Why Real Life Isn’t The Same As Drama

It’s one thing to experience or read about a dramatic event. It’s quite another thing to construct a screenplay with dramatic tension at its heart.

I just returned from a two-week family camping holiday in France. Along with my suntan, mounds of dirty washing, and a very crumpled tent, I also brought home a notebook bulging with new ideas for stories, inspired by things I witnessed along the way. I’m certain most of these ideas won’t survive closer scrutiny, but then again, one or two might turn out to be worth expanding into a synopsis or an outline. But besides reminding me that the supply of story ideas is more or less infinite, another thing this experience brought home to me again, is that there’s a big difference between ‘dramatic’ in its casual everyday sense, and Dramatic in terms of screenwriting.

Slices Of Life

During the course of the holiday, I drove a couple of thousand miles, stayed at five different locations, and encountered countless different people and situations. Too many experiences to remember. Which is what life is like. We don’t even consciously register most of what we experience, it just goes in one sense and comes out another. It’s events that cause an emotional stir that make an impression. Things that make you laugh, cry, shake with fear or anger. Like my encounter with an initially genial and helpful, ex-pat manager of a depressing camp site who, when I inadvertently disturbed him during his lunch hour to check out, turned out to be a sadistic psychopath, from whom I barely managed to escape with my life. In retrospect an amusing, if unnerving incident. ‘Dramatic’ in the everyday sense of involving fear, and perhaps even material for a scene. But not a screenplay, or even a premise for one, per se.

Real Life As A Starting Point For Drama
Observing the goings-on around me, say, at a swimming pool packed with sunburned tourists or in a huge French hypermarché teeming with gesticulating Gauls, I found myself fantasizing about who various people were, what their relationships were with people they were with, what would happen if… Which is where the writing starts. Simply transcribing reality into script format doesn’t make for a great screenplay. Just try it. At best, what you end up with is an interesting starting point from which to brainstorm a dramatic premise. Even reality–based films like Social Network, or biopics like The King’s Speech, are all carefully crafted dramatic works. Which means they engage the audience’s emotions, by putting characters in situations where they stand to lose something of great value to them personally.

What’s The Risk? What’s At Stake?

Most people’s lives (at least ordinary lives like mine, and most people I know), aren’t particularly dramatic, let alone cinematic. Take my encounter with the obnoxious camp site manager. We had an exchange of words, he pedantically tried to make me wait until his lunch hour was over before opening the gate and letting me drive out. We had something of a stand-off, in which I managed to stay calm because he was behaving like an indignant toddler, and then… yawn. It fizzled out, like most real-life encounters do. The worst that could have happened, was that I would have had to wait. But what if he had had my passport locked in his safe? Or what if he had been brandishing a knife? Or what if we were the only family there and the site were on an island? Or what if he had one of my kids locked in his house? Everyone experiences big emotions at some point in their life, and there’s a well-known list of 20 most stressful life events to prove it. However, for an emotional experience to become an dramatic premise, the character has to be forced to choose between losing something important to them or taking some sort of risk. In real life, most people will avoid taking risks if at all possible. In drama, the audience is engaged by the character’s decision to take the risk that they, the audience, would avoid at all cost, whether it makes them cringe, cry, laugh or shiver.

A Dramatic Event Isn’t A Screenplay
So, my experience reminded me that as a screenwriter, I need to be aware which sense of ‘dramatic’ applies to an idea for a story. When the news media refer to an incident as dramatic, they mean it’s fraught with emotion (usually fear of one sort or another, followed by relief or grief). But when you refer to a story idea as dramatic, you mean it’s constructed deliberately in a way that creates tension, poses a dramatic question, and makes you want to know what happens next. The bad news is that it takes a lot of hard graft to turn a real-life event into a workable premise for a screenplay. Which you then still have to write. The good news, though, is that you are surrounded by a potentially endless supply of events and characters, each of which could be the seed of a wonderful new story idea.

