This Is How I Do

Every year, in every single AFF panel, the question comes up:

"How do you write stuff?"

Of course, the exact wording changes; it gets sneakier and turns into "can you expand on the writing process you used to bring That Movie, or That TV Show to life," which is basically still asking the same question of "how do you write?" Which is a question that annoys me for two reasons:

1. The question itself is annoying because if you're asking that question I make the immediate assumption that what you really want to know is "how can you tell me to write so that it feels easier" and

 2. I am always underwhelmed and frustrated by the answer, which almost always amounts to a floundering run around of "if you don't know how to write, then I don't know what to tell you."

Well, guess what; because I just finished my TV pilot script and subsequently am feeling the kind of power that I imagine only ever truly belongs to leaders of certain communist countries, I am going to reveal the secret to you.

This secret of how you write stuff.

Ahem. Correction. This is how I do it, and it happens to work. Mostly.

Feeling good. Putin good.

Step 1: You get an idea
This I cannot help you with, but basically you want someone (hopefully interesting and dynamic) to want something (hopefully really really badly) and then things happen (hopefully big crazy things) to prevent that person from getting that thing.

Step 2: You write up a treatment
I'm not exactly sure what the current industry standard of a treatment is, but for me a treatment is a five to seven page narrative of your entire story. This happens, then this happens, then this happens and so on. You name people and places and establish a basic beginning, middle and end to the thing. There's no pressure to this step; you're just letting the idea flow and writing down whatever comes to mind. You can always write another treatment. For my latest script, I went through three different treatments before really getting what I wanted. This is also the thing you want to run past your friends, family and whoever else will listen because those people's faces will tell you whether or not you've got a good story here. Don't listen to their words, look at their faces!

Step 3: To the spreadsheets!
I love spreadsheets. Spreadsheets for everything! I have a spreadsheet of every article of clothing in my closet, from the color to the fabric to where I bought it. Why, you ask? Because I love spreadsheets. The particular spreadsheet I use came courtesy of an astoundingly amazing friend of mine and I believe it is fashioned after the Blake Snyder beat sheet, but any spreadsheet will do as long as it encompasses a basic three act structure (or four or five act, depending on what you're writing) and includes basic hallmarks of a script (setup, catalyst, b-story, midpoint, all is lost, finale, that kind of stuff). There's plenty of resources out there for this, so get Googling.

Step 4: More spreadsheets!
Seriously, and I cannot stress this enough, spreadsheets are the answer to everything. Money problems? Spreadsheet. Relationship issues? Spreadsheet that shit. Can't decide where to eat for dinner? Spread dot Sheet dot Done. Trying to write a script? Take the step 3 spreadsheet and expand. This second spreadsheet is basically a forty to fifty scene chronological breakdown of precisely what is going to happen in your story. Every scene is described in the order in which it will appear. Mine is a three column, fifty row affair that is color coded by Act. In the first column is a description of what happens in that scene, the second column is for stating the purpose of the scene and the third column is for notes that usually address alternatives to the proposed scene (maybe Lucy punches Doug in the face, but what if Harriet punched him instead), or bits of dialogue.

Because you get to change things. Throughout these first four steps, everything is negotiable, everything is up for debate, mostly with yourself. You can make up your mind, then change it, then flip it around and turn it into an omelet - whatever you want. And enjoy this freedom, because it ends as soon as you get to...

Step 5: Write the damn script
Pull up your Fade In, or Final Draft or Celtx or whatever it is you're using at the time and lay it side by side with your step 4 spreadsheet and stick to the damn plan! You are done making choices and being critical; your job now is to write this thing and to write it as quickly as possible. Ignore the doubts, ignore the part of you that keeps saying "this is crap, this is crap, this is utter crap" and continue with what you're doing. This is why you don't make changes at this stage, because the sheer weight of what you are about to do is paralyzing enough that you don't need to be grappling with whether or not you're writing the best version of your story. Of course you're not writing the best version of your story; this draft will end up total shit! Expect it, accept it. Because you can wish in one hand and write a pile of shit draft in the other and guess which will get you a script first?

When you've finished your draft, give it to those people in your life who you give writerly stuff to. Make them read it. Take your lumps. Be grateful. And celebrate; you just wrote a script! Congratulations! That's huge! Go you, go me, go everyone. Now get out there and do it!

Do it so you can feel good. Putin good.

On Women and Having it All

I'm going to make this brief because I can't even believe we're still having this conversation but whatever. Can women really have it all?

Yes.

Yeah, but really, like, can they "have it all?"

Yes. Yes they can.

Okay, hear me out here though: having it all...women...?

Yes. Is there anything else I can help you with?

