You don't have to take every note

I recently had the experience of giving my latest script - a thriller - to my writing group. I've talked before about writing groups, so I won't waste much space discussing why I find them useful. That said, it's always great to know that I can give these guys a script and have a reaction within a week.

 Notice that word: "reaction."

It's sometimes funny how scared we are as writers of critical opinions. When I worked at one agency, they made certain that none of the readers' names appeared on the comment section of the coverage. This was because they'd had incidents in the past where writers had gotten their hands on negative write-ups of their scripts and then tracked down the writers to confront them directly.

I honestly don't know what they thought they were going to accomplish. You can't argue against someone's opinion. Further, my experience is that if you confront someone about a review like this, they're only more likely to dig in because you've essentially just challenged their credibility.

If someone doesn't like your script, you're never going to argue them out of that reaction. You might be able to have a debate about what led them to that conclusion. It might even be valuable to understand why they didn't like it, but that's where it ends. You will never turn a PASS into a Consider by debating it - because it isn't a debate.

Subjectivity is just something that you have to accept if you're going to work in the creative arts. The truth is that no matter how brilliant a writer you are, SOME PEOPLE WILL NOT LIKE YOUR WORK. If you're a hack, you'll meet a lot of those people. If you're brilliant, they'll probably be in the minority.

This doesn't change the fact that the law of averages says that at some point, you're going to run across someone who isn't in love with your writing. This is the most liberating thing to remember when you're getting notes from a non-fan: You don't have to take every note.

I'm not saying you should ignore anything critical. There's nothing to be gained by closing your ears entirely to negative reaction. I always assume that if this one person comes to me with these issues, some other readers (and eventually filmgoers) will have the same bones of contention. So why not try to understand the negative reaction?

When I'm getting notes from someone, the most important thing I remember is to listen. If I'm talking more than they are, I'm doing something wrong. I also make it a point to speak less to defend the work and more to provoke the reader into discussing their response. I might jump in and explain what my intent was, for then they might be able to assess where I was and was not successful with that.

The people who give me notes often attach a lot of suggestions to them. Some are helpful, some are not, and some would turn the script into an entirely different story from what I want to tell. I cherry-pick the notes that make sense to me and reinforce my vision of the story, and I discard the rest.

So the note that pisses you off because it takes the edge out of one of your characters? You don't have to take it. The suggestion that you cut a particular joke because one reader finds it offensive? You don't have to take it.

 By the way, this isn't a license to be a jerk about it. You asked someone for their opinion, so be polite when they give it to you. Even when you know you plan on disregarding their suggestions, thank them. In fact, it should be easy to be polite because if you know it's not a direction you want to explore, why get all worked up over a hypothetical.

The more comfortable you are in the face of criticism, the more you grow not just as a writer, but as a person.

Reader question - Writing group etiquette

Script Tease asks:

I think it would be great if you would or could address Writing Group etiquette. There's no rules on paper but most writers are in a group and the rules vary. However, I seem to run into problems and have witnessed many "verbal" death matches over notes. So if you can give your opinion on 1) how to politely handle a script full of toilet humor 2) How to tell a writer they've written a novel - not a script 3) How to handle getting booted out of a group (yes, it happened to me..but like my mother says..."They were just jealous! lol)
Thx!

First, go read these posts from way back:

Writing groups: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

As for your questions:

1) Some writers are sensitive, others you could say, "This is shit" too and they'll want the detailed autopsy notes. Definitely know which breed you're working with.

With regard to a script full of toilet humor, the first question I have is, "Is it funny toilet humor?" You could try to diffuse the harshness of your critque by saying that maybe toilet humor isn't your thing, but does the problem go deeper than that? Is the toilet humor organic to the story? Is the gag plausibly staged, or is it just put in there for shock value?

