Starting a screenplay can sometimes be as hard as finishing one. Impatient to pull up to the front door of a classic motion picture, I want to get everything right so quickly. This impatience challenges my trust in the work, the creative process of screenwriting. What exactly does trust mean? If I don’t trust my writing, then what am I? Frightened. This is the battle. If I’m scared that everything I’m typing is worthless, then what? My hands find something else to do. So trust is good and important and essential to beginning this journey, alone, a trip that will eventually take what comes out of you into millions of people. But its just you now. And your trust.

Now, does trusting your writing mean sitting down with no ideas, opening a new document, and starting to type? Of course. And no. What I need to do is make a decision and execute. And this decision often comes back to whether I should write an outline or treatment before I start writing my screenplay, or, with a rough idea, a shadowy shadow of something calling from my brain, start writing?

I have done both in the past. When I wrote the first draft of LOVE LIZA, I really had very little idea of where the story was going. I had a few things to start off with, and somewhere I wanted to end up down the road, but that was it. It was terrifying and difficult to remain seated. But the most original characteristics of the screenplay came out of the immediacy of trying to come up with whats next, with my fingers resting on the keyboard. I became sold on this process. Outlines killed creativity, because writing an outline is not actual screenwriting. Its outlining.

But then I came to Hollywood and tried to tell executives the little ideas I had. I would very proudly announce an image, a picture in my head, that I knew contained the fire of an entire epic. I was shocked when they asked, Then what happens? I didn’t have an answer. Why? Well. BECAUSE I HADNT WRITTEN IT YET. It seemed like a completely stupid question. What happens? What happens?? Did I say I had a complete screenplay to show you?!

You know the rest. No phone calls and bewilderment and then I found myself in the city of pitches, and starting to flesh out things into 14 page screenplay treatments. I did so, convinced that it could never be that good, that it was forced, and staged, and predictable. I was shocked to find out that it did not destroy my creativity. I was still able to come up with interesting, original things. But deep down I knew. This was still not screenwriting. This was not the art of screenwriting. And I’m right.

So now what was I going to do? What was better? If I was to sit down and spec something out, how was I supposed to go about it? First off, I’m lazy, so having a treatment or an outline sitting next to my laptop to walk me through the first draft is very appealing, despite knowing that the inspiration driving a treatment is different than the juice that comes when writing the screenplay blindly. And I have sat down and written 90 pages, trying to find the story, only to simply start over. This is a lot of work, but I’ve come to recognize that this work is not lost. This is the path. It hurts, it kills, it bludgeons, it fatigues, it flattens, but its the road. Believe me.

But what about a heist movie, or a mystery? A thriller with twists? Aren’t movies sometimes puzzles? Can we find this stuff without a plan? Don’t you have to figure this stuff out? Yes and no. Flying by the seat of your pants often produces jaw-dropping turns the audience will never see coming. Why? The writer didn’t. This is the largest reason why studio movies are predictable—-the fabric of the script is shot through with the knowledge of the ending of the story.

If we are to plot out the map of our movie with a treatment, beat sheet or outline, we better be damn sure its the real thing. Putting our best foot forward with a very strong outline is only the start of what will end up as a screenplay. Despite putting that golden outline next to our keyboard, we will find that turning it into a screenplay is still, I’m awfully sorry, a lot of work. Scenes that we imagined to be amazing will suddenly be impossible to write. And why does that upset us? Why does that frustrate the writer?

Well, we thought we had a short cut. We thought we were going to sneak into the back of a classic movie. My journey as a writer has been marked by the learning and relearning that all that wood has to be cut out there in the back yard, whether I like it or not. If I wanna do this, I have to swing the axe.

But we know, if we trust our gift, that something beautiful is coming, regardless if we have an outline or not. Perhaps the writers who work from outlines should throw them out. Perhaps the writers who write like the house is on fire, with nary a note within miles, should sit down and write a treatment. Treatments are fun, too.

I do both, switching back and forth when I need to. When I’m writing and I start to feel blindfolded, I turn to jot down a few notes, sketch a few ideas, track a character arc, reorder an act. But when I think I’m caught up in pitches and notes and beat sheets and the safety of plans, I chuck it all and write like I did when I was a kid.

