How many drafts does it take?
How many rewrites do you go through before you feel your baby is ready to be read by agents, producers, etc? And does a screenwriter have to focus on just one genre or can he or she cross-pollinate into another genre? I notice some movies blur into two genres occasionally.
– Daniel De Lago
When I read about professional chefs, they often talk about having a “food sense” that tells them when something is ready. That is, they can put the fish under the broiler, then go off and work on something else, and return at exactly the moment the fish is perfectly cooked.
This “knowing when it’s done” sense only develops with experience. Beginning chefs are all too likely to pull something out a little too raw or overcooked and flavorless.
And the same is true with screenwriting. When I was first starting out, I was really unsure about when a draft was finished. I now have a pretty good sense of when something is ready for public consumption, which for me is really the first draft. That is, I’ve generally hand-written scenes, typed them up, assembled them into one big draft (called, cleverly, the “first assembly”). I then spend considerable hours tweaking and shaping and revising until I have what I consider the first draft.
This is what goes to my assistant for proofreading and reality-checking. (”Did you mean for the hero to leave in a helicopter but land in a private jet?”) A few quick fixes, and it’s ready to be seen by whoever the point person is on the project, generally the producer or executive who hired me.
Should you, Daniel, hand in a draft this early? Probably not. I’m a better writer now than when I first began, and don’t make the same mistakes I used to. To continue the cooking analogy, one way to make sure something is done is to check the temperature. Use your trusted friends and colleagues as your thermometer. Let them be your guide as to when something is safe to put on the plate.
In terms of genre, I never pay that much attention to what something is “supposed to” be, which is one reason my movies are a little bit hard to place on the shelves at Blockbuster. Go, Big Fish and Charlie’s Angels are all generally filed under comedy, but they’re not the same kind of comedies that Tim Allen stars in.
Not that there’s anything wrong with Tim Allen comedies.
(Well, actually, there is. The one that’s actually funny — Galaxy Quest — is funny because it’s not really Tim Allen’s movie, and relies on a big and talented cast to carry the film’s complicated conceit. But I digress.)
Genre should be a guide, not a straightjacket. One of the reasons I’ve never written a romantic comedy is that the expectations are so clear (meet-cute, complication, misunderstanding, resolution) that it wouldn’t feel very fulfilling to create one.
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March 20th, 2006 at 7:50 am
Just adding Tim Allen to the list of actors you probably won’t be working with.
But yes, Galaxy Quest was great, in spite of Allen.
March 20th, 2006 at 8:44 am
How many drafts to you usually go through once it’s submitted to the studio, producer, etc.?
March 20th, 2006 at 9:16 am
Zatoichi –
Anywhere between one additional draft (for Charlie and the Chocolate Factory) and eight (How to Eat Fried Worms, which didn’t get made off of my draft anyway).
March 20th, 2006 at 9:59 am
Tim Allen works well in Galaxy Quest because he’s appropriately utilized — a case of actor working for story, rather than story working for actor. And what a great story it is.
March 20th, 2006 at 12:08 pm
As far as writing that first draft, do you work from an outline or treatment, or do you “just write”? Considering that I write for myself, I tend to skip everything and just write, mostly in chronological order. I find that when things are clicking that it’s not so much writing as it is transcribing, as though I’m watching the movie slowly unfold. Then I go back and add/change things so that it works. I finished a script in February fairly quickly solely because it was a mystery, and I wanted to see how it turned out. Whether or not it would be as entertaining to watch as it was to write is another ball of wax.
I find that of the scripts that I’ve written that I like the least are the ones that I had to jump around chronologically a lot while writing.. to write the more interesting parts first and then going back to “connect the dots” later.
And I totally agree that Galaxy Quest properly utilized Tim Allen. It was a great, fun movie that also happened to have Tim Allen in it, as opposed to it being, “a Tim Allen movie”.
March 20th, 2006 at 1:18 pm
You’re right on about “Galaxy Quest.” And yet…
Harold Ramis was attached to direct, but he dropped out because he couldn’t get Bill Murray for the lead and the studio foisted Tim Allen on him. (Who can blame him?)
Even though everyone in the finished film acquitted him/herself beautifully, I have to admit: I would sacrifice one of my yet-to-be-born children to see the version-that-never-was with Bill Murray…
March 20th, 2006 at 3:04 pm
I always thought Shatner would have been ideal in the lead.
Sure, it would never happen, and until ‘Boston Legal’ I thought the above sentence was one that I’d never utter in my life.
Mac
March 20th, 2006 at 9:38 pm
Why is everybody hating on Tim Allen?
I call Playa-Hating on y’all.
March 21st, 2006 at 12:29 am
I loved that Shatner poked fun at himself, or rather Kirk, in his guest appearance on Futurama (though if you listen to Billy West on the DVD commentary, I’m not sure “Bill” knew the extent of the joke).
But I’ll agree that Tim Allen did play the Shat-Factor very well. When I said, “in spite of Allen,” that sounds like he brought the movie down. I didn’t mean it to sound like that. Sorry Tim, if you’re reading.
March 21st, 2006 at 1:48 am
Maybe a better question is…how much TIME on average goes into your first draft or a version ready to be sent out?
March 22nd, 2006 at 9:24 am
Aren’t your questions all a bit too subjective? How can Mr. August gage your abilities in getting your points across and ‘nailing it’ after X-number of drafts? Frankly, I don’t keep a count. I read it, make changes, and continue this process until I feel there aren’t any more changes to be made. THEN I submit it to my wife, my father, and a handful of my closest friends to go over. They comment on it, I absorb their comments; then back to the cycle – if I feel that their suggestions will help out the story any. In reality, a script is never REALLY done. If and when any of us are lucky enough to have one optioned, purchased and produced, the director usually has the final say on whether or not a script is ready and complete. Well, at least, so I’ve heard.
March 22nd, 2006 at 11:02 am
I used to burn the rice all the time, but then I got a steamer. I’m not sure of the screenwriting analogy here — maybe that screenwriting software that writes the thing for you? Then you know it’s done in the same way you know your e-filed taxes are done. Type fade out, and you get a little confirmation slip as though you’ve just completed an ATM deposit. My final tip is to poach the salmon in a foolprooth herbed white wine broth rather than risk grilling, broiilng or blackening, for heaven’s sake.–Julie Goes To Hollywood
April 12th, 2006 at 1:14 pm
I feel like a draft is done when I can feel the beat. Feel the flow of the story. I want to keep turning the pages and find out what happens next.
April 16th, 2006 at 1:43 pm
By the way Shatner was amazing in the 60’s in Roger Corman’s ‘the intruder’. Check it! the man can act when he wants to.
-David