For instance, I feel like a lot of the toilet humor in American Pie is horribly strained. The titular joke alone with the pie feels very forced, even with the conversation that's supposed to set it up. I don't believe a guy would do that. The earlier gag with the substance in the beer cup is set up a little more organically, but it's still paid off with a lot of sitcom hackery. The "coffee gag" in the second Austin Powers film

Over the years I've seen a lot of poorly motivated toilet humor. Too often, it's clear that the writer came up with the punchline ("Hey, let's have the prom queen get splattered with semen shot out of a reversed vacuum cleaner!") and then worked backwards from there. Unfortunately, the puppet strings are often very much in evidence.

But I'm drifting... my point is that perhaps you should explain why that concept isn't working for you rather than just make a blanket "anti-toilet humor" statement. If you go in with some form of "This sucks because it's toilet humor," then anything you say will probably be ignored. I don't like toilet humor much either, by the way, so I'm not criticizing you for taking exception to it.

2) This is a delicate thing too. I think a good way to start is by pointing out any unfilmables with in the script (descriptions of inner thoughts, backstory details in the action paragraphs.) Writers who write novelistically tend to make these mistakes, and so if you express that none of this comes across visually, they might understand your point. One technique might be to ask them to do a reading or a performance of the scene for the group. Then, compare what someone reading the script would understand versus what someone watching the movie would be able to intuit.

3) As for getting booted from a group - the best thing is to not take it personally. Sometimes people don't mesh, and if the group booted you, I'd bet that there were chemistry issues on both sides. Maybe they were frustrated with your notes, but I'd bet you were probably equally frustrated with them ignoring your notes.

"Two schmucks short" - Writing is a business

Let's be honest, folks. It's Thanksgiving week in Hollywood and anyone who lives here knows what that means - no one's working. Judging from the fewer hits and comments yesterday, fewer of you are reading blogs this week too. That being the case, I don't want to waste a good Tuesday Talkback on a lame duck week. Still I feel obligated to offer some amusing content. Having just come from a particularly hilarious meeting of my writer's group, I think I'll offer these words of wisdom from some very funny guys in their late 20s.

On this particular day, our lone female member brought a pitch to the group, then almost immediately apologized for it. She started to say that she knew it was lame and goofy, but it was right up the alley of a particular contact she'd made and she knew this was the kind of material that buyer went for. She thought this was stupid - but I disagreed and offered the following pearl of wisdom:

"Don't write from the heart, write for the wallet."

I admit, it's a bit crass and cynical and I'm sure that several readers who fancy themselves serious artists are ready to fire off an angry comment disagreeing with me. The fact remains that screenplays are written to be sold. I've said this before and it's true. Yes, it's possible to write a wonderful, meaningful script and get it produced with the right buyer but never forget the key word in that equation: "Buyer."

No one writes screenplays just to write screenplays. People write screenplays to make movies. To turn that particular caterpillar into a butterfly, you need money. That money doesn't appear out of the ether - it comes from people who see it as an investment, hoping for a return.

In other words, making an artistic statement with a screenplay is most feasible if you can make a few bucks on it. As another member of my group put it, "It's not 'selling out,' it's 'buying in.'"

I also offered the following thesis to the group: "All you need to sell a script is one schmuck to represent you and another schmuck to buy it."

Our unofficial chairman then made this statement: "Hell! I'm two schmucks short!"

Aren't we all?

Writing groups - part 3

Now, after spending two posts talking up writing groups, I will address the perils of said groups. Be on the lookout for signs that you're in a bad group, or that you might not be using the group properly:

1) Members who don't read the materials - Big pet peeve of mine. There are always going to be weeks where someone will have read everything and still not have very deep notes. That's normal and it's bound to happen from time to time.... but if you notice several consecutive weeks go by without a particular person speaking up, it might be appropriate to talk to them one-on-one and see if they've given your work its due. Now, their silence might be due to something like...

2) The loudest members are the only ones heard. Every discussion has its ebbs and flows, with different people taking the lead. I'm fortunate that my group is generally pretty good about making sure everyone is heard, and that dissenting opinions are debated with respect. Make sure you don't have a bully. Nothing cuts discussions faster than someone who won't let others be heard, or who rudely dismisses the opposing viewpoints of everyone else. A group can't thrive if its members are afraid to express themselves.

