Kirsten Smith
Encyclopedia
Kirsten "Kiwi" Smith is an American
screenwriter
and novelist. She wrote most of the screenplays with her screenwriter partner Karen McCullah Lutz
. Most of the scripts seems to follow the girl Power
movement of the late 1990s and early 2000s.
She recently directed a short film, The Spleenectomy, which starred Anna Faris
and was financed and produced by Glamour magazine
.
Her first film as a non-writing producer, Whip It!, stars Ellen Page
and is directed by Drew Barrymore
, and she also has American Virgin, starring Jenna Dewan
and Rob Schneider
, in post-production.
A native of Port Ludlow, Washington, she moved to Los Angeles in 1988 to attend Occidental College
. There, she studied English and Film, and also got an internship at CineTel Films, an independent film company. Initially planning on pursuing poetry and academia as a career, she began working for CineTel reading scripts and writing coverage for them. This led to a full-time job there as a Director of Development in 1995; it was there she began pursuing screenwriting in earnest. One of the scripts she happened to read and cover was written by Karen Lutz, an aspiring writer living in Denver, Colorado. The two women formed a friendship over the phone, and when Lutz came to Los Angeles, they met in person, and began writing their first script on cocktail napkins that night. That script never sold, but it inspired the women to write together again, and they embarked on a teen comedy called 10 Things I Hate About You
, inspired by Shakespeare's "Taming of the Shrew".
Smith got her official start as a screenwriter in 1997 by selling 10 Things I Hate About You as a spec screenplay. Shortly thereafter, the movie was green-lit, starring then-unknowns Heath Ledger
and Julia Stiles
, and it was shot in Tacoma, Washington, near Smith's hometown.
Smith went on to co-write Legally Blonde
, which was nominated for two Golden Globes. Costing only $18M to produce, the movie was a surprise hit, grossing $20M in its opening weekend in July 2001, and going on to make over $140M worldwide. It also spawned a sequel and a successful Broadway musical, which was based on Smith and Lutz’s screenplay.
Smith followed that with Ella Enchanted
, starring Anne Hathaway
; and She's the Man
, a Dreamworks update of Shakespeare's "Twelfth Night", starring Amanda Bynes
.
Recently, she co-wrote and executive produced The House Bunny
, starring Anna Faris, and produced by Adam Sandler’s Happy Madison
Productions. It grossed just shy of $50M domestically. Her latest credit is The Ugly Truth
, directed by Legally Blonde collaborator Robert Luketic
and starring Katherine Heigl
and Gerard Butler
.”
Having published more than 40 poems in various literary magazines in the 1990s, Smith published her first novel-in-verse, The Geography of Girlhood
, in 2006. The coming-of-age story of a teenage girl growing up in the Pacific Northwest, it contains a smattering of the poems Smith wrote and published in her early twenties.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
screenwriter
Screenwriter
Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...
and novelist. She wrote most of the screenplays with her screenwriter partner Karen McCullah Lutz
Karen McCullah Lutz
Karen McCullah Lutz is an American screenwriter and novelist.McCullah Lutz was born in the Philippines, where her father had been assigned with the United States Navy performing counterespionage duties. She grew up in Bergen County, New Jersey, and graduated from Indian Hills High School in her...
. Most of the scripts seems to follow the girl Power
Girl Power
The phrase "girl power", as a term of empowerment, expressed a cultural phenomenon of the 1990s and early 2000s. It is also linked to third-wave feminism...
movement of the late 1990s and early 2000s.
She recently directed a short film, The Spleenectomy, which starred Anna Faris
Anna Faris
Anna Kay Faris is an American actress, singer and comedienne. She is known for her starring role in the Scary Movie film series, as well as roles in The Hot Chick , Lost in Translation , Just Friends , My Super Ex-Girlfriend , Smiley Face , and The House Bunny...
and was financed and produced by Glamour magazine
Glamour magazine
Glamour magazine means:* Glamour magazine, a U.S. publication aimed at a predominantly female readership* a girlie magazine aimed at a male readership featuring photographs of women...
.
Her first film as a non-writing producer, Whip It!, stars Ellen Page
Ellen Page
Ellen Philpotts-Page , known professionally as Ellen Page, is a Canadian actress. Page received both Golden Globe and Academy Award nominations for Best Actress for her role as the title character in the film Juno...
and is directed by Drew Barrymore
Drew Barrymore
Drew Blyth Barrymore is an American actress, film director, screenwriter, producer and model. She is a member of the Barrymore family of American actors and granddaughter of John Barrymore. She first appeared in an advertisement when she was 11 months old. Barrymore made her film debut in Altered...
