Dispatch from The Quest: Emma Millions
Last week as we did here on GITS, the Quest writers focused on the fifth week of Prep. Today’s dispatch: Emma on ticking clocks:
We are speeding towards the day, next Monday, when we start to actually write our scripts. No more time for vague thoughts and ideas. Major plot points and subplots have to start taking form and making sense. The clock is ticking and the pressure is palpable. As a writer I face deadlines all the time and there’s nothing like a looming date of delivery to get me motivated. I love a deadline. In fact, even when I’m just writing something on spec, I will give myself a deadline and, believe me, there is no way I would miss one of my own deadlines. I am the worst person to disappoint with failure to deliver. I come down really hard on myself and won’t take any excuses. I give myself a severe butt kicking and kicking your own butt is much harder than kicking someone else’s. I’ve got the bruises to prove it. I love the pressure of a deadline. Sometimes I find myself inexplicably delaying getting started just to make that deadline pressure even more intense. Maybe I get some kind of sick kick out of it in a weird form of writery sadomasochism. Maybe that’s something I need to talk to a therapist about and not share with you in an awkward TMI kind of way. In movies a ticking clock adds tension and builds suspense just as it does in real life. Things get pacier, faster, more urgent, more exciting, although, if my life right now was a movie, the scenes of me getting my thoughts together ready to type fade in would be pretty dull, on the surface. Just me sitting, typing, scribbling, occasionally making a little ‘yes!’ noise when I solve a problem or work out a beat. But in my head I’m frantically trying to undo the knots that bind a woman to the rail tracks before the train comes.
There’s nothing like a good ticking clock in a movie, and I’ve got one in mine. Ever since I saw Marty McFly desperately trying to get his parents to kiss before he disappeared from his family photo and was wiped out of existence forever, I’ve craved that heart pounding, fist clenching, edge of the seat, “come on, quick!!!” moment in the movies. I loved Speed — a whole movie that’s literally just one big ticking clock moment. And the day long countdown of 24 had me in an over exicted toddler style frenzy EVERY SINGLE WEEK. Seeing characters on the verge of being caught as someone approaches always, always gets me chewing my fingernails with gleeful panic. Like the scene in Hitchcock’s Notorious where Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman will get busted when the champagne runs out…
Whether it’s a last minute dash to get the plane or to stop someone leaving (as perfected by Woody Allen at the end of Manhattan):
Or Bruce Willis destroying a comet with seconds to spare:
There is nothing like a ticking clock to heat up the action. And maybe the ticking clock of The Quest isn’t quite as Earth threatening as it is in Armageddon, I have to say I’m pretty excited. Let the countdown to ‘Fade in’ begin.
Believe it or not, I have thought this whole Quest thing through thoroughly:
* The 8 weeks of Core is intended to introduce participants to a comprehensive, coherent character-based approach to screenwriting.
* Writing exercises during Core gives writers a chance to test out key ideas and principles on their own stories, developing them in the process.
* The 6 weeks of Prep takes participants through a proven approach to wrangling a story, taking it from concept to outline.
* Along the way, “The Quest” participants have been tasked with writing weekly script journals, not only to share their experiences and insights with GITS readers, but also to get in the habit of meeting weekly deadlines.
* The 10 weeks of Pages creates 10 ticking clocks: Start the writing week on Monday, deliver a set of 10–15 pages on Sunday. Knowing that due date is waiting for you is one of the best motivational tools I know to put ass in chair and pound out pages.
After 14 weeks of work, “The Quest” participants have an outline which gives them confidence they know what they need to get from FADE IN to FADE OUT.
It also means this: After 14 weeks, they are champing at the bit to start writing pages.
Yes, it’s scary. Even Steven King says the scariest time for a writer is just before they start writing. But deadlines and ticking clocks don’t care about your nerves. All they care about is you deliver the goods.
And at the end of the day, that is exciting.
Tomorrow: Another Dispatch from The Quest.
About Emma: British based writer of ‘the funny’. Lover of cats and bad TV. Often found in pyjamas a bit drunk or a bit hungover. Occasionally does burlesque. Twitter: @emmamillions.