Father's Day by William Finlay (scriptwriter) - Short - A young boy's attempt to surprise his father on Father's Day has disastrous results. 12 pages - pdf, format 8)

Hello William,

Just wanted to say that I read your script and thought that it was an enjoyable read.

SPOILERS

There's a few spelling errors that need to be fixed, but aside from that my main thoughts are on why did Mikey keep wearing different pyjamas in the morning?

You have a scene where Mikey's mom faints after seeing the second face.  I thought this was a tad too far.  If the dad was such a heavy sleeper, she probably just shove him to wake up.

I must say on  page five, if you changed the safety razor to a cut throat razor.  That would have raised the hair on the back of my neck.  As I would have thought something terrible would have happened.

Otherwise the story was sweet and I was happy to read it.

All the best.


Javier

Javier~

Thanks for taking the time to read the script and for your comments.

The description indicating Mikey is in different pajamas is to indicate that the story is not linear. I want to be certain the reader doesn't think the new scene actually follows the previous one in real time. I suppose I could use FLASHBACK in the scene heading -- but I wanted to see if it would work without being obvious or giving too much away all at once. I don't mind a late reveal -- where the reader goes, "oh, I get it now!" But, admittedly, that only works if...well, the reader DOES go, "oh, I get it now!"

Stylistically, the piece isn’t rooted in “reality” as much as in memory. It’s one of those exaggerated, embellished recollections of some excruciating incident from the past. At the time, it was devastating. Now one can only laugh about it.  In addition, I wanted to capture something of the innocence and sweetness that the memory of our childhood often (hopefully) evokes. Glad, at least, some of the sweetness came through.

Thanks again.
Best,
William