Update: 2015 Zero Draft Thirty Challenge is ‘officially’ over!
It’s now Midnight on the Pacific Coast which means the 2015 Zero Draft Thirty Challenge is ‘officially’ over! What started out as a whimsical notion with this October 15 GITS post transformed into this amazing… thing. It’s going to take some time to process what has happened, but let me real quickly touch on three things.
First, I got to FADE OUT. It’s a true Zero Draft with some scenes and sequences feeling like first or even second draft quality butting up against piles of wordy dung intersected with a handful of scenes which are literally not much more than sketching out Beginning, Middle, and End. But you know what? I learned so damn much about this story in the process of pounding it out this month. Tons of rewriting ahead, however that’s a given with a Zero Draft. As flawed and fractured a draft as it is, it goes from FADE IN to FADE OUT. So I can pass out from exhaustion and Benadryl tonight (still fighting the crud) with a smile on my face.
Second, note how I wrote the Challenge is ‘officially’ over. I don’t know what those ‘ and ‘ are supposed to mean grammatically, but what I intend for them to communicate to folks is this: If you need more time to finish your Zero Draft, go for it. Let’s say you made it halfway through a draft. Congratulations! That’s awesome. Now you can drop the Thirty, swapping it with Sixty. Or you’re 10 pages away from getting to THE END. Great. How about turning this into Zero Draft Forty? The point is two-fold: (1) You are much further along in your writing process than you were on November 1 which is pretty much the point. (2) Keep up the momentum. Set a new deadline. Pick your own date. Like literally mark it on your calendar. Hold yourself accountable by creating a structured time-frame. Create a due date… then write like hell to meet that date.
Third, for those of you inquiring about what happens now, several things. Starting next week, I am planning on doing a week-long blog series on rewriting. I would strongly advise you to not do anything with your Zero Draft until after you go through that series. In fact, set the damn script aside. Don’t read it, don’t look at it, don’t even think about it. You need at least 2 weeks to develop a fresh set of eyes so you can fairly assess what you’ve got down on the page.
Here on the blog, we’re going to return to a more normal state of things including my annual end of year review and planning series of posts. If you participated in the ZD30 Challenge and wish to continue with it, we will be discussing possibilities in the Facebook group. If you have not joined that yet, I would encourage you to do so. Currently at 380 members, there is a lot of talk there about writing groups, script swapping and critiquing, and so forth. I’m not sure how things will shake out, but I do know this:
I plan on overseeing two Zero Draft Thirty Challenges per year. There’s no good reason why each of us, myself included, shouldn’t be generating 2 quality spec scripts annually. I have three stories in active development I intend to write and as I’m rewriting this current comedy, I’ll be researching and doing character work on the next one.
In other words, this is only the beginning. As to what it becomes, who knows? Let’s see what story it writes for itself!
So many emails, tweets, and FB posts from people with remarkable expressions of excitement, surprise, elation, and joy. I’ve aggregated most of them and will try to figure out how to share at least some of those comments with you. I think you’ll be amazed at how this crazy Challenge resonated with so many people… and in such a profound way.
That’s it. I’ve got nothing left in the tank. Heading off to bed. But to everyone who participated in the ZD30 Challenge, whether you reached FADE OUT or not, I commend you to the Muses!
Onward!
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