Writing About the Writing
The struggle is keeping the momentum…
I’m working on two single camera comedy tv pilots. Roughly 30 to 35 pages each. A page in a screenplays is roughly equivalent to one minute of screen time but that varies greatly depending on how much dialogue the characters have. The single camera thing just means that these are shows that won’t take place in front of a live studio audience on a sound stage. Scripts for these shows will be somewhere around 55 pages.
The struggle of writing for me is keeping the momentum (as I mentioned above). The following happens all the time. I have two great writing days, cranking through pages, feeling good, feeling funny, the scenes work, and it feels like an enjoyable piece of tv. But then I start writing the next morning and I get stuck. I can’t move forward. In other words, I learn that my outline isn’t working.
This is a critical point for me. I know I’ve made headway but there’s a problem somewhere and I need to assess it and try to fix it. If I don’t fix it then it’s a quick downward spiral of doubting the entire premise, the characters, and forgetting the reason I chose to write the story in the first place.
From here it’s not long before I’m analyzing every decision I’ve made in my life up this point. The next stop on this particular train ride is self pity, the dreaded place we need to avoid at all costs.
We don’t want to go there.
THERE is a dark place.
THERE is the point of no return. The bones of many a script lie in this place.
So we avoid that place because if we’ve already gotten to this point, meaning I’ve come up with an emotional logline, a beat sheet of what happens and why, and an outline (or at least made some headway on each of these things) then I already know that there is validity to the story and the premise. We won’t let our mind trick us into the freeing deliciousness of “starting over.” Because starting over gets undelicious fast.
So how do we assess and figure out where the problem is?
When I have a problem with a script I’m writing—either a loss of enthusiasm, boredom, or just feeling frozen and not knowing how to move forward—I write about the writing.
I have a word document for all my projects that I use for “free writing.” I also may pull out a Moleskine notebook. Whatever medium I’m feeling is the one I go with. Both serve the same end, which is “writing about the writing.” Creating some distance between myself and the script is crucial for me. I can write anything I want to in these free writing spaces. I can critique the project and quite literally write to myself. But more importantly, I discover crumbs that lead to a path forward.
For instance, I may write something like, “I hate this script. Why does the character do this? I want a character who is more courageous. Remember that this story is about a man trying to live up to his potential and building a strong relationship with his fifteen year old son. So he shouldn’t do this. He should do that. What if instead of being a fireman, he’s the police commissioner?”
I just go and go. I’m free to write anything.
Writing about the writing helps me reconnect with why I fell in love with the story and my characters in the first place. And it always helps me get back on track.
The most wonderful thing about writing about the writing is that it totally counts as writing! If you spend your whole writing session—the hour, two hours, fifteen minutes you set aside per day—doing this, it is not wasted effort.
Any writing about or around your project is momentum. And momentum is a very important thing when it comes to writing.
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A good writing day feels like this (see image below).
