Let it fly...

Greetings and warmest wishes for 2022!

“Time is Neutral,” who said that? It was Dr. Martin Luther King. So though I greet you for the New Year, it is also a greeting for each day. A New Year, or a new day, both imply renewal. And honestly, what is renewal if not discovery? Discovery of parts of yourself personally, or parts of an idea for a story. Or a script, that has lain dormant.

A former student and now dear friend, and a good writer; asked recently how to get back into her story. It’s a good story which has some historical reference. And she found that the extensive research she had been doing, left her early preparation of note taking and outlining had re been relegated to a back seat and she was stuck.

Research can do that to you. It can paralyze you. So what I suggested, and what I offer to you too, is to stop researching. Purge yourself of that mind set. If it takes a day, or a week, so be it. Then come back to your work and simply write: FADE IN.

Write, not think…write. Then…start - seeing - yes, and hearing too, and your writing will begin to flow.

Every so often we need to remind ourselves that writing for film is - visual writing. Both words have deep meaning. When you begin to write with your eyes, and yes your ears, and I don’t mean just for dialogue, you take your writing out of the straightforward narrative style and into visual writing. But you not only see and hear, you smell and you feel, too. After you have done your preparation, the actual act of writing is physical and emotional. All your senses must be at work when you write a screenplay.

Bearing all this in mind, start to write, and let it fly….