Hi There,

This week I’m indebted to my very excellent team of readers for the 2019 CHANNEL 4 SCREENWRITING COURSE for sharing their thoughts and responses about what has been an intense reading process that we’ve all just undergone in finalising the shortlist of 34 writers for interview.

I’m hugely impressed by my readers’ insights – I think their observations are highly perceptive and will be of great value to screenwriters.

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Every reader reads 100+ scripts. Each script is only guaranteed a 20-page read. With 100+ scripts, finite hours in the day, and a dwindling lifeforce, a reader is only going to read beyond page 20 if a script has engaged them. There are several tips one could offer here. But I am going to focus on one: have a meaningful premise and then plot it in such a way that its dramatic question keeps evolving.

For example, let’s say my series is a romcom about two characters called, I dunno, “Ray” and “Philip”. As the writer, I have also decided two things: 1) By Episode 6, I want my randomly named characters to consummate their relationship; 2) At the start of Episode 1, they don’t know each other.

Many scripts submitted this year would write Episode 1 as a bunch of incidents and verbal exchanges in which characters are introduced and by the end of which Ray and Philip are aware of each other’s existence. What does this mean? It means the story for the whole episode is “Ray meets Philip”. Hardly a dynamic, dramatic or gripping premise – really, just one beat stretched over dozens of pages.

So, I need to break down the journey to Raylip’s consummation into interesting or meaningful staging posts. Perhaps a more useful story for Episode 1 is “Philip realises there is something special about Ray”. Well, it gives us something to play with. However, many of the scripts submitted this year would plot this story as: 1) Ray meets Philip; 2) They have a long conversation; 3) As Ray walks away, Philip realises there is something special about him. Again – hardly dynamic, dramatic or gripping.

Although the story of the episode (Philip realises there is something special about Ray) is one piece of the series arc (Ray and Philip Get It On), how that episode’s story is plotted can to an extent be self-contained and deploy all of the usual story-telling tools (e.g. inciting incident, turning point, complication, resolution, etc.) so that its beats take place in a plot that develops, has movement, and maybe surprise. Consequently, Episode 1 keeps you turning the page and is a satisfying narrative experience whilst also establishing the characters, tone, style, and premise of the overall series.

To illustrate: Philip turns up to the first Script Reading meeting late, apologising for the Nutella* fingerprints on his notes, he was throwing out an old jar that was past its best-before date; nervous before his master, sweet-tooth’d Ray can’t believe anyone would let a jar go out-of-date; Philip jokingly suggests Ray would drink a jar down in one go, Ray scoffs that of course he can, Philip thinks he’s lying, an argument escalates and Philip challenges Ray to prove it next week or else get thrown out of the Script Reading Members Club; despite counsel from fellow readers, Ray goes into training but can never manage a whole tub; meanwhile, Philip attends a Channel 4 H&S course and begins to regret his actions; Ray realises he will fail and be thrown out of the script reading circle, he weeps as he reads his last few scripts; at the next meeting, defiant Ray disgorges a tub of Nutella into his mouth, but dehydrates quickly and begins to struggle, H&S trained Philip springs into action and tips the undried tears from the scripts into Ray’s throat for lubrication; Ray thanks Philip, his status as script reader safe for now and… as Ray walks away, Philip realises there is something special about him.

Obviously, this is nonsense and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. But the point is: 1) You can plot a story a million different ways, but many of the submissions don’t plot they simply parse out a premise; 2) A pilot episode needs to introduce characters, its world and series questions, but a good way to do this is through the prism of a self-contained narrative serving a broader arc; 3) With the plot settled on, you can organise your script along a series of evolving questions that help propel the reader forward (e.g., will Philip get to the meeting on time? Will nervous Ray make an idiot of himself at the meeting? Will Ray get kicked out of the Script Reading Club? Can Philip stop Ray from doing something foolish? Will Ray die eating a jar of Nutella?) – thus maximising your chances of a reader reading beyond page 20.

*N.B. Yes, I am eating Nutella as I write this.

Ray McBride

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How to write a winning script in 5 cliches

1) Write what you know

This doesn’t mean that if you run a bakery in Brighton, you can only write Brighton based bakery dramas. It means everyone knows something— grief, loss, shame— in a way that nobody else does, and that something-only-you-know is the magic ingredient to any script. The best scripts I read were the ones that were the most honest about this something, whether the setting was post-apocalypse England or a hospital or an office. If it’s real to you, it’s real to me, and if it’s real to me I’m going to care.

2) Get in late, leave early

Every line on the page is precious space, don’t waste it. If the point of the scene is that Annie is pregnant, I don’t need to see Annie going to the pharmacy, getting the test, finding a toilet, waiting for it to be free… just show me the test. Get in, get out, keep moving. A slow pace is the first thing to stop me reading on in a script.

