Directing From the Page
Most writers will, at some point in their lives, come across this quote from author Gary Provost:
“This sentence has five words. Here are five more words. Five-word sentences are fine. But several together become monotonous. Listen to what is happening. The writing is getting boring. The sound of it drones. It’s like a stuck record. The ear demands some variety.”
From ‘100 Ways to Improve Your Writing’
He then goes on to memorably illustrate, not only why sentence length matters, but how it matters, himself varying the number of words he uses.
You can read the full thing here: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/373814-this-sentence-has-five-words-here-are-five-more-words
Just like in prose or poetry, we scriptwriters need to pay attention to sentence length, which, if repetitive, can bore the reader. In screenplays, this also translates into “white space”- the number of gaps between paragraphs on a page. Lots of single lines of description creates a stripy, monotonous page.
If you are writing a sequence in which a character is, for example, in a fight, and they are exchanging a number of blows in rapid succession, then it makes sense to have a number of actions contained in the same paragraph; it is the same body of movement.
Single lines suggest a self-contained action.
Before the next moment happens.
That will, indeed, happen at times in our script. But it needs to be intentional. We are directing from the page the pace at which the reader takes in the information, as if they are seeing our movie in their mind.
A simple rule? More white space = fast pace.
A screenplay isn’t an instruction manual, but a timeline for our story. When redrafting, look at that white space, but also look at the sentence lengths. Are you varying them to make the read an enjoyable one for your audience?
The reality is that our job, as early career writers, is to craft a script to be read, not made. Read by competitions, producers... but mostly agents.
Make that script a fun read. Make those redrafts count.
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