Genre: Sci-Fi
Premise: An archeologist father and his young daughter must attempt to decipher an ancient alien message on a distant planet.
About: This is the big package that is bringing back a lot of the same team from “Arrival,” as this is another thinking man’s sci-fi story. The short story comes from Ken Liu. Shawn Levy of 21 Laps is the one who purchased it.
Writer: Ken Liu
Details: Short story about 15,000 words (an average screenplay is 22,000)

I’ve been all over Ken Liu since reading his amazing short story, The Paper Menagerie. When I heard he’d be teaming up with the new king of Hollywood, Shawn Levy, to adapt his short story, The Message, into a movie, I couldn’t remember any project announcement that got me more excited this year!

But one thing I’ve realized as I’ve studied Ken Liu is that he’s realllllyyyy smart. Intimidatingly so. Check out this answer he gave in a recent DunesJedi interview regarding his approach to science fiction versus fantasy…

“I think of all fiction as unified in prizing the logic of metaphors over the logic of persuasion. In this, so-called realist fiction isn’t particularly different from science fiction or fantasy or romance or any other genre. Indeed, often the speculative element in science fiction isn’t about science at all, but rather represents a literalization of some metaphor. I like to write stories in which the logic of metaphors takes primacy. My goal is to write stories that can be read at multiple levels, such that what is not said is as important as what is said, and the imperfect map of metaphors points to the terra incognita of an empathy with the universe.”

I’ll have to get a doctorate in Smartness at MeThinkGood University before I’m fully able to digest all of that. But the parts I did understand speak to one of the debates we’ll have later on. “The Message” has a lot of pressure on it as it’s coming after the perfection of The Paper Menagerie. Let’s see if it delivers.

Our story takes place in the way-off future. Our narrator, an exo-planet archeologist, flies around the galaxy to ancient civilizations in order to learn about extinct alien races. They’ve found a lot of these civilizations. But, so far, nobody has been able to find a LIVING alien race.

Just before he’s about to explore his latest planet, the narrator learns that his wife has died and he must now take care of their 11 year-old child, Maggie. He’s never even met Maggie so how do you say “awkward” in archeology-speak? Due to the fact that they’re going to blow up the latest ancient civilization planet soon, the narrator doesn’t have time to drop his daughter off and must bring her along.

Together, the two walk around the pyramid-infested city, which died off over 20,000 years ago. Their goal is to decipher “the message.” There are a lot of hieroglyphics everywhere and he’s convinced they’re all trying to say something. With the help of Maggie, who’s also into archeology, they do their best to decipher all the mysterious pictures.

Meanwhile, Maggie passive-aggressively needles her father about prioritizing his work over staying with the family and raising her. Why the heck does he care more about long-dead alien civilizations than his own family?? It’s a good question that takes a back seat when the dad finally cracks the message (spoiler). The message is that this is a highly radioactive area. Stay away. Stay away. Stay away.

This means they are both dying quickly. The dad can put Maggie in stasis which will halt the radiation poisoning until they get her to a hospital. But since the ship was damaged during landing, the dad will need to manually fly it back up into the atmosphere. By that point, the radiation poisoning will have reached a point of no return. He’ll die. Which means that just as this father-daughter relationship was about to get started, it’s already over. The End.

You would think ancient alien civilizations would be ripe subject matter for a movie. A sweeping shot of the long dead alien city alone is a money shot for your trailer. And yet the last two Alien movies proved that maybe ancient alien civilizations aren’t as cool as we thought they were. And this latest dive into the subject matter isn’t giving me a lot of confidence that that trend won’t continue.

Then again, Liu always seems to be more interested in the human element of these stories than he does the science element. If the character stuff works, it’s going to make the ancient civilization plot work by proxy. Unfortunately, the character stuff doesn’t work. Which is surprising considering that Liu wrote such a great parent-child storyline in The Paper Menagerie.

Today’s story proves that there’s a razor thin line between emotional effectiveness and melodrama. When the emotional component is working, it’s like magic. Our stories seem to come alive right from under our fingertips. When it’s not, it’s frustrating because you’re never completely sure why. It *should* work. A dad and the daughter he’s never met before are forced to team up to solve a puzzle. She doesn’t like him. He doesn’t understand her. The subtext writes itself.

However, something about this relationship feels on-the-nose compared to Menagerie and therefore never connects with the reader. I think I know why. If you look at The Paper Menagerie, the mother-son relationship was built around a very specific issue – she refused to speak English. He refused to speak Chinese. The story was about lack of communication. It was specific.

