Just the right size for enjoyment at your convenience
Busy times continuing, so just a few items worth mentioning.
-Good progress as the November writing project continues. Closing in on the end of Act 2, and with a few days off next week, hoping to steamroll my way through Act 3 and wrap up the first draft. Still averaging about 2 pages a day, which isn’t necessarily because I’m not very productive, but partially due to…
-Been very busy the past couple of weeks giving notes on scripts written by writer pals kind enough to do it for me. Everybody’s patience is much appreciated.
-In the early discussion stages of helping out on 2 potential projects. Both feel like they’ll really push my creativeness to the limit. Always nice.
-Ran the Golden Gate Half this past Sunday. 1:56:36, including a lot of uphill on both sides of the bridge and a light drizzle during miles 8 through 11. Also nice.
-My daughter, the illustrious Ms V, turned 13 this week. The next few years are going to be interesting, to say the least. Wish me luck.
Have an excellent weekend, and make sure to get some kickass writing done.
Getting a little tired waiting for you to write yourself.
So how’s your November writing project coming along?
Making the progress you were hoping for? Maybe you’re producing a number of pages above and beyond what you were expecting? Or are you feeling trapped in a morass of agony and frustration because the words just won’t cooperate?
No matter what your output, good on you for keeping at it. Only 20 days to go!
For the sake of this discussion, let’s say at month’s end you have a finished draft. Most likely a first draft.
How would you rate it? Good? Bad? Somewhere in the middle? Or, if you’re like a lot of writers, you’ll label it “okay, but needs a lot of work.”
And you know what? That’s totally cool.
That’s the point of the first draft. Don’t worry about if it’s perfect or not. It’s not. But it is helping you lay down the foundation for your story so you can spend each consecutive rewrite fixing any and all things that need to be fixed.
And there will be a lot of them.
Again, still cool.
Some writers consider just writing the first draft as the biggest obstacle. You’re literally creating something out of nothing. Compared to that, every subsequent draft gets a little easier. You might even be surprised how many new ideas you come up with it as you go along.
The first draft is indeed a necessary evil. At times it probably feels like a neverending slog, but once you actually do finish it, the hard part’s out of the way. All your initial ideas are now assembled into what may or may not resemble what you’re trying to create. It may not be anywhere near the point you want it to be, but you’re definitely better off than when you started.
Don’t just embrace the opportunity of getting through the first draft. Grab it with both hands, hold it tight, and run like hell.
“Hmm. How about Mrs Bates kills Marion while she’s running through the sprinklers? Nah.”
Based on what I’m seeing on various social media outlets and assorted online forums, a lot of screenwriters, including myself, are taking part in the self-imposed project of cranking out an entire script by the end of November.
I think it’s great that so many writers are taking it upon themselves to accomplish this. It definitely helps you establish a kind of rhythm or pattern or whatever you want to call it that you can incorporate into your writing process the other eleven months of the year.
A few months ago, I’d originally set a personal goal of having this draft of the low-budget comedy done by the end of the year, so that’s what I’m shooting for. At the rate of approximately 2 pages a day, there’s no reason it couldn’t done by or at least around Thanksgiving, which would be nice.
What’s also proving to be very helpful is that because this is a first draft, which means it will most likely suck (as first drafts often do), and require the requisite inevitable extensive rewriting, I’m not constantly fretting over whether a scene or a line is perfect. I might spend a minute or two on it, trying alternate takes, but I get it out of my system and move on to the next scene. For right now, whatever I write down works.
It’s a very liberating sensation, and removes a lot of that “I have to get it done!” pressure.
Also good – setting a realistic goal. A lot of writers post updates like “Only 12 pages today. Will try to do better tomorrow.” My at-least-2-pages-a-day quota seems kind of dinky in comparison, and while I wish my output were higher, you gotta do what works for you. My schedule also plays a factor. I only have so much time to write, especially during the week, so I figure I can only produce so much in this timeframe, and take it from there.
What it all boils down to is that no matter how much or how often you’re writing, the important thing is that YOU ARE WRITING. Don’t stop, and definitely try to keep up the pace once the calendar changes to December 1st.
I don’t mind the orange robes or the incense, but no way am I shaving my head
As has been well-documented round these parts, I recently entered my western in two contests. One includes feedback as part of the entrance fee, the other gives it as an option.
I don’t usually go the feedback route when it comes to contests, but it had been recommended, so I bit the bullet and opted to do it.
You know that nervous feeling you get in the pit of your stomach while you’re waiting for some kind of potentially life-impacting news? That’s exactly what I was experiencing. Despite my confidence in the script, plus positive comments from friends and trusted colleagues, the butterflies were still taking up residence in my mid-section.
