I've noticed a comon mistake in introducing a character that I felt I should bring up.  Too often, a character is introduced as the following:

A man walks into a bakery.  He is about thirty years old and dressed and in average street clothes; a faded Pepsi Cola t-shirt and equaly faded jeans with paint spots on them.  There is no one else in the bakery.  His name is JOHN.


This description is wordy and a bit awkward. You should write it in the order of importance.

JOHN (30), walks into an empty bakery.  He is dressed casually.


Note that I introduced the character by name and not by description. Also, I was not as detailed in describing his clothing.  If the paint on his pants and the logo on his shirt was important, I would've included them.

Phil

What bugs me is when people introduce characters in dialogue.

MAN
Hey, PHIL.

Phil gives Man a hug.

How else would the movie goer know the character's name?


Phil

I think he means when the character is introduced for the first time ONLY IN DIALOGUE rather than in an introduction.

Thank you, Gomez. That's what I mean.

How important and the order of importance are important. (te-hee)

Recently I had a Floppy Dog turn up in my screenplay and someone asked me: What's a Floppy Dog?

"Well," I replied, "Any kind of breed you want, but one thing for sure, is they need to flop."

The question is: Does the writer wants to leave it to the movie makers to figure that out?

Maybe there is the perfect floppy dog making circuits in the entertainment field that I don't know about.  The John Travolta or Julia Roberts of Doggie land.  I don't know.

Course if the floppy dog in question turned up in a novel or short story, he'd definitely have a breed assigned.

It's a call on the part of the writer.  You figure it's important?  I mean you just feel that your creative integrity will suffer and crumble because you absolutely need it in, or if, like Phil said, it's vital to the character, then show it, if not, then don't.

I'm going back to spend time with my kitty cats now... No, they don't flop.  I've got a Slinky Cat and a Poley Cat, but not a floppy cat... although I did once have a floppy cat, a beautiful white long haired... I think they call his breed "rag doll" and rag doll cats definitely flop, but I'm not sure if it would be legit to write floppy cat into a script because cats are more springy kind of creatures... and you know what Motley used to do? That was his name Motley... Motely would like to get vacuumed and once when I stayed...

To be continued.

Sandra

Quoted from Sandra Elstree. To be continued.

Shroom break.

Quoted from ABennettWriter What bugs me is when people introduce characters in dialogue. MAN Hey, PHIL. Phil gives Man a hug.

You would still have to introduce Phil.


MAN stands at the dock, wearing khakis and a long sleeve white shirt.  He hears FOOTSTEPS behind him and turns around.

          MAN
   Hey Phil

PHIL (30) steps up to Man and hugs him.  Phil wears swim trunks and a wide-brimmed hat.


Phil  (the real Phil)

Quoted from Shelton Shroom break.

I think there were plenty of those when people were writing their OWC scripts.


Phil

Sharooooooooooom.  Shazaaaaaaam!  ...as I was saying, I had just moved to Regina from Prince George, B.C. (which incidentally came after Vancouver and before Medicine Hat) and who would have thought that the house would take so long to sell, and who would have thought decent places in Regina were so hard to find; so here I was, staying in a a motel for a month.

Good thing they allowed three cats, well, maybe they never really did, but they never really did find out and the maids never told.  Everyday I cleaned like crazy before the maids came in... (Don't worry I'm getting to Motley) and I had to because there were five of us living in this one little room about the size of 1408, minus the ghosts... well, 8 of us if you include the three cats.

I couldn't stand to have the maids deal with it all.  It was a good experience; I learned how to do a lot of cooking inside those little coffee pots.  Did you know you can boil eggs in them?  Ok Motley... When the maids came in I told them: Go ahead and vacuum him, he loves it.

"No!  Really?"  

"Yeah, go ahead."

Word spread and soon different maids would come to see the cat that loved to be vacuumed.

And every day we took the kitties on their little kitty leashes and walked them like dogs through the elm tree flanked streets.

So there you go.  If it's important, definitely put it in your script.  Now let's see now, where was I?  Oh yes...  Shrooooooom.

Sandra

Quoted from dogglebe You would still have to introduce Phil. MAN stands at the dock, wearing khakis and a long sleeve white shirt.  He hears FOOTSTEPS behind him and turns around.           MAN    Hey Phil PHIL (30) steps up to Man and hugs him.  Phil wears swim trunks and a wide-brimmed hat. Phil  (the real Phil)

I know how you're supposed to do it, but most people think that characters are introduced first time they're mentioned in a script, period. I don't know how many times I've told people that characters are introduced in action, not in dialogue.

Phil (the one in swim trunks)