Hypothetical conversations with myself are how I answer all of life's big questions. Of course, by now this is a truth so universally acknowledged that I'm baffled when the question is still posed. Baffled, I tell you! And I don't mean posed by the media, because they'll keep beating a dead horse until decomposition spreads its bits across this green earth; I mean when posed by actual people I know to other actual people I know, or even to me by some very, very foolish individuals.

There's built-in metaphors for this kind of thing, for seemingly limiting the number of activities we are allowed to participate in at any one point in time. "She's got a lot on her plate," or "She's juggling a lot of stuff right now," or "a bird in the hand is worth two in the" - okay not that one, but definitely those first two. Where is this plate? Why am I suddenly a circus performer? If nonsensical metaphors are just up for grabs here, then give me all the plates and all of those juggler baton thingys because I'm going to fill everything with Halloween candy and throw it in the air and keep it all moving because I have fifty arms with twelve hundred fingers and I'm made of Valyrian steel and no one can stop me!

See, it just gets real out of hand real quick.

Let's not speak in metaphor. Let's just say that someone is a mother and a career woman and in her free time enjoys writing and baking and Tae Kwon Do. And then let's all collectively not act shocked because, frankly, there's not much shocking about that. Substitute the martial arts for running or yoga or Cross Fit and this actually describes a lot of women I personally know. This is not some kind of anomaly; this is the new standard. The rest of us are actually behind.

It's never been my experience that someone looks at a man who has kids and is successful in his job and also finds time to workout and brew his own beer and just goes "Wow; I don't know how he does it." I want someone to walk into the Weinstein Company and pitch a movie where Bradley Cooper plays a remarkable man who is the breadwinner for his family and still finds time to read bedtime stories to his kids and have a fulfilling personal life. You'd be laugh/coughed straight out of the office (when I picture the Weinsteins, they look like the grumpy old men from the Muppets, so they cough a lot; I have absolutely no reason for this). There's no story there. Just like there's no story here:

Do laundry, schedule a meeting and check mail? My god, she's an android kill her!!!

I didn't set out to bash a stupid movie from 2011, and I feel a little bad about throwing it to the wolves considering I've never seen it. Then I watched a clip on IMDB and I swear to god I will burn every copy of this movie I ever come across. It's not just insulting to women to say that the ability to run a meeting and do laundry in the same day is some kind of supernatural feat for our sex, it's also incredibly insightful of just how ingrained sexism still is in our culture. I mean, it's 2011 people. Really?

Apparently, not old or infirm. 

I remember when I first got married (ugh, boring personal story - I know, I know; bear with me here), I would thank my husband every time he did the dishes, or the laundry, or swiped a Swiffer sweeper across the floor. Why the hell was I doing that? He wasn't acting like it was some big production, he didn't beg for recognition. I was being sexist. Sexism isn't just this idea that women should have to do the cooking and the cleaning and the child rearing, it's a concept that places the chief responsibility of these things getting done on the woman's shoulders instead of recognizing that there are two perfectly capable people living in the same space with, give or take, equal opportunity with which to get the job done. 

And if your thing is writing, in addition to working and parenting and staying fit and meeting all those interpersonal requirements that keep you from turing into a blood-crazed sociopath, then just do that. Write. And don't listen to people who talk about plates and juggling balls in the air and all that meaningless word picture shit. Time isn't something that is just going to be handed to you any more, you have to painstakingly carve out every square inch of your day so that those things that matter most are given prime real estate and those things that don't fall in shavings on the floor (Ah! Metaphor! I can't get away)! 

So have that baby, take that job, write that screenplay or novel or teleplay or role play interactive board game; have it all. Have your damn cake and eat it too while you're at it because there's always more cake and the really delicious kind is dirt cheap so go to town. And be a wise steward of you metaphors. Treat your time like currency and spend it wisely (see, metaphors like that - pure gold - hahahaha I apologize).  

Next up: my groundbreaking definition of Feminism (not really; nobody is asking for that).
     

This vs. This

So there's this:

And there's this:

On first glance, both of these shows look absolutely the same; same murder mystery type premise, same detective type lead with his single-mom-looking sidekick and all of them with this grimace that seems to convey the seriousness and yet perplexity of the situation they now find themselves in. I mean, someone's been murdered! But in Europe, so, you know, it's more important.

Side question: cops in Britain and the Isles just don't carry guns? Retractable sticks get the job done? Really?

Back to the point. These posters may look similar, may feel similar, may even smell similar but they are not the same. Not even close. In fact, I believe that just as with the discovery of the alternate romantic comedy TV shows which served as opposites to each other, I have stumbled upon two ends of a completely different spectrum: the British and/or Irish (possibly Scottish?) troubled middle aged male-driven detective series; on one end, the triumphant and constantly entertaining and intriguing Broadchurch and on the other the sad, dreary and drawn out Hinterland.

