I agree with your advice completely, except where I don't. :D

Like Eve, I also tend to get stuck in outline mode, but I've found that my occasional forays into first draft mode are necessary for me to solidify my character personalities. I've rewritten the first act to my current idea over ten times, each time deciding that the plot development didn't fit the characters.

But yes, I definitely agree that you need to set a deadline for when you'll just say, 'F**k this' and get on with the writing.

Scott, your advice ALWAYS is on right side of kind. You weren't being too hard on Eve.

Getting stuck in outine mode means you don't have the story worked out all the way. Scott's advice is solid. Sometimes you have to get in there and write, THEN the answers come. I've written and finshed scripts off half-baked outlines before, BUT I really TRY to avoid that... so what I advice Eve do is...

... bounce her story off other people, and see if they can help solve her problem areas. Eve, open yourself up to others, their perspective may cue your solutions. Sometimes it's just hearing someone else grapple over what you have been stewing over opens things up. Then suddenly you're feeling better about starting that first draft. In short; use others to change your trajectory.

- E.C. Henry from Bonney Lake, WA

For me, a solid outline is key to a solid script. Not to say that a solid outline will guarantee a solid script, but scenes can be rewritten and moved around more easily if your outline has very clear and distinguished beats. Time spent on an outline is good for me. I always show my managers an outline first, anywhere from 5-12 pages with a bit of back story, structured beats, and side notes on thematic considerations.

Deadlines help, absolutely. Also, part of the fun in jumping into the script is imagining the different ways to get from beat to beat. So many ways!

I've always felt that writing without an outline is like driving cross-country without a map. But if you're writing on spec, I think too much outlining can be damaging to the process. Outlines/treatments are for planning the war that you'll fight out in pages. You definitely want to have a solid strategy, but when a general tries to decide what individual troops do in battle you always wind up with casualties.

So my feeling is that you only need to know six major beats once you've got your premise in order to start pooping out that first draft. They are:

* The beat that kicks off the story and sets the stakes.

* The climax of the first act

* The midpoint

* The second act climax

* The story climax in the third act

* the emotional resolution that you want to leave the audience with right before fade out.

I work very hard to make sure I understand those beats/reversals as clearly as possible. If I can nail that part, the structural skeleton will hold together even if it's not able to get up and walk around just yet. I find it's best to leave the intervening scenes fairly vague until I confront them on the page. That way you maintain your own sense of discovery and stay more in sync with the audience. But you never lose your way because you never have more than twenty pages before you know you have to arrive somewhere specific.

Of course, if you've got a producer who's insisting that your pages stay true to some detailed treatment they demanded, that's another story.

Good and sound advice, I gotta say. Writing the first draft is an exploration of characters, plot and setting. Of course, it's good to know where you're going before you begin, so do all the important homework first. But if you wait too long before you begin writing the actual script, you're enthusiasm for the original idea may well get lost.

My God Scott, how is it possible that you and I had the same golf instructor?!

That old crusty Marlboro suckin' fool gets around!

@Jeff: The old dude was pretty remarkable. He'd stand watching me knock a 7-iron about 90-100 yards -- slice, another slice. Then he'd take a 9-iron, swing it left-handed, hit it 120 yards and right at the pin. Again and again. He kept telling me, "Pull with your left, don't push with your right," and figured at some point, show it, don't say it. Left arm. Thwack. Left arm. Thwack.

He had a golf joke that he loved to tell. "Golf instructor with his student. Student swinging for shit. Finally the instructor says, 'I got a sure-fire way to knock 10 strokes off your score.' 'What's that,' the flailing student asks. 'Skip a par three,' the instructor replies." My guy would bust a gut, doubled over, slowly wobbling around in a circle of phlegmatic laughter, all the while repeating the punch line, "Skip a par three... skip a par three."

Amazing how some people stick in your memories...

Scott, I'd love to see an entire post devoted to this golf teacher of yours. Hell, how about a book?

Yeah Scott my dude was exactly the same. Knocked around courses all his life, probably seventeen tournaments away from the Masters, a classic "coulda' been a contenda'." Morris Butterworth (Walter Matthau) all the way!

He used to spend an awful lot of time huddled over the women in my classes, his arms coiled around theirs, helping them with their follow through.... well, I guess he deserved some sort of job satisfaction... lord knows, the Community Center was probably only paying him 3.25 an hour, right?

And yes, these folks do seem to linger in our memories, filed away, only to become screenplay fodder later! :D

i play guitar so i'll try to give a musical metaphor. for me, one of the great joys of life is the electric blues. blues is based on a very simple but specific chord progression I, IV, V. on top of this structure, you can improvise for hours on end without repeating a single phrase -- but the structure is the improv, not the other way around.

i guess what i'm saying is, i need a chord structure, some very simple but clear plan of attack -- based on which i can do whatever the heck i want. if i want to digress, fine, as long as i have some basic idea of where i'm trying to go.

i limit myself to 2-3 pages and i try to keep the writing as basic and un-scenelike as possible. very short sentences.

i definitely like justin's approach -- identify six key beats, and go.

@justin and alex: When I teach screenwriting and we use my own screenplay paradigm, it has 10 major plot points. But I like Justin's 6. You might even be able to get away with 4: The Opening, End of Act One, End of Act Two, The Ending. But the transition in the middle of Act Two is critical, so it'd be good to have that in mind, too.

@Nate Davis: Unfortunately that's about the extent of the wisdom the ol' fart managed to impart to me. I'm sure he said a lot more as he was always grumbling something, but I pretty much dialed him out, except when he was in my face, squinting at me, smoke drifting up past his leathery skin.

Wait. I just remembered something else he used to do. After he'd put me through all the motions before I'd swing - "head down, knees bent, elbow firm, remember pull with your left..." - and I'd be just about to start my backswing, he'd say, "Hey, question... do you breathe in or out when you take your backswing?" Bastard always threw me off with that one. Although I have to say I've won more than a few bets by rattling guys on the golf course with the same question - gets in your head and just won't go away!

Thanks for promoting my comment.

I think my other problem is finding the premise of the movie. Lagos Egri said every movie must teach a lesson. Your protagonist journey is basically _______ leads to ___________. I find that most of the story premise examples he used ended in tragedy (i.e. Romeo and Juliet "Great love defies death") rather than a happy ending thus making it hard for me to write a premise when all's well ends well.

All good advice, everyone. Great food for thought. And thanks again, Scott. I still use your paradigm. It's a permanent part of my writing folder.

Lucky I don't golf. Have a good one.