Character Traits

When developing characters, many writers draw up detailed character profiles. But a list of individual events or details about a person doesn't necessarily lead to understanding. I once dated a man for three years. Although I knew many things about him, I never fully understood him. In contrast, there have been other people in my life I understood perfectly without needing to know their every detail.

When creating characters, search for their dominant traits, not the details. "Think of people you know down to the core," says Hal Croasmun. "You can predict how they'll react to situations and you can tell when they are out of character. The core isn't a whole compilation of details. It is the part of each person that is always present."

Going back to my ex-boyfriend, one of his dominant traits was to be elusive. No matter what happened, I could never predict his reaction—other than knowing it would surprise me. One of my brother's dominant traits is he's trusting. He approaches every situation with an attitude of openness and a smile. Another of his dominant traits is self-confidence. Do you see how, together, "trusting" and "confident" already begin to paint a fuller character picture? A trusting man who isn't confident could easily be taken advantage of. But a man who's trusting because he's secure in himself is a different story.

One of my brother's details happens to be that he's a fourth-degree black belt in karate. But that detail alone doesn't make him confident. A person might acquire a high level of proficiency in karate in order to hide his insecurities without ever achieving true confidence. Details contribute to character traits or are shaded by them, but they don't define character.

If it helps you, write extensive character profiles. But keep in mind that, in the end, we know people through a few dominant traits that are revealed in everything they say and do.

Dialogue Is Not Conversation

In his book Story: Substance, Structure, Style and The Principles of Screenwriting, screenwriting expert Robert McKee states that dialogue should have "the swing of everyday talk, but content well above normal."
If I were to transcribe a conversation with my best friend and put it into a screenplay, the audience would fall asleep within seconds.
"Yeah, I might go out tonight…Dunno, maybe a movie…"
In real life, people ramble, digress, interrupt and repeat themselves. But film dialogue is clear and purposeful. Every word drives the story forward. Good dialogue conveys a maximum of meaning with a minimum of words.
Nevertheless, dialogue still needs to sound like something real people would say. Real people don't speak in full, grammatically perfect sentences or well-composed paragraphs. They use contractions. They drop words. They jump from one thought to another.
Sonny is a nervous bank robber at a bungled hold-up. He's inside the bank with several hostages and Sal, his psychopathic accomplice. Outside, the police have the place surrounded. You may recognize this scenario from Dog Day Afternoon (written by Frank Pierson) starring a young Al Pacino.
Does Sonny say, "Do you want me to give up? Look, Sal is in the back with the girls. He has his gun pointed at them. If anything should happen to me, Sal will shoot them. If you make one move, the girls will die. How can I be sure you will not jump me?"
No, of course not. This is what Sonny says:
SONNY
You want me to give up, huh? Look, Sal's in back with the girls. Anything happens to me--one move--and Sal gives it to them. Boom boom. How do I know you won't jump me?

Remember, "the swing of everyday talk, but content well above normal."

A Character's Voice

The year is 1941 in Morocco. Ilse (Ingrid Bergman) is caught in a bind between her love for Rick (Humphrey Bogart) and duty to her Resistance leader husband, Victor (Paul Henreid), whom she admires and respects. How does the ultra-cool Rick express his affection for her? He says: "Here's looking at you, kid." Compare this to Victor's line: "I love you very much, my dear." Even if you've never seen Casablanca, you get a good picture of the differences between the two men.
Each character should have a distinct voice. By "voice" I don't mean only a character's accent or dialect, or whether the sound of his voice is thin, squeaky, or gruff. I also mean his personality—his character traits, and his outlook on life. Through his reactions, word choice, and speech pattern, a character's dialogue reveals where he is from, his level of education, his character, and his point of view.
Voice can be used to connect a character to others or to keep him apart. A common language will play a bigger role the closer your characters are, but for dramatic purposes, your major characters must remain distinct. Three soldiers might share certain speech patterns and use the same military jargon, for example. This connects them, identifies them as part of the same group. But they are still individuals. Maybe one is an optimistic Texan, the other a cynical New Yorker, and the third a cowardly Midwesterner. Even if characters come from the same state, same town, or the same family, their personalities will be different. They will respond differently to the same situation, choose different words, and have different speech patterns.
Let's say you have a pair of lovers you want to connect. If you rely on similar personalities or voices to accomplish this, you risk creating a superficial and boring connection rather than a compelling one of dramatic substance. Differentiate their personalities—and hence, their voices—and connect them instead through conflict. Pit one against the other or create some friction between them, and you'll have a much more dynamic scene.
Take a few pages from your screenplay and delete all speaker attributions. Then show it to a friend and ask her to determine which characters are saying each line. If she can't tell one character from the other, then you need to re-think your dialogue.

First Impressions: The Title

Many screenwriters get lazy when it comes to titling their scripts. The argument is always the same: "Why bother? The studio's going to change it anyway."

I can think of at least three good reasons:

Pride: The title is the first sample of your writing anyone sees. If it's boring, what does that say about you as a writer? And what's going to entice a reader to pick your script out of the pile? (If you need a visual to drive this point home, go to http://photos.oscars.org/listanevent.php?events=50 to see Greg Beal, director of the Nicholl Fellowship, surrounded by over 6,000 script submissions.)

