Words of Wisdom from Boyd
Jim’s old friend Boyd McCollum just sent this note about screenwriting – and we just had to share it.
“One problem we face writing screenplays is how much or how little to write to be able to convey the story on the page. Addressing the problem of overwriting, a key component to good screenwriting is trust. There are three levels to this trust.
The first level of trust is that the writer needs to trust the other creative personnel on the production team to “get it” and that they will bring marvelous ideas and insight and creative juice to the table that will allow the words on the page to take flight.
The second level of trust is that the writer needs to trust the reader to have some imagination and that they will be able to “get it” and actually will “get it” very quickly.
The third level of trust that the writer needs is to trust himself that he’s still conveying his story his way even though he is trusting so many others to interpret his writing and his story.
These different levels of trust will allow us to cut down on overwriting scenes, either by giving too much detail (in case the set decorator doesn’t know how to find the right dinner placements for a fancy meal), writing extra business (in case actors don’t know how to act), writing extra scenes (in case the reader doesn’t know how a character can go from the lobby of a building to an office of the 30th floor without showing him in an elevator), being repetitive (in case we don’t realize the dead horse is dead unless we blow it’s brains out, light it on fire, drown it in acid, drop a grenade on it, drop an bigger grenade on it, scatter its ashes to the four corners of the globe, then have the Death Star come and obliterate the planet …), or indulging our inner writer (so readers will realize that we are, in fact, real writers and not just – ahem, cough – screenwriters 
.
Anyways, just some random thoughts. Taken with a grain of salt …”
Thanks Boyd
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