Did we use notes when we were kids?

Article URL: http://www.bluecatscreenplay.com/About/how_to_start_a_screenplay.php
Copyright © 2006 BlueCat Screenplay Competition

Winner of the Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award at the Sundance Film Festival for LOVE LIZA , Gordy Hoffman has written and directed three digital shorts for Fox Searchlight. He made his feature directorial debut with his script, A COAT OF SNOW, which world premiered at the 2005 Locarno International Film Festival. He is also the founder of the BlueCat Screenplay Competition. Dedicated to develop and celebrate the undiscovered screenwriter, BlueCat provides written screenplay analysis on every script entered. In addition, Gordy acts as a script consultant for screenwriters, offering personalized feedback on their scripts through his consultation service, www.screenplaynotes.com. For more articles by Gordy on screenwriting, visit www.bluecatscreenplay.com.

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When considering the more popular forms of fiction writing, the screenplay form must be near the top of the list, and perhaps stands alone at the top. Interest in screenwriting and in developing a screenwriting career has exploded over the last few decades. The evidence for this is easy to find. There are several books on screenwriting some of which have gone on to become best sellers and become printed in multiple editions. Screenwriting competitions are now commonplace, and are regularly used as a method for trying to establish a screenwriting career. There are also now even screenwriting programs at several universities, and some of these programs are so competitive that they’re nearly impossible to get into. Screenwriting today is as popular a form as it’s ever been.

People write screenplays for various reasons. Some people simply enjoy the process, and have no real intentions on pursuing a career. Some who write screenplays will only write one or two of them, then never another. There are those who consistently write screenplays, hoping in many cases to establish a screenwriting career. The lure of a screenwriting career holds different things for different people, obviously: there are those who hope for the opportunity to work in Hollywood’s glamorous setting; others hope to become rich; and then some just have a burning desire to create drama.

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Final Draft is the entertainment industry’s top selling software application for writing screenplays, television shows and stage plays. And with the Final Draft download, there is no need to wait for a package to arrive or for a CD ROM to install. Once you purchase, you receive a customer number. Then install it, enter the number and you are off and running, writing that award winning script that will make you the next hot property in the entertainment industry.

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Again, this demonstrates that a successful screenplay cannot be written without a deep understanding of this structure.

Some of the 510+ stage Hero’s Journey stages follow:

Call to Adventure: Kovacs tries to convince Dreiberg to help find the assassin.

Refusal of the Call: Dreiberg and the others don’t believe that an assassin is after the Watchmen and they don’t want to go back to that Superhero life.

Supernatural Aid: Dr Manhattan

Crossing of the First Threshold: the memories induced by the burial/

Belly of the Whale: Laurie leaves Manhattan and moves in with Dreiberg. She’s left the Old World and Self and is heading for the New.

Road of Trials: the hunt for some sort of truth

Seizing the Sword: Kovacs finds his Arch Enemy and forces the truth out of him etc…; Blake came to him before he died.

Near Death Experience and Rebirth: Kovac’s recollection of the time he first committed murder: the child’s death and his rebirth after that.

Atonement with the Father: Dreiberg can’t get it up; the inner issue needs to be resolved.

Apotheosis: Dreiberg knows that the issues are resolved when they return to fighting crime in the Owl Ship.

Ultimate Boon: Laurie and Dreiberg use the Owl Ship to help fight crime.

Refusal of the Return: Kovacs fights his old foes in prison.

Rescue from Without: Laurie and Dreiberg rescue Kovacs.

Master of the Two Worlds: Manhattan kills Kovacs for the sake of world peace; doesn’t mind taking the blame.

Freedom to Live: Laurie and Dreiberg together; Mrs Jupiter and Laurie work it out; Veidt is almost forgiven, Manhatten goes to another galaxy and perhaps will create some life.

Learn more…

WRITE THAT SCREENPLAY!

The Complete 510+ stage Hero’s Journey, Monomyth and other story structure templates can be found at http://www.clickok.co.uk/index4.html/

You will receive a free sample file by entering your email address at this site: http://www.clickok.co.uk/index4.html/

You can post this article on your web site or blog as long as no changes are made, the author’s name is retained and the links to our site URLs remains active.

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Kal Bishop, MBA