3) Tell your story in the simplest way possible 

There’s a fine line between complex and complicated. There seems to be an urge for new writers to prove themselves by adding time jumps, multiple character threads and dream sequences, but this doesn’t actually prove you can write. Good stories generally know how they want to be told, and good writing is learning how to tap into that. If a story needs a flashback, it will tell you so.

4) First impressions count

Frankly, when I open a badly formatted script, I mark it down in my head. Good formatting not only makes the reading easier, but gives me a sense of the writer’s professionalism and commitment to their craft. Not everyone can afford Final Draft, but free alternatives like Celtx are easy to use and come out beautifully.

Good formatting also means giving me a maximum of five lines of action description per paragraph, labelling your time jumps, and proof reading to make sure you’ve put all the right character names in the dialogue. These kinds of mistakes slow down my reading of the script, and even if the story is good it’ll be hard to shake the negative first impression.

5) Trust your reader, have confidence

Cut your adverbs. Cut any line that starts with ‘he/she feels’. Cut any recapping of the plot so far, or reminding of the stakes. Don’t tell me what’s happening in the story, tell me your story. If it’s strong enough, I’ll get it, and I’ll like it all the more for trusting me to get it

Lily Shahmoon

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Think really hard about who your characters are and why your reader or audience will want to spend time with them. Will they have seen a character of this description (eg, a disillusioned millennial stuck living with their parents, a lonely middle aged male detective) before, and if so, how is this version different? Perhaps they’re in a completely unfamiliar setting, or genre? The key is to be distinct without feeling contrived: if you’re having to work too hard to distinguish your character from their cinematic predecessors, it might be a sign that you need to choose someone else as a focus for your story.

Don’t neglect plot. Compelling characters and good dialogue alone won’t keep us hooked – or, crucially, suggest an aptitude for writing TV, which demands scope. And don’t let the plot fizzle out, either: structure your writing carefully to ensure that the characters’ circumstances need to keep evolving right until the end.

Finally: the submissions that stood out were those that left the strongest emotional impact. This doesn’t need to mean high drama, either: some of the most touching moments were in the quietest scripts. What those scripts shared, however, was a degree of focus in the writing that allowed us to become completely absorbed by the story and characters. Without this, it’s impossible to let your critical faculties relax enough to be really moved.

Nancy Napper Canter

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Conversation vs. Dialogue:

Lots of dialogue fell into the trap of just being conversational. Of course you want your dialogue to give the illusion of two (or more) people talking naturally but it has to do more for your story than just that, because dialogue in drama (and comedy) is not just people talking. There was a trend in the scripts I read for lots of ‘banter’ (for want of a better word) between characters. The problem with a lot of this type was that there was a sense of fun in these scenes for the writer writing it but it wasn’t adding anything to the scene or the overall story. If you’re a fan of this style then go back to a TV show or film you admire that does it and analyse how it’s done within the context of the scene as a whole. Don’t take into account just the dialogue but all the elements of the scene in how this works.

For the purpose of making a point about dialogue, and this is a really basic example; think of a conversation between two people about a cup of tea and how they like it, which probably at face value isn’t going to be interesting or dramatic, but it could be depending on the characters, the situation, and your voice as a writer.

For example; A wife comes home to her husband and he hides his mistress under the bed and the unsuspecting spouse begins a conversation about if he wants a cup of tea, now there is dramatic impetus to what otherwise would be a mundane conversation. Then what if perhaps the unsuspecting spouse actually knows about the mistress under the bed but still starts this conversation, there are so many elements to play with. The situation informs how the characters act and speak, they’ve got motives, and you’ve got the opportunity for subtext, tension, and therefore; drama.

Or for comedy you only have to think about how well something like The Royle Family tackled seemingly mundane life and conversations and turned them into comedy gold – mainly through absolute clarity of character and their relationships and interactions with each other.

What’s it about?

The less successful scripts I read were unclear what they were about. When we write our reports for Philip we are asked to write a simple Logline or synopsis of what we’d read and there were quite a few occasions where this was difficult because there was a lack of clarity and purpose to the beginning of the scripts. Even if you’re dealing with a complex or surprising plot the premise, generally, should be clear in the opening pages. As a reader (and/or viewer) we want to know what we’re signing up for.

What’s the point?

As a side note to that there were quite a lot of scripts inspired by the politics of our time. If you’re tackling an issue you really need to be clear what your message is and if your plot is really the best vehicle to explore that issue. There were some writers that tackled issues such as #metoo and #timesup, and racism, and sexism, but although their intentions were sincere they missed the mark in actually communicating what I think they were trying to say. If you’re going to tackle anything like this you really have to be clear on what your message is and interrogate how you tell that as a dramatic story.

