Writing Process

1. When you are working on characters or bits of plot, how
much do you research them? For example, if a character’s profession
played a major
role, would you feel compelled to learn everything you can about profession?

2. How far should a writer try to flesh out a character? I feel like in order
for my characters to be real (at least to me), I need whole life stories on
them. Is that necessary or even useful?

–Andrea Hammond

Your questions are very timely, because I’m currently deciding whether to
take on a project set in a very dangerous part of Africa. I love the idea of
the movie and the filmmakers involved, so the focus of my decision process
is whether I feel I could write the movie without physically going to the region.
I would classify myself as moderately adventurous, but I have no interest in
catching malaria or being shot in the head, both of which would be (remote)
possibilities if I were to travel there. And yet I love to write on location,
so I would probably go if given the chance.

On one hand, the idea of first-hand experience is a little silly. George Lucas
has never been in space, and even though James Cameron became an expert on
the Titanic, his movie was much more concerned with the love story he invented.

But there’s a lot to be said for research in pursuit of verisimilitude. Imagine
if Dr. Carter on E.R. referred to "that tube thing-y." Most of the
show’s writers aren’t medical doctors, just as the "Sopranos" writers
aren’t Mafia, but they’ve all learned enough of the appropriate lingo so that
we believe the characters really know what they’re talking about.

When fleshing out your characters, that level of detail should be your goal.
You don’t need to know everything, just enough to firmly place them in the
world.

I’m a 28-year old writer with a very old problem. I do my best work when I’m
not consciously structuring a screenplay. I’ve found trying to shuffle scenes
around on note cards about as useful as trying to construct a meaningful sentence
out of syllables. So I’m reluctant to embrace a fully plotted mode of writing.

–Zackery West

First off, apologies to Zackery for editing his question down so much. The
original was filled with a lot of other good observations and side-questions,
but ran longer than my whole weekly column. And in cutting it down, I was doing
exactly the kind of work Zackery is struggling against.

Structure isn’t really about tacking notecards on a wall. It’s about organizing
ideas — sequences, scenes, and beats within those scenes — so that they can
have the most possible impact. You don’t just create structure before you write.
It happens inevitably with every character who walks in the door, or takes
an action that spins the story in a different direction.

I doubt there are any working screenwriters who would say they’ve adopted
a "fully plotted mode of writing." Whatever plan you’ve made for
the movie, be it notecards, an outline or just an idea in your head, it’s always
subject to change based on discoveries you make while you’re writing.

You’re beating yourself up over not plotting out your whole script beat-for-beat.
Guess what? You don’t have to. For now, just write the best scenes you can,
keeping in mind that they may need to be changed or cut to service the movie
as a whole.

The best thing about fighting with yourself is that when you give up, you
win.

How important is the research process, and how long do you usually spend on
it?

–Adam Foster

The obvious (but not very helpful) answer is that it depends on the project,
and one’s definition of "research."

Most of the projects I’ve worked on haven’t involved a lot of research in
the classic sense, such as pouring through books, searching the web or interviewing
experts. For instance, neither CHARLIE’S ANGELS nor SCOOBY-DOO called for tremendous
historical or scientific accuracy. In fact, the best gauge of whether a detail
in your script works is usually the "Yeah, I’d buy that" believability
test — whether the average uninformed person off the street would accept that
item x could do y, or that historical event z coincided with with Korean War.
Even genuine, certified facts are useless if they fail the "Yeah, I’d
buy that" believability test.

Both Charlie’s and Scooby did call for tonal accuracy, by which I mean the
sense of being true to the spirit and rules of the original series. That meant
looking back at old episodes to remember the details that set them apart, be
it the hair-flips or the offsetting forces of Shaggy’s hunger and cowardice.
Technically, that’s research, but it doesn’t quite feel like it.

In the case of JURASSIC PARK 3, the producers wisely referred to an expert
paleontologist named Jack Horner, who was always on-call to answer dinosaur-related
questions. But it’s important to note that even he would fall back on a, "Yeah,
I’d buy that" test, although his opinion was much more informed than the
average person’s.

A few times, I have had to do serious research. A project I’ve been working
on for several years involves everything from evolutionary brain science to
cult formation, so that’s involved a lot of orders from Amazon and several
dinners with various smart people to discuss theories. Ninety-percent of what
I’ve learned won’t make it into the script, but the research process itself
has led to new questions and insights.

One technique I’ve found helpful for all my projects is keep a fat file for
each one, and add to it anything that strikes me as interesting or helpful.
Thus, my Fantasy Island file has articles and pictures of yachts, sea planes,
the Lincoln asssasination, various abstract sculptures and lots of scraps of
paper with ideas and snippets of dialogue. Again, most of it won’t be used,
but it’s the process that often helps ideas take shape.