Several months ago now, I had a cast reading of the sixth draft of Sam Bailey. When I left I had several pages of notes, and as I mulled them over, I began to realize that they reflected one or two core issues with the script, fundamentally linked to the structure and the motivation of my main character.
Put simply, I hadn't been brave enough. My characters had approached the story as if it might hurt them, and I'd let them do it.
So much of that I'd written on that screenplay had been polished and shined up that nobody was seeing these problems for that they were. Very cleverly, I'd lacquered my words over the challenges of the script until I didn't have to look at them anymore.
Breaking through all that crust into the hot molten core of the story took me almost two months of the hardest writing I've ever done. Now the script is a cracked, broken mess - but one with a much more volcanic structure. Since I broke through the crust, the heat and magma is seeping up. Drama has been unleashed from the cooling grip of my own fears and doubts.
Sometime back, a young screenwriter insisted that their screenplay was good so long as it was taken in a certain context. On his screenplay, I told him, the warning should red "EXPLOSION HAZARD: UNSTABLE MATERIAL" and not "USE AS DIRECTED". Part of why I blog and post on forums is so I can eat my own words. Keeps me honest!
On the one hand, surveying the wreckage of Sam Bailey: Draft Seven gives me a sense of exhaustion. Cleaning this mess up is going to take some heavy lifting and lots of elbow grease, for sure.
On the other, I know I'm somebody who's willing to put my hands on the beating heart of a story and massage it to life - even if it was my own self-protective blathering that bored it to death in the first place.
I've put the new script in front of my actors so they can see where things are going, and how the characters have changed... While the craftsmanship might not be as handy as I would like, I think seeing how much deeper into this story we're digging - and most importantly feeling the escaping heat - will give them a great deal of confidence.
It certainly has for me!
Keep me posted with the updates and re-writes. This is the film that you would like me to help out with behind the scenes interviews, right? I hope so, because I would like to meet Sam Bailey... Tell all your actors to get ready for their close-ups because I am so excited to see this project on wheels. Forget writing about the writing... More scripts! Yaaaaay! Love, Seaweed
ReplyDelete