Draft Two - Day One

After finishing the first draft in less than four weeks, I took a few days off to gather notes from readers and let their thoughts merge with my own ideas for the next draft.

Now, in my mind, the next draft is really the REAL first draft. (I call the first draft the vomit draft, because you just want to get through it quickly.) But, the "vomit draft" turned out to be pretty solid. So my next step is to get the script in good enough shape to send to my agent and come up with a plan to sell it.

The feedback I got was uniform. This is great news. When you have notes where one person wants you to go North and the other wants you to go West and still three more are debating between Northeast and East - that's when you know you need to make some significant changes.

When the notes come back echoing what you already were thinking, well happy day. Rewriting is still hard. Don't get me wrong.

In screenwriting, every time you change something it should naturally effect many more scenes and moments in the script. Since you aren't putting anything in your script that is simply serving one purpose - this is natural. You don't have jokes that are simply there for comic relief, they also reflect character. You don't have scenes that are there just to show how likable a character is - these scenes also have to move the plot forward. So when you change them you are also touching things that are connecting both forward and backward in your project. So, yes, it's like a puzzle and yes, it's darn tricky.

So when things get tricky - what do we do? We reach into our trusty bag of tricks. If the notes had come back indicating some sort of structural flaw then I would have broken out the 3x5 cards and my cork-board. The notes for this project concern deepening character, expanding moments and motivations and going further with the romance of the concept.

Getting started is always the hardest part. So how do I dive in?

First, I compile all my page notes and the notes from my readers onto a print out the script. My master copy of notes. I will re-read the script from the beginning keeping the notes in mind and jotting down any ideas that come to me to fix them.

Second, I duplicate the first draft, label it draft two and the date. At the end of that draft I type in bold all the "big" notes into a list. As I address these big issues in the rewrite, I delete them from my list. When there's nothing dangling after my "Fade Out," I know I've addressed the major issues.

If I was writing this on assignment I type up "what I heard" and how I plan on addressing it and email it back to the producers. Often, you will discover at this point whether you are on the same page or if you've heard two different things before you actually do the work. Thus saving yourself from writing in the wrong direction.