Plot

I’d say one of the main weaknesses in the unsuccessful scripts was plot. There could be a great premise and characters but the plot itself wasn’t engaging or told in an interesting or surprising way. Most writers could have afforded to push themselves harder in finding the best plot to tell their story in a more original way.

And from someone far more prolific and worth listening to than me….

A really useful and concise piece of advice on writing is David Mamet’s memo to the writers of The Unit. Read it, it’s really useful, and be honest with yourself about your own writing and where it could improve and if you’re doing these things.   https://gideonsway.wordpress.com/2010/04/06/david-mamets-letter-to-the-writers-of-the-unit/

Paul Williams

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I will keep this brief, as the wise words of the other readers have covered much of our experience. The main thing to say is essentially:

Create characters that you care deeply for, and the reader will care too. This will root them in your plot, ensuring you make the right decisions for their story.

Slightly off topic but important, one pattern that it would be great not to see repeated:

Please treat your female characters with the same respect as you do male characters. If I have to read another character description along the lines of ‘she’s 40 but looks good for her age’, I may scratch my eyes out.

It was a pleasure reading so many inventive, moving scripts – please keep writing!

Amy Chappelhow

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Thank you so much to Ray, Lily, Nancy, Paul and Amy for taking the trouble to share their insights – and for the brilliant work they have done as readers for the 2019 C4 screenwriting course. And thank you to all you writers who have had the courage and commitment to your craft for submitting your scripts and giving us the privilege of enjoying your stories.

The next newsletter will be on Friday Dec 14^th – in which I will let you know about a new SCRIPT MENTORING initiative I’m starting through my website.

Until then

All the best

Phil

PHILIP SHELLEY

www.script-consultant.co.uk

www.tributepodcasts.co.uk

@PhilipShelley1

November 30^th 2018

Hi There,

This week – a report back from one of  my recent script mentees, Ann Hawker, on her experiences at The Writer’s Lab 2018 Sponsored by Meryl Streep and Nicole Kidman –

‘In September this year I was lucky enough to be invited to take part in The Writer’s Lab, a scheme sponsored by Meryl Steep and Nicole Kidman and hosted by Women in Film and TV in New York.

Twelve women writers and writer/directors over the age of 40 were selected from the United States, the UK, Canada and Ireland to take part in a four day intensive workshop with mentoring provided by producers, writers and script doctors from both Hollywood and New York.

The twelve of us writers met in the middle of a New York thunderstorm at Penn Station to make the four hour train journey “Up State” to the breathtaking Lake George. The retreat was held in a nineteenth century summer house built on the lake. If we weren’t already feeling inspired by our company and our mentors the surroundings alone would have been enough!

My fellow participants were an amazing group of women who combined a huge amount of writing and life experience. Most were in some way already linked with the world of drama or film. There were several actresses, documentarians, a camera operator, a lighting electrician as well as several feature film writer/directors.

We had all applied with a specific script and had been lucky enough to have been selected from a thousand applicants. (A thank you to Phil Shelley, who helped with my script!) Over the four days we received intensive one to one feedback from producers and writers on our individual scripts, as well as participating in more general group sessions.

So what did I learn? The producers and writers approached their notes differently, but both came back to the same thing; the importance of character. In my sessions with my writer mentor I found myself going deep into the back story of my characters and interrogating every last piece of their motivation. Meanwhile my producer looked at my script with an eye to casting and attracting talent. She emphasised how much top talent are drawn to fully rounded and motivated characters.

All the mentors emphasised the need for an authorial voice which comes through writing from the heart. It is this which can help create a unique script and ultimately one which might get made. It was striking how many of the selected scripts had strong personal connections with the writers.

My script, which dealt with my experience of Alzheimer’s in my family, touched a real chord with the producer I was working with, whose father was suffering from dementia. So in my case, writing from personal experience led to a strong professional bond, which hopefully will continue!

Since I was in America it was hardly surprising there was a big emphasis on pitching. Don’t go into a general meeting in the US without a carefully honed and well rehearsed pitch! No off the cuff ramblings allowed. A top pitching tip was to always start with your own personal interest in the story, why you chose to write the script and importantly why only you can write it.

Some of the producers recommended creating a look book for your project. A collection of visual reference points and inspirations which can go a long way to capturing the tone of your project. This was probably more relevant for the writer/directors, but it could be a useful exercise for writers as well.

The advice was sometimes surprisingly detailed. There were tips on how to dress for those important producer meetings… (no surprises here, not your slouch pants and a baggy jumper). Would that topic ever come up in a room full of men writers? I doubt it. I suppose this points to some of the extra hoops older women writers feel they have to jump through.

The overall message was clear. As writers we need not only an impressive and unique script, but we need to be able to sell it to producers and commissioners with professionalism and self belief. What was encouraging was that there’s also no doubt that we writers are our own best ambassadors.