And no, my encounter with the narky proprietor didn’t yield any particularly great story ideas for me, although I can well imagine aficionados of the horror or thriller genres wanting to pick up the ball and run with it…

How To Get Your Short Film Produced

The Catch-22 of not being able to get your screenplay produced because nothing you’ve written has been produced yet, is immensely frustrating. But there is hope.

In the wake of the recent online release of Second Thoughts, a short film written by me and directed/produced by Trevor Walsh at White Tiger Films, I thought it might be helpful to share some of the insights I’ve gained in the process of getting a short script produced. There’s no magic bullet, and more often than not a breakthrough will come from an unexpected source, but the following are some strategies I’ve found practical and effective. Above all, these strategies have enabled me, as a screenwriter, to keep the initiative and avoid feeling like a victim.

See Second Thoughts on YouTube.

Enter Screenwriting Competitions
There are numerous competitions out there, some are free to enter, others charge a fee. Some give complimentary feedback, even from multiple readers. To find out about competitions and upcoming deadlines, check out Hayley Mackenzie’s calendar over at Script Angel. For a less UK-centric overview, register at Without a Box, to receive very regular updates about upcoming competitions and deadlines. You don’t have to win a competition for it to be helpful in terms of getting your film produced. Any mention in a screenwriting competition, even “quarter finalist” or “third round,” is evidence that your writing has enough quality to be taken seriously. Don’t forget to read each competition’s rules carefully, and make sure your screenplay is properly formatted and proofread before you send it.

Find A Director Or A Producer
There are literally thousands of directors and producers out there, hungry for good scripts. But they won’t find you unless you make your existence known to them. There are various ways to go about this. For example, last year, at the London Screenwriters Festival, I attended a forum in which director Olly Blackburn advised screenwriters with short screenplays to contact commercials directors, something that had helped launch his own career. Often these are directors with a huge amount of professional skill and experience, some of whom are looking to transition into directing shorts and features. It’s easy to find out online who directed a particular commercial, and most directors have their own websites or are on Facebook, etc. Another great way to find directors and producers, is to browse the catalogues of film festivals such as Raindance. Every short film screened will be listed and will include details of who directed and produced the film. Check them out online and get in contact with them. Another tried and trusted method is answering calls for scripts on online bulletins such as Shooting People. Which brings me to:

Have A Good Written Pitch Ready
It’s no good going out into the world with a script under your arm unless you know how to sell it. And we’re talking short screenplays here, so I don’t mean selling it for money. I mean knowing how to describe your script briefly and appetizingly. You basically need a good logline a brief synopsis, and an appealing one-page blurb. The one-pager can include one-sentence statements about things like genre, who the potential audience is, length of the script, production value (how many characters, locations, etc.). Any kind of brief information that will give the reader a quick and clear overview of what the project is likely to entail. Very important: Don’t bluff. If you’re not sure, don’t include it in the document. Here’s an example for a short script of mine entitled We Shall See.

Keep Yourself Motivated By Knowing Your Objective
Why do want to get your short screenplay produced in the first place? That may seem like a trite question, but it isn’t. Most short films, especially involving screenwriters with no produced material to their name, do not generate any income and are made either for very little or no money at all. Are you prepared to work on a short film production for free? That means taking notes from the director and producer, doing multiple rewrites, and so on, all for no pay. For most screenwriters without a credit, the primary reason for doing this kind of work for free, is to get that all-important first credit. Keeping that in mind, as well as the fact that most other people working on short films are in the same boat, can be an extremely good way of keeping your morale up. Lastly, acknowledge and accept beforehand that the majority of the people you contact will not get back to you. Not even a “Thank you for your email.” Don’t take that personally. There could be any number of reasons why a director or producer or anyone else doesn’t respond to your enquiries. It’s usually not because you’re a bad writer… Apart from anything else, it’s important to keep on writing new material. Once a script is ready to pitch, start pitching it and entering it into competitions, but also start writing the next script right away! What you write is your main asset. The more scripts you write, and the more feedback you get on your writing, the better you will write. The more people who read your material, the closer that first credit will come. It’s partly just a numbers game in that respect.

