MIKE LE
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MIKE LE

What inspired you to write a script rather than a novel or short story?
I am a practicing psychiatric clinician with no artistic background. I didn’t really know what I was setting out to do when I started writing The Seen in November 2025, my first foray into anything creative. The story became a visual telling of my treatment philosophy; thus, cinema is the only medium that made sense.

Was there a specific film, TV show, or personal moment that first made you say, “I want to write like that”?
I was likely influenced by many sources, but I didn’t necessarily know where my story was going or even what genre it would be. I wrote this script by following my characters’ emotional logic and behavioral psychology. After reading the finished product, I see the behavioral intimacy of Never Rarely Sometimes Always, with the psychological empathy of Take Shelter, grounded with the human-scale mysticism of Arrival.

What’s your writing routine like? Do you follow a strict schedule, or are you more intuitive about when and how you write?
I typically write when I get home in between clinic days and on weekends. It should be exhausting, but it somehow has the opposite effect. I’ve learned that I write without storyboards or beat maps, which allows the writing process to be a purely creative outlet.

When you're starting a new script, how do you shape your ideas? Do you use outlines, beat sheets, or dive right into scenes? What inspires your scripts? Characters? Plot? Theme? Action?
In both the scripts I’ve written since I started about five months ago, I have started with a simple premise and wrote through the  character logic. I later came to realize that my subconscious has already mapped out the entire story. My writing is now about excavating the story my mind has already come up with. My scripts have become an extension of my clinic work. The stories are behaviorally legible, but deeper analysis of the material will tell you exactly what I think about mental healthcare and how people actually get better. I write about what I know and what I’m passionate about. Film happens to be one of my favorite hobbies, and I have now found a vessel large enough to deliver care on the scale I need.

How do you handle writer’s block or those inevitable moments of self-doubt?
As a new writer, I’m still finding my method but it’s becoming clearer to me by the day. I came up with the idea of the sequel before I had written the first ten pages of The Seen. I wrote both simultaneously, bouncing between them as I got stuck with the other.
At some point I was raising more questions than answers with the sequel, so I just left it alone for a month. When I came back, my subconscious had answered all of my questions and I hit a flow state.

What tools—software, methods, rituals—do you consider essential to your writing workflow?
I’m too new to filmmaking to have any rituals, but I just bought my first mechanical keyboard and I don’t really want to write without it anymore.

Do you write with production realities in mind, or do you let the creative vision lead first and adjust later?
I didn’t have production constraints in mind because I thought I’d just be a hobbyist. However, I’ve come to learn that my ambition is intertwined with my craft level.
The Seen is an intimate two-hander in a single location, something that is more in-line with what I do in a private clinic room. I lucked into my first script being easily packageable, but now I understand the importance.
Once I realized I was capable of producing a real script, I let my ambition grow. The sequel is a sprawling, world-building philosophical thesis that scales trauma from the  individual level to a society.

When a scene isn’t working, what’s your go-to strategy for fixing it? Rewrite, workshop, walk away—or something else?
I do a deep dive into the character psychology and see if there is a truth I haven’t yet explored. I once spent five hours on a ten-page scene that I only rewrote three times. Most of the time was sitting completely still on the couch as I thought through the
character logic. I probably looked catatonic.

How many scripts have you completed? How many have you started and not completed (we all have those)...and why are they still unfinished?
In the five months I’ve been writing, I’ve completed two scripts. I have plans for a third, but right now I am focused on submissions.
Prior to writing, I used to play with random scenarios in my head. It’s what made decades of insomnia bearable. What I didn’t realize is that these exercises might have actually been a director’s mind. The plot of The Seen basically started out as a scenario about how a person would convince someone they’re not dangerous after kidnapping them to save their life. That
ended up becoming my public health intervention. I have dozens of random scenarios I’ve simulated across decades, and now I get to figure out if they are actually full stories behind them.