The Message doesn’t have that. There isn’t a specific problem in their relationship. It’s general. He ran off on his family so this is the first time they’re together. General is derived from the same tree as Generic. When you generalize in storytelling, you are often being generic. That’s what this felt like. Your average generic daddy who has to take care of a daughter he never knew he had story. Hollywood comes out with five of these a year. So if you don’t work to specify the relationship in some way, like Liu did with Paper Menagerie, the story is never going to take off.

More importantly, the emotional beats aren’t going to have the same oomph. This is why it’s so easy to shoot for a big emotional scene only to have the reader rolling their eyes.

Getting back to what Liu was talking about in that interview, he says that fictional writing should be all about the metaphors. I’m not sure I’ve heard an author say that before. I suppose it could be a short story thing. But I got the impression he was talking about all fiction. I vehemently disagree with that approach.

I got the sense that this ancient civilization had a metaphorical connection with the dad’s fractured relationship with his daughter. But I couldn’t make out what that connection was. Maybe someone can help me out. But even if I did understand the metaphor, it would not have made me connect with these characters any better. It would not have fixed the fact that the plot is basically two people walking around an empty city the entire time. Those are genuine story weaknesses that could’ve been improved if the focus was more on the storytelling and less focused on metaphor.

I’ll go to my grave saying that telling a good story should be the priority of every script you write. If you want to win new friends in your English class, go metaphor-crazy. But if you want to write a story that people actually enjoy, focus on the storytelling. Drama. Suspense. Irony. Unresolved Conflict. Problems. Goals. Obstacles. Stakes. Inner transformation. Urgency. And here’s the catch. You have to do all of these things IN A WAY THAT’S NOT DERIVATIVE. The story, along with the elements within the story, have to feel fresh and specific. The Message didn’t pass that test.

[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[x] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius

What I learned: Work vs. Family is one of the most powerful character flaws available to writers. This is because it’s such a universal flaw that everyone understands. Even if you don’t yourself have the flaw, chances are there’s someone close to you who does. Which means you understand it. That’s what you’re looking for with character flaws. You’re trying to find flaws that all human beings can relate to. Here, the father chose work over raising his child. Liu didn’t nail the execution (in my opinion) but I still see this character flaw working in a lot of stories. I know writers often struggle to find a flaw for their main character. Well, this one is one of the easier flaws to show and execute as a character arc. So keep it in the hopper.

Genre: TV Drama 1-hour/Supernatural Thriller
Premise: A struggling actor whose girlfriend threatens to leave him if he doesn’t find a job, robs a bank, but in the process inadvertently switches bodies with the bank teller, allowing for a unique type of getaway.
About: Jordan Peele’s Twilight Zone series on CBS’s streaming service had a rough first season, with, arguably, no breakout episodes. Maybe that’s why the second season, which dropped this weekend, came in with so little advertising. But I still like the idea of a Twilight Zone series and wondered if Peele could learn from last season’s mistakes. I went to IMDB and found the highest rated episode (Episode 3, at a 7.4) and checked it out.
Writer: Win Rosenfield (created by Jordan Peele) (originally created by Rod Serling)
Details: 44 minutes

As you’ve heard me say before, I’m looking for a Twilight Zone type script (or two) to produce. Why? Well, a Twilight Zone idea exists in a genre that can have a big juicy concept and can be shot cheaply. It also allows you to remain marketable outside the horror genre, which is music to the ears of writers who detest horror.

However, I’m realizing after watching this Jordan Peele Twilight Zone how easy it is to get The Twilight Zone wrong. Today, I felt, was a good day to identify what they’re doing wrong on this show and how one might course-correct Peele’s errors.

Something I noticed right off-the-bat was that the ideas felt dated, at least with today’s episode and many of the episodes I saw from first season. Usually, it’s a good idea to respect the source material. But Black Mirror changed the game. It’s like they said, “What if we did Twilight Zone, but with technology and a more current approach to storytelling?” This made Black Mirror feel like The Twilight Zone 2.0. Heck, with Bandersnatch, they went 3.0. Peele’s new Twilight Zone feels like Twilight Zone 1.2. It’s very much stuck in the past.

Take today’s episode, “The Who of You.” Harry Pine is a Tootsie-like actor. He can’t catch a break and is starting to detest auditions. To make matters worse, his girlfriend can’t stand being around him. The rent is due and, once again, Harry doesn’t have the money to pay for it.