Concluding words
And finally this: Second Thoughts came about through a combination of the above strategies. Another short script of mine had been recommended to Trevor Walsh by script reader Jez Freedman, and when Trevor contacted me about that script, he asked me if I would write something else for him first. Which I did. So you see, you never know when opportunity will knock or how. The trick is to always be prepared for when it does…

That’s it for now, I have to get back to my scripts now…

What Is Your Screenplay’s Master Conflict?

An important aspect of any great screenplay is the idea at its core that informs every scene and unifies all the action. Here’s one way of thinking about this, inspired by Canadian sociologist, Gérard Bouchard.

Commentators on screenwriting use a variety of terms to refer to that core aspect of the screenplay that needs to be present in all the relationships and action in order to give the screenplay a sense of unity. You might call it theme, or premise, or main problem, or controlling idea. I even recently heard it referred to as the “game” at the centre of a story.

Master Myth and Derivative Myth
Canadian professor of sociology, Gérard Bouchard, describes a core aspect of a society’s identity as its Master Myth. This is a set of values, relatively stable over time, that describes the foundation of a particular society’s culture. It lies at the heart of a society’s social, political and cultural life, and provides a sense of unity and continuity. These basic values, which inform a society’s attitude towards big issues such as the economy, immigration, sexuality, religion and so on, remain stable over relatively long periods of time, but every generation or two they manifest in new ways, which Bouchard calls Derivative Myths. So, for example, the American master myth might be expressed in terms of individualism, freedom, enterprise, self-determination, and so on. In the past, the derivative myth was expressed as the need for government to ensure that individual citizens were able to enjoy freedom, whereas nowadays, the same basic values are expressed in a derivative myth of a more laissez-faire nature, in which government intervention is frowned upon. Same values, different expression.

Master Conflict and Derivative Conflict
For a story to work as a screenplay, it has to be seriously compressed. There’s only so much screen time to fill, and only so many scenes in which to do that. As a result, the more each element of the screenplay focuses on the same idea, the more coherent and focused the screenplay becomes. Using Bouchard’s idea as an analogy, I find it helpful to look at my writing with this question in mind: What is the Master Conflict here? What is the problematic issue all the characters must relate to in one way or another? What is the basic conflict that returns in various different guises, or Derivative Conflicts, in every scene? Here’s an example.

Towelhead
Alan Ball’s 2008 drama, Towelhead, is a film about a teenage girl, Jasira (played by Summer Bishil) discovering her burgeoning sexuality and the problems this causes her with the men around her. Early on, after Jasira has allowed her mother’s live-in boyfriend to help her shave off her pubic hair, the mother, Gail, spells out what the film is going to be about:

....................GAIL
...............(stares at her, sharply)
..........The bottom line is this, Jasira:
..........When Barry offered to shave you,
..........you should have said no. There
..........are right ways and wrong ways to
..........act around men, and for you to
..........learn which is which, you should
..........probably go live with one.


Gail's anger almost masks the primal vulnerability she hates that she's feeling right now. Almost.

So here’s my version of the master conflict under scrutiny in this film: Every individual struggles to regulate their instinctual sexual needs according to agreed social norms. These three elements, the individual, their sexual needs and society’s norms, form the ingredients for all the specific (“derivative”) conflicts that play out in this film. The main character, thirteen-year old Jasira, is confused by the conflicting messages she receives about her sexuality. She encounters older predators, in the form of her mother’s boyfriend and her father’s neighbour, who are unwilling or unable to regulate their sexual instincts. Their derivative conflict is that of a sexually active adult confronted with the temptation to abuse a trusting, naive child. Jasira encounters an opposite, severely repressive attitude from her conservative Lebanese father, who viciously condemns her sexual explorations, while giving free rein to his own in a new relationship. His derivative conflict is his struggle with his repressive cultural heritage and his individual need for a fulfilling sexual relationship. Jasira encounters a more progressive, but wary position in her father’s other neighbours, a heavily pregnant woman and her husband, whose derivative conflict is this: they are aware of cultural differences regarding sexual norms, but they refuse to go along with Jasira’s father in his shame-driven blaming of the victim.

