Grubby furniture

I love it when I’ve finished a script for the first time, not necessarily the point when I type THE END for the first time; but that point when the first draft is properly finished. The point when it’s beautiful and it’s pristine. It’s something I’ve crafted, like an exquisite piece of furniture … only one about killer elves or something.

I love that first draft, the one I’ve taken extra special care to make sure all the joints fit and the drawers and secret compartments open smoothly, the one where it all just works and feels like one seamless piece of art.

Not all first drafts, obviously. Some of them are appalling piles of poo which aren’t fit to line even an Argos chest of drawers. Some of them I look at in rising panic as I realise I’ve just created the perfect evidence to prove the theory ‘I can’t fucking write’. Random bits of wood which are badly cobbled together to form hideously ugly furniture with no apparent use or function. The kind of thing you have no choice but to burn lest anyone lays eyes upon its mangled nastiness and is immediately struck blind and brain numb.

I apologise, by the way, I’ve no idea why I’ve started using furniture metaphors. I guess that’s just the kind of thing which happens at midnight on a Sunday.

The first draft (which may well be the eighth time I’ve gone from page 1 to page 110), the pure draft, the one which is MY idea. Mine. This is what I meant, this is what I wanted to write. This is the genius which has been bubbling in my brain for quite possibly days … the pristine draft before the notes arrive.

The notes which point out it makes no fucking sense.

Actually, those notes I don’t really mind. The kind where people point out the main character disappears on page 50 and finally turns up on the last page, having spent the intervening time stuck in the express lane queue at Tesco. Those are good notes.

Then there are the bad notes. The ones which revolve around expanding someone’s part because someone else wants to sleep with them. Or the nonsensical ones like:

“What if the protagonist is a kettle?”

“A talking kettle? Bit weird, but I suppose it could be a metaphor for–”

“No, not a talking kettle. What the fuck are you on about? There’s no such thing as a talking kettle. Just a kettle. Make the hero a kettle”

“Right.”

“Don’t look at me like that. Mother used to look at me like that.”

“Yeah. I’ve got to go and … I’ve just got to go.”

At which point you just make the changes requested until he loses interest, sacks you or gets arrested for trying to rape hamsters.

But the notes I really hate, the ones which make my heart sink, are the ones which are perfectly reasonable but just different. They don’t make the script better, they don’t make it worse, they just make it different. The ones where you realise the director and/or producer isn’t really imagining the same project as you.

“Ah, so when I said I wanted to write a biopic of Muhammad Ali; you thought we were making a heist film set in Vietnam?”

These notes upset me, I hate having to take the chainsaw to my chest of drawers, hack out the bits people just don’t like and replace them with new bits. No matter how much I smooth the edges down or patch the gaps … I can still see the join. When I read the fourth or the fifth draft (which may well be a thousand times better than the first) I can still see all the joins, all the bits which are no longer there.

To me, my script now looks grubby – as if I’ve written it in pencil, continuously rubbed it out and started over and over again. There’s no white space any more, it’s all grey.

Or gray.

Helpfully, my spellchecker thinks both of those spellings are right. OH TECHNOLOGY, YOU FECKLESS WHORE; TELL ME HOW TO SPELL LIKE A SIX YEAR OLD, GOD DAMN IT!

You know, I’m pretty certain I had a point when I started this.

Maybe it was that I prefer my first drafts to my final drafts, even when the final drafts are manifestly better – they just seem so … dirty.

It’s not much of a point, but I’ve been working for 17 hours and it’s all you’re going to get.

Oh leave me alone.

Unspoken dialogue

Every now and then I imagine I’m Steve McQueen.

Not in a ’stealing a motorbike, out-running the Nazis and failing to jump over barb wire fences’ kind of way … although, put me in a fast car with a long bonnet and I inevitably hum the theme tune to ‘Bullitt’ … but no, every now then when I’m re-writing a script I remember a story I once heard about Steve McQueen – apparently, so the story goes, the first thing he did when looking through a script was to cross out all the dialogue he felt was unnecessary.

A wise move I feel. Frequently, on a first draft, I include loads of dialogue which could easily be conveyed by a look or a glance. People, particularly friends, often communicate without actually saying anything and it’s a great way to reduce the length of your script without actually cutting anything.

The problem is, how do you convey the exact meaning of the removed line with a few words which describe the expression on an unseen person’s face?

For example. If you take this random shit scene:

COLIN
Stuart!

STEVE
You what?

COLIN
No, not Stuart ... Simon?

STEVE
Are you fucking kidding me?

