Fortune Favors the Prepared

I enjoyed the Fresh Air interview with Hugh Laurie. I was struck by his story that he spent three days in a hotel in LA prepping for his audition for HOUSE.

Obviously Laurie knew that this was an important audition. But surely, after the first day of going over what can't have been more than a couple of scenes, he might have felt he had it all down pat. Instead he kept going.

I personally have a tendency to spread myself a little too thin. I like to finish things. Lots of things. I tend to be an ninety-five-percenter. My impulse is to get a script to where I'm pretty happy with it, and then write something else while I send the first one around.

And yet I know there's another level. I spent a year and a half polishing and reworking my comedy KIKI WILDER, because a producer kept asking me to rework it. And Lisa and I have spent a year and a half polishing and reworking our drama ALICE FOUND ALIVE, because I'm attached to direct.

And even there I know that once we have all our cast, there will be changes that suggest themselves.

Writing is rewriting.

I'm not saying rewrite endlessly. There is a point at which you've brought a script to the point where you are making things different without making them better; there's a point where you can legitimately say, "That's the best I can do right now." Only great notes or six months away can give you a better perspective. If you don't have a vision for how the script needs to be, then further rewriting will just cause the script to drift.

But still, there it is: three days in a hotel room for a couple of scenes. It paid off for him, dinnit?

Jiggedy Jig

I'm back at my desk after a week of WGC National Forum, a trip to Winnipeg to rebreak a script with a director, and a trip to New York to see my folks. Next week, off I go to Kuujjuarapik. (Any of you up there?)

The first thing I do for a serious rewrite is take the old script back down to index cards. That's the best way to see, feel, and reshape the structure.

(I do this even if it's my own script. Not that it should matter: I try to approach any script the same whether I wrote it or not. The good parts are good no matter who wrote them; the bad parts need fixing. The only real difference is it's easier to see the flaws in someone else's work.)

Then I'm going to write up the scenes I think need to happen (we talked about them at length) and start to fool around with the cards to see how they fit together...

Festina Lente

I'm working on my fifth screenplay and while I am still improving as a writer, the pace with which I write is too slow. I want to crank out three perfect spec pages every day, but it takes me all day just to write two pages and many times I get stuck. I tend to get bogged down trying to make the right choices. I could never write for TV with its fast pace. Could you shed some light on how you improved as a writer over time in quality but also in speed? Thanks!

I'd love to help, but I was always fast. If anything, I'd say I've had to learn to slow down.

I think I write fast mostly because I plan ahead, and then I don't overthink.

Planning ahead means making sure in advance that I know what the scene has to do. I have a beat sheet that tells me what has to happen by the end of the scene. So the only hard part about writing the scene from the outline is figuring out how to get into the scene.

Not overthinking it means I am not trying to write three perfect pages a day. If I'm writing a feature, I am trying to write at least five pages a day, and on a good day, maybe up to twelve. If I'm writing TV, I could easily hit fifteen pages a day, and I've written an entire half hour script in a day. (TV is faster because I know the characters and the template; there's less to invent.) Some of those pages may be what I hoped for. Some may not. But I'm probably not going to go back and even read them until I've written the whole script. Once I've written a scene, I won't go back and fuss with it unless something I write down the road specifically makes me think I need to add something.

I think it's inefficient to rewrite pages before you've written the whole script. Only once you've written the whole script do you know how the pieces fit. You may realize that a scene that was just not working is just not working because of something you didn't do right earlier. Or you may realize you don't actually need that scene. Why fuss with it until you can see it in context?

I would say that probably the shortest period of time I spend writing a script is writing the first draft. I spend more time thinking up the concept and creating the outline. And then I tweak.

Stop worrying and just write.

That's What You're Bumping On?

Had kind of a depressing meeting where my producer was picking on some plot points in the script that have been there for many drafts. One is a coincidence that we've always felt was okay because it doesn't help the hero.

As I told him (which is why I don't mind putting it in the blog), when a plot point that has always been okay is suddenly no good, it could be just the first time someone has noticed it, but it's often a sign that something else is broken. For example, if you're bumping on the coincidence, maybe the emotional through line of the story isn't working at that point; and then people start to look for something to pick on to explain what's wrong.

So now we're trying to crystallize what really isn't working. My guess is it isn't the coincidence.

"I'm Rewriting Your Script" -- Bang!

I've been asked to look at a script by a writer you've heard of, with an eye to possibly rewriting it for a producer. Producers often ask you for your "take" before hiring you to rewrite, to make sure your instincts line up with theirs. (It's always good to ask for a creative person's take before telling him yours; that way you get a clean, honest creative response. Also, while most crafty writers will execute your creative instructions, they'll do a better job if it's what they would do on their own.)

It occurred to me what I really want to do is talk to the original writer and say, "I've been asked to rewrite your script. As a courtesy, I thought you should know. And I'd also like to hear what you think the next pass on the script should do. What would you have done if you'd been hired? What did you see as the flaws in this draft?"

I have to admit I've never done that. I've rewritten a lot of scripts, but I've never asked the previous writer what they thought. And no one has ever asked me what I thought when they rewrote me.

Obviously we all have a lot of pride tangled up in our work, and it's hard to hear that someone else is mangling your baby. And when you read someone else's script, one supposes that the previous writer did what they were capable of, and if they didn't get it right it's because they didn't know any better.

