Nate FedermanI was working on a spec pilot but yesterday I put it down and pivoted to a new idea. So I wanted to do this week’s #Scriptsky #Screenwriting thread on WHAT TO DO WHEN YOU’RE UNSURE HOW TO PROCEED WITH AN IDEA. i.e. I used to think this was a great idea but now I’m worried it might be dog shit!
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In his amazing memoir, On Writing, Stephen King talks about how he writes his first draft for himself and then thinks about his audience when he starts to rewrite. Writing is hard enough, but can start to feel impossible when you’re too worried (too early) about what everyone else thinks. So…
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When writing, follow your bliss! Especially with a 1st draft. Pick an idea, theme, world, and characters that you’re excited to explore. If you’re only writing it ‘cuz you think others will like it, you’re in for a slog. And yes, at some point, the story may get hard, but it shouldn’t start hard.
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When my new pilot idea lived entirely in my head, I was very excited! And that’s where the idea lived for a couple months. It was fun! But as soon as I started doing the physical act of translating my hodgepodge of thoughts to the page, something became clear: my idea was very, very complicated!
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Complicated isn’t inherently bad. But it’s rarely great. When I would sit down to write, I spent the bulk of my time trying to pin down the rules of the world and justify plot moves I wanted to make. The idea that felt fun in the sunny spot of my brain, was an immediate slog. That was a red flag.
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At first, I couldn’t tell if this was typical writer self-doubt OR if my idea was the problem. So I talked about it with some writer friends. 3 things became clear:
1. I couldn’t summarize the idea into a succinct logline.🚩
2. My friends didn’t get the rules of my world.🚩
3. It was very plotty.🚩
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If you can’t summarize your idea into a logline that gets people excited, or if you explain your idea in lots of sentences and people are still confused, or if all those sentences are largely about plot/rules, you’re idea might be too complicated. My idea was clearly too complicated. So…
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I was faced with a choice: simplify the story OR pivot to a new one OR suffer unnecessarily and struggle to write anything. I’d already spent a few weeks trying to simplify the idea and… it just got more and more complicated!🚩🚩🚩
So I decided to revisit an older idea but with a new take on it.
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I pitched the logline of my new idea to my agent and a writer friend, and 3 things were clear:
1. I could pitch a succinct logline.
2. They got and sparked to the logline.
3. I was spending a lot of time talking characters & comedy.
The new idea didn’t feel like a slog; it was fun! So I pivoted.
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That’s not to say you should pivot to a new idea whenever something is hard. Writing is hard. There are gonna be times when it’s a slog. But it shouldn’t make you miserable at its infancy, when it’s supposed to be all new and fun and exciting. That (probably) comes later during rewrites.
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Start with an idea you’re excited about! That you want to write! That you understand and can execute! You’ll invariably run into problems as you go, but if it’s nothing but problems from the start, you’ll never get any writing inertia. And a writer in motion wants to stay in motion! Plus…
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If you pivot to a new idea, you can always come back to that old idea. I pivoted to a fresh take on an idea that’s 10 years old. But the new take is simpler and more fun. Maybe in another few years, I’ll revisit the idea I just set down and see a simpler story. For now, I’m following my bliss.
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A postscript to this thread: when you’ve completed a draft that’s not working, it’s hard to know if it just needs a lot of rewriting OR if you’d just be throwing good time at bad writing. Sometimes writers sink so much time into an idea, they can’t bear to pivot even if they can’t fix it.
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Other times, having spent so much time working on it, they don’t want to put forth any more effort. “It’s good enough.” is something we all tell ourselves.
This is when you want to bring in other people to read your story. What are they bumping on? What are they responding to? Feedback helps!
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You don’t have to follow any one person’s notes, but if several people are bumping on the same thing, there’s probably an issue. And if no one is responding to the story but everyone has different bumps, that’s a sign there’s some fundamental problem that might be hard to put into words.
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If you know there’s a problem but can’t for the life of you figure out what it is OR how to solve it, put it down. Then come back to it with fresh eyes later. It’s hard to see the forest from the trees when you’re in the thick of a glade. A little distance can do wonders for your vision.
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Whew, this was a long one. I just spent an embarrassing amount of time writing these posts and sometimes it feels like only the same 20 people ever read these weekly #Scriptsky #Screenwriting threads. So if you got something from this, please share it. Hopefully others will too.
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