So Harry takes a rather drastic approach at solving the problem. He grabs a bag, walks into a bank, and attempts a good old fashioned stick-em-up robbery (did I tell you that this concept was dated?). However, in the process of the robbery, both Harry and Female Teller lock eyes and, boom, all of a sudden Harry is inside the Teller. Neither Harry or the woman (who’s now in Harry’s body) know what happened, but it doesn’t take Harry long to figure it out. He takes the bag of money (as the woman) and runs.

When a cop comes in the back door and spots the Teller running, he stops her and, once again, Harry locks eyes with the cop and transfers into *his* body. Harry, as the cop, takes the money bag with him and runs off. Meanwhile, ultra-macho Detective Reece comes to the bank and arrests “Harry,” who’s actually the bank teller woman in Harry’s body.

The cops sense that something is up and they start hunting Harry (in his cop body) down. But Harry has now perfected his body-jumping technique. He jumps into a barista then a jogger’s body before heading to a psychic to figure out how all this is happening.

The psychic is onto him, gets angry, then boots him out of his place. During their fight, Harry forgot to grab the bag of money! Now he’s locked out of the store. With his new power, however, Harry figures out who lives in the apartment above the psychic store and jumps into the bodies of people in the building until he gets into a little boy’s body who lives in the above apartment.

He then slips down into the psychic store to get the money back but is met by Detective Reece and whoever’s currently in Harry’s body. Detective Reece has seen enough to realize something supernatural is going on here so he knows the real Harry is in the kid’s body. Harry then does a Jedi-Level triple body swap move so he’s now in Detective Reece’s body and Reece is in Harry’s body. This makes for an interesting showdown when a squad of cops bust into the store at the last second, guns drawn.

The Who of You is a harmless fun episode. I liked the acting exercise component of it. This is a dream scenario for actors as they all get to play the lead character and they don’t usually get to play characters this varied.

I also enjoyed figuring out the rules. Obviously, I knew who was in who’s body after the first switch. But with each additional switch it became harder and harder to figure out who was who. But not in a frustrating way. It was exciting realizing how the chain of switches evolved and who was getting stuck back in who’s bodies.

Despite this, The Who of You (is it just me or does that sound like the title of a Dr. Seuss book?) still feels like a dated premise. This episode could’ve been shot in 1910, right after that famous horse film was made. That’s how back of the closet the concept is. And it’s the series’ achilles heel.

Peele seems to respect the source material so much that he’s reluctant to change it. Not only does this affect the concepts he chooses. But it affects the tone. Those original Twilight Zone episodes were from a much simpler time where TV was new and the world wasn’t nearly as complex as it is today.

The other day I was listening to some music (Jack Garrat – Circles) and it occurred to me that was the fifth song I’d heard *that week* about anxiety. I don’t think anxiety was even a thing in the 50s. But it makes sense. You don’t get any time off in 2020. There’s always a new e-mail, a new text, a new Youtube video, a new social media feed to check, a new news story. You’re always being called on by something, so of course you’re anxious. Back in the 50s and early 60s you didn’t have anything close to that level of overload.

That made an episode about people with pig-faces intense heady stuff at the time. But we’re way past that level of intensity. We require concepts with more weight, like Black Mirror Season 3’s San Junipero, another episode that plays with body-jumping but in a profoundly more interesting way. Here in Peele’s universe, the body jumping is a gag, a goof, a bouncing ball to follow along with. It’s harmless fun but I’m not sure this genre works as harmless fun anymore. There have been too many supernatural stories inspired by The Twilight Zone over the years that have elevated the genre. Peele needs to keep up.

Despite all this, the episode *does* work. As much as I’m dogging the complexity, they do try and explore Harry’s character some. There’s this question of, “Who am I really?” And experiencing how people see you differently depending on what body you’re in. And there’s this fun little subplot where all of this is helping him become a better actor. It’s not Black Mirror level introspection but it’s enough to keep things entertaining.

To answer my original question. How do you write a Twilight Zone film that resonates in 2020? I think it’s all about depth. You can’t use a concept that’s too gimmicky, like this one. Or, if you do, you have to explore the character elements more and not get hung up on the theatrics. The Sixth Sense is a good example of that. A psychiatrist who’s lost his way after a patient’s death tries to find his way back by helping convince a young child that he doesn’t see ghosts. Without that element, you just have a kid who sees dead people and that’s not going to resonate with audiences as much.

I know Peele finally wrote an episode (Ep 2) this season (he didn’t write or direct any of last season). So I may check that out. But if that doesn’t work, it might mean sayonara to CBS’s new Twilight Zone series for me.