We are the people who have the passion for our scripts, we know how we want them to hit emotionally, we have researched and lived what we have written in our pages and there are many commissioners, producers and executives out there eager to hear that experience.’

Thank you very much Ann.

…AND a response to something I wrote a few weeks ago about meetings, ideas, pitching etc- and about finding the best way forward for you as individual writers –

‘This is the area I feel I really suffer from. I am not a natural at fleshing out bags of ideas. I do not have a secret drawer. I learn my ideas/characters by writing them out in scripts – by giving them monologues and scenes. This makes my process lengthy and haphazard and that just doesn’t swing in this telly climate sometimes. I feel I constantly let people down.

I was never really prepared for how to go into telly meetings, and despite having now met tons of lovely script editors, producers and developers I really don’t think I’ve yet to find my groove.

I have developed a spread of stuff – sometimes really me – but more often than not – not me at all. And it’s been a horrid journey of material that falls apart in your fingers and causes hours of wasted time for everyone.

I feel it’s so important what you have said about the idea being exceptional and YOURS. I think there’s a bit of a false idea that you should have a million projects in with a million indies – but actually if you’re like me, you have to fall in love with an idea – and I find it very hard to fall in love that often – it’s just who I am. Yes, it makes it rather nerve wracking – the whole question of ‘what are you up to’ but I suppose you just have to hold that nerve and know that when you do have an idea that takes over, you will finally be able to answer that question with more than just ‘oh some stuff’.

The best time I’ve had this year and a reminder that whilst I might not come up with reams of material by myself – when surrounded by peers I am on FIRE! I just really love a writers room to be honest – think it chimes with what you said about being playful and under time pressure.’

NEW FREE EVENT | On 4 Dec @shootingpeoples host their final SHORT CUTS event of 2018. They will be joined by one of the UK’s most prolific and accomplished producers, the Oscar-nominated and BAFTA-winning, Stephen Woolley (Carol, On Chesil Beach, Interview with the Vampire) for an in-depth Q&A. It’s also their end of year Christmas party, so expect a few extra treats to boot. Get your FREE ticket before they go http://bit.ly/SPCDEC4.

The next newsletter will be in two weeks’ time on Friday November 30^th – in which I (and my script readers) will reflect on the (very positive!) experience of working our way through the 2800 scripts that were submitted for the 2019 Channel 4 Screenwriting Course.

Until then

All the best

Phil

PHILIP SHELLEY

www.script-consultant.co.uk

www.tributepodcasts.co.uk

@PhilipShelley1

November 16^th 2018

Hi There,

This week a look back at some of my drama highlights from this Autumn so far –

LONDON FILM FESTIVAL 2018

SOMETIMES ALWAYS NEVER

Written by Frank Cottrell Boyce (adapted from one of his own short stories). Lead actor Bill Nighy was interviewed afterwards and talked about how director Kar Hunter sold the job to him – told him 3 things about the shooting process – 1. No close-ups. 2. No improvisation. 3. No shots of anyone getting in and out of cars, going in and out of houses.

I think we can all learn from no.3. There aren’t many times where these sorts of shots are anything other than dead screen-time. A good reminder that every shot, every moment, has to count. If you’re writing scenes in which characters get in and out of cars, walk in and out of houses, brush their teeth, shower, have breakfast, dial a phone number, buy something in a shop…I could go on – think very carefully about whether you need these moments. Do they tell us something vital about the characters? Do they have story meaning? Do they advance or change the story? If not, cut them out.

Screenwriting is so much about the way you cut between the different scenes, as much about what you leave out as what you include. The great virtue of screenwriting and the way you can cut between scenes is that you can leave out the boring bits and include only the interesting bits.

Screenwriting is about telling the story in the way you move between the scenes. In this way script editors and writers need to think like film editors.

HAPPY NEW YEAR COLIN BURSTEAD

Writer / director Ben Wheatley introduced the film with a self-deprecating references to Mike Leigh. ‘I’ve done my NUTS IN MAY with SIGHTSEEERS, and this is my ABIGAIL’S PARTY.’ (It may also have been something to do with the fact that Mike Leigh was in the baudience.)

This made me think about the nature of creativity. None of us start with a completely blank page. What we experience and what we watch and read can’t help but influence and inspire us. It was really interesting to be reminded of how Ben Wheatley has picked up the baton from Mike Leigh – how we all need role models, how generation passes on the creative spark to generation. However much HNYCB is inspired by ABIGAIL’S PARTY, it’s still absolutely its own thing and an expression of Ben Wheatley’s artistic sensibilities. It’s a brilliant depiction of family. I was going to say ‘dysfunctional family’ but what family isn’t dysfunctional in some way? And the brilliant observations in this film feel emotionally universal. There are so many great performances and it’s very funny.