COLIN
Shit, sorry. Erm ... Sam? Sanjay? Sarah? Steve!
Steve McQueen! Hey!

STEVE
What the fuck do you want?

COLIN
Can I have an autograph?

STEVE
No. Fuck off.

COLIN
Right.

And you cross out all of Steve’s dialogue, you get:

COLIN
Stuart!

COLIN
No, not Stuart ... Simon?

COLIN
Shit, sorry. Erm ... Sam? Sanjay? Sarah? Steve!
Steve McQueen! Hey!

COLIN
Can I have an autograph?

COLIN
Right.

Which makes no fucking sense. Adding in action lines to describe Steve’s expressions gives you:

COLIN
Stuart!

Steve frowns.

COLIN
No, not Stuart ... Simon?

Incredulous, Steve stares at Colin.

COLIN
Shit, sorry. Erm ... Sam? Sanjay? Sarah? Steve!
Steve McQueen! Hey!

STEVE
What the fuck do you want?

COLIN
Can I have an autograph?

Steve scowls.

COLIN
Right.

Hmm … which actually works quite well. Damn, this is a pretty poor example. Although, ‘Steve scowls.’ is a fairly ambiguous statement; you can scowl in anger, scowl in confusion, scowl in something else I can’t think of with everyone fucking talking at me and the TV on.

Seriously, why am I writing this fucking post in the lounge?

Anyway … maybe, for some completely unknown reason, it’s vitally important to get across the specific meaning of a scowl. Don’t ask me why, I’ve no fucking idea. It just is, okay? Obviously the whole film hinges on this one scowl.

On a more serious note, I have had actors ask what their characters are thinking during a particular scene and it’s handy to be able to specify what a particular reaction means without loading your dialogue up with exposition.

STEVE
I really am rather miffed at your inability to remember my name,
because I'm rather famous and should be instantly recognisable.
You cunt.

I also remember Aardman saying they wrote dialogue for Gromit in all the Wallace and Gromit films so the animators could get the expressions right. I think it’s a good idea to specify exactly what the unspoken dialogue is since it helps with the read, the audience will be able to decipher the actor’s expression and body language and it steers the actors towards getting the right meaning across. But how best to go about it?

Personally, I’ve opted for just writing the dialogue in the action lines:

Steve scowls - no. Fuck off.

Again, this is a particularly bad example, but there you go. I’m tired.

I have no idea whether or not this is considered correct or incorrect format; but I do know no one’s ever complained. An actor may choose to express the words in a different manner, that’s up to them. The point is the meaning should be clear in the script.

Some people will tell you putting dialogue like this in the action lines is an unfilmable. Those people are of course completely fucking wrong. Describing the intent behind an expression is not unfilmable since actors can pull faces and cameras can be pointed at them. It only becomes an unfilmable when there’s absolutely no fucking way to deduce the words from specific face movements:

Steve scowls - maybe Maria had a point back in 1979 when she set
fire to Elton John's wig? Although the thing with the alpaca
was just wrong.

But that’s another post for another time when I’m feeling less likely to kick a hole in my computer at the memory of random fuckwits telling me it’s unfilmable when I describe an actress as angry or scared as if people are incapable of conveying such complex emotions.

And don’t get me started on the mongo-fuck-loons who bandy ’show don’t tell’ around as if they actually know what it means.

Fuck this shit, I’m going to bed.

I’m all annoyed now.

Gutted

So I’m working on this treatment at the moment and it’s all going well, I know what I want to write and am making good progress … but there’s little nagging thought: I’m missing a couple of scenes.

Basically, there are scenes I want to include between a guy and a girl which I haven’t found space for yet; and every time I look for space I can’t find it because each scene moves logically and seamlessly onto the next one. I could randomly stick them in, but that’s not screen writing – that’s just a fucking mess and my number seven complaint about bad scripts: if the scenes don’t flow into each other, it’s not a movie – it’s just a random collection of scenes.

So there’s no space for these scenes, which I assume means they’re not important because it’s not a romance and the girl is neither protagonist, antagonist nor love interest. As eminent brain care specialist, Gag Halfrunt might say: she’s just this girl, you know?

I leave out the scenes and I carry on, ploughing steadily through the treatment towards the end of act two when … oh shit.

I’ve reached the point in the treatment where I need to end act two (somewhere on page 8, if you’re interested – this is based on 1 page of treatment = 10 pages of script or screentime) and there is no way to hit the planned end of act two.

Did I say ‘Oh shit?’

I did?

Marvellous.

