outlines

First hard part’s out of the way

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Bit of a breakthrough for the action-comedy spec this week – I wrapped up the outline.

It’s done, but not totally done.

It still needs a ton of work, especially regarding the development/placement of several subplots, but the primary storyline is there, ready to be hammered into better shape.

Despite it all, I’m thrilled to have gotten here. There were many times over the past few months I’d get concerned (read: stressing out on a regular basis) I’d never figure things out.

But I stuck to it and eventually did, and am very happy with it.

Skimming through the whole thing in its current state, there are probably a lot of scenes and sequences that’ll get trimmed, cut, or drastically revised, but that’s expected. And that’s not even taking into account the aforementioned subplots.

I’ve written before about my astonishment at how other writers are almost assembly line-like regarding their output. It’s just not something I’m capable of, and the slow, slow progress for this latest project is just another example of that.

But I also realize that when somebody reads one of my scripts, they definitely remember that it’s mine – the story, the characters, the voice. If my taking the time to do that for each script means a smaller output than others, that’s fine by me. Same conditions apply this time around.

I was wavering between diving right back into this one or shifting to one of my two rewrites. I think I’m leaning towards the latter. I haven’t done as much with those two the last couple of months, so it’s probably better to let the new one simmer and work on those.

Then when I’m ready to jump back into this one, it’ll be with a mostly-all-there outline (and most likely a lot of “This is better than I remember” and “I don’t remember writing this”).

Seeking the un-familiar

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Some good progress on the action-comedy outline this week. A little further into the second half of Act Two. Act Three still looms, but it’s getting there.

The biggest challenge has been coming up with scenes, sequences, and scenarios that – as far as I’m aware – haven’t been done before, or are at least a new take on a familiar concept.

Not as easy as you would think.

The last thing I want is a reader to say “That’s just a ripoff of _____”. I don’t like it when I see it in somebody else’s script, and I definitely don’t want that to happen when they read mine.

But a new spin or something totally unexpected that gets the needed result? Yes, please. I love when I’m able to do it, and really appreciate it when I see it in somebody else’s script.

This is most likely why this outline is taking longer than expected – a significant percentage of this is just me figuring stuff out. There has been a lot of jotting stuff down – numerous pages of ideas, many of which will most likely not be used, but I’d rather have that than not enough.

A pleasant side effect of all this churning out of ideas has been the addition of a few inspired solutions out of/through a few story issues. Nothing major, but enough to help keep moving things along. Still ironing out the details.

Going this whole process and filling in all these blanks remains the biggest challenge. But I’m fairly confident once all those blanks are filled in, going through and fine-tuning (along with the inevitable continuous rewriting) what’s there will be much, much easier.

Start with the ending, work backwards

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Working on actual pages for the action-comedy spec has been quite an experience.

Up until a few days ago, I was writing only what I had for each scene in the outline, focusing primarily on “what’s the conflict here?” and “does this move things forward?”

However, two things kept nagging at me.

The first was that I got to what the outline lists as around page 40 or so, meaning just a few more pages to that page 45 twist. Except it’s actually on page 30, so more fitting for an end of the first act.

That leaves me with two choices: stick to the outline as it’s written, or come up with additional scenes to flesh things out. The most likely plan of action is to adhere to the former, work my way through the whole thing, then go back and apply the latter.

But that leads me to the second issue: I haven’t finalized exactly what the ending is. Maybe a more appropriate phrase would be “I have a few ideas for what it could be, but haven’t fully decided”.

Don’t get me wrong. I didn’t go into this with no ending. It’s just a little vague, and solidifying it would probably be the best course of action.

As much as I would love to keep moving forward with pages, there may be a short pause while I figure out what all of this is working up towards and then reverse engineer my way back to where I am now, or possibly even all the way back to the beginning.

This is still a first draft, so anything and everything is worth trying. There’s one idea in particular that’s especially appealing, so I might tinker around with that and see what happens. Setups and payoffs are already being considered.

Also important to keep in mind – the ending has to really emphasize/showcase my protagonist’s arc, and how she’s changed. Everything she endures over the course of the whole story has to come to the perfect conclusion. Challenging, but not impossible.

I was looking through all the notes I’ve been jotting down for this story, and there are a lot more than I remember. Some I don’t even remember writing, so it’s very cool to have all this material from which I can pick and choose what works best and where it could potentially factor into the story.

It may even be time to break out the index cards, and that’s saying something.

Not writing? What does that mean?

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Had a great catch-up call with my manager this week (still gives me a charge to be able to say that).

As part of our respective “here’s what I’ve been up to”s, mine included work on the two rewrites and the slow but steady progress of the first draft of the action-comedy spec.

He responded with “That’s really great. Some of my other clients will say ‘Oh, I haven’t written anything in two weeks,’ so I’m really glad you’ve been keeping at it.”

Keeping at it? To me, any day where I don’t write anything is a wasted opportunity. Even if it’s just one page, a few scenes in an outline, or just a few attempts at a better logline, I’m one of those writers who has to write something. It’s hard-wired into my system to do so.

I’d rather write something already knowing I’ll have to totally redo it as opposed to not writing anything because “I’m just not feeling it”.

My manager added that ideally each of his writing clients would have an arsenal of scripts (at least 3-4) ready to go, and not be “some one-trick pony with a single script to their name. What do I say if a producer asks ‘What else have they got?’ and the answer is ‘nothing’?”

Quick aside about writing the action-comedy spec: It’s going to need a ton of rewriting when the draft is done, and the outline remains incomplete, but writing a few pages a day has been exhilarating. I’m doing my best to keep each scene tight and to the point. Tempting as it is to go back and tinker, I’m forcing myself to stay focused on moving forward. Fixing and fine-tuning is what every following draft is for.

A lot of writers I know are very productive and prolific, some even cranking out a few feature scripts a year. I’m definitely not one of those, but still happy with my output.

I find it astonishing that a writer wouldn’t feel compelled to write. Something. Anything. Not that you should be chained to your desk until you see the results, but you get the idea.

I’m one of those writers who can’t not write. I love doing it, and to paraphrase Dorothy Parker, especially love having done it.

Heed the words of Mamet

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A few more pages added to the first draft of the action-comedy spec. So far, so good.

With a little something new added to the mix.

Each scene has been an exercise in “write it, go back and tighten it up.” One scene that was originally 1 1/2 pages was trimmed down to around 3/4ths of a page without sacrificing anything.

What really helped was really adhering to writer David Mamet’s guideline of “Get in late, get out early”.

I’ve written before about my tendency to overwrite, and the scene in question was no exception. I initially put it together how I thought it should be, but it didn’t start as late it should, and took too long to get out. So anything that didn’t absolutely need to be there got cut.

The result – a tighter, faster scene that makes the same point.

As an experiment, I attempted to write the next scene with that mindset from the get-go. Start late, get out asap. Even with a little editing and tweaking as it was being written, this one also turned out nicely.

I’m sure every scene after this won’t be written as smoothly, but it’ll definitely help, possibly even speed up the process. Possibly.

Another detail that’s been incredibly helpful is to just write what I have in the outline for each scene. Nothing extra. It’s getting easier to resist padding it for the sake of padding.

A variation on the Mamet quote could be “Get in late, get to the point, move on to the next scene”.

It’ll definitely take some time to adjust since this is the way I’ve written for so long, but I like the results so far. Will do my best to stick with it from here on out.