Introductions

Let's start at the very beginning (a very good place to - and now that song will never leave you). Broadchurch takes its time setting up the most dynamic character (played by David Tennant, which I admit automatically gives this show a leg up on the competition). Fresh off maternity leave, DS Ellie Miller (Olivia Colman) if informed that the promotion she was promised has instead gone to DI Alec Hardy. Because we like Miller, this immediately introduces conflict and by the time we meet Hardy and find out that he's kind of an asshole we feel vindicated in defending Miller which is what makes the fact that we end up liking Hardy even more amazing. Conflict, clarity and layers - all there.

Compare that to our introduction of Tom Mathias in Hinterland. He's jogging. And he jogs and jogs and jogs. Some might call it running. Anywho, he jogs up to his trailer and the phone rings and he answers it by saying "this is Mathias," and then cut to opening credits. So, clearly, he's a runner.

My problem with this is that it gives no specific information about our main man; he's not jogging a certain way, he's not running to or from anything in particular, his clothes don't even seem to give us a clue as to who this guy really is (Is he a Nike or Adidas man!?). There's no setup, and so when he answers the phone in his very serious and stoic voice "this is Mathias," that declaration doesn't have any weight behind it. When DI Hardy is introduced, we all go "ah-ha; so that's him," but Mathias the runner? No investment.

Backstory

Weaved into the bloody fabric of these series' plots is the fact that both of these guys are pretty messed up. Both are divorced or separated, both have kids that are either dead or they don't talk to and both have a brooding darkness about them that they can't seem to shake. Of course, this is great because it creates a character that feels real, who has problems and deficits just like the rest of us.

But here's where Hinterland stops. Mathias is sad and his daughter is probably dead because he keeps a photo of her in his wallet but never talks about her and we never see her. Seeds of a dark past, but really just one seed of one dark event that we're sure they'll expound on later but for now we have to be satisfied with conjecture and contemplating the metaphor of this guy running from his problems by actually, literally, physically running. Hmm.

Contrast that with Hardy's backstory. Talk about seeds; there's enough here to plant an orchard (an orchard! Get it!? Yeah). He's got the kid he never talks to, the ex-wife presumably and all this makes him a very sad boy. But it doesn't stop there. We also find out he's fresh off a similar case that he managed to completely botch, making his success here not only preferable but imperative to his career.

Then there's (arguably) the most important component of his backstory: his heart condition. And not just an eat-less-salt-or-you'll-have-to-take-a-beta-blocker heart condition, but a stop-working-or-you're-going-to-die heart condition. This does two things for Hardy as a character; first, it creates sympathy (you can't totally hate a guy with a  heart condition, it's just too vulnerable) and secondly it sets up that ever important element of the ticking clock. Will he be able to solve the case before it's too late!?

The Murders

Nothing against the elderly here, but I have a bone to pick with Hinterland's choice of victims. For your first episode to feature a murdered elder person is fine; if that's what you want to do, then do it. But for the very next episode to again feature an elder person's murder, well then that's just one too many elder people. Let me be the first to admit how terrible it is to say so, but the simple fact is that the younger the victim the more interest and investment there is in catching the killer. I don't make the cosmic mystery/drama/who-dun-it rules but there they are. The degree to which people are upset by a death is proportionately equal the number of years left unlived.

And also, what of variety? Two old folk murders back to back make it look like you're a show about old people getting murdered. If that's what you are, great! I know people who will watch that, but if you're clearly not then why the repeat? Both victims elderly. Both with no real family to speak of. Both killed in their home, one body moved, sure, but somehow found in the first location they look. Okay. Fine.

In Broadchurch, a kid is murdered. A young boy is murdered and laid out on the beach, leaving behind two parents who are struggling in their marriage and a teenage sister who has her own shit to deal with. The entire town is shocked. We are shocked. Who murders a kid? For what possible reason? Things get messy as accusations fly and the town's dirty laundry gets put out for the world to see and that is drama. That's thrilling.

Layers

Keep it simple. Stupid.

Take the first Hinterland murder: an elderly woman is killed because (spoiler, obviously) a long time ago she used to run an orphanage, which is now a hotel, but was very bad to the children there and in one case took away a young girl's baby and killed it and buried it but didn't tell the girl it was dead and the girl grew up looking for her lost child, eventually getting married and apparently forgetting about looking for her child as she tried to start a family but had a miscarriage which sent her spiraling into a crazy hunt of her first kid again which lead her back to the old lady and when she couldn't tell her where her kid was she killed her.