3) Group-think. This is the more insidious result of a few loud voices. Eventually the group notes become a Frankenstein's monster. Let's say Person A comes in thinking only "Well, the dialogue can use some punching up and maybe trim a few scenes down." Then Person B expresses that the turning point into the third act is contrived, that the love story makes no sense and keeps repeating the same points over and over again without advancement, and that the problem isn't just that the dialogue is weak - it's that the lead sounds schizophrenic because the plot requires him to act all over the map. At that point, Person A says, "Oh, none of that bugged me before... but it does now!" Then, every other member starts realizing that Person B has a point.

Now, in a lot of cases this could be helpful. You want people to help improve your scripts... but what if Person B is just a relentless nitpicker who never bought into the story for one reason or another - and the other five people were so sucked into your world from the first five pages that these flaws barely occurred to them? Instead of being a celebration of how you got most of the group to suspend disbelief, you now find yourself...

4) Rewriting only to please the group. I've seen this happen before - one member comes in with a promising idea, but the tone and the style is ephemeral enough that each member has a different idea of how the story should be told. Is it a comedy? A thriller? A disturbing indie drama? The script takes on more personalities than Sybil as the notes after each submission push the writer into a different direction.

Rewriting JUST to please the group is a losing prospect. At a certain point, you should have a firm idea of the kind of story you want to tell and stick to it. If you're lucky, most of the group will see the merit in it. If you have a few passionate defenders, then you know you're onto something.

Now if all six people say, "This needs work," then my advice is not an invitation for you to say, "Fuck you! I know this is good!" The bar for script sales is set pretty high, and if the dislike of the script is that high, take it as a portent of how the script will be received in the industry. If you're going out on a limb make sure you've got at least one VERY strong defender with you.

The writers of Mystery Science Theatre 3000 used to say that they didn't stop themselves from writing obscure jokes out of fear that the whole audience wouldn't get it. They said that in cases like that, their attitude was "The RIGHT people will get this."

Groups are wonderful, helpful and great for motivation. Just make sure you know how to use them.

Writing groups - part 2

I had plans to follow up my earlier on post with a supplement this week, and as fate would have it, the one comment on the earlier entry is a perfect introduction to it:

I remember when I lived in Des Moines, I was in a group of mostly journalists who wanted an outlet for creative writing. It was fantastic.

Then when I moved to LA, I dropped in my friend's writing group a couple times. It was filled with people who were dedicated to becoming professional film or televisions writers. I eventually stopped because the quality of writing was so bad, I didn't want the feedback of the group.

I guess it's all about the people.

I couldn't have said it better myself. One of the most important things about taking any kind of feedback is knowing who's giving you notes. Every reader will bring their own biases and perspectives to their critiques. Maybe the guy who tells you to cut your romantic subplot doesn't just think the plot is weak - maybe he hates romantic subplots in any form! Or perhaps one member of your group hates your edgy, sexy thriller because he's a prude when it comes to sex and nudity.

The quality of the other members' individual writing could be taken as a warning sign. However, I'd argue that bad writers can still give good notes. Being able to pick out and critique weaknesses is a completely different skill set from inventing something whole cloth.

It's always useful and informative to see what kind of reaction your work gets, but if you're going to rely on that reaction to guide you in making changes, it helps to understand what provoked that reaction in your reader.

Of the seven other people in my writing group, I went to school with two of them, and have known three others for at least three years. Only one member of the group was a complete unknown to me, so by and large, I know these people. I know the movies they like, the movies they dislike and their personal opinions on a wide range of topics.

So if you have a member who's high-minded and prefers the comedies of Wilder to gross-out antics of Rob Schneider, then you might not need to heed his warning about your hilarious joke involving an outhouse, a snorkel, and a near-drowning. However, if the guy who swears by American Pie and Dumb and Dumber has an equally venomous reaction... maybe Mr. High Brow has a point.

