My guess is that most screenwriters tend to write long first drafts. Probably a lot of reasons for that, not the least of which is that it’s better to have to face trimming material, rather than fattening which could feel like a ‘thin’ story.
Another reason: Why pre-edit? This is especially true if you’re using the first draft to ‘find’ your story.
My longest draft ever? 165 pages. How about you?
In 1995, my writing partner and I, probably over-inspired by Terry Gilliam’s Brazil, came up with a preposterously epic sci-fi totalitarianism comedy called “The Faceless Masses.”
It clocked in at a mere 216 pages.
Thankfully, neither he nor I have a copy of this monstrostity. It appears blissfully lost to the ages.
My first draft of DOWN AND DIRTY PICTURES was also around 165, if I recall …
The working drafts got down to 122 or so and then on the last rewrite, I got it to 108, which still, to this day, I can’t believe we got it down to that.
The first movie the (hopefully) 2 movie epic biblical story I’m working on weighed in at 175 page, I think. The second feels like it’s going to go WAY beyond that.
What you said, Scott, is so true, in first drafts you’re looking to ‘find’ your story. You’re also trying to the freedom to explore ideas, you can always cut things out later. The key is to FIND THE COOL STUFF that an audience will respond too, and that which makes your story special.
My aim on any script is to fill-out 120 pages. I was told keep it at or under 120 page a few years ago, and that stuck with me.
One other trick I found to exceed the 120 page limit, was to do a little thing called ‘DVD Extras.’ I had SO MUCH, what I thought was good material, when I wrote “Hometown Professional Football” I wanted the next level (producers) to see that I had already thought in advance of bonus footage scenes which could shot then later be used to boast DVD sales.
Just out of curriousity, which story of yours weighed in at 165?
- E.C. Henry from Bonney Lake, WA
E.C., it was a historical drama set during the Berlin Airlift called Tully’s War. Ironically after trimming it to go out as a feature film script, it very nearly came together as a 4-hour German language TV mini-series with Wolfgang Petersen’s company. Had that happened, I would have been putting back in stuff I had cut out and then some — I did a ton of research on that project.
Me, I’ve hard times even at cranking out 118 pages.
I think 118 pages it’s the longest draft I’ve ever been typing away.
M.
Before I discovered the sequence approach, I tended to overwrite — the first draft of one of my scripts (that later placed in the SW Expo) clocked in at 156 pages!
I learned the sequence approach before rewriting that project, and got it down to a tight 100 pages (which is what I aim for these days, including the script I sent you).
As for a pre-edit, I consider my outline to be a form of it. I knock off a good couple of drafts by really knowing the story before I type word one… and still find lots of pleasant surprises inside that framework.
By “sequence approach,” are you referring to “Screenwriting: The Sequence Approach”? Dana Coen, the newest member of the UNC-Chapel Hill Writing for Stage & Screen faculty, uses that book for his screenwriting course.
Seems I always write short — 95 pages — then go back and figure out what the story lacks — either character stuff, story logic, etc. My longest first draft is the one I finished just today — 110 pages.
Keep Writing!
Yeah, I think I will beat out all of you…229 pages for my first draft of Forest of Glass. This is the one I just finished last Monday (the 9th) at 3:00 AM, after a 14 hour marathon of writing. My goal had been 160. It’s fairly obvious that I went past that by a wee bit.
My intent is to have the working draft clock in at exactly 142. That is what I will be sending off to Nicholl. If I can cut that much, it will be a bloody fucking miracle. It will also be the densest sonofabitch anyone has ever read.
The first script I wrote before was a two hour spec pilot that ran at 135 pages. I’d been aiming for 100.
I have a tendency to write long. Very, very, long. See? Even now I am doing it! I’m trying to fix that. No really, I am.
Scott, do you think you could use a post or two (or 10) to cover that sequence approach? I don’t have the means to drop 14 bucks on a book right now (college student woes) but would love to learn more on the subject if it would help me pare down this behemoth of a first draft. I so, many thanks!
Nicholas, here’s a Wikipedia blurb:
The sequence approach
The sequence approach to screenwriting, sometimes known as “eight-sequence structure”, is a system developed by Frank Daniel, while he was the head of the Graduate Screenwriting Program at USC. It is based, in part on the fact that, in the early days of cinema, technical matters forced screenwriters to divide their stories into sequences, each the length of a reel (about ten minutes).[10]
The sequence approach mimics that early style. The story is broken up into eight 10-15 minute sequences. The sequences serve as “mini-movies”, each with their own compressed three-act structure. The first two sequences combine to form the film’s first act. The next four create the film’s second act. The final two sequences complete the resolution and dénouement of the story. Each sequence’s resolution creates the situation which sets up the next sequence.
Yes Scott, that’s exactly what I use, blended with Blake Snyder’s approach.
It makes writing drafts so much easier — and the drafts are way better.
Like Marcoguarda and Mike my first draft is always too short.
It used to be because I was afraid of changes. My character developed too little, hence too little conflict.
Now it is my difficulties with getting the third act interesting enough.
98 pages. I edit as I write. I also would rather add an ingredient than try and remove one–rather birth the babies than kill them.
I’m not a big outliner either. I have a general idea about where I’m going and then try and let the next scene come from the one before. I write with a compass, not a map. And I’m lazy, so I look for the shortest route–usually as the crow flies.
135 and it came in at 120. When I write, I pretty much write TO the ending and try to get there as fast as I can.