Film Courage: Is outlining a must?
Scott Myers, DePaul University Professor/Screenwriter/Creator Gointothestory.blcklst(dot)com: Again, ever
writer is different.
I would say if you have any pretensions of working in TV, yes.
No project goes to script (no episode) unless they break it in prep and that typically involves
either a beat sheet or an outline.
On the feature side of things if you’re writing on spec and you’ve got 12 months
and you want to with Fade In: and see where it goes, that’s okay.
But I definitely recommend outlining.
If you’ve not outlined, you should outline at least once and see what that process is
like.
The way I approach it that I think enlivens the experience is as I said before we work
with the characters.
So week one protagonist character treatment, ask seven key questions of the protagonist
so you are engaging them and really digging down into who they are.
Questions like what do they fear most, that’s an interesting question.
Why does this story have to happen to this character at this time.
Think about their sort of place in life.
Second week we do brainstorming, some of those exercises I was talking about, questionnaires,
biographies, these direct engagement exercises, interviews, monologues and steams of consciousness.
Third week we now move to plot so we talk about what is the beginning of the story.
What is the end of Act one?
What is the end of Act 2?
What is the end of the story?
Just to get a sense of those four primary plot line points.
But we are also identifying subplots.
My principle there is SubPlot = A Relationship.
So whatever character you’ve come up with, the primary characters in your story then
start to look at them in terms of their relationships and if you can work with character archetypes,
that’s very helpful.
Oh?
This is a protagonist-attractor relationship, this is a protagonist-mentor relationship,
etcetera.
And so you start to think in terms of subplots and in week four we do the psychological domain
and we talk about these four theme line movements, disunity, deconstruction, reconstruction,
unity.
For the first few weeks it really is focused on character and by the time you get to the
last stage where we are breaking out 3X5 index cards and doing that whole thing you know
that you’ve spent so much time with the characters and generated so much content,
there is a vibrancy to it, there’s an aliveness to it, there’s a vitality to it.
It’s not just literally plugging in this-to-that and this-to-that and this-to-that, you are
really seeing the story unfold and you are sensing how the characters are involved in
the protagonist’s psychological journey and their arc.
So I would say it’s not mandatory to do an outline.
I highly recommend it.
If you feel that it is better for you to write a treatment version of it, a more literary
thing, that’s fine, too.
Or a beat sheet.
But I do outlines and they can run to 25-30 pages long like single-space because I put
everything in there, like what is the central conflict?
Why are these characters, lines of dialogue I’ve heard.
How am I going to get in-and-out of the scenes (transitions to the next scene).
I put it all there.
I would strongly encourage people to do an outline, yes.
Particularly if they want to work in TV they just absolutely have to.
Film Courage: Let’s say someone does not want to do an outline and you say “Alright,
that’s fine.
That’s your style even though I highly recommend it.”
Then you read their script and see that it could have benefited from them taking time,
seeing the story a bigger picture.
What is your answer to this?
Scott: Well here is the thing.
I’d say nine times out of ten I’m not going to get that script because they are
going to crash and burn by page 50 or 60 because they don’t know where they are going.
Anybody can write a first act.
You’ve got to establish the key characters, the story universe, the central conflict,
the atmosphere and tone, something happens (the inciting incident or the call to adventure)
and then something propels them off into this new world right?
Well so you can probably (off that energy) go Okay the next 10-15 pages…and then maybe
5 more…but I don’t know where I’m going?
Maybe I better figure this out?
Okay I’ll write another 10-15 but well…that’s stupid…that doesn’t really work.
Oh wow?
And so people will get…I think the number one reason why people do not finish a script
is because they don’t know where they are going?
If you do an outline, you do know where you are going.
Like you are familiar with Washington D.C., there is the Chesapeake Bay Bridge tunnel
(I do a blog post on this, it’s pretty funny).
The Chesapeake Bay Bridge tunnel extends from Virginia Beach up to the Delmarva Peninsula
which is Delaware, Maryland and Virginia.
And it’s long, it’s like 20-some odd miles long.
So you’ve got this span which is a bridge and then there is a tunnel for like a mile-and-a-half
which is creepy enough because you are under the Atlantic Ocean in this tunnel.
Then you come up and there is a mid-part of the bridge and then there is another tunnel
and another part of the bridge.
That middle part of the bridge which is about 10 miles out, if you go during the day, you
cannot see land anywhere.
There is no land.
You are on a bridge in the middle of the ocean.
If you have an outline at least you know where you’re going and you just keep going and
going because that middle of the story (Act 2) can be so discombobulating sometimes and
so you know where you’re going because you’ve got the thing broken because you’re trusting
you are going to come out the other end.
But yes absolutely, I’ve read scripts where oh gosh, they didn’t know the structure
or structures or a mess.
But if there is something there and the characters are vibrant then yes, we can work around that.
Structure is important absolutely for screenplays but there are ways to get to that.
The characters who are alive and vibrant and compelling, that’s really the harder part
I think in some respects.
Film Courage: You just triggered a memory when I was a kid and being afraid to have
my grandparents drive me over that bridge.
Maybe this is why I’m afraid of bridges.
There was the subconscious coming out…see you brought it out…I forgot all about this.