Marketing: A great title makes your movie easier to market. Your title goes hand-in-hand with your logline. The logline sets up the pitch, the title delivers the clincher. Say you're pitching a movie about a great white shark attacking people at a summer resort. Close with, "it's called Jaws," and you've painted a whole movie in the producer's imagination—and increased your chances of making a sale.

Writerly discipline: Coming up with a fantastic title means clarifying your concept. It helps you see the movie as much as it helps the producer. If you start to stray while writing or pitching, a single glance at the title can help get you back on track.

According to producer Hal Croasmun, there are three types of titles that work.

• The same title as the best-selling book that the movie is based on. This works even for titles that are confusing or uninspiring because they already have a built-in audience (Cold Mountain, Remains of the Day, The Godfather).
• Intriguing titles that hint at something lurking underneath the surface (Indecent Proposal, Crying Game, One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest).
• Titles that instantly capture the story, the environment, the main character, etc. These titles give the essence of the movie. You aren't fighting an uphill battle trying to explain the story (Legally Blonde, Clueless, GI Jane).

"Avoid overly long titles, titles where you have to watch the movie to understand them, or titles that are confusing or make you think it's a different genre," advises Croasmun.

There are many ways to brainstorm great titles. Here are a couple of tips from Croasmun:

• Use contradictory word combinations, as in Back to the Future or Bad Santa.
• Give us the main character's internal state, as in Bedazzled or Unforgiven.
• Give us the key location, as in Moulin Rouge, Air Force One.
• Use a cliché from the story, as in You've Got Mail, or a twist on a cliché, as in Natural Born Killers.

Remember, the title is the first impression a reader gets of your writing. Make sure it shines!

Getting Dirty

Think of your first draft as a lump of clay: malleable, flexible raw material. To mold it into a solid screenplay, you need to feel totally free to add, subtract, rearrange, destroy, and reshape material. Jump in, get dirty up to the elbows, allow yourself to feel the grit under your fingernails. Rewriting isn't a job for sissies.

The biggest mistake you could make in the rewriting phase is to get too precious with your first draft. Don't be afraid of losing material you like. If it doesn't fit the story, be disciplined enough to throw it out. This is known as "killing your darlings," and it's an essential skill to develop. As screenwriter Andrew Bennett put it, "Great writers aren't great first-drafters. They're great rewriters."

You may be head over heels in love with your first draft, and maybe it even deserves all that affection. But once you have rewritten a script several times, take your final draft and compare it with the first one. Most writers will admit that their brilliant first draft now appears terribly flawed and downright unlovable.

So save a copy of your current draft in a read-only file if it makes you feel better. Then roll up your sleeves and let the mudslinging begin.

Breaking Into Hollywood

Hundreds of thousands of scripts are written and shopped around, but only about 400 feature films are produced in Hollywood each year. The competition is fierce, so how does a novice screenwriter break in?

According to producer/manager Hal Croasmun, there are numerous routes into Hollywood. "Too many screenwriters give up after trying only the traditional strategies," says Croasmun of ScriptForSale.com. "We didn't want to see any more dreams die over a lack of options." That's why Croasmun, who is also a writer, developed the free program "33 Ways to Break Into Hollywood." Every other day, a new strategy pops up on your desktop until you've read all 33 strategies. It's designed to give you time to consider each tip carefully. Once you've read a strategy, you can review it again at any time.

You'll learn how to win contests with industry recognition (strategy #5), approach indie filmmakers (strategy #17), and build your Web site (strategy #10). By the time you've finished, you'll be able to put together an amazing marketing campaign that will get you noticed by Hollywood.

This tool is one of my favorites. No writer should be without it. 33 Strategies can be downloaded for free at http://www.scriptforsale.com/33ways/signup33.htm

Agents Make Money FOR You, Not OFF You

An agent only makes money AFTER he's procured work for you—through a sale, option, or writing assignment. Then, and only then, is he allowed to charge you a 10% fee. Legitimate agents who are looking for new clients will never ask you for money. It's against the WGA signatory rules—another good reason to stick with WGA signatory agents. There are unscrupulous people who use the Internet to seduce inexperienced writers with promises of representation, and then try to charge a reading fee or sell script doctoring services. Don't fall for this.

Bottom line: never, ever pay an agent to read your script or to represent you.

Creating Heroes and Villains Audiences Love

The hero (protagonist) and the villain (antagonist) are the two most important characters in most stories. They have opposing goals and are bound through conflict. Audiences love to see them battle it out. Rooting for a hero with an uphill battle and booing the bad guy is part of the fun of going to the movies.

Protagonist: This is the hero, the main character of your story. These are the essential traits of a compelling protagonist:

• He must be active. He must drive the conflict.
• He must have a strong goal, and he must not compromise.
• He must face a series of ever-increasing obstacles, but he must have some hope of achieving his goal.
• He must be special or unique in a meaningful way
• The audience must empathize with the protagonist. They must root for him.