But hang on, maybe this isn’t a bad thing? Maybe there’s a whole new way to end the second act which either still leads into the planned third act or, even better, leads to a completely new third act which trumps the old one and immeasurably improves the story?

No.

Bugger.

As far as I can tell, the best that can happen from here until the end is it will ramble on for a bit and then stop. Not exactly thrilling.

So what’s gone wrong? Why have I come out of the dense thicket of act two in the wrong place? Why can’t I see the finish line, the prize, the treasure … the end?

Obviously, it must have something to do with those scenes between the girl and the guy – something about the things I wanted them to say to each other must steer the guy towards the correct end of act two. But if that’s true, which I suspect it is since it’s beginning to dawn on me the girl embodies the reasons the guy is making the wrong decisions, then why don’t they fit anywhere in the story? Why is the sequence of scenes seamless without the vital scenes needed to keep it on course?

And there’s the answer.

The girl keeps the guy on course, and therefore the story too. Without her input, he’s making the wrong decisions and will continue to make the wrong decisions until the film runs out of time and just stops. Now I know this, I can trace the story back to the point where it goes wrong. Now I can see half of the seamless scenes are actually seamless in the wrong direction.

Bugger.

Oh, I said that did I?

Fuck-toggle?

I’m pretty sure I’ve never said that before.

So where does that leave me? It leaves me leaning on the delete key and rushing perilously back towards page 4 and the point the story began to meander. It does still cross the mid-point at the bottom of page 5 and for a moment I think I maybe able to stop the word-slaughter there, but then I realise it crosses it in the wrong direction so all that has to go too.

Back to page 4.

Arse-phlegm.

I, like the treatment, am gutted.

Screenwriters’ Festival Launch (again)

So last night I went to the second launch night for this year’s SWF and I’ve got to say the evening was a bit of blur … not because it involved any kind of great rampage on my behalf  (it’s kind of hard to get that effect with a cup of tea and a diet coke)nor was it bewildering, star-strucking (which I know isn’t a real word – but it should be) or fast moving … no. Last night ws a bit of a blur because I forgot to take my glasses.

I’m new to the whole glasses wearing game and rarely remember to take them anywhere. In fact, I wear them so infrequently I often forget I actually wear glasses at all and sometimes spend weeks at a time wondering why the world is out of focus. So even though we (me, Piers, Michelle, Jason, Helen and Elena) were sitting on the second row (which Piers complained about) the people on stage were a little fuzzy.

I could give you a blow by blow account of who said what and when, but I’m fairly certain since journalist extraordinaire Arnopp was sitting not four seats away – he’ll be covering all that. Instead, I thought I’d give you my impressions of the underlying message and the the reality of screenwriting in the UK.

Just so you know roughly what happened while we’re waiting for Jason to pull his finger out …

Some drinks.

David Pearson (Festival Director) and Kevin Loader (Chairman) introduced the evening.

Two writers who are finalists in the ScriptMarket initiative talked about how difficult it is to break into the industry.

Two agents, Rob Kraitt (A P Watt) and Matthew Bates (Sayle Screen), talked about how hard it was for writers to break into the industry and how there actually isn’t really an industry as such to break into.

Christopher Hampton talked about how difficult it was to get a film made after you’d broken into the industry and then given up and gone to America (he’s written 42 scripts – 14 have been produced, the other 28 vanished up their own arses).

And then we had some more drinks.

A lot of what was said is interesting but the basic message I kept getting from everyone on stage and everyone asking questions in the audience was scriptwriting in the UK looks something like this:

There are only a couple of companies with money and thousands of people jumping through increasingly smaller hoops to compete for a minuscule amount of money which has almost no chance of making you rich but might, just might, if you’re very, very lucky make you a modest living.

Getting a film made under these conditions is nigh on impossible but it does happen so although it’s mostly fruitless, it has to happen to someone so don’t give up. Even though most of you aren’t good enough and haven’t got a hope in hell.

Hmm … inspiring stuff.

But hang on, I can’t help thinking this is only half the picture.

While all these people were talking about it being virtually impossible to get a project off the ground … I’ve had seven feature films produced and haven’t had to jump through a single hoop.

One of the the writer/finalists mentioned the Microwave Feature Fund – where 90 odd projects were competing for 2 lots of funding. Funding which, if memory serves (and it probably doesn’t), is a maximum of £100,000 … so nobody’s doing that for the money. Getting that kind of funding means you can make a feature film for almost nothing as a calling card and hope it will lead onto better things, whilst basking in the satisfaction of having achieved what should be your real goal – getting the script right.

