[dagw]

playwrights have won in the past so in principle it could happen. The problem is that the way tv and movies are made today, there really isn't one person you can point to as 'the screenwriter' of a movie. Between writing rooms, script doctors, rewrites and on set changes, it's hard to give one person credit for the words and actions that end up on screen.

The other aspect is the for whatever reason there simply is no culture as it were around reading movie scripts, the way there is around reading plays or even song lyrics.

[cubefox]

Also, screenwriters seem to be mostly people hired by a producer to write something, not single authors who may be writing a genius story (a novel or short story, or stage play in the past) simply because they are struck by inspiration. There are many famous novelists but hardly any famous screenwriters. A large portion of famous movies are actually adoptions of preexisting books.

[chongli]

The best screenwriter I know of is Vince Gilligan (best known for Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul). Although he -- like everyone else in the TV business -- works in a writer's room, his writing style and his method for "breaking the episode" has led to some incredibly nuanced and compelling characters.

It may (presently) be inappropriate to compare him to Tolstoy (a towering figure in literature) though it must be said that the novel, at one time, was considered a low status medium compared to epic poetry and Greek theatre.