[ ] What the hell did I just watch?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[x] worth the stream
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius

What I learned: Today’s What I Learned is not about today’s review, but rather a question for all of you. I’m curious what the most helpful screenwriting tip is that you’ve learned from the site. While I know what *I* think are the most important screenwriting tips, I realize that everybody prioritizes things differently and it might be fun to put a post together with all the best reader-inspired tips/lessons. So, it’s time I learned from you. What is the most important screenwriting tip you learned from Scriptshadow???

This is the second in a series of articles leading up to The Last Great Screenplay Contest deadline, which is July 4th. Today we’re going to talk about a common screenplay topic that remains one of the hardest to get right. And that’s character. Or, more specifically, how to set up your characters to give you the best chance of writing a great screenplay. Because if you can write great characters, everything else tends to fall in place.

I’ve been in innumerable conversations with writers where I’ve read their script, I didn’t like their characters, and afterwards they told me, “This is what I was trying to do with the character,” and what they tell me is in no way what I read. It’s a little bit like how we see ourselves versus how the world sees us. Those two streets don’t always line up. So I want to discuss some major things you can key in on that will help you execute the character in a way where the audience sees them like you do.

Picking a character audiences will respond well to

The first thing you have to do when you create a character is to pick a character who you think AUDIENCES will find interesting. This may seem obvious but what often happens is the writer prioritizes creating characters that THEY find interesting. And they never consider that that type of character won’t play well to others. The number 1 all-time example of this is the main character in a Duncan Jones movie called “Mute.” I read that script ten years before it was made and I could tell right then that the movie wasn’t going to work. The main character was mute and inactive. So there was no way for us to connect with him. I’m sure, Duncan believed, that by giving the character this impairment and throwing him into some rough futuristic exterior, it would make him appealing to people. But the truth is, it was boring. Cause the character was boring. Cause the character couldn’t talk. And the character was passive. So always consider how others will perceive your character and not just how you see them.

Character introduction

A strong character introduction is one of the most important things you will be tasked with. Audiences form the majority of their opinion on characters right away. Which means you need to get two things right. One, give us a character description that stands out and that conveys as much about that character as possible. A lot of good writers use “essence” character descriptions, which are descriptions that are less about the external and more about the internal. “His saggy posture and unkempt look denote a broken man,” is better, for example, than, “He has dark hair and brown eyes.” Once you’ve done that, you must give the character an action that is memorable and that tells us who they are. If your character is a jerk, intro her being a jerk to her co-workers. The combination of these two things – great description and strong action – will literally solve half your character problems. If you want to see a good character intro scene, go check out Ozark (Netflix), Season 3, Episode 1 for Ben Davis’s introduction (it’s in a classroom). Is it any wonder this previously no-name actor is now the hottest name in Hollywood? That’s what a powerful introduction can do.

The Flaw

The reason to give your character a flaw is because a) it instantly provides them with an additional layer, and b) it gives the audience a reason to keep watching them. Because if we care about a character’s flaw, we will care about them overcoming the flaw. The best ways to come up with a flaw are to put yourself in the character’s shoes and ask, “What’s holding me back in life?” Or to identify a flaw in your own character (as in you, the person reading this) and inject that into your fictional character. If neither of those work, look to your character’s situation and occupation. For example, if your character is a money manager, you probably want to give him the flaw of greed (The Wolf of Wall Street). If your character is a kid in a Youth Hitler Camp, you probably want to give him the flaw of close-mindedness (JoJo Rabbit).

Vices

The reason why the execution of vices varies so wildly (in one script, a drug addict is the most cliche character ever, in another, it leads to an Academy Award), is due to how the vice is implemented. A vice is something you should only add if it’s a) being used to forget something, or b) being used to escape something. If your character was sexually assaulted when they were a child, it stands to reason that they may turn to drugs to forget about it. If your character is in a loveless marriage, it stands to reason that they might turn to food (or smoking, or gambling) to avoid the pain of dealing with that. As long as the vice is being motivated by something, it works. But if you’re just making someone a drug addict cause you want a bunch of scenes of them shooting heroin? Be prepared to be hit with the cliche label.

