Charlie Productions : How To Write A Script

The world is full of people pedalling advice on screenwriting. The internet is full of it, though wiser exponents will insist that for the best advice you should really buy their book, or, better still, pay to see them read from their book and then buy it.

None of which is to say that their advice is wrong, or even, necessarily, overpriced. Once upon a time both Chris and Ben would have been pretty dismissive about the laws of Character Arcs and Inciting Events. We would mock the Threshold-Gate-Keeper and roll our eyes at the Flawed Hero and his Quest, feeling that all of this advice tended to amount to one thing - "Make your goody and your baddie related or in love and NOW YOU HAVE A STORY!"

For years Ben in particular was fond of starting a script on page one and writing 'till everyone was either dead or staring out to sea. Any talk of structure or narrative device would produce a shudder of horror, surely that would destroy the magic, that special subconscious something that just sort of happened when he moved his fingers...

Consequently most things he wrote petered out around page 70 with all the characters horribly unsure how they would make the ending happen whilst Chris, who preferred to start by writing key scenes on filing cards and rearranging them on the floor until they made sense, wrote scripts that read like the contents of a deranged filing cabinet.

If There Aren't Any Rules, How Can You Break Them?

The big change for us was in meeting Carolyn Young who was assigned to us for a year as script editor on Screen East's now tragically abandoned Featurelab Scheme. She was the first person we ever met who understood the rules well enough to know when to bother with them and when not to. In her hands the Three Act Structure and Genre Theory became powerful weapons she could use to prove that we'd got it wrong. We'd argue back heartily that whatever the problem with the script might be it certainly wasn't that it lacked an inciting incident on page 33. No, she would retort, perhaps not, but if this script is a thriller as you say it is then at some point something thrilling has to happen otherwise the audience will feel cheated and turn against it, no matter how many nice speeches about the golden mean you put in it.

Vitally Carolyn never told us what we could or couldn't do. She never said that these were rules we could not break. All she did was point out that the script wasn't working and then suggested ways it could be better. In short, she showed us that whilst there are no rules there are some very handy tools that enable you to get to where you want to be much faster.

So we would never say that you shouldn't buy that "How To Write A Screenplay" bible, never say that money spent on a seminar or development course is wasted. Equally though, just because some one has sold a couple of thousand books it doesn't mean that their advice is necessarily right for your script.

Being Open To Everything, Including Mistakes.

However there is a very strong tendency amongst writers, and to be fair amongst the rest of the world too, to buy into the idea of the writer as unique creator. On the whole writing is something of a lonely occupation. There are exceptions to the rule but for the most part, no matter how many people are involved in the creation of the idea, the basic act of writing is the work of a single individual hammering away on their own. All too often this sense of the individual becomes not just part of the process but, almost, the point of the process. The single vision becomes fetishised to the point where in order to be 'good' the script must also be utterly and uniquely the work of the single genius at the keyboard. Other ideas are rejected because they are 'other' or are only used once silently subsumed into the writer's own consciousness (many writers would rather tacitly steal than openly accept another influence).

For the world at large the appeal of the myth of the writer's mystery is understandable. People who can't write like to imagine that good writing is an act of magic or genius, something that they couldn't possibly aspire to. It's something that special, gifted people do. The truth that, in fact, most of the best writing comes purely from an entirely learnable thoroughness is not so appealing. For non-writers to reject this is one thing, but anyone who seriously wants to be a screenwriter it is important to do all you can, as early as you can, to give up on your unique genius.

Obviously, as there are two of us, this should have been quite easy for us to achieve - however it really wasn't. For many years we would struggle away on our own ideas, as if writing back to back, stubbornly refusing to let the other have more than a glance over the shoulder. Occasionally we'd show each other a script and have a huge, sullen but usually quite productive argument and finally some real progress would be made... however it took Carolyn and her utterly terrifying no-prisoners editing approach to get us to properly work together. At first this was mainly because together we stood a better chance of surviving each script edit but soon it became blindingly obvious that the more we let each others ideas in, the more we let Carolyn's ideas in, the better the script got...