Master Conflict: The Thematic Core Of A Screenplay
Articulating the master conflict at the heart of a story, both limits and liberates you as a writer. It literally delimits what the film is about, and creates a kind of early warning system, or a litmus test (pick your metaphor), ensuring that every element of the screenplay is relevant to the story at hand. It’s liberating, in that it sets boundaries, making it much easier to distinguish between essential and superfluous scenes, lines of dialogue, and so on. It keeps you focused, gives you a place from which to start when you need to brainstorm new ideas, and functions like a touchstone throughout the writing and rewriting of the screenplay.

How Well Do You Know Your Screenplay?

One of the keys to getting a screenplay written, is to discover what the screenplay wants to be, instead of trying to force it to be what you want it to be.

Sounds a bit like being in a relationship, doesn’t it? The more you acknowledge who your partner is, the more authentic and genuine your relationship with them can become. Or the more disastrous, of course, if your expectations or demands turn out to be unrealistic. The same with a screenplay. Is it Movie Of The Week rather than Oscar material? Is it art house rather than high concept? Is your short really a one-hour TV drama? Or is it even a stage play rather than a film? Acknowledging what kind of animal your material is, can be tough. Especially when it’s not what you expected. However, I think it’s essential to the process of getting the script written as well as possible.

Recognizing What You’re Writing
According to a recent episode of WNYC’s RadioLab, called Help!, Tom Waits apparently has very specific relationships with his songs while he’s writing them, as if they are entities outside himself with whom he has to deal. Sometimes the relationships are stormy and argumentative, other times he will negotiate with a song in order to get it down on paper. To me, this makes perfect sense. It’s the same as with children. Despite certain general similarities between all children, each individual child is unique. Even the same child can change dramatically without warning. The same applies to screenplays. Regardless of genre conventions, formatting rules and other limitations, each screenplay is a unique thing. Some stories seem to arrive more or less pre-packaged, complete with great visuals, intriguing character and neat little act breaks. Others need coaxing and kneading, like they’re unwilling to expose themselves to the harsh light of day. It’s only once you recognize with whom (or what) you’re dealing, that the writing really starts flowing.

What Happens When You Push Too Hard?
Unfortunately, it’s often impractical to spend the necessary time wooing a screenplay, letting your relationship with it gestate and mature sufficiently. Especially when you’re writing on assignment, and other people are waiting for your pages. But the alternative, pushing, is not necessarily the best thing for the script. Pushing can take on many forms, depending on the drive to push. You might be so enthusiastic about a draft, or conversely, so fed up with a story, that you send off a draft before it’s really ready to read. You might make do with second best because someone is breathing down your neck, or because a competition deadline is approaching. You might not know your screenplay well enough and be trying to squeeze a comedy out of a not so funny premise. You might not want to go through another round of feedback from script readers because you can’t face even more notes. However the pushing manifests, the end result is always the same: The script isn’t as good as it could have been, and there’s only one person to blame: the screenwriter.

Knowing Which Tactic To Choose
If a screenplay refuses to cooperate, it probably means you’re not listening to it. The screenplay feels offended and sulks. It’s a stalemate. Now you have a choice of tactics: Start shouting and screaming, issuing threats and throwing heavy objects around the room. Alternatively, you could offer the screenplay chocolates, sweet talk it into collaborating like a good screenplay should. Failing that, you can always walk away. Go and do something else, something which will take your mind off the humiliation of being held hostage by your own fantasy. Walk around the block, do the shopping, clean the kitchen… whatever it takes for your emotions to cool down, so you can go back to the screenplay, apologize, and ask in your nicest possible voice what it was trying to tell you when you were so rudely not listening.