I firmly believe the script should be the writer’s ultimate goal – getting it to the point when you’re proud of it and other people think it’s good enough to get made. The feature film is the bonus at the end and belongs to the cast and crew – they made the film, you wrote the script – the two things are different.

The script is your work, your product and I think should be your ultimate goal. The produced feature film is the advert someone else makes to promote your product – your next script.

So if you’re resigned to not making much money at first and just want to get some adverts for you as a writer into the market place, then why spend all your time and attention competing for the one egg? There is another way and I’ve had seven feature films made to prove it.

True, only one of them has actually been finished so far, so it’s an experiment with no proper conclusion and may turn out to be hopelessly inaccurate – but it seems to me the full picture of screenwriting in the UK is this:

You may need to clicky clicky make biggy biggy in order to see it properly.

Or you may not. Maybe you don’t need glasses or actually wear the ones you have?

There are a lot of very rich people in this country who are happy to hand over a £100,000 in return for telling their mates (and the people they want to sleep with) they’re in the film business.

There is a lot less competition in this sector of the industry and no hoops to jump through, hence mediocre writers like me can easily get films produced … so why aren’t more people doing it?

Or maybe they are and I’m just not paying attention?

Touchy feely

Just back from my hols and feeling a bit … well, a bit like Scotty.

Original, James Doohan Scotty, that is – not that there’s anything wrong with Simon Pegg’s version, I thought he was great, but he’s just different and … no. I’m really fighting the urge here to post a four hour rant on the new Star Trek film – which, despite the odds, I enjoyed. Seriously, don’t get me started … would it really have been so difficult, as well as making it action packed and visually stunning,  to get it to make sense? I don’t even mean making sense from one end of the film to another – it’s a long film and that’s quite difficult – but couldn’t at least one scene have made sense from beginning to end? Just one? It was everything Star Trek should be: bright colours, short skirts and fist fights but … surely, just one scene where I didn’t think ‘Hang on, didn’t he just say they couldn’t do that?’ wouldn’t be that difficult, would it?

Sorry. I’ll shut up now.

As an aside, how gutted would you be if someone rang you up and offered you the role of Scotty in the new Star Trek? I mean, yes, on one hand Scotty was a great character and probably one of my favourites on the crew, but come on! We all secretly want to be Kirk, don’t we? I think my first thought upon being offered the role would be “So I’m not the charismatic, ladies’ man with natural leadership oozing from every pore? Are you sure? I’m fat, ginger and balding, that’s got to count for something, surely?” It would be a bit like Stephen Moffat ringing you and asking you to be in the new series of Doctor Who … as Sergeant Benton. Nice to be asked, but a bit of a slap in the ego.

Anyway, I’m back from hols and feeling a bit Scotty:

                           SCOTTY
I had me a wee bout, sir – but, uh, Doctor McCoy pulled me through.

                           KIRK
A wee bout of what?

Uncomfortable, Scotty exchanges a glance with Bones.

                           BONES
Shore leave, Admiral.

Yes it was great to relax and spend time with my family. I had a great time, it was relaxing. And fun. But I want to get back to work, I’m itching to get back to work. I have contracts to sign, treatments to write, scripts to plan and … oh fuck, I’ve just remembered: my laptop power supply exploded the day before I went away.

Bugger.

And yes, before you say it, I know I should have bought a Mac, because Mac power supplies never explode; but how fucking boring is that? What’s the point of life if occasionally bits of it don’t go POP, FIZZLE or BANG and make a spirited attempt to set fire to the curtains?

You know, I think my attitude to technology is skewed by my love for the Millennium Falcon and the TARDIS – both are a bit unreliable, a bit dated and have a nasty habit of exploding at inopportune moments … but they’re all the cooler because of it. Reliable technology? Who wants it?

Oh shit.

My laptop’s not working.

My laptop’s not working!

Shit!

Argh! Panic! Fuck! Argh!

What am I going to do? What if I want to go and hide in the Caribbean? In fact … I do want to go and hide in the Caribbean. I want to go tomorrow, but I can’t, not without a laptop. What the fuck am I going to do?

Okay, calm down, it’s just the power supply (the second power supply, since you’re not asking – the first one maliciously went ‘fizzle’ some months back) I can order a new one.

But it won’t arrive by tomorrow.

No, wait! I have a variable laptop power supply from an old laptop whose power supply went POP one day!

Is there a pattern here?

Where is it? Where is it? Not in the shed, or the other shed, or the thing under the stairs outside which is kind of like a shed.

