From 0 to screenplay outline in 1 week

Hey guys, I’m sorry for not having posted the newsletter yesterday, or at all this week, but I was very busy with completely changing the screenplay.

If you read last week's email, you know that I was in the midst of changing my screenplay, with only two months left to finish it. Why? Honestly, because I wasn’t connecting to the material. I told you at the beginning of my journey how important it was for me to feel like I was writing the correct idea, and I needed to put my money where my mouth is. At the end of the day, I realized that the screenplay I had been working on for months was wrong. Not in the sense that it is a bad idea, because I don’t believe it was. But rather, that it was a story which I didn't feel compelled to write about. I picked it for the wrong reasons, because I thought it had the strongest conflict, or the most chances of selling, etc. Now I'm not saying these things don't matter, but at the end of the day, if you as an artist are not aligned with your work in the moment, then none of the other factors matter.

3 steps to craft an Idea from sratch?

I have a new idea. It's about a coming-of-age comedy with a blend of action. As I said, it is a really new idea, so I am still working on figuring things out, but for now let’s just say it is a blend between Superbad and Die Hard. I was working every day of the last week trying to figure it out, and here are the exact steps I took to figure out the idea.

1- use a word generator: I start making up premises. For example, think car and explosion, and then I would write a little premise like: it is a story about a NASCAR racer whose car blows up in the most important race of his life, and how he deals with the aftermath. The idea is to get the brain working in weird and unexpected ways. I did this about 50 times over.

2- now that I had some interesting premises, I wanted to get to the heart of it, especially when I was feeling so emotionally disconnected from my last project. I wanted to find the heart of the story. So I made a little collage of movies I love, and more importantly, movies whose vibe I would like it to resemble what I was about to write.

I did this with like 25 movies in total, and afterward, I just simply figured out what genres came out most, which for me were lighthearted action, fantasy, sci-fi, comedy, and a little romance.

3- At this point, I had a pretty good idea of the feel, and then I just needed to figure out what I wanted to talk about. As you know, I like to connect with the theme of my movie before I even start thinking of the plot itself. I decided I wanted to make a coming-of-age movie that talked about the hardships of growing up, the weight of expectations.

And thirdly, I just went back and read through all my premises that I had written, with a genre, tone, and theme in mind. I could pick out not only those that were the most interesting to me, but also a premise that was a good playing ground so to speak for me to explore the themes and ideas.

With all of this, I now just had to outline. This time I used a blend of Snyder's beat story structure from Save the Cat, just to get the bare bones of the story on the table. But I will probably be using Dan Harmon's story circle to flesh it out.

How did I do it so quickly?

Well obviously having a deadline set for a week to come up with a new story will put a rocket up your ass, but I think that more than that it was a change in mindset. I decided that the only thing that mattered in making this a success was, I needed to come out as a better writer at the end of it, and I needed to enjoy the process. (this interview with jacb collier really helped) 

In regard to learning I just need to finish the screenpaly, because at this point in my career the simple fact of managing to write a full-length screenplay will inevitably make me a better writer.

But the second one is where the magic happens because it was thanks to that idea that I gave a lot more priority to what I really felt like writing, no matter how silly, no matter how hard it seemed to gel solid and be produced, no matter if the conflict seemed stronger in another idea. I just wanted an idea that I would have a good time writing. And if like me you are starting out, I’d tell you to do the same. It is much more important to get writing rather than the quality of it.

What is more, I have accepted that the quality is going to be rather poor, just because it is my first feature film, but also because I have 2 months to write it. This now doesn’t bother me, at least not as much as it used to. Right now I’m focused on getting the first draft out as fast as I possibly can, and from there I’ll make it the best that I can in the time that I have.

I’ll keep you posted

I hope you enjoyed this week's Monday Draft; we have two really intense months ahead, filled with learning as I near the end of my first screenwriting journey. So make sure to subscribe to keep up to date."