Is there any merit in saying "Go to a workshop that will force you to write pages and then give you brutally honest feedback?" I don't disagree with anything you said, just thought this angle was left out. Is it not good?

Scott, I meant "fast" as in efficient and not wasting time doing stuff that does not help in learning the craft. In no way did I mean to superficially skip any steps or take an easy way out. Total immersion was implied in my question. In High School, we had a basketball coach that put us through drills to master the fundamentals.... the guys that went through the drills sped up their development because they developed proper technique while the other guys were just wasting time being out of position and not shooting in proper form. You could spend 15 years working on scripts and not get anywhere if you're doing stuff that's not really that productive and learning how a script works. Film school grads, studio readers and video clerk geeks have a distinct advantage over their brethren that are just sitting in front of a blank screen tapping out pages.

Scot, depending upon the workshop, I think that can be a great idea. If you find one with a top notch facilitator as well as knowledgeable participants who understand what it means to give 'constructive critiques'. The experience can not only help your particular story, being involved in workshop give and take can develop your critical analytical muscles, important to one's ability to progress as a writer and absolutely essential to be a working screenwriter. If on the other hand, the facilitator is poor and the participants are not terribly well-versed in writing, then that might not be all that helpful, and could be detrimental. That said, having led dozens of workshops myself, I can attest to their value. The experience can be extraordinary and in some cases transformational.

Ah, Eric, thanks for that clarification. I was reading the question on the face of it and in the context of a recent encounter with a neophyte writer who had whined about how hard it was and was tempted to purchase some high-priced program that more or less promised he'd deliver a "selling screenplay". I get weary of sharks and charlatans out there preying on impressionable aspiring screenwriters, conveying the message there is some easy or quick way to success. There isn't. So beyond the advice I provided the OP, other things a writer can do to immerse him/herself in the craft: There's my trust 1-2-7-14 approach: Each week, read 1 script, watch 2 movies, write 7 pages, and work 14 hours developing other stories. In comments here, Scot mentioned workshops. Please see my response. On Twitter, someone mentioned studying the writing processes and habits of professional screenwriters. You can do that in part through the hundreds and hundreds of interviews I have hosted on this site. Circling back to reading scripts, try reading 30 screenplays in 30 days, something I've promoted on the site a few times with two of those series in Archives. Likewise watch 30 movies in 30 days. Same type of learning. Movie DVD filmmaker commentaries. Read "Adventures in the Screen Trade" by William Goldman. In fact, a great starting point is the Deep Focus: The Go Into The Movies Project, basically film school on the cheap. If I were on the other side of things today, what I'd do is identify some goals in terms of my immersion into cinema, create a calendar with annual goals, quarterly goals, monthly goals, weekly goals, and daily goals. But then, I'm task oriented, I like ticking things off my to do list. I would use those as motivational tools to compel me to push, push and keep on pushing into cinema. Does any of that help? And sorry for my confusion about your question, although I think the point of the OP still stands.

I think there is a fast-track: Work harder than everyone else. Read more screenplays. Write more pages. Read more screenwriting books. Watch more movies. If you have to quite your job and move in with your parents, live on your friend's couch or out of a box on the street, do it. But in general I think as long as you're fully dedicated to the craft and willing to make sacrifices in your life you should have nothing to worry about. That said, if I were to give advice about expediting the process, I'd suggest reading a lot of screenwriting books BEFORE you embark on your journey. A huge part of the process is understanding WHY things are the way they are. It's great to watch 2,000 movies, but if at 2,001 you still can't tell me where the major plot points are, why character flaws matter and when you've entered into Act 3, then how much progress have you really made? If you ask me, understanding the ART of STORY is the most important part of the process. You're better off knowing the basics of folklore before trying to apply its concepts to contemporary cinema for a potentially paying gig.

Mistakes are part of the learning process. So: “Make mistakes as fast as you can.” --John Lasseter (Pixar) Learn from them and move on.

Thanks Scott, yes that helps. Though, I was out at the theater the other day just watching a marathon and felt guilty about it because they weren't movies directly relevant to my genre---just wanted to watch them for enjoyment and because of the filmmakers. When students are reading these scripts are they mimicking the style of what they're seeing?

That's a really good point. That might help expedite the process by getting through all of those learning mistakes.

In my view, see EVERYTHING. But that's me. I love to learn EVERYTHING. Some writers are really obsessed with one genre. Great. See EVERYTHING in that genre. I happen to be funny, so it was pretty natural for me to write comedy, then get established as a comedy writer, but over the last several years, I've felt the desire to spread out into dramas and drama-comedies, so I've been watching and reading a lot more of those. But I still try to watch everything. In terms of mimicry: Absolutely! Mendelssohn actually transcribed Bach sheet music. F. Scott Fitzgerald copied by hand Charles Dickens. We are informed by what we read and watch, and there's nothing wrong with that, indeed, we should embrace it. But that just feeds the process. The goal is to find our OWN voice. So we experiment, twist, tweak, turn, testing it on the page. Brings to mind that Woody Guthrie story I like to tell. He supposedly wrote vote 4,000 songs and was asked how he came up with his melodies. Guthrie responded, "Well, I take a melody I like, and I give it a twist here, and give it a twist there... and I make it my own." That's a key to finding our voice: Informed by what we read and watch, we give it a twist here and there... and make it our own.

Kalen, I completely embrace the spirit of what you say: Work harder than everyone else. I'm also in general alignment with your point about reading books, however two caveats: (1) Some screenwriting books apparently are awful, even ill-informed (I've only read a couple and way back when, so I only know about them secondhand through my interactions with writers), so one has to be careful about WHICH books one reads. (2) There can be a trap of reading too MANY screenwriting books to the point where the writer is completely confounded about HOW to approach writing a script. I can't tell you how many writers I've worked with through Screenwriting Master Class who have had this experience, read dozens of books, attended seminars, bought DVDs, and so forth, only to come out of the process utterly confused and stymied when it comes to the actual writing. That's one of the reasons why I think what I do at SMC has been so successful: I teach a comprehensive and coherent approach, all coming from a single perspective: character based screenwriting. And while I do not claim it is THE way to approach the craft or write a script -- I don't believe there is one right way to write -- I do know it provides a set of proven, professional principles and practices (a lot of "P"s there!). In other words, a writer comes out with a clear understanding of Story and a methodology for prep-writing, page-writing and re-writing. That said, I do believe it's entirely possible for writers to learn what they need to succeed by this mantra: Watch movies. Read scripts. Write pages. I came up with that years ago... and still believe. It may take longer than getting a formal education or working with a teacher like myself, but you can get there if you do as you say: Work harder than everyone else.

Ultimately, writing is about discovering who you are. It's all about that direct and frightening dive into your emotions. The techniques and methods, though they are a long learning process, won't matter as much as this honest and liberating sense of truth, which is the real taste of great stories. So if this can helps, I guess the fastest way is not to learn, but to dive, with conscience and honesty into your own rich and complex humanity. Looking for this first, being confident that you'll find on the way any process or skills necessary to the telling of the story, may be the most efficient way to your unique voice. And always, always being absolutely convinced that if you tell something true, you'll be doing a great gift to your fellow humans. Best luck on the way !

You brought up something very interesting about mimicry. Did you ever write any blog posts in the past about that? Btw, What did F. Scott Fitzgerald do with his hand copied Charles Dickens material? Did he just study it or was he playing around with the words to find his own style?