Today we’d like to introduce you to Jamie Nash
Hi Jamie , can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
I grew up being THE MOVIE FREAK amongst my friends and family. I saw every movie. Knew every director. Read books about the making of movies, subscribed to Premiere Magazine, and was a living Wikipedia of movie knowledge.
I’ve always wanted to write or make movies. I started out as a software engineer who began writing for fun, never really considering Hollywood as a possibility. But in the 1990s, movies like The Blair Witch Project, Clerks, and Welcome to the Dollhouse started making me think, “Maybe I can make an independent film.” With the advent of cheaper ways to make movies and the internet providing access to information, I began writing screenplays with the intention of making them myself.
My first screenplay became a finalist in the Austin Film Festival’s annual contest. A couple of years later, I optioned a script for about $10,000. That’s when I started to realize that writing movies was my favorite part of the process.
Around 2004, two significant things happened:
I sold a movie that was ultimately made as ALTERED. It was produced by the team behind The Blair Witch Project and directed by Eduardo Sanchez, who also directed Blair Witch and happens to be a Frederick, Maryland, resident.
I co-directed a schlocky, low-budget horror movie called TWO FRONT TEETH. It was an absolute blast and a dream come true.
These experiences fueled my passion for filmmaking, and I went all-in. A lot of projects followed—some produced, mostly within the independent film space. I got an agent, started becoming more well-known in the industry, and eventually quit my day job to pursue writing full-time.
Today, I still write every day but have also incorporated teaching, coaching writers, writing books about writing, and occasionally directing films into my career.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
It’s a very very difficult career path. I once calculated there are weeks where I essentially get rejected hundreds of times per week.
Plus there are lots of times where everyone tells you a project is going to get made and you start banking on it and it gets cancelled at the last minute.
It’s also the type of work where you go through long droughts of not much happening that can make you think your career is over… only to be surprised when an opportunity comes out of nowhere.
It’s not for everyone, that’s for sure. It can be very stressful. And if you are not good with dealing with tons of uncertainty, rejection and lots of chaos, it can be unbearable.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I’m best known for writing in two genres: very scary adult horror movies and kids’ movies.
It’s an unusual combination. My favorite genre is probably horror comedy, but the truth is, horror comedy is a tough sell in Hollywood. I discovered that horror comedy can often be repackaged as kids’ movies (think Goosebumps), and that intersection led me to writing for kids. Similarly, many movies I love—like Back to the Future, Men In Black, Bill & Ted, and Galaxy Quest—are also hard sells in Hollywood, which tends to favor intellectual property like comic books and sequels for their big-budget projects. However, kids’ movies often explore similar genres on lower budgets with original ideas, so I naturally gravitated toward that space.
While I’m probably most proud of the horror movies I’ve made, creating movies for the whole family is a lot of fun, especially since it allows my friends and family who don’t watch horror to enjoy my work. I remember when Santa Hunters aired on Nickelodeon the night after Thanksgiving—millions of people watched it all at once. It was an incredibly cool experience to know I was part of people’s holiday that year.
What matters most to you?
When I first got into this I probably had dreams of just getting movies made or seeing my name on the credits of a movie or playing Sundance or whatever.
But over the years, what’s most important (and not easy) is to just be able to do what I love everyday. That’s enough. That’s about all I could ask for. Any other success is nice… but just knowing I get to do what I do for the rest of my life is the most important think. And it’s a blessing, I don’t take for granted.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.jamienash.net
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100063646983079
- Twitter: Jamie_Nash
