This morning in my social media feed, I came across two screenwriters bemoaning the quality of the notes they’d received from professional script readers. One of the posts was lamenting that the reader gave feedback based on what they believed the script should be rather than what the writer was trying to achieve. I see this come up often and I’ve experienced it myself, so let’s get into it… ‘My name is Legion; for we are many’ this quote from the Bible about demons popped in

I bet you thought I was talking about pauses. I'm not. How often do you say exactly what you mean? For me, the only time I aim at absolute unequivocal clarity is when I'm pitching, presenting or lecturing, and even then I rarely nail it. Inevitably there are gaps. Consider this scenario, I’m sure you’ve experienced it; you chance upon a friend on the street -someone you might not have seen for a while- you stop to talk and you ask how she is. She smiles and tells you that l

If everything the audience needs to understand about your film is carried in the dialogue you might as well shoot your film with the lens cap on because you haven’t written a screenplay, you’ve written a radio play. I’m sure you’ve watched films where the dialogue is laughable. Characters tell other characters important information about the story or other characters, they signpost what is likely to happen, or re-cap previous events. It feels artificial, we can sense the pres

Creating confusion is never good, ambiguity on the other hand is a mighty weapon in your armoury. Get it right and the audience will love the journey you've created, get it wrong and your film script will be consigned to the 'no idea what that's about' pile. Some believe that a more convoluted or complex script is better than a simple one. Sure convoluted and complex can work. If complex and convoluted goes wrong however -which is easier the more complex or convoluted the st

In confidence, screenwriter to screenwriter, writing a satisfying ending for a feature screenplay is hard isn’t it? Your audience won’t know how or why -that’s your job- but they definitely know when you’ve let them down at the end of the film. A few years back I watched an indie feature written and directed by a friend -names have been removed to protect the innocent- and though in many ways it was very accomplished, throughout the film I remember repeatedly asking myself t

Are you thinking about your audience’s journey through your story, or are you so absorbed by writing the screenplay that you’ve forgotten about them? If you fall into that second camp, then this is your timely reminder to begin the process of thinking through your audience’s journey. What does the audience know and when? This is a mighty question. Manipulating where you put your audience in your film can radically transform your audience’s experience of it. Through the durat

What does it really mean? On face value ‘write what you know’ appears limiting and restrictive, but it doesn’t have to be. There is a quote attributed to the Roman playwright Terentius Publius ‘…I am human, nothing in humanity is alien to me…’ This really resonates with me. In a very real sense, if I’m doing my job properly, I’m always writing what I know because regardless of any contextual variation; nationality, ethnicity, religion, gender, sexual persuasion etc. people ar

When I started my screenwriting adventures, if someone had said to me that I needed a 'process' I would have laughed in their face and muttered about process being anti-creative. I'd had some success early in my 'career'. Two producers had vied to option my first feature script. Since I'd written that screenplay in a very idiosyncratic way, I assumed -in my arrogance- that 1. I knew a thing or two about the craft and 2. I didn't need a process. Those views lasted precisely un

Boy! Have I seen some bad screenwriting advice about character development on social media recently. Known screenwriting consultants failing to make important category distinctions and putting the cart before the horse. As usual, the names have been omitted to protect the guilty. Don't worry writers, I've got your back. Do NOT interview your characters to figure out who they are. Do NOT borrow characters from other films. Do NOT write pages and pages of detailed biography - I

What are the two most fundamental questions in screenwriting? I’d suggest that it’s 'What happens?' and 'What is it about?' I'm often surprised when I ask a screenwriter 'what is it about?' and they proceed to tell me the the events of the story or I ask 'what happens?' and they start describing the thematics. Let's get into this common misunderstanding. What happens is the series of events in sequence -not necessarily linear- from beginning to end. What is it about? Now this

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Yes you did read that properly. There are no books you need to read to learn screenwriting. So you're probably thinking that this sounds controversial. Perhaps you think I'm deliberately courting controversy, catching eyeballs by being provocative. Maybe you think I'm being ridiculous or that this is an absurd idea. So blatantly stupid that you should just stop reading now. After all it flies in the face of given wisdom right? But does it, does it really? Here's a question

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