Helpful Pointers for Other Aspiring Writers

I’ve gotten to a point in my script where I eagerly look forward to getting back to it and writing. It’s a happy place where details form effortlessly, scenes make sense to me, and medication has no side effects. I think about my screenplay as I work, run errands, commute, announce tractor pulls, ice fish, and appear in court. I’m sure to carry a notebook with me everywhere. If I don’t have a notebook I’ll use any smooth surface within the extension of my arm, which brings me to my first point:

A stranger’s sleeve is a poor choice to write notes on. Aside from the possibility of the person frowning on your creative endeavor, he or she may be difficult to locate later if a proper contact address is not provided. And so there goes a great plot point for your story as it hops a train to Long Island and out of your life forever. Which then lends itself to this point (more handy advice than a point): Be sure to ask the proper protocol for scribbling notes while in the back of a paddy wagon… I found out the hard way.

Ideas just naturally flow if you are prepared to write them down. Even little tidbits of inspiration can be rewarding later when jotted down at the moment of inception. It’s writer Anne Lamott’s adage that if you always carry a pen, ideas will come to you. I’ve always said that myself (perhaps too loudly in front of Anne at a potluck, no doubt).

So the point there would be:
Say nothing funny, noteworthy, or remotely interesting around another creative. Or, if you slip out with some witty repartee, be sure to carry forms crediting you for all to sign. And it can’t hurt to always travel with a notary public. (Confession time… who also used to think that archaic phrase was “Note a Republic” when the dreaded repo man came a-callin’?)

Another similar point I certainly must stress is:
Never say anything funny around a crowd of people unless you say it LOUDLY. All too often yours truly has taken the demure approach where, after witnessing some event, I modestly make a witty observation into the ear of a nearby Judas. Time and time again that individual will laugh with me and a split second later will shout my brilliant banter to the room and reap the lion’s share of accolades. They can’t possibly feel good about themselves. I feel sorry for them. I find it common courtesy to just give proper recognition. They must realize the response is not genuine and the laughs are artificial. And stolen. And it must keep them awake at night as much as it does me with the searing pain of anger and the taste of bile that froths to my lips. They know what they’ve done… oh, they know.

Anyhoo… where was I? Right… I have found that if I have my paper and pen and I am open to write an idea or a witty line of dialogue it will channel right through me. It can become almost a stream-of-consciousness experience with magnificent swirls of Dadaist automatic writing. So that winds us down to our last point today.

Be sure to write clearly:
Hard to read scribbles will only complicate things as you try to decipher your inspirational notes. There’s the rumor in the biz that Mommie Dearest’s famous line, “No wire hangers ever” was accidentally scripted as “Now rehang the beaver” when Robert Getchell wrote with a particularly leaky pen. Titanic’s “I’m the king of the world!” might have been “I’m talking in the wind!” “Rosebud” could easily read as “Rosacea,” and a whole different clientele would be lining up to see When Harry Met Satan rather than… well, you know.