2005

Michael Carnick, a UCSD undergraduate majoring in theater, was named the first place winner in the prestigious Samuel Goldwyn Writing Awards at Hollywood ceremonies last week. The honor for Carnick's screenplay "Who's Driving Doug?" came with a $25,000 prize.

Carnick wrote the screenplay as an assignment for his theater classes. The script portrays a young disabled man and his new mysterious friend who go on a wild road trip where they discover they have more in common than what is apparent on the surface. The screenplay has received recognition from other screenwriting competitions, but the Goldwyn Award is Carnick's most distinguished laurel to date.

2005 marks the 50th anniversary of the Goldwyn Awards, which recognize UC students for excellence in screen writing. Carnick's work was deemed the best by judges A. Scott Berg, a Pulitzer-prize winning author, Robert Bookman, a Creative Artists Agency (CAA) partner, and Jonathan Kellerman, a best-selling novelist and former Goldwyn Award winner.

Former winners of the Goldwyn Award include Francis Ford Coppola, Collin Higgins, who wrote "Harold and Maude," and Scott Rosenberg who wrote "Gone in Sixty Seconds." Many past winners have gone on to win both Emmy and Academy awards.