Tips for Great Screenwriting

Screenwriting is hard work when sunshine and warm weather outside beckon. If you don’t love the writing process, it’s hard to stay focused. Applying your imagination, creativity and patience on a daily basis requires discipline and determination.

It can be a lonely pursuit, especially in these trying times where we’re all stuck at home. But sometimes no more lonely than when you’re in meetings with producers and execs searching for some ineffable quality that will make your project stand above the rest.

There’s no way to guarantee what makes a screenplay great. But there are some rules you can follow to make sure that your script is the best it can be.

Less is always more

The phrase “Less is More” is often associated with the architect and furniture designer Ludwig Mies Van Der Rohe, one of the pioneers of modernist architecture. He believed that the basis of good design was simplicity and clarity.

The same applies in screenwriting. After all, screenwriting is a form of architecture. With your script, you are creating not just one sofa or building, but an entire world.

In a good screenplay, the writer is trying to grab a reader’s attention, fill his or her imagination with ideas, infuse it with emotions and create an urgency that keeps the reader turning the page…