Calling Home by Nikki April Lee - Short, Drama - A driven depression therapist enjoys her star client's final moments with her at the top of a bridge. 8 pages - pdf format

Writer interested in feedback on this work

Wow! I had no idea where your story was going, but I wasn't expecting this! This should provoke many comments and theories as to its meaning. And that's a good thing. My opinion is that the story is about a "driven therapist" alright, but one who is driven to add notches to her belt (or rather pictures to her Angels Box). Mya (who seems so caring and put-together) is basically a suicide enabler, and that makes her a monster, to ME at least. Now...if that wasn't your intent,  I apologize. But I'd certainly like to know if I was on the right track. In any case, I thought it was a tight and interesting little script.

3 small typos: page 4: "quints" (I believe you meant "squints"), page 5: "car" (should be plural) and "a part" (used twice and should be "apart" each time). Also, on page 6 I think the word "implement" seems wrong ("implicate" maybe?).

But this is just nitpicking. This was a strong little story.

Hi Nikki,

I'm going to takes notes as I read..:)  

"They watch attentively at the
WOMAN at the peak of the circle as she speaks."

You could get rid of this sentence and introduce Mya straight away. You have introduced her as WOMAN, then in the next few lines she is introduced as MYA. In this case it seems unnecessary. The sentence is also a little awkward.

"A gentle-eyed brunette YOUNG WOMAN grabs her pendant and
stares at it, she flips it over."

You need to introduce Skylar here. It doesn't fit the story to leave introductions of characters names so late in the piece. There ends up being too many capitalized characters and it can get confusing.


"INSERT - TEXT MESSAGE
The phone reads, “SKYLAR: The Angels have called...”
Mya jumps up. Charlie rolls over."

You need to write BACK TO SCENE before the sentence 'Mya jumps up....' to take the reader back to the scene of them in bed. And because we already know we will be reading a text on the phone you can get rid of 'The phone reads' i.e....

CU ON PHONE

SKYLAR: The angels have called..."

BACK TO SCENE

Mya jumps out of bed.


"Charles rolls over"

I wasn't sure if Charles rolled away from her or towards her. Maybe you could make it clearer by stating which way he rolls so we can picture it straight away. The clearer it is for the reader the easier it is to read and script readers love that :)

"Mya and Skylar lean over to see a man looking at him and on
the phone."

This sentence is a little awkward.... Maybe.... 'see a man on the phone looking at them.'

"Mya sits on the edge of the bed with a photo dangling in her
hand. She gazes at the
INSERT
Skylar is at the beach. She makes a funny face at the camera."

This was confusing.....the photo is dangling which means she can't really be gazing at it. She needs to be holding the photo. i.e...

'Mya sits on the edge of the bed gazing at a photo in her hand.

CU ON PHOTO

Skylar is at the beach making a funny face at the camera.'

BACK TO SCENE.


This is a good story, good pacing, strong emotional theme. I like what Mya says to the women. The beginning of this  could be a self help script for anyone going through a tough time :)

I did see Mya as a monster too. But also someone that knows of the struggles to stay alive when dealing with severe trauma. This is one of those stories that makes you think at the end...which is very good..well done.

Cheers K..

The dialogue could be worked on more, tightened up in some areas.