"Bleeding Hearts: How Revising a Mediocre Screenplay Helped Me Find My Voice" examines the development of Joseph Pudas’ feature screenplay Bleeding Hearts. It tracks the course of how Bleeding Hearts was written and provides a candid look at the creative process, specifically how the writing and rewriting of this particular screenplay helped Pudas discover truths about his sensibilities and limitations. In his two years at the University of Texas, Pudas took the opportunity to experiment with different genres and tones in order to pinpoint his strengths and weaknesses as a screenwriter. Bleeding Hearts was initially intended as a straightforward romantic comedy set in the political sphere, but early on Pudas encountered difficulties with tone and genre (romantic comedy vs. cynical political satire) that would continue to persist throughout the bloated first draft. With the assistance of his peers and thesis committee, Pudas reworked the concept and wrote a more streamlined, romantic draft closer in line to what he originally envisioned the project to be. / text