Some peeps write a passage, a scene, etc., and then go back, reread it, and fix it up before they move on, thus making the need for a mega "rewrite" much less.  Those that do this, upon completion, have much more than a first "raw" draft.

Others obviously just write, and don't seem to care what the actual quality is when they're done.  In this situation, a complete rewrite is necessary, even to come up with a first, rough draft.

But, either way you do it, you should definitely always be looking for things that aren't necessary, in terms of words and phrases, and every time you have a lonely little orphan all by his lonesome, you should see if you can find him a home with his friends...on the line above him.

The reality of the issue is that it doesn't matter if you call them orphans or unicorns or just a single word on its own line.  Anytime you can save an entire line by cutting an unnecessary word, as Nike says, JUST DO IT.

Quoted from Dreamscale Some peeps write a passage, a scene, etc., and then go back, reread it, and fix it up before they move on, thus making the need for a mega "rewrite" much less.  Those that do this, upon completion, have much more than a first "raw" draft. Others obviously just write, and don't seem to care what the actual quality is when they're done.  In this situation, a complete rewrite is necessary, even to come up with a first, rough draft. But, either way you do it, you should definitely always be looking for things that aren't necessary, in terms of words and phrases, and every time you have a lonely little orphan all by his lonesome, you should see if you can find him a home with his friends...on the line above him. The reality of the issue is that it doesn't matter if you call them orphans or unicorns or just a single word on its own line.  Anytime you can save an entire line by cutting an unnecessary word, as Nike says, JUST DO IT.

Good, solid common sense advice.  Crazy not to follow it, since it's so simple.

Quoted from Ledbetter You know, for the life of me, I never even gave this subjest a thought until I started working with Jeff on some script work a while back. He pointed out to me what they were and I still didnt give them a thought when I wrote. If my paragraph had a dangly, so be it. Even now, when I write "raw" those things would only slow me down. Before anyone ask, "raw" means to me writing without structure being at the forefront. But I do apperciate Jeff teaching me this and several other facets of writing that would not have otherwise known. Shawn.....><

Hopefully no one ever finds any found footage, Shawn, of Jeff 'pointing out your dangly'...

Quoted from stevie Hopefully no one ever finds any found footage, Shawn, of Jeff 'pointing out your dangly'...

Just hope your dangly doesn't wind up on the cutting room floor.  

I just went back through my 20+ pages of script and knocked out about 6 or 7 orphans.  Now those lines read much better, and the script is just under twenty pages.  Just like that.  Not just to cut back fat, but it forces you to write economically!

Quoted from steven8 I just went back through my 20+ pages of script and knocked out about 6 or 7 orphans.  Now those lines read much better, and the script is just under twenty pages.  Just like that.  Not just to cut back fat, but it forces you to write economically!

Now hit ctrl f and search for "is" in your script.  Take them all out.

Quoted from Baltis. Now hit ctrl f and search for "is" in your script.  Take them all out.

Got rid of twenty-odd occurances of the word 'is'.  I had no idea I'd used it so often.  Replaced them with much stronger words, or just plain got rid of them.

Thanks Baltis!  And thank you Jeff, for the advice on Orphans.

The script is getting stronger, and now that I am more aware, I won't have to go back and hunt things up, I'll make t better the first time!!

Steven, I wasn't going to jump in. What good does it do me to piss people off again? The people giving you advice mean well. But be careful about what advice you follow in forums, any of ours. You're being given advice that may harm your writing.

Let me be up front: I am little more than a rookie myself. Unproduced, not an authority on screenwriting. I think I've learned a few things, however, and I want to share them with you. In the end, though, follow what you think is best.

People confuse rules of thumb with rules. Whether it's the use of "is" or "ly" words, or "ing", or a myriad of other issues. That includes "unfilmables".

But you should not take my word either. Dig into pro scripts, and I'd be happy to provide you with some.

Let me begin with this instruction on "is": namely, to "Take them all out". I can tell you with confidence that any advice that extreme is likely to be bad advice. As a rule of thumb, avoiding "is" and finding more descriptive and active verbs to use instead is excellent advice. And the writer who pointed this out has helped you. But once this becomes a law, a "rule", it will only create trouble in your work. If you make it to the pro level, you'll find yourself wondering why you allowed rules to force you into more awkward writing.

I decided to pick a few pro scripts to look at, ones that happened to come my way this week. The first sold for 3 million dollars. Here's the opening:

FADE IN ON:
A snow globe.
Sitting on a little girl's desk. Inside it, among the water
and glitter, is a model of THE WHITE HOUSE.
The flakes swirl and gleam in the reflection of a night light.
Framed pictures on the desk. A little girl in front of the
Capitol. The Lincoln Memorial. We are in
INT. EMILY'S BEDROOM - NIGHT
Cramped. EMILY CALE (10) slumbers. A stack of magazines by
her bed. US Weekly. Teen People. The Economist.
We hear a cell phone BOOP. Emily stirs. Checks her battered
first gen iPhone. An email notification. The screen reads:

Multiple "rules" are broken. But this is strong writing. It's visual, effective, clean, quick. It's what the studios want.

Let's pick another. This was written by one one of the writers from Mad Men

on page 2, I find this:

Steve sits on the edge of the black lacquer bed unbuttoning
his shirt and kicking off his shoes.

Steve undresses and stifles a yawn, talking over his shoulder
to the next room.
In the darkness a MAN attacks him. All we can make out is a
beard and a round, strong body as they wrestle and struggle.

Ben is blowing into one of those long Australian horns that
makes a weird vibrating sound. Steve exhales smoke.

Let me try a third, seeing I'm 2 for 2. This one is an FF that sold to a big studio:

Newell is waved away by SERGEANT WOLFE, a black NCO with a
severe allergy to authority. Says a lot about him, he made
it this far on such an abrasive personality.

Delta is lined up. Byron paces, a conductor before the opera.

one more script:

This one�s of A PICTURE PERFECT FAMILY: the SENATOR, his
pretty WIFE, their pretty DAUGHTER (14).
The magazine is placed back down, face-up. THE COVER
smiles back up at us.

These are just cursory reads of the first few pages of these scripts. I have a bunch of recently optioned scripts on file. Pick a card, any card. It's that easy. These "rules" seem to only apply to unproduced writers. Now, you can learn what you want from that. Some people conclude that pro's do it just because they can, they're inside the gates already. But think about that a moment. Every single pro writes like this just because they can? Every single pro decides to just drop what they learned now that they've made it? Does that make sense?

Of course it doesn't make sense. At all. These writers understand the difference between rules of thumb and rules. Follow the rules of thumb only to the point where they make your writing better. Be wary of absolutes.

Also, those examples above are taken out of context. By themselves, they might even look like poor writing. But I assure these scripts are very solidly written. I'd be happy to send them to you, or we can randomly pick 4 more.

But again, don't take my word, or anyone else's, though well intentioned. Trust your own judgment. Look at pro scripts. Make up your own mind. If I could convince you of anything, it would be to be wary of absolute rules in this field. We're not writing computer code. Focus on the story, tell it visually. Tell it like a pro.

Yeah, don't listen to me...

I learned all of my immediate screenwriting know-how from the back of an off-brand cereal box.  Fruity Dino Bites, I believe it was.  

Taste almost like the real thing too.

But you really should omit your "is" words when applicable to do so.


--
The road is covered in snow, it stretches for miles and miles.

or

Snow covered roads stretch for miles and miles.
--

I mean, this is work-shop 101 shit here.  But, yeah, do what you feel your comfortable with.  It is, after-all, your material -- not mine.

OK, I'll bite as well, Kev.

First of all, I do agree about most absolutes.  There are exceptions and times when just about anything is not only acceptable, but maybe even the better way.

Is using "is" really such a terrible thing?  Nah, not really, but it is "weak" writing, and as Balt points out, there are usually much better , "stronger" ways to construct a sentence.

Now, the "we see" and "we hear" shit?  C'mon now...terrible.  Fucking terrible, completely unnecessary, amateur hour 101...and I don't care if every sold script in the world contains them.  There is no argument that anyone is ever going to make to convince me that there is any reason to use them.