Have you earned recognition in this or other competitions? What’s your strategy when submitting your scripts, and how has contest feedback shaped your work?
SBISA was my very first submission as a filmmaker. While waiting for placement, The Seen also became a finalist for the SAGindie Fellowship. So far, the SBISA coverage is the only direct industry feedback I’ve received, and their seventeen pages of coverage helped me generate eight new pages for my script. Likewise, I am reshaping my entire second act for the sequel based on the coverage I received.

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Have you done anything at this point to promote yourself or your writing (besides entering online contests)? If so, how would you gauge the effectiveness of those efforts?
No, I’m still learning how to navigate the industry. I have submitted widely with great early returns. I won’t know how effective it will be until my work gains more traction.

Have you pitched to producers or taken meetings yet? What have those experiences taught you about the business side of screenwriting?
No, but I was accepted to a producer’s lab which I have yet to attend.

What do you see as your greatest strengths as a writer? Your greatest weaknesses?
My strength is writing characters who feel authentic. The behavioral precision and emotional logic are translated directly from six years of psychiatric practice. My weakness is my general lack of industry exposure. I had never read a script before I wrote my own, and only learned formatting after I finished the story. I don’t know what I don’t know, and now my focus is on bridging the gap.

How do you balance your writing with your “day job”?
Strangely enough, writing has become the outlet for my day job. The heaviness of my career doesn’t come from the subject matter, but rather the restrictions of the healthcare industry. Writing has given me a way to continue scaling. I look forward to
getting off work all day so I can go home and find out where my story is about to go.

What message or emotional response do you hope audiences walk away with after experiencing your work?
My goal is to show mental illness as it exists in a person, not as a diagnosis or a backstory. My characters should feel real in a way that’s felt before it’s understood. In doing so, I hope to reduce the stigma of mental health that continues to be a major
barrier to care.
Paul and Angela, the leads of The Seen, continue to be people despite their trauma, and this is the most important thing I want to show. I also write plot points without manufactured drama or performance. Addiction is not shown as an incessant need, but
rather the need to always keep the brakes applied. The slow spiral of the relapse was deliberately created to give the audience the feeling of losing someone to alcoholism – the looping nature, repetitive fights, the push when you try to pull.
If one person quietly suffering recognizes themselves in my characters and chooses to get help, or one provider learns what healing actually looks like – then I will have effectively scaled my practice from a private room to an audience.

What are you working on right now the world needs to know about?
Right now, I’m just working on finding my place in an industry I have no familiarity with. SBISA was my start. I am applying widely to targets that match what I am trying to do. As this is my first cycle, I have no foresight into how far this will get me.
I have two full-length scripts written since November 2025. I have a full trilogy architecture created, each with increasing scope but written with the same behavioral precision. Now I just need to get it in front of the right people.

Where do you see yourself five years from now as a screenwriter—and how do you plan to get to that place?
Ideally, I would be on a set directing one of my projects, but I recognize I’d be skipping the line. I’ve just come to learn that a career in healthcare is not sustainable for what I’ve always wanted to accomplish. Growing up in a family of physicians, I didn’t know any other way. Filmmaking is the first vessel large enough to contain my need to scale, and I take it seriously as such. I am not writing to become a creative. I am writing because it is the vehicle to deliver care to a much larger audience. I also happen to really love it. I treat this with the same intensity that helped me reach the top of my psychiatric career within six years. I’m about to find out how far that can take me in the film industry.

What advice would you give to any aspiring writer hoping to follow in your footsteps?
Just try it. I can only speak to writers who’ve believed they can write but never had a reason to open a blank document. Ideally, it wouldn’t take a professional rupture to finally seek out the thing you were meant to do. I don’t regret my path. I needed to reach my career ceiling and panic in order to create The Seen. However, that is a very specific circumstance, and had it not happened, I would not have discovered my actual calling. You won’t know if you can until you try. Think Nike. Just do it.