Ah! I know!

I sent it to the insurance company when they didn’t believe my original laptop refused to work anymore.

Bugger.

Hmm … now I come to think of it, my laptop does have a sticky ‘d’, the ‘a’ is beginning to get a bit suspicious and the wifi adapter doesn’t always find a network. And it’s always been a bit on the pink side for me … I think there’s only one sensible course of action here …

A new laptop! With Touch Screen! A touch screen laptop!

I have it now.

It’s mine.

I can relax.

Phew.

Ooh, pretty. I’m off to stroke it … and maybe pretend I’m Captain Kirk.

Last post

Yeah … sorry about that last post.

I had one of those days on Friday when I completely failed to achieve anything useful whatsoever. It’s not that I had nothing to do, it’s more I just did nothing.

All day.

Most people produce shit until you put them under pressure, and then they produce a diamond. Me, I produce nothing until you put me under pressure and then I produce shit. It’s not an ideal situation, but there you go.

At the moment I’m just waiting for people to get back to me. Every project I’m working on is inbetween drafts (or currently shooting, or being edited or … other technical stuff which has nothing to do with me) and I can’t really do anything until people start getting back to me.

True, I have a long list of spec projects I could start … but … I didn’t.

And probably won’t.

Well, I will one day; but that day wasn’t Friday.

So I did nothing all day, then tried to write a blog post and failed.

Sorry.

Still, ‘Just for the Record’ started shooting yesterday … is it still Monday back home? No? Oh. It’s still Monday here because, yes, as usual I’m hiding in the Caribbean until the shoot is over.

No, that’s a lie – I’m here for the first week, then I’m going to see my folks in France for the second week. Either way, I’ll be avoiding the shoot and the UK until it’s all over.

Actually, that’s a lie too. I might go to Nuneaton on Thursday.

Or I might not.

Regardless of this drivel, ‘Just for the Record’ has started, it’s being filmed now and I can heartily recommend - without shame, reservation or doubt – if you’re going to avoid the filming of your script by hiding in the Caribbean, make sure you travel First Class … they’re very accommodating:

 

 

THERE USED TO BE A VIDEO HERE …

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

IT ISN’T HERE ANY MORE

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

JUST IN CASE YOU WERE WONDERING

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

MOVE ALONG

 

 

 

Long, boring post

———————————————————————————————————-

WARNING – EXTREMELY LONG AND REASONABLY TECHNICAL POST

YOU MAY LIKE TO SKIP TO THE END AND READ THE HAPPY NEWS

OR YOU MAY NOT

RUN AWAY! SAVE YOURSELVES!

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED

———————————————————————————————————-

It’s been a bit of an epic week writing wise, but it’s finishing up in the nicest possible way.

Last Tuesday I had a meeting about an ongoing feature project. It was the first time I’d met the director and that’s always a difficult moment – will he be a nice guy or will he be a twat? Will he appreciate what you’ve done so far or will he ‘want to move in a different direction’ – code for ‘it’s shit, do it again’ … or sometimes ‘it’s shit, you’re fired’. But even getting fired can be considered pleasant compared to the most horrible thing a director can say:

“I think I should co-write it with you.”

To which, the correct response is to drop to your knees, throw your arms wide and scream to the heavens …

“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

Sometimes there’s nothing worse than ‘Director’s Dialogue’. Not always, some directors are very, very good writers; but as I’ve said many times: most directors can’t direct and most writers can’t write, so a writer/director is usually someone who fails at two things.

And yes, you could point out exceptions, but I could also come round and stab you in the eye with a pencil – so let’s just leave it at that.

So I go for this meeting, a bit on the tired side and woefully unprepared. I didn’t go from home so I didn’t have a copy of the script with me and I hadn’t slept for a little over 24 hours … but it was fine. It was a sunny day, the director’s a nice guy and the first thing he said was about how much he liked the script and DIDN’T WANT TO CHANGE ANY OF THE WORDS I’D WRITTEN.

Fuck me.

None of them?

Cool.

To explain what he did want, I need to go back a little bit and give you a bit of info about the script.

The script was originally conceived as an ultra low budget, single location with no action and where none of the characters ever speak to each other. It’s a talking heads mockumentary with the characters giving their version of an event direct to camera. Since they’re all doing it against the same background, there’re no scene changes and the illusion of a conversation is created by cutting between the different characters. There were a couple of bits of other footage dropped in occasionally, but for all intents and purposes, from a script point of view, it’s one scene for 90 pages.

That was the first draft.