The Compelling Character Dilemma

One of the most common questions I get asked from intermediate screenwriters is, “How do I give a character a flaw without making him unlikable?” Indeed, this is one of the trickier tightropes you must walk in screenwriting. You have to make your character flawed if they’re going to have any depth. But if they’re too flawed, we dislike them. Conversely, if they’re too perfect, we’re annoyed by them. The trick is finding balance. My solution is to use the Formula of Offsetting. Make sure there’s at least one more good or sympathetic trait than there is bad. What do I mean by “sympathetic?” Sympathy doesn’t have to be created within. It can be something pushed upon your character by the outside world. For example, if your character has a blatantly unloving father, we will feel sympathy for them. This is essentially why we’re okay with everyone being an asshole in Succession. Their father doesn’t show any love towards them. To use a movie example, “Joker” is about a creepy guy (1 bad trait) who cares for his ailing mother (1 good trait) and is picked on by everyone (1 sympathetic trait). The good trait and sympathetic trait outnumber the bad trait, so you’re good.

A couple extra points to make about this. The more mature the genre, the more you can lean into a character’s negative traits. Uncut Gems does not have the most likable hero. But it’s a dark indie thriller, a genre where the audience expects the character to be darker. So it’s okay. Likewise, if you’re going into a lighter genre, like a PG-13 comedy, you’ll want to lean a little more into the positive traits of the character. Also relevant to this discussion, the further away you go from the main character, the more negative traits you can get away with. Luke Skywalker wouldn’t work as a badass. But Han Solo, a secondary character, does.

I’m going to finish this up by sharing with you the single biggest character mistake I’ve ever seen in a mainstream film. And I would argue that this mistake didn’t just kill this movie. It killed this director’s career. Look at his movies before this moment and look at his movies after. It’s like night and day. And I genuinely think it’s because he lost sight of how to properly write a character audiences root for.

The movie in question is Vanilla Sky. It’s a Cameron Crowe movie starring Tom Cruise. The movie starts off giving its hero, David Aames, a clear flaw. He’s vain. That flaw is fine, I guess. I don’t think it’s as interesting as a lot of other flaws, but it’s something you can work with. And through the first fifteen minutes, the movie is interesting. A trust fund baby lives the upscale New York City party life us mortals could only dream of. There is an opportunity here to show how a flawed individual overcomes his infatuation with the material world.

And then came the scene.

The scene occurs at David Aames’ house party and David’s best friend, Brian, comes with a girl. David then proceeds, right in front of his best friend, to steal the girl from Brian. Your main character just stole the girl his best friend brought to his party. GAME. OVER. Audience gone. Viewers done. The movie died in that moment. We hated the main character SO MUCH that nothing afterwards mattered. You could’ve written freaking Citizen Kane 2 and nobody would’ve cared. I still can’t believe that Cameron Crowe actually wrote this scene and thought it was going to work. I bring this up to remind you just how critical it is to consider how your character is going to be perceived. If you don’t understand how your character comes across to others, screenwriting becomes very hard. Cause you can do a lot of other things brilliantly and still people will say they don’t like your script. Look at Cameron Crowe. At the time, he was considered one of the top 3 dialogue writers in the world. It didn’t matter, however, when he got the character wrong. NEVER FORGET THAT!

Not sure why this is labeled “deleted scene.” It was in the movie.

Hope the writing is going well! Share your character tips in the comments!

That’s right! You know him from the comments section. You know him for winning Amateur Showdown. You know him as one of the nicest writers on the block. It’s Nick Morris! Three years ago, Nick won Amateur Showdown with his script, “There Was a Little Girl.” Nick soon received a phone call from a producer who wanted to make it. Three years later, the film, now titled, “Becky,” is being released! How cool is that? Today we pick the mind of our resident genius and find out how we, too, can get our scripts made. Nick is a frequent commenter and I’m sure he’ll be more than happy to answer any additional questions you have in the comments.

CR: Let’s start with how this idea came to you. What inspired you to write it?

NM: I’m so obsessed with movies, especially horror from the 70’s and 80’s – the ones I grew up with. I try to write scripts for movies I’d personally want to watch that don’t exist yet. My first script, “Harvester” came from this epic, supernatural-slasher franchise that I had been building in my head for a lot of years before I ever actually sat down and attempted to write it. The script got me enough attention to inspire me to keep on writing. But it quickly became clear that “Harvester” was just too ambitious (read: expensive) for any producer in their right mind to take a chance on with a first-time writer. Okay. Think smaller. More intimate. Low budget. The Harvester’s day will come… :)

The idea for “Becky” came to me while driving, where many ideas seem to find me. I’m a big fan of “Home Alone” and as you know, pretty much all things horror. What if “Home Alone” were a hyper-violent revenge thriller? Hard R rating. Shot on location in the woods. Played seriously but in a fun, over-the-top, satisfying way. This was something I’d pay to watch. I had the basic framework in place by the time I got home and started writing immediately.

