Lessons from a first-time screenwriter
I am 39 years old and I’ve only written two screenplays in my entire life. The first was an 85 page dark comedy for a college screenwriting class about a couple of movie nerds who wind up in the middle of a drug deal gone bad. Inspired by what every other dark comedy of the late 90s and early 00s was inspired by—you guessed it—Kevin Smith and Quentin Tarantino. Oh so dark. Oh so edgy. I cringe at the memory of it. It was actually well received in class and the instructor even told me it reminded her of a Tarantino flick, which I took great pride in at the time. I think reading it today would be eye-roll inducing given how many Tarantino disciples have emerged from the woodwork in the last 30 years.
Fast forward 20 years or so to the second script I’ve ever written, and the damn thing wins Quarter Finalist status in the 2021 Killer Shorts Contest. I promise you, the only other screenwriting I even attempted was writing bits and pieces of Star Trek scenes that never went anywhere, and those were just to see if I could write convincing Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock dialogue.
But how did I end up writing an 18 page Quarter Finalist script about a possession that manifests inside a guy’s tooth?
Let’s start with why I didn’t do it sooner:
What I Had to Relearn About Screenwriting
Personally, there was a great amount of anxiety involved in just figuring out how to write a screenplay. Sure, I’d done it in college, but that was 20 years ago, and it was for a class and not a competition where industry professionals would read it. I could also feel my pulse increasing at the thought of trying to solve the logistics of camera angles and scene numbers. The idea of trying to keep track of all this nearly cripples my ability to focus on simply trying to tell a good story.
The Screenwriters Network
But by researching the Killer Shorts Contest, I quickly discovered The Screenwriters Network podcast, where I very quickly learned the difference between a spec script and a shooting script. A shooting script, where camera angles and scene numbers are put into play, is often written after a spec script has been put into production. Basically, the trappings of a shooting script aren’t even a writer’s concern until their spec script is put into production. This was an immediately liberating revelation that gave me the confidence to even start writing a spec script.
Protecting My Work
I was also intimidated by the process of securing a copyright, which, in the past, I was instructed to mail a copy of my script to myself and never open. I never really understood why this could hold up under any kind of legal scrutiny. But again, through Killer Shorts and The Screenwriters Network, I learned that for a scant $20 I could easily register my script through the WGA securing protection for five years.
What to Write With
Now that I had cleared up these concerns, I just needed something to write my script that would easily keep it in the necessary screenplay format. When I was in college, I only knew about a couple of more expensive options, and for all I knew, that’s all that was available today, but a quick Google search revealed a great variety of options, all easily at my disposal.
With all these issues resolved, plus the added benefit of an isolating pandemic that kept me perched up in the bonus room of my house, surrounded by tons of cinematic inspiration, I had no excuse to why couldn’t hammer out a 25 page script.
The Short Form Inspired Me to Write Again
Until you’ve done it, there are fewer things more motivating and powerful to a writer as simply completing a story. I say simply, but I’m also very aware of how difficult this can be. My point is, I found the challenge of limiting my story to 25 pages at the most to be very liberating. I didn’t have to be concerned with filling time or over-explaining things that I’d already thought too much about. Too much thought and explanation can undo wonderful entertainment.
The Freedom of Horror
It’s very easy to get caught up in trying to explain the rules of whatever world or notion you’ve created but it’s not always necessary. However, since I only had 25 pages at most to tell my story, and because horror audiences are clearly very good at suspending disbelief, I absolutely took advantage of leaning into and trusting my audience. We’re both here to see what lengths we’ll go to entertain and be entertained, so let’s have fun.
Where to Start
The short format forced me into getting down to business much sooner, and I was surprised at discovering where my story should actually begin. This revelation helped relieve the stress of developing too much set up that runs the risk of committing the mortal sin of boring the audience to death—and if watching hours of Shudder has taught me anything, it’s to never be boring. One thing we can all agree on as horror fans is we’re ready to get to the good stuff. I found creating a situation to get your characters into trouble early on, made it easier to keep the story moving, and it forced me to use the situations I was creating to help influence the characters and develop the world around them. These situations informed how the characters should react, which is naturally a great opportunity to develop them simultaneously.
My script Tooth is about a guy who has a toothache that won’t go away, and in spite of whatever he does — two trips to a strange dentist and a gory attempt at self-extraction — it only gets worse. I also added a simple, strange element that eventually drives him into a murderous rage. Since this was a short horror script, I took liberty with the freedom to not necessarily explain it, but simply allowed it to unfold. I felt any explanation would be a better dynamic that could develop for a longer format.
Knowing When to Show and When to Tell
I also had to remind myself that I was dealing in a visual medium and that the action pieces were as important as the dialogue, so if it was something I could show, then I needed to show it. This helped me keep tighter, more relevant dialogue which ultimately prevents characters from looking stupid. I can’t say I was completely successful in this, but it was a revelation that simplified the storytelling process for me.
Before I knew it, I was typing THE END, and even though it needed some polishing, the completion of my script was 110% necessary to be motivated to improve what I’d written and to be driven enough to do it again.
A New Passion
If you’d told me that hammering out a crazy idea for a contest of nearly 1000 entries would put me in the top 15-20%, I would have told you you were nuts. But taking the time to squash my anxieties and shut down excuses forced my focus into telling the story I wanted to tell and instilling an obsession to see it through.
I just recently typed THE END on the first draft of my next script for when submissions open again, and I’m still riding on that Quarter-Finalist wave of confidence. I may even have another idea or two brewing. My point is, now I want to write all the time. And even though there’s a good chance that whatever I submit in the next Killer Shorts Contest may not even be accepted, I would be foolish not to try. Now that I’ve done it, I know I can do it. The hardest part is over. I can deal with rejection, but what I can’t deal with is knowing that I failed simply because I didn’t.
