Film Courage: Do you start every screenplay out with an outline? David Wappel, Screenwriter: I first start with a notebook
once I decided okay this is a project that I want to write I buy a notebook
for it I usually try to sort of theme the notebook so if it's like old like
pirate adventure I'll try to make it look I'll find a notebook that looks
like that and then I will just use that notebook to just freehand write anything
I'm interested in in regards to this screenplay whether it's just like a very
vague idea of I think this thing should happen or I'm writing dialogue for a
scene that might exist in the stream I'm sort of filling that notebook up and I
don't really have a timeline at that point so I'm talking about specs scripts
for me I'm just writing it writing it write it until hopefully a story will
coalesce and once I feel like that story's coalesced I'll try to write that
story as succinctly impossible essentially I'm trying to write the log
line for it and if that log line is engaging to me and I think will move me
if I think that story that is told even in that little you know one sentence is
moving enough to me I'll try to take that sentence and I'll turn it into a
paragraph and if that paragraph is moving then I'll move on if it's not I
will continue to maybe reshape that paragraph and then that paragraph will
become a page that page will become multiple pages into sort of a treatment
and then if the treatment that's when I think I'm doing most of my story work
I'm writing that over and over and I will do that for a couple a months maybe
depending on how often I can work on it and once that treatment is really
resonating with me and is a story that again will move me then I can take it
and start writing the draft and so it almost feels like that draft is more
like a translation project than writing something new I'm taking something that
exists in full prose writing and then put it into a screenplay format
and so all of the little things that exist in a screenplay that's when I'm
putting those things in because my story I feel I already feel incredibly
comfortable about so I don't have to discover any of the story things they
just discover all those little things all those little nooks and crannies that
happen when a story is now gonna be put on the screen and I'm translating it
there and then I'll get that first draft and then from that I'm moving into
rewrites and polishes and all those sort of conversations but I think it's helped
me because I feel like my story usually doesn't go through too many significant
changes once I'm on that draft once I'm in the screenplay software and writing
it because all those changes I've hit all those dead ends all those things
that I thought were great that are not all those things that I was excited
about that didn't end up doing anything for me I've already figured that out in
that treatment process so I don't outline so much as try to just tell a
story and tell it fuller and fuller until that's a full rich story and then
translate it to a screenplay if that makes sense
it does so it almost sounds like this little notebook that you buy this themed
it's like a scrapbook yeah okay so then you're putting it's almost like a diet
part diary parts scrapbook you're just putting little notes and it's like it's
like filling up and then by the time you get to the screenplay formatting it's
already its own world in that little book yeah it already exists and I have
this full treatment that was pretty detailed and it tells a story so it's
not an outline because I don't so I don't have to discover how this
character is going to convince this other character of what they want
because I've done that in the treatment but now I get to in the screenplay
figure out what are the exact words that she's using to convince this character
about what she wants or something like that so a lot of the work is for me
compared to how I think some other people I've heard their process some of
that work is kind of split where it's story stuff here and
then sort of screenplay stuff over here when I'm in the software and and doing
all the screenplay formatting and stuff like that
are there any pictures to help flush it out no I actually don't use pictures I
think it's because I'm a horrible artist and I don't do clippings or anything
that I think in every way I've ever been creative it's always been in words and
ideas and so anytime I've ever tried to translate any of my creative ideas
through visual stuff it just never works and so I'm just I've just I think given
up on that for now maybe at some point I will try to learn how to draw or
something like that but it's probably why I do I'm a lot more active on
Twitter than I am on Instagram because that's just where I feel the most
comfortable sure well Instagram is also very
personal and like a this is what I had for lunch and you know there's a great
photo of it and yeah here's me you know with so-and-so and some people that you
know it's just they're they're just better sharing links to articles or
talking about writing or something yeah yeah do you ever go back and look at
those notebooks during the process or afterwards even years later like oh wow
this is this notebook for this so this notebook became this thing yeah I mean I
have them on my shelf and I can see because they're all different I can make
oh that's that project that's that one and I mean now and then I might flip
through one and like oh yeah I had that idea for that scene that never ended up
anywhere but there's something I love about this idea this this scene and it
didn't have a home in this project I thought it did but maybe it'll go
elsewhere or I'll see something and I think to myself why did I ever think
that was interesting like who was I at that point that wrote that little scrap
