Film Courage: Do beat sheets work?
Jill Chamberlain, Script Consultant/Author/Writer: I think having an outline is an excellent
idea.
I do know writers who don’t need them.
I think they need something and these are going to be…I speak of writers who I have
worked with so they tend to already be devotees of using The Nutshell Technique.
And that might be all they do.
They won’t do each sheet, they’ll just do The Nutshell Technique form.
And as long as they are true to that they’ll have it and it’s nice and solid and maybe
they will work with me one-on-one and make sure their Nutshell is solid, they will tack
it up on their bulletin board and they will write from that and they don’t do any other
beat sheet or outline.
I think most writers need a beat sheet or outline, they need more detail than that.
But as long as you have a solid structure you don’t necessarily need more than this.
This isn’t drawn to scale but you will see that most of my structure is all in Act 1
and Act 3 and the only thing that is in A 2 is this one element here and Act 2 is actually
twice as long.
So I don’t have a bunch of structure requirements, they don’t have the required beats in your
Act 2 even thought Act 2 is twice as long.
I strongly believe that if you properly structure things in Act 1 and properly structure things
in Act 3 it does all of the heavy lifting of supporting your Act 2 even though your
Act 2 is twice as long.
As long as you maintain conflict.
So I know lots of writers who hate beat sheets and ask me “Can I really throw it out?”
You absolutely can.
If you don’t like doing a beat sheet, if you don’t find that helpful you don’t
have to.
As long as you find a nice solid structure and you stay true to it this should be enough
to guide you as long as you have conflict.
I do think most writers need more detail but it’s up to the writer a little bit.
More detail…but I don’t think it’s a good idea to do super detailed one because
you want to allow a certain amount of discovery on the page.
That’s why I like having the looser structure of The Nutshell to begin with.
We have a couple of things you’ve got to hit.
If you shift from them then you are screwing up your story.
But if you stay solid to these elements that might be all that you need and you can just
write and live on the page as long as you hit those couple of moments.
Perhaps you need a little bit more structure, a little bit more of an outline or a beat
sheet but I don’t recommend doing super-detailed ones.
There is a thing I call “beat sheet fatigue” where people just spent too much time on that
particularly if you are getting feedback or you are sharing your Nutshell or (I’m sorry)
your beat sheet or outline with your writing group or people like that.
Maybe get feedback on like an 8-page one.
If it’s any longer than that it’s getting into too so much detail that we’d rather
read the script at that point.
A beat sheet is ultimately for your benefit anyway.
It’s for whatever you need.
So if you need a little more structure than just this and like I said I think most people
need a little bit more I think it’s a good idea to have a loose guide of this happens
and then this happens and then this happens.
But kind of loose so that you can discover somewhat on the page.
Film Courage: What about conflict fatigue?
What about someone adding too much conflict right away but there is no real purpose?
It’s just creating friction because the writer thinks they need it but then it doesn’t
really lend itself to the story?
Do you see this a lot?
Or do you see not enough conflict?
Jill: I see not enough conflict more often as a problem.
What you are describing of there being too much it sounds like to me it would be the
case of somebody who hadn’t really figured out what the story is and they just know Screenwriter
101 I’m supposed to have conflict right?
So they just have a bunch of conflict but they don’t really have purpose.
So it sounds like it might be a little situational or episodic but I’d have to see this on
a case-by-case basis.