It shouldn't really be surprising. Script writing is one of the key parts of film making and film making is a communal activity. For a film to work a large group of creative individuals need to work in unison and it is daft to imagine that a script for this process has to be written by one person on their own. However the image of the genius in the garret is a hard one to shake and learning to accept other people's creative influence can be very difficult, very painful. Thoroughness is not an easy master and it can be very hard to actually be thoroughly truthful about your writing, about what is working, what is lazy, what of another's idea is valuable and what is wrong. As with all of this, knowing when not to listen is as hard as listening.

"Helicopter Land" was written by the pair of us together, with a lot of input from Carolyn and quite a great deal of input from Keith, whose idea it originally was. This was such a success that we then went to the extreme of allowing other's input into our work with "Mouchak And Junce". With nothing more than a few sketches in our minds for scenes and basic ideas for the two main characters we took six of our closet friends to a cottage for a weekend and proceeded to write the entire 90 page script in two days. For two days we did nothing except drink and sit around a big table writing, improvising and generally being silly until our sublimely ridiculous story was finished. We have later given this script a brief polish without the others but the vast majority of it stands untouched.

So buoyed up were we by this new, all inclusive, writing process that we tried to use it for writing "Police & Thieves". However this was a very different type of film and the results were disastrous. We tried work shopping with actors, another intensive group writing session, sending draft scenes to all our friends for their feedback - all of it simply putting off the important task of actually writing it. In the end we forgot about everyone else, wrote a very full treatment together and then Ben locked himself away for a month and wrote a first draft, occasionally asking for help when he got stuck.

Obviously, like all first drafts, this was quite flawed and had a very unconvincing ending. Which is the point of a first draft. If there is one myth more pernicious than that of the writer as solo genius then it is that of the perfect first draft. "Mouchak And Junce" came out remarkably well for a first draft but it is not a finished film and we would never expect, or even especially want, to finish the first draft and expect to start shooting. However one of the hardest fears to overcome is the fear of writing badly. "Police & Thieves" was held up for the best part of eighteen months whilst we found ways to not actually write it, both secretly terrified that actually this brilliant idea wouldn't really work on the page, or as a ninety-minute story. This became focused on a reluctance to write a draft and a massive over-importance being given to the ideas of other people who weren't really that fussed about being involved. Now we have a first draft the problems are clear and the solutions clearer.

Thoroughness.

All of which leads us where? Listen to advice but know when not to listen to advice? Don't imagine that your story has to be created by you sitting alone and writing it, but don't forget that sooner or later you probably will have to do this? It's hardly a formula...

Then again it boils down thoroughness. Be thorough on your plot, be honest when what you are writing is really rather contrived. Be thorough on your characters, would they really say that? Would she really go in there? Be thorough on your reasons for writing the story. Be thorough, be honest about what sort of story you really want to write. If you are honest about your reasons for writing a film then you can write it right and the audience will enjoy that. Luc Besson used to be superbly honest about wanting to make films in which pretty girls do fighting with guns wearing just sporty knickers. It may not be the European High-Art that a lot of people like to pretend it is, but he still made some very good films.

If you are honest about what you are trying to do and how well you are doing it then you'll know when you need someone else's advice, when their advice is right for what you're working on and you'll know when, actually, you need to lock the door and get down to it. And how do you know if you're being honest? Well, some people never do, but the best way is to keep writing because it becomes clearer... so yeah, after all of that, what is the real advice - stop reading this and write a script. It'll be rubbish, but don't worry you can make it better, but, hell, don't bother, throw it away and write another one. Then write another one. Then come back to your first idea and rewrite it with more convincing characters and a better middle bit. Or don't.

Charlie Productions believe passionately in doing things and always trying to stop in time for tea.
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