scripts

Bulletin board back in action!

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It’s not your name in lights, but pretty darned close

Reinvigorated from their summer vacation, the hard-working staff at Maximum Z HQ has assembled the latest batch of projects from savvy creatives well worth your time and attention.

-Writer/director/producer Aaron Mendelsohn is offering a special 20% discount for his new ebook The 11 Fundamental Questions: A Guide to a Better Screenplay. Aaron is the co-creator and co-writer of the AIR BUD franchise (12 films and counting), has served as Secretary-Treasurer for the Writers Guild of America, and is currently a Professor of Screenwriting at Loyola Marymount University.

-Writing coach and author EJ Runyon runs the online writing service Bridge to Story. She’s launched the Little by Little crowdfunding project to help her build a vehicle that with your help will bring her services to those without internet access “anywhere in the lower 48”. You don’t “donate” to her Kickstarter; you book a coaching or story editing session and your funds go to the build!

-Screenwriter Phillip Hardy has launched his own script consulting company The Script Gymnasium. Phillip’s scripts have placed or won at over 30 film festivals and script contests, including Austin and Screencraft, and he also serves as a judge in the New York City Midnight Screenwriting Challenge. Seeking help to get your script in shape? He’s your guy.

-Writer-director Josh Mitchell runs Wicked Pissa Publicity, but has also worked on a lot of short films and is now running a crowdfunding campaign for his feature-length family film project HARRY HEAD, an original story about loyalty, family, unity and differences. Donate if you can!

-Screenwriters Chris and Jay Thornton have been busy the past couple of years with some script sales and developing a TV show with The Weinstein Company, but they’re now working on their debut feature CACTUS JACK, “an ultra-contained, thematically supercharged and extremely relevant gonzo micro-budget film.” A crowdfunding project is up, and you can view the NSFW proof-of-concept trailer here. Donate if you can! And as an added bonus, an interview with the Thorntons will post in the very near future.

Have a project of your own for which you’d like a little help getting the word out? Our email inbox is always open.

Several thoughts while you wait

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This was originally a clip of “Igor, would you give me a hand with the bags?”, but the greedy jackals at Fox have removed it. This photo proudly takes its place. RIP Mr Wilder

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

Am I getting better?

 

 

 

 

Thank you for being better than me

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Mine don’t look like theirs yet, but give me time…

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.

Just the push I needed

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What are friends for?

Notes are coming in for the comedy spec, and reactions are pleasantly positive. My always-reliable readers have provided some extremely helpful notes, including an across-the-board opinion about a key plot point.

A lot of what they had to say made some good sense and are really helping solidify the script into something more-than-decent.

While they had nice things to say about the script, each reader threw in an extra little tidbit in the form of comments directed at the script’s writer.

AKA me.

“These two lines of dialogue are an anomaly compared to the rest of it. I know you can do better.”

“Great story, but I’d like to see you dig deeper.”

And these are comments from experienced writers who’ve read some of my other scripts, so they know what I’m capable of. They’re not just saying these things in a casual, generic feedback kind of way, or because they’re trying to be nice. They really mean it, and I take what they say to heart.

I thought the script was okay to begin with, but after getting comments like these, it makes me want to try even harder.

When you’re in the process of putting a script together, you really dedicate yourself to doing a good job, and then try to do better with each subsequent rewrite. It’s how we improve.

But it’s also kind of tough to be able to get yourself past a certain point. You think you’ve done everything you can, but then you get a bit of a supportive nudge and your journey resumes.

It’s quite the confidence booster to know there’s somebody out there rooting for you (especially somebody without a vested interest in you). They want to see you succeed just as much as you do. So you buckle down and throw yourself into making that next draft even better.

End result – you have a stronger script and their belief in you and your abilities is confirmed. Wins all around.

And when the time comes and they ask me for notes on their script, I have a strong suspicion I’ll be able to do the same for them.

Plan accordingly forwardly

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Know what’s ahead and what you’re going to do about it

Now that we’re well into the second half of the year, I’ve been working on scheduling out how I’d like the time between now and December 31st to be filled up, both writing and career development-wise.

As you’d imagine, there’s a lot of writing involved. Finishing the rewrite of one script, polishing another, cranking out a first draft of yet another. I’ve done what I can to establish realistic and achievable deadlines – no more writing marathons for me.

Add to that the efforts to network and meet with other writers, both in-person and online, along with pursuing viable avenues to get the work out there, such as query letters and contests.

One important part of all of this is that, for the most part, I’m the one overseeing all of this. Nothing will get done or happen if I don’t make the effort. As for the things I have no control over, especially the career-oriented ones, I’ll do what I can to get the ball rolling and see what develops.

A friend saw my list of objectives and said “Good idea. Plan to succeed.”

Part of this stems from exactly that. I’m working at this so I can succeed. Being organized about what you want to accomplish helps you stay focused on getting closer to actually achieving it.

While you’re working on your script, you should always be asking yourself “How can I make this better?” Well, this also applies to working on getting a career going. How can you make it better?

–Keep writing. Your skills will improve and your number of completed projects will increase.

–Seek out connections. The internet is your greatest tool for networking with other writers and folks within the industry. Very important – be nice.

–Do your homework. Find out the necessary details as they apply to you and what you’re trying to accomplish. Whether it’s the best format for a query, if somebody’s contact info is still accurate, or which contest is a good match for your script.

–Commit. You know all the things you need to do and want to do. Now dedicate yourself to doing them.

All of this may seem somewhat overwhelming at first, but get in the habit of making it a daily effort – even just a little at a time – and the results will start to take shape.