Juno (film)
Diablo Cody was first approached to write a screenplay by film producer Mason Novick, who had previously landed her a book deal for her memoir, "", after discovering her blog about stripping. He persuaded her to adapt the book for the screen, but suggested that she first write a screenwriting sample to show studios; that sample became "Juno". After deciding on an adoption storyline, Cody collected the stories of adoptees, birth parents and adoptive parents, including that of her then-husband, an adoptee who reunited with his birth parents after she wrote the film. She also found inspiration in the story of a close friend who had become pregnant in high school and used some details from her friend's experience in the film, such as mistreatment from an ultrasound technician. Much of "Juno", however, was based on Cody's own high school experiences: She dated a tic-tac-loving boy similar to Paulie, she was best friends with a cheerleader like Leah, and she used a hamburger phone identical to the one that appears in the film. After writing the screenplay over seven weeks in the Starbucks section of a Target store in Crystal, Minnesota, Cody compared writing to breathing, seeing Juno as an extension of herself.
Kirk DeMicco
DeMicco's first script sale was called "A Day in November" which he sold to Warner Bros. and producer Arnold Kopelson for $1 million before signing to write "Quest for Camelot". Later he wrote and co-produced "Racing Stripes" for director Frederik Du Chau. John Cleese and DeMicco co-wrote the film adaptation of the Roald Dahl's children classic "The Twits". He also wrote "Splitting Adam" a movie that was set up at United Artists. He then worked as a writer on "" and later worked on "Casper's Scare School". In 2008, he wrote and directed the movie "Space Chimps" for John H. Williams and his company Vanguard Animation; the film is inspired by the first chimpanzee to go to space, Ham. While working at Warner Bros., he and Du Chau also wrote a script for the upcoming live-action–animated film based on the Hanna-Barbera character, Hong Kong Phooey, which they sold to Alcon Entertainment. He adapted the Jack Kirby comic "New Gods", and collaborated with filmmaker Barry Sonnenfeld on an adaptation of an Elmore Leonard novel. He has also done many production rewrites for Disney, Warner Bros., DreamWorks and Spyglass. In television, he is the creator and executive producer of the Discovery Channel documentary "HALO: Freefall Warriors".