John Stanton
Writer/Director
The basic human need for community and the breakdown of communities in the face of economic changes is one of the major themes running through Stanton’s films. It is a point of view he honed as a newspaper reporter for over a decade in places as diverse as Washington, DC, Bluefield, West Virginia, and Brookline, Massachusetts. He took the first step into telling those stories on the screen instead of the page as a writer for “Leather Soul: Working for a Life in a Factory Town” (Picture Business Productions,1990).
Stanton worked as a writer on the Picture Business films “Witch City” and “Unfinished Dreams” before writing and directing debut in 2002, with a film about a legendary watering hole called The Bosun’s Locker in “Last Call: Dreams, Main Street, and the Search for Community.”

Along the way he won a Telly Award for his work in the Time-Life video series “At Time of Diagnosis,” edited a collection of newspaper stories covering the 20th Century on Nantucket called “The Last 100 Years,” and was the executive producer for a soundtrack CD for “Last Call” featuring the music of former “Mountain” drummer Corky Laing and singer/songwriter John Pousette-Dart. More recently he is working as a freelance screenwriter for the PBS/ITV series “Healthy Body, Healthy Mind.”

Stanton is continuing his exploration into community with a series of documentary shorts about Nantucket history and everyday island life now in production for PlumTV. He is in development with films on the life of 19th Century philanthropist George Peabody and on the rise form slums to champion of Johnny Goodman, the last amateur golfer to win the U.S. Open

John Stanton
Phone: (508) 228-3358
Email: wordstogo@comcast.net
Shouldered Oar Films
Box 384
Nantucket, MA, 02554