But that's not necessarily true. I just turned in a rewrite on a script of mine. In each draft I've been working on clarifying the main character's motivations, which in the first draft were pretty murky. I always knew they were murky. It's taken several drafts to get them to the point where they're fairly clear. Usually when I turn in a pass, I can't tell you what's wrong with it, or I'd have attempted to fix it. But give me six months of perspective, and I can usually tell you what I'd do in the next pass.

On another script of mine that was taken off my hands, I knew the producers wanted something funnier, but I didn't know how to do that without betraying the characters as I saw them, and the tone I was going for. I gather the next writer just went funnier. A good friend of mine was kind enough to tell me he's rewriting that writer, and I suspect he'll nail it. He was even kind enough to ask to read my original draft.

If you knew you were being rewritten, would you appreciate a call from the new writer? Or would that be too painful?

If you are rewriting someone else, can you imagine contacting the original writer? Or would that be just too awkward?

Rewriting

Q. I sent my script to a dev exec for suggestions to improve it. She suggested a few changes.

The problem is I feel I stink at rewrites.

I fear I might create plot holes during the process of making the changes that she suggested to make my script better. How do I battle my fears and how I see that I don’t create plot holes in the process of rewrite?

Sometimes the best way to do a rewrite is to take the script back down to index cards, and then rebuild it.

Read through the script and write down each beat as succinctly as you can. Actually, it's even better if you don't go through the script, just write down each beat on an index card, from memory. I usually type my beats, print them out, and paste them onto cards.

Spread your index cards out on a table, and read the story through from the index cards. This is the stage at which you should be taking the notes you've been given. Any plot holes will be obvious: you won't see how the story gets from one index card to another.

This is also where, if you were brave and wrote your index cards down from memory, any beats that you forgot to write down will show up again: you'll remember oh, that scene where they argue about the pants goes there. If you don't remember a beat when you write down the cards, and you don't realize it at the card stage, then you have successfully cut an unnecessary story beat.

Now you write your cards back into the computer. You now have a revised beat sheet for your rewrite.

Then dump the beat sheet back into your script program (Final Draft or Screenwriter or Celtx or what have you).

Then start rewriting. If you have a scene that doesn't need to change, you can cut and paste it from your script. Most scenes will change a little. I usually rewrite them in the script, and then cut and paste them. Some scenes you'll have to write from scratch. Some scenes you'll just erase from the script because you don't need them any more.

When you're finished, voilà, you have a new script. And there won't be any plot holes, because you took an afternoon to rework the bones of the story on index cards.

Synopses

I have two screenplays going into the various Canadian and Quebec funding agencies for rewrite funding this round, which means I'm writing a whole bunch of auxiliary material for the applications: long synopses, short synopses, dramatis personae (!), "author's vision."

It's odd to write an "author's vision" of a screenplay; I mean, read the screenplay, eh? And if the author's vision doesn't come through, then it's not a very good one. And anyway, who cares what the author's vision is; it's what comes through in the screenplay that counts. On the other hand, this is for a rewrite funding application, so by definition the author's vision isn't coming through perfectly if the thing needs a rewrite. So the document helps the funders figure out what you are going for.

I hate writing synopses of a completed script. Just hate it. But I've found two ways to make the process work for me.

The first is to try to write the synopsis off the top of my head, without looking at the script. This gives me a shorter, snappier, clearer synopsis. It also tells me if the story is holding together. If there are spots where I can't remember what comes next, then the plot isn't as strong as it could be.

The second is to write the synopsis for the rewrite, not the synopsis for the current draft. I spent a couple of hours driving over the mountains to New York talking over a thriller synopsis with Lisa. We talked over what made sense and what didn't make sense. Some character motivations got changed. Some scenes got dropped. Some got changed. One may get added.

(There's really nothing like a long drive for working on screenwriting stuff, I've found. We've created a lot of our TV ideas in the car.)

I know it's easier to write a synopsis by blitzing through the pages and writing down what you see. That's certainly faster. But if you use every opportunity to come at your script from a different direction creatively, you'll see room for improvement. A synopsis can be a chance to strip your script back down to its story. Often, problems that weren't apparent when you're looking at the pages become obvious when you retell it as a story. You realize that once scene doesn't follow, or it's framed wrong, or it needs to be completely switched around.

I wonder what we'll do on the road to East Hampton?

Index Cards

I'm rewriting an old script of mine which, I discovered once I had some perspective on it, was trying to be both a romantic comedy and a coming of age comic drama, and wasn't doing either that well.

So the first thing I did was, write myself a short recap of the script, as much as possible without looking at the script. I had some new ideas for the ending, so I wrote them up too.

Then I cut it all up into index cards. That left a big hole in the middle. So I started writing index cards up to fill in the middle. Many of them were for scenes from the script. But they began to take on slightly different functions and meanings as I wrote them up anew. And sometimes they wound up in different places than they had in the script.

Then I took my index cards and wrote up a new step outline for the new draft. And ran it by Lisa.

I should really have pitched it to her out loud, ideally without looking at the cards. But she nicked the outline while I was getting a decent pen from the car and was halfway through before I got back. At least, that's my excuse to myself for not practicing what I preach.

Now I'm rewriting from the new outline. I think the new script is in many ways going to look like the old script. I'm not sure there will be that many brand new scenes. But the old scenes are going to focus better on the story, and the whole thing should hold up better.