Dispatch from The Quest: Rob Pilkington
Last week as we did here on GITS, the Quest writers focused on the subject of style. As the screenwriting principle we started with is Style = Voice, the Questers spent a lot of time thinking about the importance of determining what their voice is in relation to the stories they write. Today: Rob Pilkington writes about voice… and darts:
The game of cricket is kind of boring.
It’s the same three turns, back and forth with your opponent, throwing at the same targets game after game. Learning to win is basically memorizing how to throw the same seven straight lines ad nauseum. Still, I played it obsessively with a roommate of mine, nights upon nights, hucking countless darts and swinging comically sized steins of beer together, seldom considerate to our third roommate sleeping on the other side of the wall we regularly punctured.
One particularly sloshed and sweaty night, as we wound down and sang tales of matches won and lost, our third roommate passed by and surprised us — we hadn’t even realized she was home. Relieved we hadn’t kept anyone up, I leapt upon the coffee table and proclaimed “Well, you shoulda been out here, man! Because I totally rocked a sweet takedown in that last game! -air guitar-”
Roommate #3, who was doing something boring like washing dishes or taking out the trash or something, just yawned and said “Yeah, I know.”
…
So… alright. I’m having trouble coming up with something to write about last week’s Quest lectures/discussion about style and narrative voice. Mostly because, unlike other screenwrite-y things we’ve talked about in these dispatches, this post should actually exhibit the thing it addresses. Style. Voice. Distinctiveness.
And that’s a lot of pressure! Think what would have happened if Ray Bradbury set out to write a book about how freakin’ great books are but then his novel sucked? We’d be a glassy-eyed, complacent society obsessed with boobs that absorbed everything through electronic screens. Do you want that? Huh? Do you!?
I was reminded during last week’s style lectures of the ol’ saying that “a screenplay is merely a blueprint” for a film. And sure — as someone who can see that framed inside the long and arduous triathlon that is actually making a film, yeah — it makes sense. Compared to what a movie will eventually be, a screenplay is flat, skeletal. It resembles more bar code than art. And as much as we know we have to master what’s in between the lines, we’re still working with straight ones. Much like I imagine an architect might.
But even in the straight lines there’s opportunity for style. For a fingerprint. For something that is distinctly “you.” That third roommate who just magically knew I won at darts? It’s because I aim once and throw in quick succession, while my rival roommate aimed each dart carefully before every throw. My rapid BOOM-BOOM-BOOM that closed the game signaled my win to every room of the apartment. Even working in straight lines, I was still being, somehow, myself.
I think most people naturally do this, but to do something as purposeful as screenwriting, I think you have to make it a priority. Crank up the tone, the mood, the personality. Execute the story and characters like only the person who thought them up can. “Why does THIS story have to happen to THIS character at THIS time?” Well, why are YOU even the person to write it? That’s what Style Week at GITS meant to me.
So, yeah — it’s a lot of straight lines. But it still has to be your signature.
(…I’m not getting my security deposit back, am I?)
“Why are YOU even the person to write [this story]?” Good question. If you claim that story or perhaps even better, the story claims you, then grab that sucker and tell it the best damn way you know possible. And that includes bringing your passion and personality to every word of scene description, every choice of how to approach a scene, every transition, everything you do in writing a script. If that is your story to tell, then put everything you’ve got into it, including style.
Tomorrow: Another dispatch from The Quest.
About Rob: Boston writer headed for LA. Lover of Kubrick, Nolan, McDonagh, and the Coens. Okay, good talk. Back to writing. Twitter: @HeroesAreBoring.
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