It’s also deceptively narratively tight. It’s essentially a study of family who get together for a New Year celebration but there are a load of narrative clues and hooks that make it compelling as a piece of story-telling as well as a study of family and relationships. The ultimate message seemed to be – however difficult we find our families, we all, ultimately, need them.

Both SAN & HNYCB had strong narrative threads of ‘The Prodigal Son.’ Bible stories are a great source of universal story templates.

THE FRONT RUNNER / FAHRENHEIT 11-9

I saw these two political films straight after each other and the comparisons / contrasts were interesting. TFR is about 1988 democrat presidential Gary Hart and his campaign to become president being destroyed by a sex scandal. The film’s thesis seems to be that Hart was one of the first victims of tabloid excesses – the film dramatises Hart’s furious response to questions about his marriage and private life. On the one hand the film seems to be saying Hart was a noble man who was victimised by the press but on the other hand it’s also saying that he was a bit a sleaze-bag, who had extra-marital affairs & one-night stands with several women and brought defeat on himself (although it’s very much the first idea that dominates). While the film is objectively excellent – the acting, direction and writing are of the highest standard, ultimately I felt that this film was trying to have its cake and eat it; and that it didn’t really know what it was saying. I think it’s trying to be interestingly complex but for me, this is a classic example of a lot of time, money, talent and effort being expanded on a deeply flawed idea – and it will amaze me if this film is successful (although it’s very much worth seeing).

FAHRENHEIT 11-9 on the other hand is Michael Moore’s best film for some time (although IMO all of his films are pretty damn good – the world needs more campaigning, committed film journalists like Michael Moore). The film tries to hit a lot of targets and it could be said that it’s a bit scatter-gun in its approach – but it is undeniably powerful. It has a real emotional kick and is terrifying and inspiring in equal measure. The film covers so many completely extraordinary stories. It’s films like this that make me despair of the less good, small ideas that I get pitched. When so many terrible, jaw-dropping things are happening in the world, so many things that need to be exposed and discussed, do we really need a comedy drama about a family-run café and its owners attempt to keep it running? (NB This is MY terrible idea – NOT an idea that I’ve been pitched – but just there to show you what a low stakes drama idea looks like to me!).

And it’s not just Trump who gets both barrels from Moore – there is also some really interesting flak for Obama and the democrats.

THE LEHMAN TRILOGY – National Theatre

This is what I call a good idea – an epic 3 ½ hour play, performed by 3 actors, about the history of Lehman Brothers – from the arrival of the three brothers in the USA from Bavaria in the 1840’s to their role in the financial crash of 2008 (and the company’s liquidation) – in effect a history of US (and World) capitalism seen through the prism of a single family and their business. And the play lived up to the promise of its compelling idea – the writing is razor-sharp – never less than fascinating, often humorous and at times really powerful. Above all it feels epic – and important. The script is enhanced by the brilliant direction and performances. All three actors are outstanding, the musical accompaniment almost throughout by single piano works wonderfully and the design is also excellent – really classy, well-judged, unshowy direction by Sam Mendes. I could never claim to be the most patient audience member but I was gripped throughout the 3 ½ hours; I was even a bit surprised and disappointed when the play ended – and at that length, that’s the greatest compliment I can give it.

STORIES by Nina Raine – National Theatre, Dorfman

Beautifully-observed writing about a subject that is emotionally universal and felt all the more so because this account of it also felt so specific and personal. The story of a 39 year old woman who is determined to have a baby. As a follow-up to the wonderful CONSENT, STORIES marks Nina Raine out as one of the foremost dramatic writers in the UK at the moment.

C4 SCRIPT-READING

It’s been a very enjoyable (ongoing), thought-provoking process discussing the scripts with my team of 7 script readers. I talk a lot about the huge importance of characters with whom we can relate but one of the things that keeps coming up in many of the scripts I’ve responded to is a big, clear story hook. When you start reading a script, as a reader you need something to hold onto, something to anchor you in the story. In some of the best scripts the title points the way, but there’s also a really clear and compelling narrative idea that is evident often from the very start of the script.

It’s also been great shifting between long days of concentrated reading broken up by the occasional theatre matinee and bouts of LFF films (it’s a tough life but someone’s got to do it) and using some of the brilliant plays and films I’ve seen as a touchstone for the standard of scripts I should be looking for in the 4screenwriting submissions. And it’s been really exciting to read so many scripts that absolutely live up to the standards of shows like STORIES and HAPPY NEW YEAR COLIN BURSTEAD. It feels like a very exciting privilege to be on the front-line of discovering some of the new dramatic writing talent in the UK.

The next newsletter will be on Friday November 16^th.