, and she also has American Virgin, starring Jenna Dewan
Jenna Dewan
Jenna Lee Dewan-Tatum , better known by her birth name Jenna Dewan, is an American actress, dancer, and former model.-Early life:...
and Rob Schneider
Rob Schneider
Robert Michael "Rob" Schneider is an American actor, comedian, screenwriter, and director. A stand-up comic and veteran of the NBC sketch-comedy series Saturday Night Live, Schneider has gone on to a successful career in feature films, including starring roles in the comedy films Deuce Bigalow:...
, in post-production.
A native of Port Ludlow, Washington, she moved to Los Angeles in 1988 to attend Occidental College
Occidental College
Occidental College is a private, coeducational liberal arts college located in the Eagle Rock neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. Founded in 1887, Occidental College, or "Oxy" as it is called by students and alumni, is one of the oldest liberal arts colleges on the West Coast...
. There, she studied English and Film, and also got an internship at CineTel Films, an independent film company. Initially planning on pursuing poetry and academia as a career, she began working for CineTel reading scripts and writing coverage for them. This led to a full-time job there as a Director of Development in 1995; it was there she began pursuing screenwriting in earnest. One of the scripts she happened to read and cover was written by Karen Lutz, an aspiring writer living in Denver, Colorado. The two women formed a friendship over the phone, and when Lutz came to Los Angeles, they met in person, and began writing their first script on cocktail napkins that night. That script never sold, but it inspired the women to write together again, and they embarked on a teen comedy called 10 Things I Hate About You
10 Things I Hate about You
10 Things I Hate About You is a 1999 American teen romantic comedy film. It is directed by Gil Junger and stars Heath Ledger, Julia Stiles, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Larisa Oleynik, David Krumholtz, and Larry Miller...
, inspired by Shakespeare's "Taming of the Shrew".
Smith got her official start as a screenwriter in 1997 by selling 10 Things I Hate About You as a spec screenplay. Shortly thereafter, the movie was green-lit, starring then-unknowns Heath Ledger
Heath Ledger
Heath Andrew Ledger was an Australian television and film actor. After performing roles in Australian television and film during the 1990s, Ledger moved to the United States in 1998 to develop his film career...
and Julia Stiles
Julia Stiles
Julia O'Hara Stiles is an American actress.After beginning her career in small parts in a New York City theatre troupe, she has moved on to leading roles in plays by writers as diverse as William Shakespeare and David Mamet...
, and it was shot in Tacoma, Washington, near Smith's hometown.
Smith went on to co-write Legally Blonde
Legally Blonde
Legally Blonde is a 2001 American comedy film directed by Robert Luketic, written by Karen McCullah Lutz and Kirsten Smith, and produced by Marc E. Platt...
, which was nominated for two Golden Globes. Costing only $18M to produce, the movie was a surprise hit, grossing $20M in its opening weekend in July 2001, and going on to make over $140M worldwide. It also spawned a sequel and a successful Broadway musical, which was based on Smith and Lutz’s screenplay.
Smith followed that with Ella Enchanted
Ella Enchanted
Ella Enchanted is a Newbery Honor book written by Gail Carson Levine and published in 1997. The story is a retelling of Cinderella featuring various mythical creatures including fairies, elves, ogres, gnomes, and giants...
, starring Anne Hathaway
Anne Hathaway (actress)
Anne Jacqueline Hathaway is an American actress. After several stage roles, she appeared in the 1999 television series Get Real. She played Mia Thermopolis in The Princess Diaries...
; and She's the Man
She's the Man
She's the Man is a 2006 American romantic comedy film directed by Andy Fickman, based on Twelfth Night, a play by William Shakespeare. The film stars Amanda Bynes, Channing Tatum, Laura Ramsey and Vinnie Jones....
, a Dreamworks update of Shakespeare's "Twelfth Night", starring Amanda Bynes
Amanda Bynes
Amanda Laura Bynes is an American actress, comedian, singer, and fashion designer. Bynes appeared in several successful television series, such as All That and The Amanda Show, on Nickelodeon in the mid to late 1990s and early 2000s, and in 2002, she starred in the TV series, What I Like About You...
.
Recently, she co-wrote and executive produced The House Bunny
The House Bunny
The House Bunny is a 2008 romantic comedy film directed by Fred Wolf, written by Kirsten Smith and Karen McCullah Lutz, and starring Anna Faris as a former Playboy bunny who signs up to be the "house mother" of an unpopular university sorority after being conned by a rival into believing she's now...
, starring Anna Faris, and produced by Adam Sandler’s Happy Madison
Happy Madison
Happy Madison Productions is an American film/television production company founded by actor/comedian Adam Sandler in 1999 that is best known for comedy films. Happy Madison takes its name from the films Happy Gilmore and Billy Madison, two box office successes starring Sandler himself, both...