Incidentally, the first cut of “Becky” wound up getting an NC-17 from the MPAA.

CR: I sense a Nick Morris Cut on Disney Plus in the near future. Okay, so, I reviewed your script three years ago, then titled, “There Was a Little Girl.” What happened after that review?

NM: So, the day that the Amateur Friday review for “There Was a Little Girl” was posted, I was at work, shipping equipment and driving a forklift. Every time I got to sit down at my desk, I was reading Scriptshadow. Every chance I got to check my phone, Scriptshadow. I was getting so much great feedback, both from you and the community, that I couldn’t tear myself away from Scriptshadow any longer than was absolutely necessary to still function and do my job. Late in the day, I got an email from a producer. He said that he was reading the script and that his colleagues down the hall could hear him going nuts over it! He asked if he could share it with his partners and get back to me about possibly “picking it up”. Hell. Yeah.

I gave him my phone number, wrapped up my work day and headed home to kick off my vacation with cold beer and an AF review to pour over. I had gotten some interest in my script from a producer, accomplished nothing at work, and I was now on vacation. Solid Friday, all around.

A couple days later, my wife and I set out on a little road trip to attend a Metallica concert in Montreal. It’s almost a 12-hour drive from here in Nova Scotia. Somewhere just inside the border of Quebec, my phone rang. Unknown number. I pulled the car over to answer. It was the producer. He talked a mile-a-minute and I did my best to process everything he was saying on the side of the highway with trucks roaring by. He said that he, and everyone in his office, loved the script and they wanted it! We could discuss it further when I got back home in a few days. I can’t even describe everything I was feeling in that moment. I was waaay over the moon.

CR: That’s awesome! What specifically about the script did they respond to?

NM: I remember him calling it “Die Hard with a little girl.” It was probably the gleefully violent tone that drew him in but I think the lawnmower scene was what sealed the deal.

CR: One thing writers learn quickly in this business is that no matter how much someone likes your script, they’re ready with a round of notes. Was that what happened with you? And if so, what were the major notes you were given for the rewrites?

NM: The producers didn’t really have a lot of notes for me out of the gate. Their biggest thing was the characterization of the bad guys. They wanted them to have more “flavor”, which was something that you also pointed out in your review. They suggested making them Nazis. So that’s what I did and it was a great note because this approach definitely gives the personalities of the villains, particularly the leader, Dominick, more color and depth.

CR: What about rewrites? How many were there and how long did the process take?

NM: I was under contract for one rewrite and one “polish”, which is just a lighter, final round of minor revisions. So from the time the contract was signed to the time I turned in my last draft was probably between two and three months. It was sometime during those rewrites that the producers opted to change the name of the project to the shorter and punchier title of “Becky.”

CR: As a writer going through this for the first time, was there anything about the process that surprised you?

NM: For me, almost everything is surprising on some level. Everything is a first. And I’m still learning new things every day about the process and about this business. Probably the biggest surprise to me early on was how cool everyone was to work with. I think I was nervous that the whole experience was gonna be really stressful or something. But that wasn’t the case at all. The producers and everyone I’ve dealt with have been absolute pros and a total pleasure to collaborate with and learn from.

CR: Another lesson working writers learn is that what works on the page to hook readers doesn’t always work in movie form. Were there any changes you needed to make to make this more “cinematic” and less of a spec script?

NM: Certain elements needed to be dialed back or cut in the interest of production, logistics and the budget. Some things are far easier to write than they are to shoot. A lot of that stuff was handled by Lane and Ruckus Skye, the other writers for “Becky.” They came onboard the project along with the directors, Cary Murnion and Jon Millott. They were responsible for taking my wild and untamed story and whipping it into a tighter and leaner narrative and they did a fantastic job with it. I couldn’t be happier with how the finished product turned out.

CR: My primary criticism in the script was, as you remember, whether it was believable that this little girl could physically compete against a group of grown men. Was that ever an issue during development? If so, how did you tackle it?

NM: Nobody ever voiced any real concerns to me about Becky’s age. I tried to make everything she did in the script reasonably plausible, using her anger, her resourcefulness (and her dog) to outsmart and outmaneuver the bad guys. Divide and conquer. In fact, one of the very first things the producer told me was that he wanted to get “the little girl from Annabelle 2” for the role of Becky. Lulu Wilson was eleven years old at the time and she was already a familiar face to horror fans so I was thrilled by this revelation. Within a few weeks, Lulu was onboard and she was super excited about the project. That was sometime during the fall of 2017. But principle photography didn’t begin until August of 2019. By then, Lulu was thirteen. She’s so talented and she was always the producer’s first choice for Becky so her character had to be aged-up along with her. It was absolutely the right call because Lulu’s a total beast and what she brings to the role is really phenomenal to watch.

