Sam Shepard (left) and Wim Wenders on location for 2005's Don't Come Knocking

The Austin Film Festival just announced this year’s Distinguished Screenwriter Award will go to Sam Shepard, the Pulitzer Prize-winning giant of American theater and Oscar-nominated actor (for 1983’s The Right Stuff).

(Yes, yes, that’s all very impressive – but have you seen 1987’s Baby Boom? Oh my, how my 9-year-old self swooned for the kindly country vet…)

A good chunk of Shepard’s screenwriting work consists of adaptations of his own plays, but he also penned such originals as Paris, Texas and Don’t Come Knocking (both for director Wim Wenders), Dylan art film Renaldo and Clara, and Zabriskie Point for Michelangelo Antonioni.

The 2008 Austin Film Festival runs Oct. 16-23. For more info, visit www.austinfilmfestival.com.

This article appears in July 18 • 2008.

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