The second draft, along with some story and character changes, was about moving the characters to locations whic reflect their personalities. So instead of everyone coming to a central location to be interviewed, the documentary team went to them at their homes or places of work. Again, there’s no communication between characters and no changing scenes once they’ve been established. It seemed to me, the best way to write this is a scene heading when we first meet the character and then just INTERCUT between them for the rest of the script. What I didn’t want was a new scene heading for every line of dialogue because it would be a) unreadable and b) hundreds of pages long.

All well and good.

Draft three … there is no draft three.

Or not really, one character changed – which amounted to two or three pages worth of re-writes. I accidentally called it draft three while I was waiting for this meeting and it kind of stuck. And that brings us up to last Tuesday.

So we have a script which is essentially just dialogue and the director, quite rightly I thought, wants to make sure it’s visually interesting because otherwise it might as well be a radio play. Yes, the actors would make it come alive on screen, but he wanted to give them things to do as a start point. The other concern was, at 90 pages of pure dialogue, it would probably come in at around 60 mins of screen time.

The task seemed simple: take 90 pages of dialogue and add another 30-40 pages and action to every scene. What he was looking for was something funny (for ’tis a comedy) happening in the background or to the character every time we cut back to them; in other words, a visual gag for every line of dialogue.

That doesn’t sound too hard. He’d even come up with ideas for the first 30 pages so a third of it was already more or less done. On the way home I was thinking about this and came to the conclusion: as well as seeing something funny, since we were now going to be moving some of the characters around a bit, why not visually tell a different story for each character? It doesn’t have to be anything complicated, but the characters can be trying to achieve something and every time we see them they’re either closer or further away from their goal.

No problems. 30-40 pages of extra dialogue – that’s a couple of days’ work.

Funny visuals for each line of dialogue which follow on from each other to create multiple interlocking storylines – that’s … fucking hard.

Hence the reason, at 4 am this morning, I finished a week of 12 to 18 hour days.

Oh, and the rush is because the film shoots on the 17th May and needs to be scheduled asap. In fact, because of the way the script was written, until the end of the 4th draft no one has any idea of what locations might be needed – not even me.

And to be fair, I actually typed THE END at 10.30 pm yesterday; but a) it took a couple of hours to spell check and proof read and b) there was one more huge fucking problem: the resulting script is completely unfilmable.

Because it was shit?

Hopefully not, but you never know.

It’s unfilmable in a technical sense because of the way it’s been written. Again, purely for reasons of clarity and enjoyment of reading, there are very few scene headings. I only put scene headings in the first time we see someone in that location and don’t mention where they are again until they move to a new one.

So for the main characters, they might spend the first 30 or so pages of the script in one location; but only speak twice a page or so. From a scheduling point of view, that scene isn’t 30 pages long, it might only be 6 or 7 pages long. From an actor’s point of view they have to learn 6 or 7 pages of dialogue by combing through 30 pages of script.

For the minor characters it’s even worse. One character, for example, speaks on the first page and the last (as well as every now and then in between) – her total dialogue is one two-page scene – but she has to wade through 164*pages to find them. So do the ADs for scheduling – and they have to do that for every character!

Plus it’s difficult for me to work out what the character was doing last and to maintain a constant flow of their dialogue and story. Something needed to be done. Which is why, at 4 am this morning I finished a second script – the production script (178 pages!). I combed through 164 pages worth of dialogue and collected them all together into scenes, separating them with a transition: LATER – hence the extra pages.

The original script is now the STORY SCRIPT, which is one you can give people to read and enjoy – I would say for casting, but that’s pretty much all done now – and the PRODUCTION SCRIPT is for … well, production. It makes no fucking sense to read, since each scene is just one person’s side of a ten sided conversation, but at least it can be scheduled and filmed. As an extra level of common sense – all the scene numbers in both drafts match up.

The big problem now will be any tweaks for the next draft since every word changed has to be changed in two scripts where they’re on completely different pages – but fuck it, I’m not thinking about that for the moment. I’m thinking about tomorrow and the nice way to end the week of hard bloody graft.

Tomorrow there are two pleasant things happening:

1. Karma Magnet is showing at the Southend Film Festival - 6.30pm at the Southend Central Library for anyone in the area and/or desperate to see it on a big (?) screen.
2. A sitcom pilot I co-wrote with Lee Otway begins shooting. It’s got a great cast, so hopefully it’ll all turn out quite nicely.

I was going to post the cast list but I think that can wait until another post – this one has already got way out of hand.