CR: Take me through the mind of a writer who is writing for himself as opposed to writing for an employer. What can screenwriters expect from that transition? Does writing get harder?

NM: In many ways, I find writing for an employer to be easier than the process of grinding through the first draft of a spec script. But I’ve been fortunate in that everyone I’ve worked with so far has been really enthusiastic about my writing but they’ve also been perfectly clear about the changes they want to see. Having that direction helps a lot and knowing that someone is eagerly waiting to check out your next draft is a great motivator to get it done as efficiently as possible. It definitely requires a bit of a mindset shift in terms of your approach to the work but it also clarifies your path going forward.

CR: What was the biggest lesson you learned as a screenwriter from this whole process?

NM: There are so many. The biggest thing I’ve learned on this wild ride is that it’s possible. It can be done. And you don’t need to be in LA, either. Thanks to social media and platforms like ScriptShadow, where “Becky” was discovered, you can put your work out there from anywhere in the world.

CR: One of the things I’ve always liked about you, Nick, is how positive you are. I mean, you’re the only person I’ve ever had an online disagreement with about The Last Jedi and we both left the argument courteous and respectful. :) This is an extremely important quality for writers to have since this business can be so harsh. Where does that positivity come from and can you give us any tips on how to remain positive in the face of a rejection-based business?

NM: Hey, thanks! I still dig “The Last Jedi”. :) Of course, you need to be cognisant of what people say about your work and differentiate between what’s valid and what isn’t. Understand that screenwriting is an artform and all art is subjective. One person will dig what you’ve come up with and the next won’t. Take it all under consideration. But in terms of a generally positive outlook on life? You know that scene in “Airplane” with the pilot walking through the airport fighting off everyone that comes near him? That’s sort of what I try to do with negative influences. Learn to identify potential threats to your happiness, your confidence and self worth and dropkick that shit the hell out of your way without looking back. Keep moving forward. Find whatever it is that makes you happy, inspires you and makes you feel safe and direct all of your energy there. For me, it’s my loving and supportive family, music, movies and writing. The rest is noise.

CR: And finally, do you have any advice for aspiring screenwriters out there on how to get their script turned into a movie!

NM: Put your scripts out into the world however you can. Submit to Scriptshadow, hosting sites, contests, wherever. Use social media to build legit relationships with folks in the industry, but tread carefully without EVER coming off as pushy or annoying. Ideally, you wanna let them come to you about your work. And if your writing connects with the right person at the right time, you’re off! Maintain that positive attitude, be cool to people, be adaptable and open to criticism and you might just get to watch your script become a movie.

CR: Oh, and when and where can we see Becky???

NM: Tomorrow! June 5th. “Becky” will be available Digitally and OnDemand through all of the major platforms. You can pre-order it now on iTunes and, if you’re lucky enough to have one nearby, “Becky” is playing at over 50 Drive-in theaters across the U.S. with more to come as they continue to reopen.

So I finished Netflix’s Into the Night and I can honestly say it’s the best TV show of the year so far.

I haven’t encountered a show with this level of urgency in a long time. The closest I can think of is Netflix’s Black Summer. But what makes Into the Night so much better is that the urgency is organically built into the premise. They have to keep flying to avoid daylight.

There are three screenwriting tips I want to bring up in particular with this show. It should go without saying that I’m including spoilers. Watch the show first if possible. I guarantee that once you start, you won’t be able to stop.

Oh, and fun little piece of trivia. This show is based on a book. And the creator adapted the entire first season from the FIRST PAGE of the book.

The first concept I want to talk about is called sandwiching.

There comes multiple times in every TV or Feature script (but TV especially) where you’ve got to write a scene with boring exposition or two characters who don’t have a lot going on. This could be the C-story in a TV episode. You’ve been told you have to write the scene and there’s nothing interesting going on between the two characters.

In these situations, you want to SANDWICH the scene with something really big before and PROMISE something big is going to happen after. If you do this well, we’ll tolerate the scene.

So there’s this moment in episode 5 of Into the Night where Sylvie, our helicopter pilot protagonist, goes back to the apartment of her dead boyfriend and mourns. Another character shows up to try and convince her to come back.

Now before this scene, we just showed a major fight between two characters in another location where one character beats the other one to near death. He then leaves that character to get back to the plane. That’s the first piece of bread on this sandwich.

