Sunday, July 25, 2010

Day 21 - Approaching the End of Act Two

The end of act two will land somewhere around page 80-85. I try to break my second act into twelve beats before the midpoint and twelve beats after the mid-point. In my current project, after hitting the mid-point, I looked at my outline and I'm feeling like I'm running a little long. But, this is the vomit draft - and so I am marching ahead. I'm taking note, in case I hit a scene that feels redundant, but I'm charging on. Since I'm on track and happy with how the story is progressing, it would just be procrastinating to try to re-org now.

My goal is to hit the end of the second act by this Friday. This will be a challenge because Tuesday I play in the finals of the President's Cup which will undoubtedly be followed by compulsory celebratory drinking. But, since I've looked ahead at my week, I've also made a plan as to where I can catch up on missed time. (No "So You Think You Can Dance" for me. Sorry, Kent will have to make it on his own this week.)

So, twenty-five-ish pages to go. Approximately 10-12 scenes. Four days of writing. That's about 6 pages a day. About three scenes a day. No problem!

Here's where I have to admit that all this bravado is bullshit. Because this is a crucial part of the script. There's a lot of stuff that has to happen in a short amount of time. Your stakes have to keep rising, the characters have face set-backs, where you think they are going in the wrong direction, but are actually growing along their arc. It's a very, very, very important and difficult stretch. Wish me luck.

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