More feedback coming in on the comedy spec, so some tweaking and revamping is underway. Hope to be done with it soon.
In the meantime, I think these previous posts do a more-than-adequate job of summing up what a lot of writers, along with yours truly, probably experience and encounter during this process.
Enjoy.
Thank you. I’ll take that under consideration.
Knocked down, but not staying there
Not everybody’s going to like it
The great exchanging of two cents
Via a writing colleague, I recently found myself in the possession of a pair of scripts written by a pair of pros.
“Open one and read a few words and you’ll be in for the rest of the script,” I was told.
And you know what? They weren’t far off.
I only got a few pages in, but found the writing to be extremely vivid and descriptive. No problem at all in painting those mental pictures with a powerful brush.
My only complaint – all that dazzling wordsmithing got a little too distracting, making it slightly tougher to focus on the story. Nevertheless, I’m looking forward to reading both scripts.
But I totally got my friend’s point: the writing was exceptionally engaging. It really grabbed you and made you want to keep going.
Compared to it, my writing comes across as kind of dry and might even be considered sort of dull and lackluster. Not to totally disparage my own work, but these writers are professionals. I, as it has already been established, am not.
But reading these scripts and others like them are good reminders of what I and every other writer should be trying to do. You don’t want a stick drawing. You want a finely-crafted elaborate work of art.
Speaking from experience, this isn’t easy. It’s almost like learning a new way of writing. It requires a lot of work, nor will it happen overnight.
But don’t despair. The good news is you can start working on these improvements practically immediately.
Take the last scene you wrote. How does it read to you? Does it compel you to want to know what happens next? Feel free to tinker with it until it gets to that point. Then do the same with the scene after it. And the one after that. And so on, and so on.
Think of it this way – you want the reader to “see” the scene in the same way you imagined it. Therefore, your challenge is to write it so the actions, images and dialogue in it come as close as possible to matching your version AND that no other description would do it justice.
Reading these professional scripts was at first intimidating in a “I’ll never be able to write like that!” kind of way. But with a continuous effort and a lot of work, there’s no reason to think I couldn’t come mighty close.
Barbara “Babz” Bitela is a literary manager operating out of northern California, a “hired gun” editor for fiction writers, and hosts the Babzbuzz internet radio show “because folks were nice to me and helped me, so I’m trying to pay it forward, and believe me, I’m keeping it real.”
“We want voice on the page. We KNOW it when we ‘hear’ it.”
Her book Story of a Rock Singer is currently being adapted as a Broadway musical.
What’s the last thing you watched/read that you thought was incredibly well-written?
How’d you get your start doing representation?
I pitched a semi-retired agent named Ed Silver on a book I wrote. He was Lee Marvin’s manager and finance guy, also for James Coburn and many others. The guy’s ‘seen’ stuff, man – Hitchcock napping, for one. He loved my style and offered me a gig to take over and he’d mentor. We clicked big time. He’s Jewish, I’m Italian. As Sebastian Maniscalco says, “Same corporation, different division.” That’s us.
Is recognizing good writing something you believe can be taught or learned?
You for sure can learn it IF you want to. Here’s why – bad writing obviously sucks. It just does. How do you know that? By reading GREAT (not just good) scripts. I read so much so often I can now tell what’s going to go and what MAY go but here’s the rub: in the absence of money behind it, it may not matter. And I may love it and another may say “meh”. So pov does matter. So you can learn and pitch but Lady Luck is no lady: she’s a tramp in cheap shoes and she’s fickle. We press on because we believe in the story/writer we hawk. If it goes, it goes, if it doesn’t, well, I’ve had the benefit of “seeing” incredible “movies” and the only down side is, so few others will see that. THE WRITER however, benefits. Why? Job well done. And if you don’t write for the JOY of the craft, there’s no point. Write for the sale? That’s an industry sucker punch. I’ve learned to find great scripts and I’ve learned it can be like screaming in space once you do.
What are the components of a good script?