Ideally, your writing group will give you an idea of how your movie will play to a wide audience. Hopefully there are a few people in there representative of the perfect target audience for your film, along with a few other people who could be won over with the right execution.

Or to put it in political terms - if you're lucky, there'll be people who represent your base and your swing votes.

This isn't to say that those who say your script "just isn't my kind of movie" should be completely ignored. They might very well give you some good insights. I just wouldn't waste all my energy on rewriting the script just to please that person.

The bottom line is, I trust the people in my writing group. It's rare that the group is in total 100% agreement about a particular script. However, on numerous occasions, MOST of the members have arrived with very similar issues to discuss in a particular script, targeting similar weaknesses.

As disheartening as it is to sit through some of those sessions when your script is on the block, it's much preferable to getting two people who love it all, two people who hate everything about it, one person who thinks the first act is brilliant and the climax is crap, and one person who hates the opening, but loves the ending. If you get a scattered reaction like this, and it's not something that can be explained by the viewing preferences of the individual members, then you might have to consider that the script's identity is so fluid that everyone read it expecting a different kind of film.

The bottom line is: when seeking feedback, know whom you're getting feedback from. If you're going to do a big rewrite to please one person, make sure that person is the kind of viewer you'd want to please in the first place.

Next time: the perils of a writing group.

Writing groups

One of the best decisions some friends and I have made this year was to start a writing group. See, all of us fancy ourselves writers, and like all writers, often the hardest thing for us to do is to force ourselves to write. I'm sure many of you know how it goes - you've got a notebook full of ideas, maybe even a few treatments, but when it comes time to translate that into dialogue and descriptive action paragraphs, somehow something always manages to come up and steal our time.

By starting a writing group, we've been able to establish firmer deadlines. It's easier to make yourself write when you've got seven other people nagging you for your pages, and giving you feedback as you go. The way we started was everyone came in with a pitch or two or three. Some people had full treatments, others just had a premise, a logline and a vague outline of the structure of the film. We all gave our feedback, and either pushed the writers to turn in a fleshed out treatment, or helped them develop their idea further until they were ready for that point.

If memory serves, we started this the last week of January. To date, four of us have completed at least one full draft of our screenplays (one or two of those are already on draft two or further,) another writer is very close to completing his first draft, and the remaining three are hard at work on their first acts. Impressively, each script is developing differently, and - at least in my opinion - there are no "duds" in this bunch. In fact, I'm incredibly envious of at least two of the ideas being worked on.

Writing normally is a very lonely venture. One sits in a room alone and tries to fill a blank page. Sometimes it's all too easy to get stuck, and then fall into a rut of writer's block. A good writing group won't let this happen. If someone's stuck in our group, either they bring their problem to us on their own imitative, or the group reaches out and says "How can we help?" Already, the group has put its collective brain to use in getting several of us past our problem spots. It's like having an entire writer's room help you through a rewrite. Solutions are presented and debated, and often lines end up being drawn. The group doesn't always agree - some ideas have been met with equal parts enthusiasm and incredulity - but on more than one occasion, a struggling writer has gone home, and emailed the others to say "Thanks for the session tonight... I think I know what I have to do now."

Feedback. To some writers it's a dirty word, but a smart writer recognizes that eventually he's going to push his baby out into the world, and he's probably not going to be the most objective judge of its quality. So before Mr. Wannabe sends his script off to CAA, don't you think it's a good idea he has a few people look over it to make sure it all holds together?

Certainly, every writer is only hoping to get one kind of feedback - positive. This overlooks the fact that negative feedback can help make a script BETTER. One thing I admire about my group is that the criticism is never personal, but the other members don't mince words when it comes to weak points. I know that if I get a glowing review from this bunch, I've earned it, and it makes me feel more confident about the quality of my script.

And when it sucks... well, those people have been there to say, "You can do better - and we're going to make sure you MAKE this better."

Screenwriting groups - they're like AA meetings... but you can still drink!