Skip Hollandsworth

Walter Ned "Skip" Hollandsworth
Skip Hollandsworth at the 2011 Los Angeles Film Festival Opening Night Premiere of "Bernie" - After Party Photo by Kevin Winter/Getty Images North America [CC-BY-SA-2.5 (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5)], via Wikimedia Commons Skip Hollandsworth at the 2011 Los Angeles Film Festival Opening Night Premiere of "Bernie" - After Party Photo by Kevin Winter/Getty Images North America [CC-BY-SA-2.5 (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5)], via Wikimedia Commons
Pen name	Skip Hollandsworth
Occupation	Journalist, Screenwriter
Nationality	American
Period	1981–present

Walter Ned Hollandsworth (born November 9, 1957), better known by his pen name of Skip Hollandsworth, is a journalist and screenwriter, and is one of Texas’ best-known writers. He is the Executive Editor of Texas Monthly magazine. In April 2010, the American Society of Magazine Editors awarded Hollandsworth the National Magazine Award for Feature Writing for “Still Life,” the story of John McClamrock.

Hollandsworth co-wrote the Richard Linklater movie Bernie, a comedy film starring Jack Black, Matthew McConaughey and Shirley MacLaine, about the 1996 murder of 81 year-old millionaire Marjorie Nugent in Carthage, Texas by her 39 year-old homosexual companion, Bernhardt "Bernie" Tiede. The film made its world premiere at the 2011 Los Angeles Film Festival on June 16, 2011.

Biography

Hollandsworth was born on November 9, 1957 in Kannapolis, North Carolina. He is the son of the Reverend Walter Ned Hollandsworth, a Presbyterian minister,, and Peggy Hollandsworth.

Hollandsworth grew up in Lexington, Kentucky where his father was the pastor at Meadowthorpe Presbyterian Church from December, 1961 to December, 1968. When he was eleven years old, Hollandsworth moved with his family to Texas, settling in Wichita Falls in December, 1968, where his father served as pastor of the Fain Memorial Presbyterian Church.

Hollandsworth’s father, uncles and grandfather graduated from the Union Presbyterian Seminary in Richmond, Virginia.His family assumed that he, too, would become a Presbyterian minister, but Hollandsworth, in the November, 1985 issue of Texas Monthly, wrote that he “could not help but be fascinated yet repelled by church ways.”.

From an early age Hollandsworth became fascinated with the North Texas State Hospital, an in-patient mental health facility owned by the State of Texas, located in Wichita Falls. In the June, 2010 issue of Texas Monthly, Hollandsworth wrote that “I didn’t truly understand where I was from until I stepped inside the gates of the local state hospital.” “For reasons I couldn’t then explain, I kept returning to the hospital.” Hollandsworth wrote in Texas Monthly that he went into journalism because he loved visiting the local state hospital:

“Years later, while I was giving a speech to a college class, I was asked why I went into journalism. I suddenly blurted out, “I think it all started when I went out to the state hospital... I was captivated by the patients and tried to fathom what it felt like to be swept away by madness.”

Education

Hollandsworth graduated in 1979 with a B.A. in English from Texas Christian University.

Career

Hollandsworth has worked as a reporter and columnist for newspapers in Dallas, Texas. In 1981 he worked as a sports reporter for The Dallas Times-Herald.

Hollandsworth joined Texas Monthly magazine in 1989. He has also has worked as a television producer and documentary filmmaker.

Author

The Midnight Assassin" Book

In January, 2003, a book by Hollandsworth entitled "The Midnight Assassin," about the man said to be the first serial killer in American history, was purchased for a "significant" six figures by HarperCollins. Publishers Weekly, in reporting about the book sale, stated that the Texas killer was "so notorious in his day that when Jack the Ripper terrorized London, it was believed he might have moved there." Hollandsworth, Publishers Weekly reported, believed the possible killer was a member of high-society, "protected by the local establishment." Currently the book is "unavailable" and unpublished.

Candy Barr Book and Screenplay

In September, 2001, Hollandsworth published in Texas Monthly his interview with Candy Barr, one of the first American porn stars. In 2003, Hollandsworth was contacted by an agent from the William Morris Agency about writing a book and screenplay about Barr, but the project was abandoned when Barr complained that too many writers had "told and retold" lies about her and withdrew from the project.

Journalist

Hollandsworth’s articles in Texas Monthly have launched a number of film and television projects including the CBS telepic Suburban Madness,, and The Goree Girls, a film starring Jennifer Aniston in her first singing role. The movie, set in the 1940s, tells the story of several women in a Texas prison who form a country-western band and became famous.

Awards

Hollandsworth has received the following journalism awards:

The 2010 National Magazine Award for Feature Writing.
A National Headliners Award.
The City and Regional Magazine gold award for feature writing.
The Texas Institute of Letters O. Henry award for magazine writing.
The Charles Green award for outstanding magazine writing in Texas.

Hollandsworth has been a finalist four times for the National Magazine Awards. His work has been included in such publications as Best American Crime Writing and Best American Magazine Writing.

Controversy

In their 1999 book, "West Texas: a Portrait of Its People and Their Raw and Wondrous Land," by Mike Cochran, John Lumpkin, and Ron Heflin, the authors report Hollandsworth's criticism of Wichita Falls: "Hollandsworth,“ they wrote, "railed about overweight topless dancers and the effects of the heat.” Hollandsworth wrote that in Wichita Falls "Your vision blurs and your legs start quivering like dying fish on hooks."

Carroll Wilson, the editor of Wichita Falls newspaper, the Times Record News, was critical of Hollandsworth, writing:

"Of course, it's hot here, and that's the way we like it, us and 103,000 other souls who believe there's more to a city than interminable traffic tie-ups, indefatigable drug dealers and insufferably smug magazine editors."