Michael Gilio is no stranger to the Yukon, having visited innumerable times with his wife, Amy Sloan, whom he credits with providing him with the direction he had lacked in his life before he met her in an acting class. The family currently lives in Oak Park, a village of some 55,000 people near Chicago.
His initial plan was to be an actor, but he eventually decided he didn’t have the temperament or patience for it. “I [also] aspired to be a director, and you can’t do either profession without the help and money of others.”
Why shift to writing?
“Anyone can sit down and write,” he said. “And I did. Writing became an invitation to collaborate with others.”
It took him years of work to find success, but after gaining recognition as the writer and director of the independent film Kwik Stop and having his unproduced script for Big Hole win an award, he found himself writing projects for Paramount, Warner Brothers, Universal Studios, Fox Searchlight, Lion’s Gate, Annapurna Pictures, and Focus Features.
He has collaborated with various directors: Guillermo del Toro, George Clooney, James Mangold, Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, Doug Liman, Gore Verbinski, Matt Reeves and Sam Mendes, to name a select few.
Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves, co-written by Michael and directed by Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley (Game Night), was released by Paramount Pictures in spring 2023.
He described the original D&D idea in interviews as being “Ocean’s Eleven in Middle-Earth.” Dark Harvest, executive-produced and written by Michael Gilio and directed by David Slade (30 Days of Night) was released this past October (2023) by MGM.
He’s very matter of fact about his success; he knew it was working out, he said, when he “got paid.”
He describes his work habits the same way.
“There’s no mystery to my process. It’s a job. I mostly write five days a week, nine-ish to four-ish, and most of that time is spent procrastinating and taking breaks and ‘researching’ and lying to myself about the work.
“I write a treatment before I start writing the screenplay, to keep me honest. As a screenwriter, I don’t have time to ‘explore’ ideas into dead ends; or waste days and weeks finding my story only to realize I don’t have one.
“The treatment is where a lot of the intellectual work is done, but once I actually start writing the script (usually in a panic, realizing that I’m running out of time), the treatment is usually abandoned and I write with purpose and without an ego. At least that’s the goal.”
The “sad, dirty secret” as he called it in an interview, about scriptwriting, is that a good many projects never get made, but he’s had good fortune with his last two projects.
He’s happy to be coming back to the Yukon for the Young Authors’ Conference.
“I just recently taught my first screenwriting course at Northwestern University in Chicago and I learned so much about workshopping ideas, articulating the craft, and organizing lesson plans, that I’m excited to continue collaborating with students who have a passion for writing.
“I love everything about Whitehorse—particularly its unique and passionate culture for the arts. It’s an honour to be asked to participate in the conference.”