Productions. It grossed just shy of $50M domestically. Her latest credit is The Ugly Truth
The Ugly Truth (film)
The Ugly Truth is a 2009 American romantic comedy film starring Katherine Heigl and Gerard Butler. The film was released in North America on July 24, 2009, produced by Lakeshore Entertainment for Columbia Pictures .- Plot :...
, directed by Legally Blonde collaborator Robert Luketic
Robert Luketic
Robert Luketic is an Australian film director. He directed the films Monster-in-Law, Legally Blonde and 21.-Early life:...
and starring Katherine Heigl
Katherine Heigl
Katherine Marie Heigl is an American actress and producer. She is possibly best known for her role as Dr. Izzie Stevens on ABC's Grey's Anatomy from 2005 to 2010, for which she won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress – Drama Series in 2007...
and Gerard Butler
Gerard Butler
Gerard James Butler is a Scottish actor who has appeared on film, stage, and television. A trained lawyer, Butler turned to acting in the mid-1990s with small roles in productions such as the James Bond film Tomorrow Never Dies , which he followed with steady work on television, most notably in...
.”
Having published more than 40 poems in various literary magazines in the 1990s, Smith published her first novel-in-verse, The Geography of Girlhood
The Geography of Girlhood
The Geography of Girlhood is a coming of age novel verse novel by Kirsten Smith, screenwriter and film-maker. Published by Little Brown in 2006, the novel chronicles Penny Morrow, fourteen-year old with a missing mother, a wild older sister, a protective younger stepbrother and one severe crush on...
, in 2006. The coming-of-age story of a teenage girl growing up in the Pacific Northwest, it contains a smattering of the poems Smith wrote and published in her early twenties.
Films
- 10 Things I Hate About You10 Things I Hate about You10 Things I Hate About You is a 1999 American teen romantic comedy film. It is directed by Gil Junger and stars Heath Ledger, Julia Stiles, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Larisa Oleynik, David Krumholtz, and Larry Miller...
(1999) - an adaptation of William ShakespeareWilliam ShakespeareWilliam Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...
's The Taming of the ShrewThe Taming of the ShrewThe Taming of the Shrew is a comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1590 and 1591.The play begins with a framing device, often referred to as the Induction, in which a mischievous nobleman tricks a drunken tinker named Sly into believing he is actually a nobleman himself...
set in a modern American high school - Legally BlondeLegally BlondeLegally Blonde is a 2001 American comedy film directed by Robert Luketic, written by Karen McCullah Lutz and Kirsten Smith, and produced by Marc E. Platt...
(2001) - screen adaptation of Amanda BrownAmanda Brown (voice actor)Amanda Brown is a voice actress who worked on the properties of 4Kids Entertainment for a few years. She was most known for voicing Zoey Hanson in Mew Mew Power..-Voice roles:*Magical DoReMi - Belinda Higgins*Mew Mew Power - Zoey Hanson;...
's novel Legally Blonde - Ella EnchantedElla Enchanted (film)Ella Enchanted is a 2004 British-American romantic-comedy film loosely based on Gail Carson Levine's 1997 novel of the same name. The film stars Anne Hathaway as Ella and Hugh Dancy as Prince Charmont. It plays with the usual fairy-tale genre...
(2004) - screen adaptation of Gail Carson LevineGail Carson LevineGail Carson Levine is an American author of young adult books. Her first novel, Ella Enchanted, received a Newbery Honor in 1998.-Early life:...
's 1997 novel Ella EnchantedElla EnchantedElla Enchanted is a Newbery Honor book written by Gail Carson Levine and published in 1997. The story is a retelling of Cinderella featuring various mythical creatures including fairies, elves, ogres, gnomes, and giants... - She's the ManShe's the ManShe's the Man is a 2006 American romantic comedy film directed by Andy Fickman, based on Twelfth Night, a play by William Shakespeare. The film stars Amanda Bynes, Channing Tatum, Laura Ramsey and Vinnie Jones....
(2006) - an adaptation of William ShakespeareWilliam ShakespeareWilliam Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...
's play Twelfth Night, or What You WillTwelfth Night, or What You WillTwelfth Night; or, What You Will is a comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written around 1601–02 as a Twelfth Night's entertainment for the close of the Christmas season...
. - The House BunnyThe House BunnyThe House Bunny is a 2008 romantic comedy film directed by Fred Wolf, written by Kirsten Smith and Karen McCullah Lutz, and starring Anna Faris as a former Playboy bunny who signs up to be the "house mother" of an unpopular university sorority after being conned by a rival into believing she's now...
(2008) - The Ugly TruthThe Ugly Truth (film)The Ugly Truth is a 2009 American romantic comedy film starring Katherine Heigl and Gerard Butler. The film was released in North America on July 24, 2009, produced by Lakeshore Entertainment for Columbia Pictures .- Plot :...
(2009)
External links
- kiwilovesyou.com, the personal homepage
- http://www.twitter.com/kiwilovesyou, the twitter page