No matter how much I tried to redirect my concentration on working on the low-budget comedy, that nagging thought about the contest feedback would not go away.
What if after all was said and done, the general consensus was that the script sucked and I’d wasted all that time and effort for nothing? Sometimes there’s nothing as powerful as a writer’s self-doubt. It can be downright crippling.
Then the first email came in. If I’d been hooked up to a heart monitor, the thing would have blown a fuse in trying to keep up.
The notes were very positive. Some intriguing comments about what the reader thought needed work, but they seemed to really enjoy it. Possibly even a lot, which was extremely reassuring.
The way I see it, if the reader isn’t gushing over how perfect and wonderful the script is, then I figure there’s not much chance it’ll place, let alone win. Turns out I’m cool with that. While it would be great to win, this is still a pretty solid result.
Two days later, the next email came in. Oh jeez. All those positive feelings I’d reestablished vanished in a puff of smoke. Here we go again.
But much to my surprise, these notes were on par with their predecessor. Lots of positive things to say, plus some suggestions about potential fixes, plus a few things the reader didn’t catch that I thought were fairly obvious, or at least hadn’t been an issue before.
These notes also included scores in 16 categories. Out of a potential 10, I got 2 8s, 2 10s, and the rest were 9s, which was fantastic. Final score 135 out of 150. Not perfect, but still – they seemed to like it, and nobody’s saying, “You suck! Give up now!” Again, do I think I’ll win? Not likely. Place? Maybe. But right now, that doesn’t seem important.
This whole experience definitely feels like a “face your fears” kind of thing. I know I can do this, and each draft really does help me improve. I was psyching myself out about how I’d do, and ended up actually doing better than expected. That’s pretty good. And since each set of notes had similar things to say about a particular part of the script, I have plenty of time to work on making those fixes before the deadlines for more high-profile contests like PAGE and the Nicholl. Also pretty good.
But most of all I really like the fact that now I can finally put aside thinking/worrying/obsessing about these contests with a little more confidence in my abilities and get back to focusing on developing my other scripts*.
*I’m taking part in the “write an entire script in November” project, but I admit to having had a bit of a head start by working on the low-budget comedy, which was already around the halfway point. But getting this draft done by the end of the month would still put me ahead of schedule.
-My writing chum Justin Sloan, who’s interviewed me as part of his Creative Writing Career book series, has launched the similarly-named Creative Writing Career podcast. A great listen for creative writers interested in several fields, including screenwriting, books and video games. Highly recommended.
I posted this just about a year ago, and after recently receiving some very supportive and encouraging script notes, think it’s still relevant.
“Am I getting better?
One of the sad truths about trying to make it as a screenwriter is that it’s an extremely frustrating process.
On certain days, the frustration feels like it extends to the uppermost part of the outer edge of the stratosphere. To the nth degree.
What is it about screenwriting that people who don’t do it think it’s easy? If you’re reading this, it’s more than likely you’ve given it a go, or at least know somebody who has, so you know full well that it most definitely is not.
We even try to warn those who think hammering out a first draft in a few weeks is a guaranteed million dollar paycheck. This is a long and arduous road, we say, but they don’t let that stop them. A legion of the truly unaware who will discover the scary truth soon enough.
Those of us who are fully committed (an apt phrase if ever there was one) finish the latest draft, then edit, rewrite and polish it so many times it enters well into double digit territory, hoping our writing and storytelling skills are improving with each new attempt.
But how do we know if that’s even happening?
We ask friends and trusted colleagues for feedback. We pay for professional analysis. The script gets reworked yet again.
We hope this newest draft is light years ahead of all of its previous incarnations in terms of quality, but sometimes it’s tough to be able to recognize if that’s the case. At least for me, anyway.
Whenever I send somebody a script for critiquing, I always say “Thanks for taking a look. Hope you like it.”
I know the script isn’t perfect – maybe even far from it, which is why I ask for help. Part of me knows it’s good, but can be better. It’s being able to identify the latter that gives me trouble. I’m so deeply embedded in a story that it’s tough to step back and be objective. Maybe I can not look at it for a few weeks, but even then it’s tough to look at it with fresh eyes.
Follow-up notes will tell me what they liked and what they feel needs work. There will be a fair mix of stuff I should have already figured out and some “How could I have missed that?” surprises.
So back I go into rewrite mode, hoping for improvement for both the material and myself, still not knowing if that improvement is there until I undergo the entire process all over again.
Maximum Z 