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Today, Gentle Readers, I’m here to tell you to FORGET ABOUT THE BIBLE. Forget it! Ignore it! It’s totally unnecessary! Spec pilots, such as you’re writing, don’t need to be accompanied by show bibles.

This is in answer to a question from Gentle Reader Ellen in Chicago, who wondered if writing three specs a year, as I urged in an earlier post, meant that one would have to write three separate show bibles. Nope. Not even one.

A show bible, if this is a new term to you, is a document that bridges the gap between the pilot script and the hypothetical television series that would result from it. It lays out the arcs of the characters and the show as a whole over at least one projected season of the show. It can also get into character details and back story and description/analysis of the world in which the show is set. Now, this is certainly work you can do on your own, and much of it you probably will do on your own – in your head – even if you don’t actually write it down. This information will be very helpful in the writing of the script, but it is not anything that would ever have to accompany the script.

When I’m writing a pilot for a studio, I have told them all about how I see the show developing. If they were seriously considering ordering the show, they would have me write it all up, but it’s just not something you do in the early stages.

This means, of course, that your script has to stand on its own as a cold read. A reader has to be able to pick it up and understand who these people are and what’s going on without any supporting documents to tell them. And they have to finish the script with a good idea of how the main conflicts are going to continue into the future lives of the characters. This sounds tricky, but it’s really not. Have you ever joined a movie midstream? Unless it was a very plot-twisty movie, you probably found that you were able to infer a lot about the characters and their relationships as you watched. “Oh, I think she’s that guy’s sister, and he’s mad at that really uptight guy…” So forget the bible, take your foot off the exposition pedal, and let the viewer’s understanding evolve.

Lunch: sushi at Echigo, the place with the warm rice. Get the lunch special. They bring you one perfect bite every few minutes.

Suppose you hear someone on the street exclaim, jocularly, “Sweet Muscular Jesus!” Or “Sweet and Sour Jesus!” Your first thought may be, “Ha! That’s hilarious! I must put that in a script!” It’s not a bad thought. If you’re lucky, you just heard someone’s original proclamation and that line in your script will sparkle with I-never-heard-that-before-ness. But more likely, you just heard an early use of a phrase that’s just about to go viral and your script will quickly smell of oh-that-one-was-funny-last-monthitivity.

A better first thought is, “Ha! That’s hilarious! I wonder what I can make up that has a similar structure, but is mine and mine alone?” Then you can make a list:

Sweet Potato Jesus!
Sweet ‘n’ Low Jesus!
Sweet-talkin’ Jesus!

And then you can branch out into…

Holy Dimpled Moses!
Hail Mary Full of Pie!
Sweet Virgin Records!

Or whatever. That took ten minutes and probably at least one of those hasn’t been all over the internet already.

Whenever you hear an original quip, remember that someone had to think it up. Are they really any smarter than you? Instead of helping them spread their glory, work on your own.

Lunch: another heirloom tomato salad. If you haven’t tried heirloom tomatoes, you’re missing out. As varied and lovely as tropical fish, only made out of tomatoes.

In Fellowship news, Brandon in Maryland writes in with a question about the ABC/Disney Fellowship that never would’ve occurred to me, but it’s a really good one for anyone who might be facing a substantial move. He’s asking about the “one month’s accommodations” that the fellowship supplies. Well, I checked on this for you, Brandon, and I’ve discovered that they’ll take good care of you, should you get selected. Fellows are given the choice of being put up in a furnished apartment in a very nice complex near the studio in Burbank for one month while they look for a place, or they can take the money equivalent and find housing on their own right away. This is an excellent deal, and I certainly hope housing issues don’t prevent anyone from applying to the program.

Lunch: Vietnamese food again — different place, but that same dish with the pork and the noodles and the sweet sauce. I need to write down the name next time.

Are scripts visual or auditory? Your spec scripts aren’t going to be read aloud by actors, but they are going to be read by people who are actively evaluating how they would sound if they were. Reading a script is certainly a more ear-based experience than reading a short story or an essay is. I bet if you did one of those brain scans, all the bits of your brain that have to do with hearing would be all squirmy and lit up while you read a script.

And yet, it’s all still just words on a page, and you, as a spec script writer, are in the unique position of being able to use the fact that you KNOW you’re writing exclusively for readers, not viewers, to slip a few treats into the script that wouldn’t be detectable if it were being read out loud. Little non-auditory gifts.

For example, when I wrote a Buffy script with a troll as a major guest character, I wrote all of his lines in all capital letters. It wasn’t really a cue to the actor, who would’ve bellowed beautifully anyway, as much as it was just me having fun on the page for the benefit of a reader.

In another script, Willow had to comment on the fact that there was more than one Buffy. Instead of having her say “two Buffys?” I wrote “two Buffies?” knowing that Joss — the script’s ultimate reader — would enjoy that.

Something I’m dying to do, and I can’t imagine why I haven’t done it already, is to write a British character’s dialogue with all British spellings. I think it would be hilarious on the page:

AMERICAN GUY
Are you insulting my honor?

BRITISH GUY
Your honour? Certainly not.

Personally, I could even see a writer doing something as nonstandard as having a character very meekly say something in a tiny font. Although I’d only do it once in the script. It’s right on the edge of gimmicky, but if a script was really well-written and then had one little whimsical note like that, I’d think it was pretty cocky and cool.

Others will give you different advice on this point, but I say, once your script is great, there’s nothing wrong with playing just a little bit like this. Lightly, lightly.

Lunch: antipasto salad

There is more good news about the Warner Brothers Writing Workshop, Gentle Readers! A little bird who works for Warner Brothers (I think that makes him Tweety), tells me about two interesting developments, both of which I think are new. First of all, the program is going to attempt to recreate the feel of a working writers’ room, which is very ambitious and interesting. Second, and more importantly, Warner Brothers show runners are going to be given a powerful incentive to employ the workshop participants — the workshop will pay the salary of those writers for the first fourteen weeks if they’re taken on board a staff.

If this information is accurate — and I have no official confirmation — it’s huge. Suddenly ABC/Disney is joined by a genuine alternative, and there are two reasons to continue to write specs for shows that already exist. So set your tivos, scour the internet for produced scripts, fire up Final Draft, and let’s get to work on your submissions for next year! (Or get one in the mail fast for this year — the WB deadline is Aug. 15)

Lunch: a homemade avocado, Roquefort, heirloom tomato and prosciutto sandwich on a seed-encrusted mini-baguette. Best thing I ever ate.

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