When All Else Fails, Use Force Anyway

Another option, perhaps the most dangerous of all, is the Ulysses tactic. Ulysses, hero of Homer’s epic poem the Odyssey, had his crew members stuff their ears with beeswax and tie him to the mast of his ship and ordered them not to untie him no matter how much he pleaded, so that he would be able to hear the song of the sirens without following them to his death. (BTW, this is portrayed beautifully in Ben Stiller’s Tropic of Thunder, where Jack Black goes cold turkey tied to a tree.) Needless to say, you don’t need to be a Greek king to do this, you could achieve the same effect simply by agreeing a deadline and making sure there a whole lot at stake if you don’t finish by the deadline. The problem with this approach is, of course, that for some writers, this kind of pressure paralyzes the creative mind rather than liberating it.

Just as no two screenplays are the same, every screenwriter has to find the right way to relate to each script they write. The trick is, I think, to recognize and respect each script on its own terms, and allow it to show you how to treat it.

Five Terrible Reasons To Be A Screenwriter

A frank examination, based on traumatic, first-hand experience, of some potentially disastrous motives for being a screenwriter.

One of the staples of being a screenwriter, especially if you’re not on anyone’s A-list, is that you often work without knowing whether your material will ever be seen on a screen. To persevere under these circumstances, it pays to know why you’re doing it. Perhaps even more importantly, it makes sense to be aware when you’re setting yourself up for disappointments, by motivating yourself with unrealistic expectations. Here are five of my favourite wrong-headed motivations to persevere as a screenwriter. If they make you blush or fume, good. If you’re so past this already—like I clearly am, really I am, honestly—even better. Each terrible reason potentially points to a complementary, uplifting motive (the bright side). The trick is to redirect the emotions which are fuelling your misguided ambitions.

I Can Do Better Than That
This refers to the feeling you get when you’ve sat through, or zapped away from, yet another piece of generic, derivative, overly predictable filmmaking. The notion that you could do better, isn’t necessarily a bad place to start from, but it’s not necessarily true, either. The more I get to know about how films are written and produced, the less it surprises me that quite a lot of what gets made isn’t really that original. It’s not because there aren’t a lot of extremely talented people working in films and TV. Rather it’s because films and TV programmes are products made by commercial enterprises who are averse to taking risks and so prefer to go for the familiar. They are projects managed by people whose first priority is to keep their well-paid jobs. Oh, and I guess there are some talentless nitwits out there too, but they’re not the screenwriters…

The bright side: You don’t really know how your material will look once produced. So don’t moan about films you don’t like, rather, learn from them. It’s often much easier to pinpoint why a bad film doesn’t work than why a brilliant one does. Just articulating in as much detail as possible why a scene or story irks you, can give you some great screenwriting insights. There will always be lots more mediocre productions than amazing ones, so look at it as an abundant and free educational resource!

I Love Watching Movies
Because you’re a movie buff, doesn’t mean you know how to construct one yourself, even though that’s what it may feel like. Movies are deliberately and methodically constructed so they will appeal to as many people as possible, all over the world. Millions of people enjoy watching movies as much as you do, but only a handful of people can write great screenplays. Just because you feel you intuitively “get” how movies are written, doesn’t mean it’s true. Really well-made movies seem completely effortless and intuitive, precisely because of the talent and craft that has gone into keeping the structure invisible.

The bright side: If you’re serious about screenwriting, not only do you have to read a lot of screenplays, but you have to watch a lot of movies too. The more you learn about how screenplays are written, the deeper your appreciation becomes for great films. You not only get to watch your favourite films over and over (it’s called ‘research’), but you also come to realize what a special and privileged profession screenwriting is.

I Want To Get Rich
It’s amazing how prevalent and enduring the myths are about people selling screenplays to Hollywood for vast sums of money. It does happen, of course, but the majority of screenwriters around the world earn their living from a combination of gigs other than writing feature films, including writing for TV, theatre, corporate films, teaching screenwriting, script editing, and so on. My day job at the moment is translating subtitles… Yes, you can make small fortune in screenwriting, provided you start with a big fortune.

The bright side: Rich people are often miserable. But, joking aside, don’t give up the day job too hastily. If you’re not dependent for your livelihood on convincing someone to pay you for your screenplay, you’re much more at liberty to find and express your voice by writing what really fascinates you. A screenwriter desperate to be paid, is not necessarily a great creative sparring partner.

