Hey guys, I've got kind of a weird question. I'm currently writing a screenplay where two characters meet due to the fact that they are in a new city and the only ones wearing the home city's sports team rival shirts (due to the fact they are both from the same place). This scene is really brief but my struggle is that I don't really want to specify the major cities and teams to take readers out of the story from their own preferences. The rest of the script isn't specific to any city, I like to keep my screenplays open to location.

My question is that if I simply write the descriptions by avoiding the specifics and just describing, would that read too weird? Is it a good idea to stray away from getting specific here, or would you as a reader find it better with the details? I've never really had to deal with this hurdle in writing so I'm just curious to get some opinions. Thanks!

How about making it up? Don't use real places but fake. No one would get distracted.

Gabe

Quoted from kev Hey guys, I've got kind of a weird question. I'm currently writing a screenplay where two characters meet due to the fact that they are in a new city and the only ones wearing the home city's sports team rival shirts (due to the fact they are both from the same place). This scene is really brief but my struggle is that I don't really want to specify the major cities and teams to take readers out of the story from their own preferences. The rest of the script isn't specific to any city, I like to keep my screenplays open to location. My question is that if I simply write the descriptions by avoiding the specifics and just describing, would that read too weird? Is it a good idea to stray away from getting specific here, or would you as a reader find it better with the details? I've never really had to deal with this hurdle in writing so I'm just curious to get some opinions. Thanks!

There is no rule here. However, in my view, In my view - yes. I would include the City as I can't imagine what the character dialogue would be like with out it. In other words - there has to be some back and forth about where they are from - yes? You are also kind of trapped because you are using rival sports teams as the catch - if it is major sports - that by definition may  somewhat limit you to NY, LA, Chicago, etc. (i.e., only major cities have a two teams in the major sports).  You didn't ask, but since I assume you want the shirts to be a bit of an oddity (i.e., a Chicago White Sox and Cubs jersey in lets say any town would not be something that would stand out as unique, you may want to go with something a little less constraining (e.g., rival high schools, colleges, ).

Goo luck.

Thanks Mr. Ripley and eldave1 for replying!

Quoted from eldave1 There is no rule here. However, in my view, In my view - yes. I would include the City as I can't imagine what the character dialogue would be like with out it. In other words - there has to be some back and forth about where they are from - yes? You are also kind of trapped because you are using rival sports teams as the catch - if it is major sports - that by definition may  somewhat limit you to NY, LA, Chicago, etc. (i.e., only major cities have a two teams in the major sports).  You didn't ask, but since I assume you want the shirts to be a bit of an oddity (i.e., a Chicago White Sox and Cubs jersey in lets say any town would not be something that would stand out as unique, you may want to go with something a little less constraining (e.g., rival high schools, colleges, ). Goo luck.

You bring up some valid points and I think I figured out how I'm going to do it and it's looking towards using fictional college teams. I figure if it ever does get made, those involved can warp it to whatever they want, right now I'm leaving it vague but not unspecified. Thanks again!

Can you explain why are you against specifying the exact nature of the t-shirts?