of an idea and why was i interested in that so it's not just a useful tool
creatively but personally it acts as a little bit
of sort of like an idea diary of what I was interested at the time that I wrote
that thing I think it's cool to that you have it in the theme of whatever the
project is yeah and I definitely have notebooks that are empty but I was like
that's a cool notebook but I can't use it yet because I don't have an idea that
fits the feeling of that notebook and sometimes it the notebook itself
will get me going oh I should write a fantasy novel because that notebook
looks like a fantasy novel or something like that
I forget which author it was that said don't buy really pretty notebooks to put
like your feelings in or creative right whatever because you're gonna be too
precious because it's so beautiful if you buy something that it's not even you
don't care too much about it's like the spiral notebook from the 99-cent store
you're just gonna be like cool I can put whatever I want I can just regurgitate
it all here and I don't have to be precious with it
mm-hmm I don't know that's just a thought but there's so many beautiful
notebooks that you see in bookstores if people go to bookstores anymore but I
remember back in the day you know and it would almost be too intimidating to
writing something that's leather-bound and I feel that way I keep a personal
journal and it's a lovely leather-bound journal as a gift for my sister years
ago and I am a little bit intimidated to write because the notebooks for my
screenplays I'm just collecting scraps of ideas and I feel like I'm just kind
of spilling my brain out onto it but my personal journal I feel like what if
someone finds this and reads it I want it to be thoughtful and interesting and
I want I want to appear smart even though it's for me I'm still thinking
some how about how this might be seen by others and it's because this notebook
feels like it's something that would be read by others whereas those other
notebooks for my screenplays it's like if that is read by others that's great
because it's it's not supposed to be a thing it's not supposed to be readable
but if this Diary would be something that would be red I would be terrified
and even though it's not I'm still terrified and I think it's because it's
a really nice turtle sure sure and it's not you you want to
write in the King's English yeah pen or something you know what's
the other one you put whatever profanity just whatever thoughts yes my house you
would be doing that yes my handwriting is also terrible and so I also think
about I need to write legibly in this notebook because what if someone
discovers it years from now and reads it I want them to not think I couldn't
write good handwriting sure that's interesting
yeah what moves you when you're writing I think what moves me is seeing real
people go through something and
I don't know I have to really sort of think think about it that's very that's
not a good answer hmm that's why I think a lot of us go to the movies and and
choose certain types of movies some people just want to be entertained and
they want a happy ending a neat little package and and others they want to see
people go through something yeah I'm trying but I'm trying to think of what I
want to see people go through and that's what I think that's why I think it's not
good it's not that it's about its but I don't think it's as accurate as it could
be because I think that things that move me are real people in extraordinary
situations going through something that is incredibly human and I think that
might be why I love Shakespeare so much particularly the histories because I
will never be king of England but when I see the King of England talk about what
it's like to be up at night and I know what it's like to be up at night and
dealing with something then I'm now connected in a way to what it might be
like to be the King of England it's just the thing that keeps me up at night is
way different than the thing keeps him up at night but the fact that we are
both have this same experience tells me that that's another human that is going
through something that I go through and we're connected through empathy and I
find it very moving when I see people in these situations that I will never find
myself in but if I was in that situation I might react the same way because that
reaction is a very human reaction that's what moves me right this is off on a
tangent of it but just in watching Masterclass they had one on political
leadership it's not necessarily a class I would
gravitate toward but it was just really interesting and I love the framing of it
in the way it looked and they just talked about how a lot of the great
presidents forced themselves Abe Lincoln forced himself to go to the theater
different people to get out of that mindset begins they were so focused on
what to do with this war that war and they were criticized for it mm-hmm but
they needed that time away from it because it did keep them up at night and
so that just reminded me of that where they had to get away from the problem of
war and these different things for a short time so that they could come back
and try to solve or deal with it yeah they needed that escapism yeah I think
that art and art that is storytelling forces us to engage with ideas of
ourselves in situations that we might not ever find ourselves in but when
we're forced to think about that it opens up our minds in ways that we can't
get because we don't we just don't get that experience in the real world so I
think that we part of the reason we go to the theater we go to the movies and
we watch TV is even if it's subconscious it's so that we can experience these
lives that we would never experience but because that's a human life and were
humans in a way we get to expand our minds in ways that we need to
you