Tips
for Writing Scripts
If
youve never written a play, youre like most teenagers.
Keep in mind that:
Plays
are about desire. We witness a journey in which characters discover
what they desire, try to get it, and succeed or fail. A play works
when the desire is universal health, love, comfort, independence
and the obstacles are difficult to overcome.
Effective
plays show us a story (prose tells us) through dialogue and dramatic
action. If you let us watch your characters interact at key moments,
you wont need a narrator.
Plays
are about people in relationships. We stay glued to our seats
because events in the play cause the people, and their relationships,
to change. Skip the car chases, physical violence and special
effects; film does these better.
Create
characters you can understand and care about. Find something to
love or respect in every character, and well care about
your characters too. Since each should be well developed, use
as few characters as possible.
Plays
come from experience, imagination and knowledge. Youve got
all three. Mix them together and write about what you know, deep
inside. Plays that work, regardless of their genre, style or structure,
give us a sense of truth.
To
start planning, ask yourself:
As you discuss, improvise, write and revise each scene, decide: