Mr James by Stephen Brown - Short, Drama - A school teacher faces a disciplinary hearing after an altercation with a student - pdf, format

Writer interested in feedback on this work

Hey Ste,

Really interesting story you've got here. Very well written too, it never dragged once. You did a real good job of developing Mr. James into a character I sympathized with.

I didn't notice any typos or anything.

About the ending, are you hinting that Mr. James is dead at the end? Or just stuck in one of his trances? Which ever it is, I think it needs to be more clear so it will give the end more of a punch.

Not much else to say other than I really liked it. Good work. :)

~Zack~

Hey up, Ste

Page format seems a bit off, loads of space top and bottom of pages?

There's quite a lot of 'Mr. James...' which got a bit repetitive at times.

The story I can relate too as my Mrs was a teacher and got fed up with the kids being arseholes and there was nothing the teachers could do.  When I was at school there were certain teachers who would literally drag you out of class by your tie lol.

I really enjoyed this but it seem a bit long, probably due to the page layout?  The story itself was was very moving and the ending was very touching.  Overall a great piece of work.  I just love reading English scripts on here.  I wasn't sure about the headmaster saying 'R and R' though.  Maybe that's just me but it sounds a bit too American, I don't think I've ever heard anyone say that over here?

Very good script, bud.

Thanks Don for putting this up.

Zack, cheers for the read.

This is a longer piece than I'm used to writing and it is also an adaptation of a story I wrote, so I think that allowed me to develop the character more. Pleased you found him sympathetic - although, there are some mixed feelings about the character I wanted to get across.

I wanted to leave the ending slightly ambiguous - mainly, because I prefer that to spelling it out at the end. I see what you mean though about it maybe dampening the impact of the ending.

Alffy, thanks for checking it out - you got anything recent on here I can check out in return?

You're probably right about format as this is the first time I've used word. It was for an assignment for uni so I couldn't use software.

Probably a good shout about the repetition of Mr. James - I'll take a look at that.

Pleased you liked it mate,

Ste

Overall, a nice effort.

Some folks have already commented on the formatting issues - so won't plow that ground again.

The dialogue did not seem modern. It had the tone of something from the late 60s, early 50s - a time where there was more of culture clash between old and young. So, if this is set in that time period - perfect. If it is set in today's time period - the dialogue seems dated.

Might consider giving Susan's character a name early on rather than just receptionist.

The ending was kind of meh for me - so, he is going to get some R & R and return back. I think I would like another scene where he's at a mental institute or just at home still yelling at the boy in the yard.

Good effort - poignant story.

Thanks for the thoughts,

Yeah, I wanted to have Mr. James' dialogue be old fashioned to match his views on discipline and the world as a whole. I maybe should have made this contrast more with the other characters?

I don't really see him returning to work. I see him retiring even if he does recover to be honest. Although, your mental institute idea is interesting.

Let me know if you'd like a particular script of yours read in exchange mate,

Cheers

Ste

Not right now - I'll hit you up later - best of luck with this

Stephen, a very well written story you have. I can only be nit-picky in finding errors.

1. There seems to be much space top and bottom of each page and an extra space at time between action and dialogue.

2. The (V.O.) and (O.S.) should be placed after the Character Name and NOT under it.

3. I recommend capping the SOUNDS in the action lines. But that's a choice.

4. There's a few *ings* that could be stricken and rewrite without them to strengthen the sentence.

5. Page numbers go on the TOP RIGHT.

6. On page 13, the Character name MR. JAMES is decapitated from the dialogue an found at the bottom of the previous page.

Very good character study of Mr. James of his confusion with the boy of himself.

I hope I was of some help.

Happy New Year to you. May you find greater successes in 2018.

Steve