This week on On Story, a conversation with screenwriter Mark L. Smith on writing Twisters – the 2024 summer film that took audiences by storm…literally! The action-packed, thrilling adventure directed by Lee Isaac Chung is a standalone sequel to the 1996 film Twister starring Helen Hunt and Bill Paxton and produced by Austin Film Festival awardee Kathleen Kennedy. Yet, as the plurality suggests, stakes are raised in Twisters as meteorologist Kate Copper, played by Daisy Edgar Jones, tests a groundbreaking storm tracking system. Copper’s world spirals when she crosses paths with cowboy, social media superstar Tyler Owens, played by Glen Powell as the two storm chasers fight for their lives in the plains of Oklahoma. 

 

Mark L. Smith is best known for writing the screenplays The Revenant, starring Leonardi Di Caprio whose performance in the film earned him the Academy award for Best actor, The Midnight Sky, directed and starring George Clooney, and The Boys in the Boat, produced and directed by Clooney. Simply put, Smith is a mastermind at crafting stories that are sure to keep audiences at the edge of their seats. 

 

I sat down with Smith at our annual Writers Conference to discuss writing captivating action sequences and his process of writing a script which both honors and builds off the original 90s blockbuster. 

Twisters clips courtesy of Universal Pictures, Warner Bros. Pictures.