All the best

Phil

PHILIP SHELLEY

www.script-consultant.co.uk

www.tributepodcasts.co.uk

@PhilipShelley1

November 2^nd 2018

Hi There,

Following on from my newsletter two weeks ago about story ideas and pitching, here are some more related thoughts –

MEETINGS

Once you’ve written 2 or 3 outstanding spec scripts and people in the industry are starting to take notice of you, you will get a lot of meetings and you need to be ready to take advantage of what these meetings offer.

If a producer / script editor / development executive gets in touch and offers to meet up for a cup of tea and a chat, for a ‘general’ meeting – this is NOT just about a cup of tea and a chat. No script editor is going to want to meet up with you unless they genuinely like your writing and are keen to work with you. This initial meeting will be to sound you out – to make sure you and they are roughly on the same wave-length, that you come across as professional and conscientious but, most importantly, they want to know what ideas you might like to write about, and to see if there’s any common ground between your interests and theirs. So don’t rock up waiting to be impressed. You need to have done your homework, researched the person you’re meeting and the company they work for (and even the companies this script editor used to work for) and have constructive, engaged opinions about the shows made by the company you’re going to see – this doesn’t necessarily mean you have to be glowingly positive about every show they’ve ever made.

For a script editor / producer these meetings aren’t casual social events to pass the time. If they want to meet you, they have already made a significant commitment to you as a writer – and you need to make the most of these opportunities. Us Brits like to downplay things and you have to be adept at reading the sub-text of what is said.

GENERATING STORY IDEAS

Above all, you need to go into these meetings armed with ideas that you’re passionate about writing. The industry is hungry for your good ideas and if they are good, companies will commit to them and you will have to be continually creating and generating brilliant new ideas. As professional TV dramatists this is almost as important a part of your work as actually writing the scripts. It’s these new ideas that are going to get you new script-writing work.

Go for ideas that don’t just interest you but impact on you emotionally. Those are the stories we’re all looking for – stories that address what bothers, excites, scares, terrifies, infuriates, overjoys you. What excites and enthuses you? What are your secret passions? What / who do you love (or hate? And why?) Stories that evoke an emotional response. Stories that challenge the status quo. It’s not enough that your story is intellectually a good idea. It has to have emotional resonance.

Think about – why your story needs to be told now. Even (particularly) if it’s a period story. What does your story tell us about the world we live in today?

Don’t think that because an idea came to you easily that you should be suspicious of it. OR conversely if you have struggled working on an idea for years that that confers status on it. The opposite is more often true – the best ideas come quickly and easily.

You will feel / know when your pitch / idea is good. And it will be easy to pitch. And anyway it’s not about the delivery of the pitch, it’s about the quality of the idea.

But you have to put yourself in the right place (mentally and physically) to be open to these ideas. Look outward more than inward.

MAKING THE MOST OF THE OPPORTUNITIES

Sometimes the switch between no success or recognition at all in the TV drama world – and fighting off the meetings and offers – changes very quickly. The industry is quite small and producers and script editors are constantly swapping notes on who’s good. If you get onto one scheme like 4screenwriting you may suddenly find you get all sorts of other offers. You need to make sure you’re ready to take advantage of these opportunities when they do come along. And if you’re putting yourself out there and working hard at writing scripts, generating ideas and meeting people, and nothing is coming of it, then you need to be able to stand back and revaluate why things aren’t happening for you and work out what you need to do differently. Because there is an industry of people actively, hungrily looking for new writers, and if you’re working at it but not breaking through there will be a good reason for it – but perhaps one that the potential employers are too polite / cowardly to tell you. At the same time, you need to be sure that you are receptive to constructive feedback about how you can improve your chances of success.

WORKING RELATIONSHIPS

At a certain tipping point when you have got to know quite a few people in the industry and know who you want to work with and who you don’t, these people will start coming to you with their ideas. Sometimes it’s smart as a writer to be receptive to ideas that companies are bringing to you – this is an advantageous position to start from – when the company is trying to persuade you of the virtue of their ideas rather than the other way round. The company / script editor will already have an emotional / vested interest in the idea and you will be leaping on board momentum that has already been built up in-house without having to initially persuade them of the virtue of your idea. And hopefully the ideas that companies bring to you will already be informed by their knowledge of what is likely to get commissioned at that particular moment.

PITCH DOCUMENTS

These documents are very hard to write. They’re a completely different skill to writing a script but they’re really important and as screenwriters you need to embrace the challenge of writing them.

What these documents aren’t about is a detailed chronology of plot detail – we just want the absolute story essentials. Resist getting bogged down in plot when pitching – pitching is about the wider overview, not detailed plot chronology.

