There comes a point in a script where —
— you’ve outlined the story —
— you’ve done a scene breakdown —
— why, you even roughed out an 85-page working draft —
— but then you hit page 79 of your proper draft, you know you’ve another twenty or thirty pages to go, and all the voices you’ve been ignoring since page 47 just stop all of a sudden because –
a. admit it – you’re lost, and
b. you’re not adding value.
Now, there’s lost as in I was wondering how I was going to reach the second act out but my fingers seem to know the way and then there’s I’m making my characters walk and talk shit.
And as for adding value, there’s My characters are walking and talking shit but there’s something useful happening here, and then there’s This. Is. Going. Nowhere.
The word sanguine comes to mind – until i see that it actually means cheerfully optimistic.
Melancholic is more accurate, I suppose, but it just sounds so… down.
Hang on, my first instinct was right: sanguine, adj – eager to shed blood (archaic).
Yep.
I always finish. Of course, that’s not quite true… I do have a couple of drafts that I got to page 20 and stopped. But the way I figure it, if you write a draft all the way to the end. Then you’ve got a draft. It might be a bad draft. But it’s a whole thing that you can show someone and get feedback. Such as “I liked the start, good tone, and I liked the end. But wouldn’t it be better if in the middle you had your characters do something instead of having your characters talk about their feelings”.
Whereas if you stop a draft before the end. Well, you don’t have a draft. And even if you’re willing to show it to someone for feedback… the feedback is often less useful.
I’ve written 9 full feature scripts. Many of those scripts are embarrassingly bad. Some I only did one draft on and then decided they were best abandoned. But the interesting thing is I know exactly how many different scripts I’ve written. I’ve got no idea how many treatments, outlines, scriptments, drafts of each script, etc. I’ve done.
But a finished feature draft is a complete thing. It’s an idea realised. Up to page 86 of a draft… well, that’s almost something. But it’s still partly an idea rather than a script. And that just bugs me.
So I hope this isn’t coming across as harassment. But I say finish the damn thing. Finish it badly. Finish it quickly. Finish it wrongly. But finish it.
That said. I suspect my friend Sean would possibly disagree with me. And I respect Mr Molloy a lot. So maybe I’m wrong.
(No. I’m never wrong. Doesn’t “I wrote a bad first draft” sound better than “I got stuck on the first draft so decided to start again”)
y’know what? if someone else had told me they’d stopped at page 8x, i’d be exhorting them to finish the wee fecker, too.
most times, for better or worse, i finish a draft. i might not be as close to the finish line as i’d like but at least i’m closer.
it’s just that in this instance, it was like crossing a looong stretch of water, with all preparations made and the stars in alignment for making landfall at a specific beach festooned with Dunkin Donuts and KFC stalls – but you had an extra five minutes break at the half-way mark, and you thought it’d be a good idea for that fifteen-minute burst of energy at the three-quarter mark – and now you find yourself headed for a different beach, which has a Lucky Horse Takeaways stall, and no amount of grunting and straining and visualisation is getting you back on course and so you…
start a new draft.
boy did i choose a bad analogy.
So where are you with this draft now?
I think you had a good analogy… especially as I’m not a big KFC fan but wouldn’t mind having a chinese from the Lucky Horse.
I just had the hardest writing week of my life. Which I probably shouldn’t go into on the internet. But I tell you what, I earned that money.
[looks around furtively] i’m outlining from scratch. it sounds awfully amateurish – but i think because it’s a spec that i’m rather keen on, i don’t mind the multiple reinvention of the wheel.
and a phwoaa on your writing week last week. we writers always earn our money (and it’s sooo much sweeter after some/any turbulence).