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Sometimes I receive kind letters tucked between the pages of novels or other works of prose. The notes are from the authors, which overwhelms me — people who manage to put together book-length amounts of prose impress me beyond my own meager words. Books — have you looked at these things? The words go all the way to the margins! Do you know how hard that must be?

Sometimes the authors are pointing out a reference in their book to the influence of Buffy on their lives. Thank you very much on this score to Brianna Hope Jacobson, the author of Mortified, a collection of teenaged writings edited by their now adult authors, and Doreen Orion, author of Queen of the Road an off-beat travel memoir. Thanks also to Jennette Fulda (Half-Assed, a Weight-Loss Memoir), Austin Grossman (Soon I Will Be Invincible), Lani Diane Rich (The Fortune Quilt and Maybe Baby among others), and Eugene Ramos (one of the nine collective co-authors of The Artifact) for their wonderful words. James Kennedy (The Order of Odd-Fish) was especially gracious in his note. And there are more, the books currently residing in my home on various bookshelves and resisting my efforts to locate them.

Sometimes these authors mention that they’ve found something in this blog that applies to their variety of writing, and that they’ve been able to apply it. I’m tremendously flattered to think that might be true, since I myself write entirely — other than a few short stories and this blog — in script format.

But today I had a thought that is directly applicable to prose writing, so I’m going to lay it out there. It’s about the granularity of detail in a scene. (Do novels have scenes? I mean, they do, but I’m not sure they’re called that. You know what I mean.) Sometimes a novel has been sweeping along, covering days and weeks efficiently, and then you get a long slow start to a scene — I’m thinking of a specific one in Jhumpa Lahiri’s The Namesake. (SPOILER ALERT) On page 159, chapter seven starts with “Ashima sits at the kitchen table on Pemberton Road, addressing Christmas cards.” And the action slows to a maddening crawl. On purpose. We hear about the cards, the envelopes, the address books, the tea kettle. She gets a call, ends the call, the scene goes on, and the fine fine grain of the scene tells you that something very important is about to happen. And it does. Ten full pages later. And, my goodness, those are a great ten pages because you’re so tense throughout that you’re in danger of cracking open. (END SPOILER ALERT)

It works because the readers know that a scene wasn’t included for no reason, so they keep waiting for the reason, but it also works, I think, for a deeper reason having to do with the human brain. The precise reporting of inconsequential details mimics the way our memories go into retentive overload in dangerous or emotional situations. It’s the effect that makes spills and collisions suddenly seem to go into slow motion as we experience them, because we’re suddenly hyper-aware of every moment. A great prose writer like Lahiri can capture that feeling on the novel’s page.

Now, can you apply this to script writing? Yes! And since you’re presumably writing spec scripts, not scripts for production, you can achieve it remarkably easily through the novel-simulating magic of stage directions. Don’t make them long, because the readers will skip them, but make them frequent and you’ll get the effect of slowing down the reader, slowing down the scene. Do it right (a mild suggestion of danger inherent in the situation helps) and you’ll get suspense. Let me try it. Let’s say that John is making a phone call as he walks down a empty city street on a cold night:

He picks up the quarter and pauses, looking around…

See how it’s all suspensy? It’s not just the situation, it’s the level of detail and how it slows it all down. Sometimes you want danger to blindside your character, and that can be great too, but if you want suspense, play it like a novelist.

And thanks again for the lovely notes, all you prose writers out there!

Lunch: “Green Eggs and Ham” from the breakfast menu at Moe’s, a (primarily) burger place in the valley. Lots of spinach and avocado. A new discovery!

I’ve mentioned the amazing Friend-of-the-Blog Jeff Greenstein before, and here he is again with a great idea. He suggests that I talk about the right way to open your spec pilot. Yes. This is huge — a lot of people never read past the opening, so making it as perfect as possible is crucial. Jeff says: I am a big believer that the opening line of a pilot (or the opening image, or the teaser) should be the series in microcosm.

Yes. Exactly. I agree. I do this and I suspect many other writers do as well. In fact, Jeff is prepared to prove that they do. Here is a darn impressive list he composed:

In the Cheers pilot, the teaser is Sam with an underage kid who’s trying to get a drink using a fake military ID. Kid says he was in the war. Sam asks what it was like. “It was gross,” the kid replies with a shudder. “Yeah, that’s what they say — war is gross,” Sam replies. The teaser gives you a sense of the place and the guy.

The West Wing pilot: In a bar, talking off-the-record with a reporter, Sam Seaborn is distracted by a hot girl who’s giving him the eye. This show is about politics and sex (well, it started out that way), and the “backstage” lives of people in government.

Wow. That’s a fantastic list. I would add the teaser of the pilot of The Wire, in which a detective gently interrogates a neighborhood kid about a senseless murder — the gross illogic of which the kid takes in stride. The series’ whole sense of an overwhelming inescapable system of crime is there in that scene.

And the Buffy pilot teaser? Remember, it was that bit that looked like the girl was about to be munched by a vampire, but in fact SHE was the vampire? It told you to throw out your dramatic expectations, that danger could come from anywhere, and that women were going to have some power in this world. It was Buffy’s own story, but told from the vampire side first.

Writers tend to agonize over their teasers, especially that first page, and especially if the project is a pilot. If you’ve just shrugged and started with your main character waking up in bed, then I’d suggest that you might’ve missed a really good opportunity. Think about the heart of your show — what’s the central dynamic? The central message? Is there a way to capture it in your opening sequence? Go ahead, agonize. It’s good for you and your spec.

Lunch: wonton soup at Noodle Planet.

Breaking News. What went wrong with your writing program submission? I found out.