They are about expressing the uniqueness of your idea. What is utterly distinctive and exciting about your idea? Why does it need to be made – now? What is the emotional hook of your idea? Why are you not only the best writer for this project but the only writer who could write it? What is the compelling dramatic premise / narrative hook of your idea? Who are the vivid compelling characters at the heart of your story? What are the detailed visual images / tableaus / moments that articulate your idea?

These are the sorts of questions your document needs to address – and the document needs to address them in the shortest form possible. No reader wants an initial written pitch for a project to be 20 pages. Ideally they’d like it to be one page. But if you feel that you need 2-3 pages to do real justice to the idea, then that’s fine. But you should write this document with real economy. There should be no repetition.

The document needs to convey not just your passion / excitement but also the tone / stylistic approach. If you’re pitching a comedy, your written pitch needs to be funny. If you’re pitching a thriller, it needs to be thrilling.

And the way you write it needs to convey how excited you are about the idea. But like the best scripts, all of this needs to be sub-textual. There is nothing more off-putting in these pitch documents than empty promises – assurances that the script will be funny, heart-breaking, thrilling, without any evidence of this in the document. These documents need to deliver not tease. At the same time, these documents aren’t meant to be a complete package – they’re just supposed to pique interest and initiate a conversation and questions about the idea.

As with your scripts, get feedback on your pitches, try them out on people, work on them and redraft them before you submit them professionally. Treat them with the focus and dedication you would a script.

Identify the essence of what is exciting and unique about your idea and keep this at the heart of your pitch. The clarity of the idea is key.

The next newsletter will be on Friday Nov 2^nd,

All the best

Phil

PHILIP SHELLEY

www.script-consultant.co.uk

www.tributepodcasts.co.uk

@PhilipShelley1

October 19^th 2018

Hi There,

I’ve had a hugely enjoyable week with three days of courses – on Tuesday my STORY, IDEAS AND CHARACTER ‘masterclass’ at the Indie Training Fund (who this week merged with Creative Skillset to become ‘SCREENSKILLS’ in case you’re interested); and then on Wednesday and Thursday 2 sessions with the BBC writersroom 2018 Drama Room intake (15 writers selected from their annual Drama script submissions for 6 month mentoring and script development).

On both of these courses, I asked the writers to find an idea from 2 pages of newspapers and create the best feature film or TV show pitch they could get from their particular pages. The results were astonishing – and I’ve had a very enjoyable time listening to some very exciting, imaginative pitches for a lot of shows that I would very much like to see on our screens.

I want to say a massive thank you to all the writers involved for their whole-hearted, committed approach to these exercises – they put in a lot of effort (and had the courage to pitch their ideas in rooms full of about 20 people).

I’ve used this and similar exercises many times on courses and they nearly always produce brilliant stories and pitches. It seems to me that the more parameters, the more limitations, the less time you give, the better the ideas that come out of the exercise.

But the ideas I’ve been listening to over the last three days, created through ‘artificial’ games and exercises, are also better than nearly all of the ideas that I’ve been pitched in proper writer meetings over the last year. I say this a little reluctantly. As you may have gathered I try quite hard to be positive in these newsletters. But if there’s one area of screenwriting that I’d say writers need to think more about, it’s this area – creating ideas that are likely to be picked up by producers. (This is both true of writers when they initially pitch their ideas at the start of the Channel 4 course and in development meetings I’ve had outside of the Channel 4 course).

And this is true both of verbal pitches but perhaps even more so of written pitches and outlines which seem to be fiendishly hard to get right.

So here are some related thoughts  –

This should go without saying but I’m going to say it anyway! Particularly if you’re a new writer with no TV track record (but actually this applies all writers of any level of experience) the ideas you pitch don’t just have to be good – they have to be exceptional. No self-respecting indie is going to commission you to write even an outline for £500 unless they are genuinely excited by the idea and think that it has a hope of cutting through and being attractive to the decision-makers, the commissioning executives.

There is no allowance for the fact that you’re a newer writer. Whoever you are, you are directly competing with Jed Mercurio and Sally Wainwright. Your ideas don’t just have to be as good as their ideas (who’s going to pick your similar idea over writers with track records like theirs?) it has to be considerably better.

So the ideas you pitch have to be outstanding and exceptional. And when you pitch them you have to believe this. And if they’re not outstanding and exceptional because you haven’t fully thought them through yet, but you’re just trying them out in meetings in their early development phase, then you shouldn’t be pitching them.

Instead you should try them out on your friends, loved ones or more particularly those who you trust to give you constructive but, above all, brutally honest feedback. (You’ll find teenage children are very useful in this respect).

It’s a great time for newer writers to be pitching new ideas because there are quite a few precedents at the moment of shows from brand new writers being picked up and even made (by both traditional broadcasters and SVOD’s). But they’re only being picked up because they are outstandingly good ideas – and because the writer has gone into a meeting with an indie and managed to persuade a script editor, then an executive producer, then a commissioning editor (and probably several other people besides) of the uniqueness and excellence of their idea.