At first glance that might look like layers, but allow me to correct. That's confusing. A bunch of things happening that eventually leads back to something that happened in the past leading to murder is not bad writing, but it's not layering. Layers are a result of things happening on multiple levels, as in the outcome or progression of a crime has an effect on multiple people to varying degrees and effects more than just what is apparent to the crime itself.

A good example of layering: Broadchurch. If you have not seen this show, go watch it now and then come back and finish this blog. Because I'm going to ruin the ending otherwise, and this show is worth it so just leave now. If you've seen it, then you know that it's not just the murder that's going on here. We're not just looking for a killer, we're finding out things about almost every character that makes them look suspicious for the crime.

In the end, the explanation is simple: a grown man who has a secret relationship with the boy lashes out and kills him when he threatens to tell. That's it. And even though it could have conceivably been any number of characters, the show chooses a murderer with the most impact: DS Miller's husband. In Hinterland, the murderer is chosen and substantiated well enough, but there's nothing far reaching about the effects of an obscure woman murdering her old head mistress who was terrible to her and the other children. A seemingly perfect father, married to and living under the same roof as the detective investigating his crime is on a whole other level of disturbing. It effects everything.

Bond, James Bond?

Throwing Luther in there for good measure, because this is the show all the other shows like this want to be. Complicated characters, simple plots. Not easy, predictable plots but one's you can see you're way through once they're revealed; one's that feel clever, like they took some time. Of course the original and never to be topped version of this principle is: 

You boys think you're complicated? That's cute.

Prime. Suspect. Forget everything I just said, and go watch that. End of lesson.

The Importance of Writing It Down

I never believe those people who say "Ah, I had this great idea for a movie and I didn't write it down and now I can't remember it. Gone forever." I don't buy it. That you would have thought up some grand sweeping picture of story, been so enamored with it that you immediately recognized it as great and then forget the whole thing? Forever? Nope nope nope.

And I guess I can dismiss the idea so readily because, deep down, I'm not terrified to lose these broad sweeping ideas because that's never quite what makes the story/book/script great. It's the little things. The subtlety and subtext and damn it those little things are hard to come by and easily forgotten. That's what you need to write down; that's the stuff that has me scrambling for a cocktail napkin (I have never in my life, not once, scrambled for a napkin of any kind).

By and large, those little things are the result of layers upon layers of planning and editing. They are the product of time and effort, which is why it's so easy to spot a lazy script. I don't necessarily mean a bad script or even an amateur script, but the ones that are really infuriating because they're told logically, all the essential elements are there and yet they are lacking. They're hollow. Someone didn't put in the effort.

As an audience, these aren't things you notice in the story right away; they come to light two or three days later when you're still thinking about this movie because of how great it was. There's this thing in Inception where if the people who are dreaming draw too much attention to themselves, then the subconscious can start to notice and begin attacking the dreamer. This is a little thing - you don't really need it for the rest of the movie to make sense, but take it away and you lose this kind of depth, you lose that little extra sense of suspense and urgency that is so perfectly aligned with what the movie is; most importantly, you lose that moment where Joseph Gordon Levitt gets Ellen Page to kiss him (which I know I can't live without).

Inception is actually the perfect metaphor for what I'm talking about. You can't just choose to go into a single level dream or a really super deep gray beaches and dilapidated buildings level dream; you have to move through each layer until you reach the one you're really looking for. Those ideas that really elevate the story are a thought within a thought within a thought within a thought. You have to go down the rabbit hole of ideas and you have to write them down every step of the way because once you get to the next layer you'll have forgotten how you got there and you won't be able to replicate that process with any certainty.

And all this just to point out that we need outlines. Seriously, we do. If you could sit down and in one session complete a work, from dreaming it up to final edit, then there would be no need to outline, to make treatments, tables, beat sheets, note cards and all those other little cheats. But you can't. You have to sleep, you have to eat, most of us have to work. We have to take these insufferable breaks so that we don't starve to death or get divorced and when we come back there needs to be a way to resume where we left off; we need to leave ourselves a little trail of breadcrumbs so that it's not all starting over every damn time we sit down. The outline, that beat sheet, however you decide to do it, that is your way back. Without these things, the thought of returning to your writing and starting from virtual scratch day after day is too daunting and you won't do it. You just won't.

Now, there are people, professional writers even, who claim they don't outline. They don't need to. Once again, I don't believe them. I don't - maybe they have impeccable memory, maybe they have a running list of "cool little things that will make my script seem better," but I don't buy it and more importantly I know from experience that I can't do it. Outlining is a bitch, it really is, but you push through and you get the job done. You put in the damn effort. You make sometime great.

And you drink.

Your milk.

In your cereal, because cereal is the food of the gods and of the writing muses who do give their blessings to all who partake.