Balance

Look! Up in the sky! It's a bird! It's a plane! It's a screenplay! ...A screenplay oddly resembling a crappy eclipse photo I recently took with a digital camera, blew up and brightened in Photoshop, that is. After all, what is a screenplay, but a mass of dark and light with the footprints of men all over it?

Parallels

Screenwriters Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio once told a tale of a fellow they had read whose script was original and among the best they'd ever seen. It was about a guy who was resurrected as a rat and had to redeem himself over and over, sacrificing himself to come back as a higher animal each time, trying to get back to human form so he could get back to the woman he loves. They offered to assist him in running it up the chain. They went to a round table pitch meeting with some of the best peeps in the business and learned someone else already had a story in development about a guy resurrected as a rat. What were the odds? Pretty good in Hollywood.

I was reminded of that story recently when I noticed that same phenomena creeping into my class. A dozen writers randomly thrown together wouldn't be likely to be writing about anything similar, however, I'm finding odd coincedences in the work posted by others so far, as well as my own work.

Here's the bizarre tally:

Stories with a woman driving a Toyota and listening to the radio: 2
Stories with characters named St. John: 2
Stories with animal noises described musically: 2
Stories involving Greece: 2
Stories with scenes in France: 2
Stories with scenes set in the 1790's: 2
Stories that describe a person's neck as "twisty": 1 (so far)
Stories where paternity is in question: 3
Stories with elevator scenes: at least 3

There are probably more and most likely will be more as more stories are posted in the next few weeks. And this from a dozen random writers thrown together. As unlikely as parallel development seems, it's all too real.

Speed Bumps

My rewrite is coming along...slowly. But, after hitting a speed bump last week and searching in vain for a solution, I finally had a breakthrough with a troublesome scene. It still needs some tweaking, but I think it's got more power than even I anticipated going into it.

I've got two weeks to finish up Act I for my class. I've got about 10 pages to go, but technically less because a few of the scenes I salvaged from my prior draft will be in there. They just need some modification to mesh with the new storyline.

Then the real pressure kicks in. I'll have five weeks to come up with 30 more pages and I'm not entirely sure yet how I want to fill them. I've got ideas, but nothing that has hit my outline as a definite, yet.

It seems like we've got a pretty good group in class this time around. More people participating. Still a few that seem to be there in name only. Some appeared on the message board in the first week that haven't been seen since. Some that appeared on the message board, but haven't left feedback for others and some that showed up for an impromptu chat last week that haven't been active on the message board nor have they left feedback yet. Those who follow the message board discussions, chat and leave feedback for everyone - THEY are the people who make the class worthwhile. Unfortunately, not everyone in the class feels it's as important as others. Still, this is still a more active group than last. It'll be even better when Paola returns with her unique voice.

Meanwhile, I've got all of my week two checklist done for the class and have a lot of writing to do, so hopefully Monday and Tuesday will be fruitful. I made decent progress (for me) on Friday. We'll see what happens this week. The clock is ticking.

Se7en

"Koalas. They're telepathic. PLUS they control the weather." - The Nines

On an occupational scale, I suppose screenwriter would qualify as a 9 as defined by John August. Most of us struggle to be decent 7's. And while I endeavor to be a 9, I shall remain a 7 for the short term, at least. Being an 8 would be pretty sweet, though.

With that cryptic, non-spoiling post behind me, I can now focus on Class Eve - the night before class. My next structured foray into screenwriting education begins at midnight. The core of my last class will remain intact for the new one. Hopefully, I can catch up on pages.

After a major shift in story, most of "Protocol" had to be relegated to the 'Prev Drafts' folder. Here I was on page 42, scratching my head, when a bomb went off. I had to return to the index cards to outline my new storyline. So far, I've got 8 pages and a few scenes I can probably salvage.

Rewriting. It's all part of the process. I wish it had happened sooner. Glad it wasn't later.

Feedback

I'm about halfway through my second screenwriting class. In it, I posted the first act of "Protocol" and have received mostly enthusiastic, positive reviews. I'm still waiting for the instructor's notes. The comments were all very accurate. I haven't given enough detail. Or, at least, some questions came up that have answers much later on in the story. A big part of the reason you submit this stuff to others is because you're so close to the work you can't be objective about its content. Several comments reminded me that I know a whole heck of a lot more about what's going on than anyone else and there are a lot of subtle details that haven't been revealed to the reader/viewer. I need to be mindful of that.

An exposition scene that I originally had in an earlier draft had since been pulled in order to get to the reveal of the protagonist's goal by the end of page 10. There were things in that scene that visually provided some important information. Reading the comments, I realized they would not have had the issues they had if I'd left that scene in. The trick now is editing it back in and still meet that ten page mark. If I pull the opening grabber that I had moved there to get people's attention immediately, my first 10 pages won't have much of interest. It's already a pretty fast-paced opening. It's going to take some work to squeeze more into it. I've got some ideas how to do it, but I can't add without taking something out.

In the meantime, I've already enrolled in my third class, starting Feb 13th. And I've added some incentive (aka pressure) to the sidebar - a countdown encouraging me to finish a screenplay by the end of the year. I'm going to say that's as good as done. I'm also going to say that maybe I'll try to finish two this year, but the key to all that is staying focused and motivated - two things I'm finding difficult. Hopefully the classes will keep the pages coming out. I'm due to submit up to 30 more pages of Protocol the end of this month. That would take me to about the midpoint of the script. I think that's doable. Let's make it so.