I Want The World To Know How Clever I Am
When was the last time you saw a film or a TV series and thought, ‘Wow, whoever wrote this, is really clever!’ Audiences are primarily after some kind of emotional experience, something they can consciously or unconsciously relate their own experiences to. No one (except perhaps other screenwriters) is in the least bit interested who wrote the script, much less what erudite or witty individuals they may be. In fact, just as with structure, the more ‘invisible’ the screenwriter is, the better their work.

The bright side: Writing screenplays requires a lot of very disciplined thinking and research. Whether that’s in terms of structure or subject matter. Plus, you’re always delving deeper and deeper into human motivations and weaknesses. And guess what? Wanting the world to know how clever you are is a classical flaw, which you soon learn to overcome (actually, only by about page 75 in your life, to be honest). Screenwriting is an inherently enriching and enlightening activity.

I Want To Be Famous
How many Oscar-winning movie stars can your local greengrocer name? Everyone’s heard of Bruce Willis, Nicole Kidman, and so on. How many directors do they know? They’ve probably heard of Steven Spielberg, or Quentin Tarrantino. Can they name any screenwriters? The typical answer to that one is: “I didn’t know movies were written.” Successful actors and directors can become global celebrities, successful screenwriters can become guests speakers at screenwriting conferences.

The bright side: In many spiritual traditions, the highest form of charity is an anonymous donation. How many people know who wrote Jaws? Or Raiders of the Lost Ark? (I confess, I had to look these up.) Screenwriters are generally spared the hell of celebrity limelight, but a beautifully written film can have a profound impact on viewers. That’s some fulfilment. Plus, even hugely successful screenwriters can visit Paris without being hassled for their autograph.

So, there you are, just a few simple thoughts from someone who has no authority whatsoever on the subject, but doesn’t let that deter him from pontificating from time to time.

Why It’s Good To Read The Screenplay First

Reading screenplays is essential to every screenwriter’s ongoing development, especially reading unproduced screenplays or screenplays of films you haven’t seen yet.

So many professional, successful screenwriters emphasize the importance of reading screenplays, that it’s a piece of advice worth taking seriously. However, I find that when I read a screenplay of a film I’ve already seen, I have to filter out the contributions of the director, the actors, the music, the set design and all the other elements that combine to create the movie-watching experience, in order to see what the script per se has to offer. Which is why reading screenplays of films you haven't seen yet, or which haven't been produced yet, can be enlightening.

Reading Movies You Love
Reading the screenplay of a movie you’ve enjoyed watching, is a bit like watching the movie again in your head. It’s a great way to identify keys moments and see how the screenwriter described them on the page, but what it doesn’t do is give you insight into the impression the writing would make before the film is made. One of my favourite films of last year, for example, was Noah Baumbach’s Greenberg. Although I love how the script is written, there’s no way I can imagine anyone other than Ben Stiller playing the part of Greenberg, with his brilliantly executed body language and inimitable delivery of the dialogue. Although reading screenplays of films you’ve seen can teach you a lot about style, dialogue, pacing, structure and so on, once you already have so many specific images, camera angles and cuts in mind, it’s harder to take the writing on face value.

The Professional Reader’s Experience
When you read a screenplay cold, with no specific actors or set designs, or soundtrack in mind, you experience what a potential director or actor or producer feels when they read a script for the first time. Does it trigger the imagination? Does the scene unfold with tension or humour? Are the twists unexpected or dramatic enough? How much is left to the actor’s discretion? Does the writing evoke distracting questions? It’s useful to take note of what works and what doesn’t in this respect, because your own material will be received precisely on these terms.

Watching the Finished Product
Sometimes a film will exceed the expectations evoked by the screenplay, sometimes it will disappoint, and sometimes the film is just what the script suggested it would be. But whatever your reaction to the finished product, it’s also an important source of information. You can now go back to the script and discover what it was about the writing that did or didn’t survive the production process as far as you’re concerned. Sometimes scenes will have been significantly shortened, sometimes it’s the camerawork that gives the scene added meaning, sometimes the acting doesn’t do justice to what you imagined whilst reading, and so on. What, specifically, was the difference between what was on the page and on the screen? These are all really useful insights to take back to your next rewrite.

