Overview
- Film finalists: Frankenstein (Guillermo del Toro), Hamnet (Chloe Zhao and Maggie O'Farrell), One Battle After Another (Paul Thomas Anderson), Peter Hujar's Day (Ira Sachs), and Train Dreams (Clint Bentley and Greg Kwedar).
- Television finalists: Dark Winds (Max Hurwitz and Billy Luther), Death by Lightning (Mike Makowsky), Dept. Q (Chandni Lakhani and Scott Frank), Slow Horses (Will Smith), and Wolf Hall: The Mirror and the Light (Peter Straughan).
- The selection committee, chaired by former WGA West president Howard Rodman, reviewed 43 film and 64 television adaptations to arrive at the finalists.
- New eligibility rules limited consideration to adaptations from books, novellas, short stories, graphic novels, plays, or magazine articles, excluding video games and characters originating in previously published works.
- Winners will be announced January 24, 2026 at USC's Town & Gown ballroom, where author Michael Connelly will receive the USC Libraries Literary Achievement Award.