Not only that – but you also need to persuade those who hold the purse-strings that YOU are the best writer for this story – indeed that you are the ONLY writer who could tell the story you want to tell.

Listening to so many great ideas this week has really made me think about what a good TV drama idea is, what it looks and sounds like.

There were a couple of ideas that were pitched to me yesterday that were epic – stories that were spread over several years in a life and over different continents – about struggle, hardship and ultimate redemption. Be ambitious in the ideas you pitch. Don’t limit yourself and your ideas. Go for scale, ambition and the EPIC! Go for BIG ideas.

Titles. In another exercise I get writers to come up with completely random titles and then create stories from the titles. Two of the titles that generated cracking stories – THE WINTER IS COMING and SEVEN WAYS HOME. Strong, imaginative titles like this can spark strong, imaginative stories.

(So many good ideas have come up this week through (frankly) quite silly games and exercises. But I think the silliness is really important. Creativity is so much easier in a playful environment. It should be FUN, it shouldn’t be sitting staring at a computer screen until your brain bleeds.)

The devil is in the detail. Stories and characters come alive through telling detail – particularly visual detail. Memorable visual images and moments between characters can stand out (rather than more generalised descriptions of character qualities).

Following on from this was a discussion of the mundane aspects of our lives that contain insightful, defining characteristics – what we eat, what we buy at the supermarket; what we wear; what newspapers we read; our mode of transport; social media profile and activity. If you can imagine all of this for your character, you have gone a long way to creating an utterly unique, clearly-defined person. So often it’s these authentic, idiosyncratic details that bring characters to life.

I’m going to carry on these thoughts about ideas, pitching and how you generate new stories and invent new characters in 2 weeks time…

CHANNEL 4 SCREENWRITING COURSE 2019

The final script total for the 2019 course was (gulp) a whopping 2800 which myself and my small team of readers have now begun to read and discuss. If you entered – thank you very much. It will be a good few weeks before we have any news but we really appreciate the level of interest in the course and are delighted that so many people submitted scripts. I’ve already read several cracking scripts and I can see the choice of the final 12 is going to be ridiculously difficult. But it’s a really exciting process discovering so many talented new dramatic writers, reading so many wonderful stories.

A message from excellent 4screenwriting alumna DREW MARKE –

****FEMALE WRITERS WANTED****

A Call to Arms for our scribing sisters!

The 14th of December this year will mark 100 years since the first woman in the UK cast a vote. The first time a woman had a say in who would make the decisions that affected her. It would take another ten years for all women to be granted that right, but still, it was a momentous occasion worth celebrating, don’t you agree? Earlier this year we formed a female creative collective to develop a piece of work to commemorate this centenary, and as a response to #MeToo and the Time’s Up movement. On the 14th of December 2018, at Above the Arts Theatre in Leicester Square we will be celebrating this groundbreaking event with an evening of pieces, produced, directed, written, and performed by women.

We are still looking for some additional writing for our show and we would love submissions of monologues, duologues, songs, or spoken word which hold up a mirror to contemporary female experience, or are inspired by or based on the achievements of extraordinary women, or the gagged, mute, invisible and hidden; those who have been airbrushed from history. With that said we would really like a selection of pieces which not only examine oppression but are celebratory, that are bold and unapologetic or posit an alternative way of being; an opportunity to re-write the narrative. Each piece should be no longer than 10 minutes. At this stage in proceedings, what we can offer with regards to remuneration in that the profits from the show will be equally divided amongst those taking part.

It is our intention for this to be the inaugural event to launch an ongoing, collaborative group of creators who get together on a monthly basis to discuss issues and stories, current and historical, that matter to women, and will inspire and inform our future work as individuals and as a collective. We want to keep the conversation alive, and to make our contribution towards the issue of gender equality as well as give opportunity to women in our industry who are still woefully underrepresented. As Emmeline Pankhurst said, ‘You have to make more noise than anybody else…you have to be there all time’!

Applications are open immediately, and will be closing on October 21st at 16:00, please email them to: femaleedit@gmail.com

Thanks,

Drew

Breaking Into UK Film And TV Drama: A comprehensive guide to finding work in UK Film and TV Drama by Matt Gallagher

Finally this week I’d like to recommend a book. One of the excellent delegates on my ITF course this week was Matt Gallagher. He told me nothing about this book but I happened to come across it, had not heard of it before and, having flicked through it, I think it’s a really excellent guide to many areas of the TV and film industries in the UK.

The next newsletter will be on Friday October 19^th

All the best

Phil

PHILIP SHELLEY

www.script-consultant.co.uk

www.tributepodcasts.co.uk

@PhilipShelley1

October 5^th 2019