James Moran

James Moran may refer to:

See also

James Moran (writer)

James Moran (born 5 March 1972) is a British screenwriter for television and film, who wrote the horror-comedy Severance. He works in the horror, comedy, science-fiction, historical fiction and spy thriller genres.

Breaking in

Born in York, Moran's first produced work came as the result of a competition run by the Sci Fi Channel. The competition asked for writers to submit short science-fiction themed film scripts. Moran won, and his entry Cheap Rate Gravity was produced and shown both on the sci-fi channel and in front of full-length movies, including Final Destination 2.

Moran secured an agent at the PFD Literary Agency from the strength of the competition win, a spec film script, and a six-part TV drama entitled The School. He wrote the entire run of The School on spec, later saying he was unaware that generally only a pilot is written until a production company shows interest. Moran claims the series is still his favourite of his own works.

Film work

Moran scripted the 2005 film Severance, which concerns office workers on a team building trip being stalked by a masked killer. Talking about where the idea for Severance came from, Moran said "I'd been trying to think of a good horror idea, and one day had a really bad commute home – yuppies in pinstripe suits were everywhere, pushing past me, jumping the queue, and generally being the ignorant scumbags that they are. So, in a flash of temper, I decided to kill off some yuppies in a horror – take them to a cabin, and pick them off one by one. Once I'd calmed down, I thought that was a pretty good idea – take some standard, British office types, and throw them into a cabin-in-the-woods horror, see how they react. And it developed from there."

James Moran (shipbuilder)

James Moran was a shipbuilder from St. Martins, New Brunswick who pioneered shipbuilding in the Bay of Fundy. Moran was one of the two leading families in the shipbuilding era of St. Martins from 1803 to 1919. During this period a number of different families built ships of all sizes along the beaches of St. Martins, which roughly producing 517 ships. He was the son of Matthias (Matthew) Moran. James married Mary Hamilton who gave him two sons, Robert and James H. Robert went on to be a master mariner, while James H. Became a junior shipbuilder who later worked alongside his father and took over the business. In 1805 James, at the age of twenty four, built and launched his first small ship, a 59 ton schooner named Thistle. The ship that Moran is best known for is Waterloo, a 392 ton ship built in 1815. It was the first three-masted square-rigged ship built in the Bay of Fundy.

In order for a shipbuilding family to function the support of a wife was needed. James built ships and operated a shipyard for over four decades. During his life span he produced at least 20 ships, with the firsts being on the smaller end of tonnage. Between 1840 and the late 1850s James was one of the leading shipbuilders in the Fundy area. In 1856 his son James H. took over the shipyard which later expanded to Saint John, New Brunswick. The Morans had one of Atlantic Canada's largest fleets during the 1870s. By 1874 roughly 88 ships had been built, mostly over 1000 tons.