Play God For Me (was Devil and the Deep Blue Sea) by R.L. Riley (_ghostwriters) writing as Sir Lancelot - Short, Drama - After a tragic accident, a nun faces a moral crisis when her brother’s left in a coma... - pdf format

Writer interested in feedback on this work

I like the premise and the story - just needs a going through on grammar, punctuation, brevity and expel some of the exposition. But overall, a good start for a short that just needs a few more drafts/run throughs.

I have no issue with BOLD slugs, adopted that very early myself, but not a fan of the underlining too... personal opinion of course.

So, the story... you introduce him as MALE PATIENT, but we quickly find out that he's part of the family, I'd definitely change this, name him and provide a description from the start - he's important and you then call him by name a couple of lines later (Horatio though?)

Unless I'm confused, Mother Mary Saint-Jean is a Nun also, a Mother Superior? It's pretty unusual (though not impossible) for Nuns to have children...

And I'm afraid the flow of the remaining pages doesn't feel natural to me, and sister or not I can't believe Blair would be so easily swayed to euthenasia... and you had a couple of pages still to play with.

Not sure I saw any reference to estrangement either here?

Not bad. A very different story and I really like the premise.

Liked the prolonging life v prolonging death line.

I think it suffered with the role of Mary being a bit formal and stilted - (her character, I know,) but the estrangement between the two and their history needed a bit more clarity at the start to pull at the heart strings.

I think you needed to give 'male patient' a name too - establish the brother/family angle sooner.

They're on different sides of the ethical quandry. I liked that. And then in the end Blair agrees to go against everything her vocation has taught her. That's pretty good.

A very original take on the brief. Just escalate the emotional push and pull imho.
Good job

I appreciate the gravity of this script. Life support leads to challenging decisions. The script is appropriately solemn.

The relationships were a slight problem for me. Blair is a doctor who happened be a nun at one time. Her mother is a nun. The patient she is treating is her brother. The family connections, in other words, feel a little too much on the forefront. A nun with two children would be a rarity, I think. I was also unclear about the terrible decision that put Horatio in danger.

Hi writer,

Personal preference - get rid of the underlining of slugs.

Also no a fan of randomly capitalizing dialogue, just looks messy on the page.

I think you have a decent idea here but didn't execute as well as you could. I'd give this one some love after the challenge.

Also I'm not sure who was estranged from who? Sorry.

All the best.

Hi Lance,

I'm not sure this one was for me.

The dialogue is stilted and kind of implies a sort-of "olden times" feel but there's enough anachronisms in the dialogue and setting to dispute that. The way characters talk is very on the nose at times but maybe that's the nature of trying to fit plot into five pages.

I do like how there's a lot of contextual backstory implied here with the character's estrangement and how Blair stopped being a nurse against her mother's wishes.

In a way, it kind of reads like an out of context snippet of an old Tenesee Williams play a little.

Thanks for sharing :)

The relationships/character backgrounds in this script are unnecessarily confusing. Why does MSJ have to be a nun at all? You can have the same moral dilemma just by establishing her as a Catholic. As others have pointed out, it's on the strange side that a nun would have two children. Not impossible, but unusual. To the point that it's a distraction. And, scripts don't need distractions.

And her daughter is a former nun, now doctor. Again, it adds very little except to distract.

I'd suggest making the daughter a nun. The mother, a practicing Catholic. Then play out the scenario you have set up: a deeply held moral principle up against the reality of a tragic situation. That's the strength of your script... focus on that.

I'm a bit confused but it's probably my own naivety when it comes to who can be a nun. A son and daughter? Hmmm...well, none the less (rim shot), I think it's kinda weird.

Meets the challenge? Estranged - check. Was the son the third variable? I guess so. He was only on one page too.

Dialogue is a bit clucky in places but minor revision would take care of that.

Good job, writer.

Pretty good for the most part. Definitely estranged. Not a fan of the dialogs here. They were a bit unnatural and OTN. But in five pages, what can we do?

Anyways, good luck.