Script Coverage Chronicles – January 2016: Sick Of Your Resolutions Yet? Here Are Five Easy-To-Keep Screenwriting Resolutions.

We’ve already spent a few weeks in the New Year, and most of us have given up on our diets by now.  So here are five alternative resolutions, all of which should be easier than consuming less food.

1. Take Your Stress Out On Your Characters

We’ve all got stress, but instead of yelling at your family members try sticking it to one of your characters.  Choose one of your fictional chums and make that character’s life ten times harder in your story. 

You’ll blow off some steam and improve the conflict level in your script.

2. Put Your Script On A Diet

Instead of dieting yourself put your latest screenplay on a diet. 

Vow to cut 3 to 5 pages of fat from your story.  Unless your screenplay is already at the minimum suggested page count, I’m 99% certain you can cut that much without losing any narrative muscle.

3. Watch More Movies

Resolutions don’t get much easier than this for movie buffs, but the truth is we all need to watch more movies in order to improve our writing and stay ahead of a constantly changing curve. 

You’ll need some popcorn of course while doing this mandatory work.

4. Consume Less Unconstructive Feedback

Every writer gets some now and then – unsubstantiated negative feedback.  It’ll always be a part of the screenwriting biz.  Resolve not to give it your time or energy.

Feedback is crucial.  We all need to learn everything we can from it.  But it’s so important to tell the good constructive feedback from the other kind.

5. Take More Risks

Risky writing is much more fun than safe writing.  By risky writing I mean the more original stuff – the stuff that’s more likely to fail. 

Sometimes you need to go for that quirky high-risk personal story.  If you can make it work, it’s actually got a much better chance of helping new writers break in than more straightforward fare.


That’s it for now.  All this resolution talk is making me hungry.