Creative of the Month: July 2025

Trent Atkinson

Screenplay Writer 

Business Location:  Currently Idyllwild / LA 

-How did you become interested in becoming a creative person?  

I’d always been a writer of stories and poems and nonsense even as a kid, but movies were an escape for me growing up in pretty bad circumstances, so originally I had planned to be an actor.  

I did that professionally for about a decade but it wasn’t the job I’d hoped it would be, even when working - so I taught myself to write screenplays thinking it might lead to more roles for myself.  

I worked very hard at my writing and still do, honestly so it was just a better fit. I started writing TV a couple of years after finishing my first screenplay (on a show I had done a couple of stints on, playing an autistic teen. Very funny stories).  

But I am pretty creatively open minded and am now doing with directing what I once did with writing. The one upside of a shitty upbringing at least for me is that if there was pressure to be something else, I didn’t feel obliged to listen to it. 

-How would you describe your work?  

It’s tricky because a lot of my work is writing for other people’s shows, so to me the goal there is to kind of disappear and become the best version of the creator’s voice. 

Within that I am obsessed with the rhythm of words and seeking as much character truth as possible in them. If I were to try and boil it down, I aim for an emotional response. 

I write across genre, so in my comedy or in my horror stuff I find common ground in dialogue and plot and the energy I am trying to build there. I am also a big believer that real art can also be very crowd pleasing so I find myself trying to entertain more than anything. My life was saved by wonderful entertainment that made me feel something too, so this is me paying that back I guess. 

-What inspires you and brings you the most satisfaction in doing your creative endeavors? 

Oh boy. The most satisfaction I have ever experienced creatively would be either when I am directing actors who are performing my own words and it works just right. The worst part of writing might be when the thing inside doesn’t match the thing you create so perhaps the most wonderful part is when it’s the direct opposite and you surprise yourself and make something that affects people. That and hearing an audience laugh at my jokes. 

Inspiration comes from everywhere, I’m a whore creatively. I like  to read everything, watch everything, learn from everything. Some of my favorite ideas have come from the strangest places, so I try to keep the inspiration net as wide as possible.  

Socials: Instagram @trentmakesthings