But, Kevin, IMO, you continue to miss the big picture when you continually site "recently sold" scripts or any sold scripts, and point to something and basically say, "See?  It's in here, and this sold for $3 Million, so it should be in all scripts."  Paraphrased, obviously, but my point is this -

The things you're bringing up - the rules that "Pro" writers break, have absolutely nothing to do with why their scripts were sold, or why they're "Pros".  You seem to think that emulating certain script writing fads will turn your material into Pro level work, and IMO, that's so far from the truth, it's downright silly.  There's another writer on SS, whom I will not name, who seems to think this way as well, and his writing seems to go downhill with every script he writes, and few readers ever give him anything except grief about it.

I think it's very important to understand a few things about writing, as well as literally anything.  When you get instruction, you learn tried and true do's and don't's.  If you study close enough, you eve learn why certain things are smiled on and frowned upon.

You can use this simple analogy to literally anything from cooking to skiing.

Once someone becomes proficient, they see ways to bend certain rules, find ways to enhance this or that.  And the reason they, or we do this, is to produce a better omelet, to jump a few inches higher, shave a few seconds off the race time, etc.

Kevin, if you honestly think that by reading your "hundreds" of Pro scripts, you've stumbled onto the keys of success in screenwriting, hey man, that's awesome and I wish you all the luck in the world, and I'll be first in line to see all your movies.

But, as I've said on other threads, in one way or another, just because a script sells or a writer is a paid Pro, doesn't mean that the script is good or great, or the writer is even good or great.  Don't confuse a script selling to mean that's the way to go about writing yours.

Balt made a very good, simple point, and it sums up my feelings on the subject in general - "this is work-shop 101 shit here".

And it is.  It's common, basic knowledge that you cannot argue with.  Just like you can't argue with me and tell me "we see" and "we hear" is a good way to go about writing your script.  It just isn't and there's no way you or anyone else can tell me there is...and prove it.

So, if you really want to follow your new Pro writers style, you should go all the way and include lots of "we see", "we hear", this is", lots and lots of unfilmable smartass asides, underline a word or phrase on every page, have your characters do and say completely ridiculous things, and don't by any means worry about orphans.

These are the keys to success.  Now, just start planning what to do with all the money that's abut to start rolling in.

I think the use of "ly", "is", "we see" or "we hear", unfilmables etc. comes down to when it's applicable. You can't say never. Try your best to not use it. And if you think you need it, then use it. There's nothing wrong with that.

Unless you're writing a FF script, what possible reason is there for using "we see"?  I need to know.

Anything written in action/description lines are things we see - oh wait...that's not true, because some dumbass writers who think they're cool, like to include lots of unfilmable asides, which we don't and can't see.

Hey!!  Maybe that's it.  Everything that we or are supposed to see should be bolded, CAPPED, and underlined, to make sure that we not only see it, but pay attention to it as we read it.  Might as well start the sentence off with WE SEE, as well, then that way, anything that's not bolded, CAPPED, and underlined and doesn't begin with WE SEE, we'll know it's just an irritating unfilmable aside.

Yep, I think we've got it figured out now.

Seems we've veered towards "Pro emulation" here as a topic.
In general, I think it's a waste of time, unless for a very specific reason.
And I've actually come across a situation where it's somewhat viable...

If I'm writing for a specific feature producer...
I do ask for an example od two of how they like scripts written.
What's their favorite kind of "voice on the page".
And more often than not, there's something I can pluck out to use...

The producer may like a bit of unfilmables on the page...
Or, I find out they don't like swearing in action descriptions.
Stuff like that, you bet I emulate, because it's the feature producer.
And he's the cat with the agency reps to get my pages read.

Other than that, I haven't found much use for emulation in its strictest form.

E.D.

I totally agree with you, Brett, but it appears that Kevin is referring to Spec scripts.

Use whatever you have in your toolbox to tell your story.

And it will be good, or it won't be good.

Somebody telling you beforehand that your script will not be good because you elect to employ a certain technique is being totally silly.

How could they possibly know that?

Your stuff will be good or not good -- simple as that -- whether you "bend rules" or adhere to them rigidly.

Truth is, you actually have very little control over it.  Really.

You either know what you are doing or you don't.