VOICE, RISING ACTION and TWISTS. What is voice: it’s a lot like porn – I know it when I see it but it’s hard to describe. Think of it this way: you open a novel, settle in and by page two you’re thinking “Ugh, this just sucks”, but you press on and by page ten you know it’s not the book for you so you donate it to Goodwill. It’s the same with a script. I once read a tv pilot by my client that I couldn’t read it fast enough. Why? I WAS DYING TO SEE WHERE IT WOULD LEAD. The action and characters were alive on the page. That is what makes a good script: I call it NARRATIVE TUG.
What are some of the most common mistakes you see?
Where to start? Typos, for sure. It’s a speed bump.
Wrylies. Just don’t. UGH! Makes me crazy. There’s only one time I’ve seen it used where it worked. ONCE. And that writer is a five-figure-income writer.
Novels posing as scripts. The writer MUST understand the economy of words and do VISUAL storytelling. Telling a story with pictures is a movie. Telling a story with talking is a soap opera.
Avoid using “ing” words – slows narrative, slows the readers eyes.
Avoid “very”. Just find what IT IS. Don’t say “very smart”, say “bright” – just pick! Not kidding. You’ll thank me. Rodale’s The Synonym Finder is invaluable for writers.
And never fall in love with your stuff. It’s gonna get cut.
What story tropes are you tired of seeing?
Well, many work. Some don’t. My favorite recently was probably in draft form: “Fire all phasers!” But instead he said “Fire everything!” Love it!
But I say write bad and cliché in the draft, leave it there, then go back and rewrite it.
Lots of folks say “Not my first rodeo.” I say “Not my first rocket launch.” Anything to WAKE UP the reader.
What are the three most important rules every writer should know?
I’ve got more than three.
-Don’t enter a script contest pitching a word doc.
-Don’t send a script unless invited.
-Don’t ask me what I think if you don’t want to know.
-Don’t go past 120 pages. I mean it. Try to stay around 100 if you can.
More rules? I think it’s just wise to do 12pt Courier font as it’s tradition. The Coen Brothers don’t use Courier. But they’re already famous, so when you’re famous do what you want. In the meantime, stick to tradition.
What do you look for when it comes to potential clients, both personally and professionally?
No dope. No booze. No drama.
Feet on the ground, and committed to spending tons of time doing what you love, regardless of the outcome.
My clients pitch themselves. They must. If that’s not for you, then I’m not the agent for you, and also, you’re in the wrong business.
Yes, the agent makes inroads, but you must pitch you and build relationships. When you do; AVOID using “I” and ask the person “What do you do, and how do you do it?” Ask about them. We’re people FIRST. That’s why I do Babzbuzz. People like me. They helped me. So I take what they tell me and mush it up with what I’ve learned, and talk about it on my show to try to help.
I’m a small company: I’m WGA.
Meh. Folks hang up on me all the time.
Why?
“Babz, love the script! Who’s funding?”
Crickets.
“Babz, baby. Call us back when you have the dough and I’ll show my client. He may want to star in it.”
EEEK!
What happened to love of story?
Hell, that left the building and moved to an island the actor/director owns. He’s got to feed his family too, ya know. So bring the bricks.
EEEK!
Lightning can and does strike. That’s what I do. I’m really a stormchaser who looks for folks with money who want to buy.
Readers of this blog are more than familiar with my love and appreciation of pie. What’s your favorite kind?
Oh man, you had me at the fridge door. Dutch apple. Key lime. Rhubarb when you can find it. And pretty much any clever use of chocolate.
After some thorough self-imposed analysis, the revising of the comedy spec is underway. It’s getting easier to spot trouble spots.
There’s one scene in particular that’s giving me some trouble. It’s a pivotal scene involving the main character and offers a revealing glimpse into his backstory. The problem was in figuring out how to best do that.
After much drumming of fingers, rubbing of chin, and a whole lot of attempts, a potential solution may have presented itself. It’s still in the development phase, but for now, quite workable.
