Broadcast Rites by Paul Reynolds - Drama - A network television news program obtains the exclusive rights to show a death row execution live on national television. 109 pages - pdf, format

Writer interested in feedback on this work

I just started reading the script, I like the concept and the writing is clear and not difficult to follow, but I have a question:

Why are the characters treating the idea of filming an execution as unheard of?

On page 10 Rick says "I'm just glad we thought of this first"

On page 19 Steve says "this is something that's never been done before, probably not even thought of"

My issue is that (and I think you might be aware of this) there is a substantial legal history surrounding this issue and debate. One thing I loved about the screenplay is that you named the serial killer Garret, a reference to the Texas "Garret v. Estelle" case (if I remember correctly Garret was the name of the journalist). It just strikes me as odd that you subtly (in an interesting way) allude to the legal history of televising an execution but sort of cast it as a new or unheard of idea.

I'm only about 40 pages in so I might have a better sense of things once I finish reading it, but it just struck me as odd.

Ok, so I just read through it. Unfortunately I have a lot story issues.

I feel like the screenplay significantly neglects the legal aspects of the story. I think you could draw out a lot more conflict within the story if  you developed this aspect further. Especially with regard to the US Supreme Court I found this to be the most problematic part for me. First if the Texas Supreme Court ruled in their favor, how did it get to the U.S. Supreme Court, who appealed the ruling? Also the Texas Supreme Court ruling in their favor would not be passing the heat to Washington, it's the exact opposite (quickly dismissing or ruling against would be passing the buck). With respect to the the U.S. Supreme Court scenes,  I could not understand the reasoning for the court's decision for the life of me, the part where Tom (p44) states it is a 14th amendment case not a 1st amendment argument needs to be explained as does its relationship with the judges ruling.

While this may be  a story about the media and journalism I have a really hard time getting past all the legal stuff  (it just doesn't make sense to me). In terms of the media, I feel this could be developed further as well. It just felt like there was a lot about a generalized sense of fear of this opening the floodgates  in some ambiguous way to the detriment of exploring some of the moral conflicts at play (I think you could really dig into the debate about public vs private executions).

Im not trying to be harsh or rip apart the story your trying to tell, this is just my opinion so take it with a grain of salt. As you revise and continue to work on it I think you can hammer these kinks out. My advice would be to look at some more legal studies, jurisprudence articles, court decisions and articles to firm up your screenplay.