As is traditional, I won’t be going anywhere near the filming and will be hiding somewhere exotic. A randomly thrown dart at the map tells me I’m going to be in … Crouch End.

Hmm … not that exotic then, but sounds vaguely rude so it might be fun.

Ta ta.

*I know, 164 pages! Fuck me! But there is a reason … I just haven’t decided what it is yet.

Free lunch

I read some advice to scriptwriters somewhere recently about never paying for lunch. I can’t really remember where it was or who said it. I can’t remember whether it was an instruction:

NEVER pay for lunch!

Or on a list of mistakes scriptwriters make:

7) Paying for lunch.

I can’t even remember whether it was serious or meant as a joke; but I do know this: it’s bad advice.

Yes, the producer is hiring you. He called you in for a meeting, he wants to buy your services, he’s probably paying your travel expenses, so he should pay for lunch too. Sounds right, doesn’t it? After all, they’re the big money bags producers and we’re the poor, starving writers …

Fuck that shit.

That’s an employer/employee relationship. You don’t want that relationship; you want to be their friend, you want to be their equal, you want to be their partner in crime.

I’m not saying you should pretend to be friends with people – that’s pointless and soul destroying – but if you like this guy and you get on, then you being friends with them gives you advantages over being an employee.

If an employee tells you your script idea sucks, you sack him and find someone who’ll do what you tell them. If a mate tells you the same thing you listen. Yes, you might have an employee whose opinion you trust and whose judgement you listen to, but a friend is someone you’ll want to work with again and again.

With every new project, the producer has a list of writers he can go to. Different writers are better at different things and he’s more likely to go to the horror guy for a horror film and the comedy guy for a comedy film … and being one of those ‘go to guys’ is a great position to be in.

But isn’t it far better to be the mate in the pub the producer is having a few drinks with and a bit of a laugh when the idea first hits?

When he says he’s got this half-baked idea for a film and through the laughter and the beers (or coke, or even tea in my case) you thrash out a story … who’s he going to go to for the script? You’ve already worked on it together, you’ve already shown you’re on the same wavelength and you get his idea. You’re friends - he knows you can deliver what he asks for on time and to standard AND he likes working with you. Yes, he may think of you as the horror guy; but what the hell, he might as well let you have a go at being the comedy guy too.

And all this starts with three simple words:

“I’ll get this.”

You don’t have to buy all the drinks, you don’t even have to match him round for round; but you can at least offer to pay once in a while.

My mate had a few dates with this girl a few years back who never, ever brought her purse with her when they went out. He intended to pay for all the drinks, after all he’d asked her out – hell, he wanted to pay for all the drinks, probably because it made him feel more masculine and vaguely superior … but the fact she expected him to pay for everything and had no intention of even offering to pay rang alarm bells and just pissed him off. Did she just see him as a meal ticket? Was he just a wallet on legs to this girl? With a penis?

Is that how you want producers to think you see them? As two legged cock-wallets? Offer to pay for a round now and then you tight bastards.

Same with lunch, just pay every now and then – pick the cheap restaurants if it really bothers you – but get yourself on that even footing. He’s not your employer, he’s your mate and together you’re going to take on the world.

They say there’s no such thing as a free lunch, well there is … but it’s a bad thing.

Spinning plates

I finished film number three in the Easter Extravaganza on Sunday. So far it’s all going swimmingly, I even managed Saturday off for Mandy and I to catch my brother’s play in London. Here’s a vaguely Danish video link:

http://www.tv2lorry.dk/moduler/nyheder/showregvideo.asp?dato=17-03-2009&cID=1&vId=474536

If you accidentally find yourself in Copenhagen in the next week or so, I highly recommend it.

I’ve got one more film to go now before Easter and plenty of time to do it in.

Sort of.

Because the problem is, the workload for each script doesn’t finish when you send it off. It’s just not that simple. It really is a case of setting the plates spinning then rushing back and forth occasionally to make sure they keep going. With each successive project set in motion it gets harder to keep them going, but so far it’s been remarkably easy.

Which worries me a bit.

A quick recap – four feature films before Easter:

Plate #1 – is a sword and sorcery re-write I’d been nibbling at since the last meeting in September. This was a major re-write which changed pretty much every word in the script. I finished this on the 3rd of March and so far haven’t heard anything back. This could be innocuous and just means producer and director haven’t had time to read it yet (we’re all busy) or it could be bad and they’re sitting around trying to work out how to tell me how truly awful it is. Either way, it’s a plate which has been spinning unaided for a long time and is beginning to look a bit suspicious …

Plate #2 – is ’til Death which had a minor re-write somewhere around the 5th and 6th of March in between me fucking about with Legoat my parents’ house. That draft was well loved but has generated some new ideas which I’ll get told at a meeting on Friday, and that means another minor re-write. In addition, the one-pager (logline and synopsis) no longer reflects the script so that has to be changed to match. It’s not the end of the world, we’re talking a couplle of days to do both but it’s a wobbling plate which needs a quick flick.