I’ve pinned down three reasons why scripts don’t make the cut when they’re submitted to scriptwriting competitions like the one profiled yesterday. Two of the three key errors that have been flagged are no surprise to me. But one is, so hold onto your space bars, there’s something interesting ahead.

First off – Guest stars! If your spec script centers around a guest character, then that could well be why you didn’t get into the program. This was one of the first things I talked about when I started this blog. One of the very few reasons that someone would ask you to write a script for a show that’s already on the air is to see if you can capture the voices of the characters. The reader is listening to the show in their head as they read, imagining the literal voices. A guest character, no matter how well-written, causes silence. And it’s not just a pseudo-auditory problem — your regular characters need to drive the story, if someone else is coming in and doing a lot of talking, chances are that you’ve got them acting and all your regulars reacting. Big problem. It’s an episode of The Office, not Michael Scott’s Mother Visits The Office. Use original characters in small doses. If you’ve got a stranger given material that approaches the amount given to one of the regulars, then that’s almost certainly why you didn’t get in.

Second — Spelling! Grammar! Punctuation! Imagine that the fellowship reader is filling out a form about your script, creating a score. Imagine that you get points automatically taken off for (real or perceived) errors. How many points do you want to lose because you forgot to have your mom/professor/friend proofread your script to make sure you used the right form of “your,” that you spelled “precede” correctly, that you’ve got your apostrophes in the right place? Seriously, find an apostrophe fiend and make him or her study your script — I find apostrophe errors in every script I read. Imagine the advantage you’ll have when everyone else’s script takes a scoring hit in this category and your script does not.

And here is the third, surprise factor:

Failing to observe the difference between multi-camera versus single-camera formatting. This one I did not see coming. Multi-camera, traditional sitcoms like The New Adventures of Old Christine, Two and Half Men and Big Bang Theory use a very specific style of formatting — stage directions are capitalized and dialogue is double spaced. Some sitcoms also put all the stage directions in parentheses. They also label the scenes with letters of the alphabet (but not ALL letters of the alphabet, some are skipped). I also seem to remember from my comedy days that some shows even had the peculiarity of omitting the period from the last sentence of every clump of stage directions. In a nutshell, sitcom scripts are strange and need to be studied closely. Get a copy of a script for the show you are spec-ing. Study it! Mimic it! If you try your hardest and simply cannot get a script for your show — well, I think that’s a big problem, but the least you can do is to get one for a show that resembles it in format. Again, this mistake is easy to avoid but could cost you.

Submitting a script to a writing program is like submitting your college application. It’s worth taking the time to do it right.

Lunch: In ‘N’ Out burger, “animal style”. So good! I wish it was easier to combine this with an order of McDonald’s fries.

I haven’t been to the mail bag for a while, Gentle Readers, for a number of reasons that have to do mostly with the mail bag’s contents dwelling variously in my home, my office, my backpack, my hotel room, etc. The letter I’m looking at now, from Gentle Reader Rich, originated in Montreal. From there it went to Beverly Hills and then finally made its way to me here in Vancouver.

Rich is asking about choosing a show for which to write a spec script. He is toying with the idea of writing a novelty spec — an episode of a show like Buffy that is long off the air. The problem, Rich, is that most agents and most shows these days want to read original material — spec pilots or scripts for short films. Even plays. The primary place for which you’ll need scripts for shows that already exist is for the ABC/Disney writing fellowship, and it only accepts scripts for shows currently on the air. So I’m afraid you’d have a tough time finding a reader for your vintage spec.

I recommend you write a fellowship-ready spec if you’re at all interested in the program. You mention that you like House but are concerned about your lack of medical knowledge. You might find that this isn’t the obstacle that you think it is. You don’t need an M.D. to find out everything you need to know about one specific disorder. You might want to start by watching some episodes of those shows that follow real patients with hard-to-diagnose diseases. I’m talking about Diagnosis: Unknown or Mystery Diagnosis. Don’t lift the exact story from one of their episodes, but these shows are wonderful for suggesting starting places and possible misleads.

There are other good shows to consider as well. I would think that Mad Men would be a fun choice. Since you only have to please the ABC/Disney readers — not create a script that will be usable industry-wide — you can be much more idiosyncratic with your choice of show.

Then, after you’ve got that done, you should really dive into the world of original material. Be bold, don’t make a generic cop show or family show. And don’t hold back, hoarding your favorite story until you’re in the position to sell it for a thrillion bucks. Put it all out there.

You’re reaching for a big prize, use a big reaching thing.

Lunch: mac and cheese from craft services, served piping hot on set. Yum!

Today, I received some hot inside info on the Warner Bros Writing Workshop from Jack Gilbert, this blog’s man on the inside. He wanted me to tell all of you that everyone there is looking forward to your submissions, and then he added a whole bunch of good news. Take it, Jack!

Under the first year of Chris Mack’s leadership, an astonishing 7 of last year’s 12 participants got staffed, by far the best result ever.

You can tell them that we’ll spot great writing whatever series they submit with, and that they shouldn’t worry if their specs have similar elements to aired episodes, or if their story choices turned out to be different than where the series eventually landed. We’re just looking for the very best writers we can find.

Let’s count the good news. First, that’s a really amazing placement statistic. Second, although the adjusted deadline gives you less time, you’ve got some warning, and I have to say the total number of submissions is less than I’d thought — they have almost as many participants as the ABC/Disney program and far less competition.

Finally, I love that they’re going out of the way to clarify that their standard is writing quality, not clairvoyance. We all know how hard it is to aim a spec script at a moving target, and this program is letting you off the hook for errors of anticipation. I think that’s an excellent policy.

So start polishing those scripts and aim really high — it doesn’t have to be as good as what’s on television. It has to be better.

You can do it!

Lunch: a chopped antipasto salad. But the pepperoncini were left whole and stemmed. A flaw in an otherwise fine attempt.

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