The second piece is we have to leave within an hour! That’s when the sun comes up. So we have to get back to the freaking airplane NOW! This is our exciting second piece of bread which is a PROMISE that something interesting is coming. And it’s for that reason we tolerate this slow decent-but-mostly-boring scene of Sylvie trying to get over her dead boyfriend.

Where writers get into trouble is when they get lazy, when they stop sandwiching boring scenes, when they try to pile 3 or 4 boring scenes inside a sandwich, or when they don’t understand the technique at all. Because that’s when you’re at risk of writing 20-30 pages of boring story.

In an ideal world, every scene would be riveting. But it’s just not possible. You need to set certain things up for later scenarios to be exciting. And setup can be boring.

Moving on, tip 2. Dialogue doesn’t matter as much as you think it does. Into the Night is one of the most riveting TV shows I’ve ever seen. But it’s in another language. And I don’t understand that language.

Therefore, I have to use subtitles. Now, for those who don’t know about the job of subtitling, these people do not directly translate what the characters are saying. Instead, they give the bare bones generalized idea of what they’re saying in its most basic form.

If you want to have some fun, turn on the dubbed English audio and also put on English subtitles. You’ll see that their dubbed words don’t even match the subtitles. That’s because two different people are doing those jobs and they’re both just putting up their generic interpretation of what’s being said.

I bring this up because everybody talks about the importance of dialogue when shows like Into the Night and movies like Parasite are amazing yet we’re basically watching them with 3rd grade level English dialogue translation.

Does this mean you shouldn’t strive to write great dialogue? Of course not. But it’s a reminder that it’s what’s SURROUNDING the dialogue that’s most important. If you get that right, a scene will work regardless of how basic the dialogue is. Shows like Into the Night prove that.

Add conflict. Add tension. Add dramatic irony. Come up with an interesting scenario, like 7 passengers questioning an 8th passenger on if he’s really who he says he is.

From there, do the best you can with your dialogue. But it’s setting up the situation surrounding the dialogue that matters most.

Finally, one of the writing devices I like the best is when the writer makes it seem TRULY IMPOSSIBLE that the characters are going to succeed in the end.

And I stress “truly” for a reason. Because most writers set up an ending where they’re already thinking of how they’re going to get the characters around the obstacles in their way, and therefore, it doesn’t TRULY feel impossible. We can sense the writer carving that escape hatch that the characters are going to find and be okay.

Instead, you want to write your ending almost like you hate yourself. You want to make it as hard as possible for you the writer to figure out how your characters are going to get out of this.

Into the Night aces this test and then some.

(Major Spoilers)

While on their final flight – they’re not going to have fuel after this – the group has located an old Soviet bunker in Bulgaria that government officials are fleeing to. So their plan is to land the plane at the Bulgarian airport and haul ass to the bunker.

Now get this.

There’s no guarantee they’re going to get inside. It might be locked. It might be full. So right from the start, it’s bad news.

Next, they don’t know exactly where the bunker is. They’re working with some janky old map.

When they land, they have half an hour until sunrise. So they have to find a mystery bunker that they only vaguely know the location of in a country they’ve never been to before, driving on roads that are completely foreign to them, and then hope they get inside when they get there.

Only one person can carry the map but there are 9 people so they have to split up into two jeeps. So the first jeep is speeding away. The second jeep has to try and keep up with them on these winding roads. If they lose them, there’s no way to know which way to go.

Three quarters of the way there, the second jeep crashes. So they have to walk the rest of the way. Meanwhile, the first jeep crosses a gate that automatically closes behind them, locking the second group out.

The second group eventually gets to the gate but it’s electric, so they can’t even climb over it. There’s only 12 minutes left before the sun rises, by the way. They don’t even know if they’re close to the bunker or not. Also, nobody knows where the bunker entrance is. It’s not like a McDonald’s with Golden Arches signaling the location. It’s metal doors built into a hill.

I was sitting there watching this both in awe of the show, in how well it was crafted, and in awe of the writer, who so boldly made things difficult for himself.

Because it would’ve been easy to throw one mildly difficult obstacle at the characters. To throw THIS many obstacles requires a lot more work. Because now you’re stopping the characters more. You’re having to come up with solutions to these problems you’ve created. And bad writers don’t want to do that. It takes way longer to write the obstacle overcoming scenes and requires a lot more brainpower.

So I was rooting for both the characters and the writers simultaneously with this ending because I couldn’t have asked for a better end to this season.

Those are my Into the Night tips. Take them with you, into the night, and use them on your next screenplay!