One of the first things I learned about screenwriting was what each scene needs to accomplish: advance the plot, the character, and the theme.
Regarding plot, does the scene move things forward? Does it fall neatly into place in terms of how the overall sequence of events plays out? If you took it out, would it totally mess things up?
I’ve read a lot of scripts where something happens and I don’t know why. Maybe it’ll pay off later? Sometimes it does. Other times, well…
Another handy tip when it comes to advancing the plot in a scene: do it quickly. Get to the point of the scene as fast as you can, then get out. Don’t wait around. Just get out now. Too many times I’ve seen a scene drag on much, much longer than it needs to.
Regarding character, does each scene show them changing a little bit more from when they were first introduced? This doesn’t just apply to the main character. Every character needs to grow/develop. Wouldn’t it be kind of boring to read a story where nobody changes?
And tying it into the advancement of plot, every situation the character experiences should help move their own development along.
Which brings us to theme. The message of your story. This can be a little tricky.
Each scene should tie into the theme, or have it on display in some manner. I recently worked with a writer having trouble tying everything together. We discussed the story and the main character’s internal and external goals. What was the message they wanted to convey? Based on those discussions, we were able to come up with a theme that worked for both the story and as it applied to all of the characters.
One of my favorite examples of a theme in use is BACK TO THE FUTURE. Early on, Marty says “History’s going to change.” And boy, does it. We get a ton of set-up in the first act, and then everything does indeed change in the second act as all of those setups are paid off. Amazing.
Take a look at your latest draft. Does each scene advance the topics in question? If not, do you have a way to fix that so it does? The more you get in the habit of doing this, the easier it’ll get and the faster it’ll become second nature to do it all the time.
Once again, your stalwart author makes the necessary sacrifices so you don’t have to.
This time around, I had the misfortune of watching an extremely bad large-budget movie from the semi-recent past. It was painfully obvious that a larger percentage of the budget should have been diverted to hiring quality writers, rather than on everything else. A pipe dream, I know.
But trust me. It was bad.
What made it so bad, you may ask?
Oh, where to begin.
My biggest problem was that too much of the story felt glossed over, with vital elements explained in a very lazy and haphazard way, if they were even explained at all. It felt like they were trying to force events to match how they wanted the story to play out, rather than deftly setting things up.
Reasons why something would happen, or were supposed to have happened, seemed to have simply been thrown against the wall, and whatever stuck, that’s what they went with. Did it matter if it fit within the context of the story?
Nosireebob.
Once again, there were too many questions raised that were never sufficiently answered. When this happens, it simply takes away from the movie-watching experience. The only reason I knew the film had to have been around the midpoint area was because of its running time, and NOT because of what had transpired over the course of the story.
I could say I had a vague inkling of what was supposedly going on, but was just never sure, since the story was being told in a very sloppy and unorganized way. It irked me to no end to be see such terrible writing so prominently displayed. And apparently I wasn’t alone in my opinions. The film was a major flop at the box office.
So what silver linings can we extract from this pitch-black cumulonimbus that stole away just under two hours of my life?
-Write a story that’s easy to understand. Keep it simple. This doesn’t mean dumb it down. Keep us informed, unless withholding that information is absolutely necessary.
-Let the story play out organically. Don’t try to force it because that’s what you want to happen. It’s easy to tell when that happens, and it ain’t pretty. If you didn’t put in the effort to figure it out, why should we?
-Have things happen for a reason. “Because it looks cool” is not one of them. Would it drastically change things if it didn’t?
-Set up, pay off. If something happens, we want to see what happens as a result. Don’t leave us hanging. And counter to that, don’t suddenly spring something on us out of thin air. It reeks of desperation. Audiences don’t like that, either.
One of the things I always strive for in my scripts, be they big or small budget, is to respect the intelligence of the intended audience. That is one lesson I believe the writers of this abomination should have kept in mind.
Maximum Z 