Remember, story is conflict. Nobody wants to watch a hero who doesn't do anything or is indecisive. Make sure he has a goal that he pursues actively. And he must earn his reward. Life shouldn't be too easy for him. "Make him suffer. Force him to claw his way out," says screenwriter Rose Gumarova. "At first I thought it was sadistic to throw my protagonist into hell. But then I realized that when I'm watching a movie, I love cheering the main character when he's fighting overwhelming opposition. As a writer, if you baby your characters you cheat your audience."

Antagonist: The antagonist wants to stop the hero. Usually the antagonist is another person, but sometimes it's a natural disaster (The Day After), an animal or a creature (Jaws), the supernatural (The Exorcist), or even the character himself battling an inner conflict (Leaving Las Vegas). Inner conflict, however, is harder to write for the beginning screenwriter. If you're starting out, build your story around a strong external conflict against a well-defined antagonist. Most antagonists are villains with an unmistakable bad side, but there are exceptions. In romantic comedies, the protagonist usually ends up marrying the antagonist! Instead of thinking of the antagonist as the bad guy, think of him, her, or it as the main source of opposition to the protagonist.

If the protagonist could easily beat the antagonist, there would be no story. No matter how strong the protagonist is, the antagonist must start out stronger, with his own goal that he pursues as rigorously as the protagonist does his. Develop your antagonist with the same care you devote to your protagonist. Both actors and audiences love a great antagonist. The best villains (Hannibal Lecter, Darth Vader, The Joker) are as complex and interesting as the hero.

Writing Narrative

Narrative is everything that isn't dialogue. It includes descriptions of the characters, the locations, the images and actions we see, and the sounds we hear. It also sets mood, pace, and tone.

Good narrative is active and lean. Here are some points to keep in mind:

Write only what you can see or hear: If you describe a character's inner state (A painful memory from when he was 5 years old overwhelms George) or give backstory (Celia was Jonathan's first girlfriend) in the narrative, how will the audience be made aware of this information? If it's absolutely vital to the story to have this information, turn it into a visual or a line of dialogue.

Describing Actions: Whereas novels are often written in past tense, screenplays are always written as if they're happening right here, right now. Use present tense: John opens the door, walks into the room. Stick to active voice: John opens the door, and avoid the passive voice: The door was opened by John. Replace the present continuous (Gloria is driving) with the present simple (Gloria drives) whenever you can.

Describing Location: Include only enough for the reader to follow the story and the production team to design the shot. Follow the "rule of three." Point out no more than three items in a room to characterize it. People can easily visualize and remember three things, but become overwhelmed when asked to remember more. Use quintessential details. For example, if you want to describe a hippie's apartment, you may want to point out the chintz, the incense, and the Kama Sutra displayed on the coffee table, but skip describing the furniture, the color of the rug, and the windows. Unless, of course someone is about to burst through a window. Then by all means let us know it's there.

Describing Characters: When describing the way a character looks, avoid non-descriptive clichés like "drop-dead gorgeous," or specifics like "blond and blue-eyed." The first only gives us a generic picture, and the second limits the casting possibilities. Use metaphors to paint more vivid pictures. Instead of, "At six feet tall and weighing only 120 pounds, Beth is too skinny," say "If Beth stood sideways and stuck out her tongue, she'd look like a zipper."

Break up the paragraphs. Large blocks of text are a turn-off to the reader. First, it slows down the reading experience and as a result slows down the story. Second, it indicates the writer is either inexperienced or spending too much time on details. Keep your description to blocks of four or five lines. Include only details that are truly important. Keep your sentences short and simple. Avoid complicated grammatical constructions.

Tone: Keep your tone consistent. If you're writing a comedy, your descriptions, actions, and choice of words should be funny, too. If you're writing an action film, then your narrative should be full of tension and action.

Your Trusted Circle Of Readers

No writer should be without a trusted circle of readers. You may get loving support from your mom or your best friend when they read your drafts, and that's well and good. Besides and beyond validation, however, you need to surround yourself with clear-thinking readers who are willing and able to give candid feedback.

"Find and keep very dear anyone who tells it like it is," says writer/director Joy Perino. "Honest—not mean or fawning—feedback is precious and very hard to come by." If you're taking a screenwriting class and there's a classmate whose work you admire, suggest an exchange. Approach a former writing instructor you've stayed in contact with. Or consider joining a critiquing group. Find one by going where writers hang out—bookstores, cafes, the library—and looking for or posting a notice. If you can't find a group in your area, consider joining one online.

A few precautions, however. Avoid critique groups that only tell you how wonderful you are, as well as the ones where everyone tears everyone else down. Both types exist. Neither approach is helpful. Join a working group, not a social club. Make sure there's a submission schedule and a minimum critiquing requirement, and that the group actually sticks to it. Even if you have to join a group of non-screenwriters, you can make it work if you all give great feedback and are supportive and consistent. I was a member of just such a group for three years, and I learned an awful lot. To help us all out, I wrote up a screenplay critiquing primer and introduced everyone to the screenplay format. It worked really well for us.

Building your trusted circle of readers takes time, but once you do, you won't know how you ever lived without those precious people. Don't forget to them in your Oscar® acceptance speech.