Oscar Nominated Screenplays
Every year there’s a flood of great new screenplays on the web in the run-up to the Oscars. They’re all very recent films, some of which you may already have seen, but some of which you probably haven’t. If you want to find a ton of great screenplays to read, head over to chinokino and get reading!

A Screenplay Is Only As Good As The Idea At Its Heart

As film audiences become increasingly savvy and demanding, it’s more important than ever that screenwriters have something authentic and meaningful to say.

It’s that time of year then, willing or unwilling, you get swept along by the general wave of people evaluating the past year and looking forward to the next one. Of course, there’s nothing stopping you from doing this every day of the year, but somehow the symbolic nature of our calendar and the annual cycle of seasons and festivities seems to encourage this annual stock-taking. For me, this past year has been mostly one of writing short screenplays, of which a few have been doing nicely in competitions and receiving encouraging endorsements from script readers and fellow filmmakers alike. And the process of writing shorts has taught me a lot of things, not least of all the paramount importance of good ideas.

Quick and Dirty or Slowly but Surely?
It seems to me there are basically two schools of thought in this respect. On the one hand you have the “quantity first” school and on the other side, the “quality above all” folks. Either you believe that writing a lot of screenplays, regardless of their originality, inevitably leads to you writing your best possible material, or you believe that the only screenplay worth writing is one based on a killer idea. I’m increasingly coming down on the side of the people who advocate brainstorming a lot of ideas and finding the most suitable one before embarking on a first draft. “Suitable” can mean marketable or meaningful or both. And I think this is true for short scripts as well as features. I came across an old post on Christopher Lockhart’s blog, The Inside Pitch, which sums it up nicely. It’s from the beginning of 2010, and it features advice from Hollywood Exec Adam Levenberg. Among the tips Levenberg gives is the following:

Be willing to NOT move ahead to a screenplay after completing your beat sheet.

Some writers need to write 3-5 full beat sheets to find the idea they are excited about and that works. Not all stories are movies. Most aren’t. Yet some writers finish a beat sheet and reflexively jump into a first draft. Don’t. You’re better off writing twenty beat sheet outlines over the next year and waiting until [next year] to pick the best one to take to the next level (a first draft screenplay).

Beware of Your Talent

It’s that last sentence more than anything that caught my attention. Don’t jump into writing a screenplay before working out its essence and judging whether it’s worth the time and effort. This resonates with what I’ve written previously about the ten things to ask yourself before you start writing a screenplay, and with something I’ve heard Linda Aronson say a number of times: Talent can be a disadvantage. Because you love writing and you’re good at it, even a mediocre concept can start looking attractive if you let yourself get carried away. One of the most difficult things for a screenwriter, is recognizing that a particular story or concept isn’t good enough to do your writing talent justice. It goes against all your instincts to say: I’m not going to write this script because I can write a better one. It’s difficult for other reasons too, including the influence of people who insist that not writing a mediocre script is worse than writing it.

The Only Thing that Counts: Believing in Your Material
Of course, nothing is this black and white. There’s no one-size-fits-all approach to screenwriting. The point for me is, looking back on 2010, that I’m very happy to have achieved this insight. Regardless of whether any of my shorts and other projects are ever produced (statistically, I know most of them won’t be), it feels good to be completely at ease with the ideas at the heart of my work. Finding outlets for scripts is hard enough as it is, but at least this way I don’t have the added handicap of having to pitch material that I don’t genuinely believe in.

The Most Interesting Questions are the Unanswerable Ones

So that’s my little message of hope for the coming New Year: Take the time to find the really good, authentic ideas before you start writing the scripts, using whatever method works best. For me personally, that means constantly trying to push past questions I’ve seen dealt with far too often already in films, until I encounter awkward, uncomfortable questions to which I don’t know the answer. I know that’s a risky attitude (for one thing, I might turn out to be embarrassingly stupid) but then again, at least I’m constantly learning more about life...