Plate #3 – was the solid gold brick shat by a producer and I a couple of weeks back and the one I finished on Sunday. Which, since I only started it on Wednesday and had Saturday off, surprised the hell out of me. No outline, no planning, no cards, notes, character outlines, treatment or synopsis – just sit down, start at the beginning and write with the central premise in mind. Not something I’d recommend, but it seemed to fit the style of the project. I was on a bit of a roll with that, finished it at 23.06 on Sunday and handed it in safe in the knowledge I could forget about it for a few days at least. I’ve only just started it spinning, I don’t need to do anything for a while …

Except I get an email at 00.07 on Monday morning – the producer had read it. One hour and one minute later! The plate’s wobbling already! Crap, it might fall off before it even gets going. Worse still, he might have an immediate set of notes which interfere with moving on to plate #4 … but no. He read it, he laughed, he liked it. Meeting on Friday to discuss the next draft.

Cool.

I’m ahead of the game!

So Mandy and I buggered off to New York for a few days. We saw the Statue of Liberty:

Carrie Bradshaw’s house:

Real movie steam:

Went to Times Square:

And had a drink in a revolving restaurant:

Shortly after that we got attacked by a T-Rex:

But luckily, Spidey turned up to save the day:

And all was well in the Big Apple. Which is neither big nor Apple-ish. It is quite tall though.

Whilst queing endlessly for the ferry out to the Statue of Liberty and having to strip naked to get through the x-ray machine, it occurred to me terrorists are badly named. On September the 11th I imagine there were quite a lot of terrified people – but within a year that terror gives way to being bloody annoyed. “Why have I got to take my belt off? What the fuck do you think I’m hiding there? I was a child when I joined this queue.”

They should call them annoyingists, not terrorists. They’d get the same effect if they just followed people around and hummed all day or snuck up behind people and licked their ears – it’d be cheaper, kinder to the environment, nobody would have to die and it would have exactly the same impact on society.

Anyway, we’re back now and it’s time to set plate #4 in motion – a completely new feature project this and terribly exciting. I may even have to break out the new pack of index cards.

As long as nothing else wobbles in the meantime.

No more

Right, that’s it. No more procrastinating, no more dithering, no more picking aimlessly at bits of script.

In short, no more fannying around.

It seems to me I’ve achieved nothing particularly useful (writing wise) in the last half a year or so and have spent far too long not doing it. So no more.

From now on I’m back to just knuckling down and getting on with … oh look, Stargate’s on.

No, God damn it! No more Stargate. No more Simpsons. No more Battlestar Galactica … well, maybe I’ll just finish season 2 and then … definitely no more.

Except maybe season 3.

But after that, back to work baby.

With a vengeance.

Is there a season 4?

No, fuck season 4.

Work!

The script I’ve been picking randomly at since September – that’s going to be finished by March the 4th at the latest. No, shut up, no excuses. It’s going to be finished by March the 4th. Do you hear me, me? Am I listening to myself?

Why March the 4th? Because that’s when the meeting for the final(ish) set of notes for the final(ish) draft of  ’til Death is. And after March the 4th, I’m going to be busy with the final(ish) draft, obviously.

After that I’m working on a new script based on an old idea which has once again reared its malformed and, frankly, just plain weird head. It’s got everything – sex, death and … um … fish.

Actually, not so much fish. Mostly just sex and death.

Without the sex.

Okay, it’s just a lot of death.

But it’s got the whiff of sex all the way through it (which I’ve always thought smells a bit like telephones – you know, the old dial up ones). The treatment feels like the characters might spontaneously burst into sex at any minute … but probably won’t.

In fact they don’t. I know they don’t. I wrote the treatment. Four fucking years ago.

So no sex.

Just death.

And Nazis.

But not real ones.

Maybe in Jersey.

The country, not a pullover. That would be weird.

Although probably quite warm.

And that script WILL be done by Easter.

Why Easter?

Why fucking not?

When is Easter?

I don’t care. It will be done by Easter, whenever it fucking is, or there’ll be hell to pay.

If it existed.

Which it doesn’t.

Seriously, when is Easter?

Why did I agree to this?