Successful Scriptwriting - Hardcover

Cox, Kerry; Wolff, Jurgen

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0898793254 ISBN 13: 9780898793253

Publisher: Writer's Digest Books, 1988

Synopsis

Covers plot, characterization, and dialog, tells how to write for specific formats, and shares the advice of successful scriptwriters

About this title

Review

Successful Script Writing is an excellent and ambitious crash course in all aspects of script writing. Beginning script writers can use this guide as a blueprint for approaching their craft, and experienced writers will find it a useful reference work and also a kind of "letter from the front;" it is full of real world examples from the authors' own experiences as script writers, plus interviews with other writers, directors and producers. The script writer's shelves, of course, are already filled with some excellent books, notably: William Goldman's Adventures in the Screen Trade:A Personal View of Hollywood and Screenwriting,, John Brady's Tbe Craft of the Screenwriter, the many works by the prolific Syd Field, including Screenplay: The Foundations of Screen Writing, and Carl Sautter's How to Sell Your Screenplay.- 7-be Real Rules of Film and Television. All these draw on a wealth of personal experience in the business and are highly recommended. The strength of Successful Script Writing is ease of format and interviews "from the pros." The authors divide the book in three sections: Learning the Craft, Applying the Craft, and Turning the Craft into a Business.In the first section, there's a checklist for honing in on your idea/story's salability, followed by chapters on plot structure, creating three-dimensional characters, writing outlines and treatments, and writing feature film scripts.In any book of this size some subjects are bound to be short-changed. So look on this section as a useful introductory course to the actual business of writing; you will need to search further for in-depth information on each particular element of script writing. Interviews with writers Stirling Silliphant, Alvin Sargent, Colin Higgins and Larry Gelbart provide informative glances at differing working methods. The second section focuses on writing for different genres: how to write movies of the week, hour-long series scripts, situation comedies, soaps, animation, variety shows, and how to create a new series. This section is strong on practicality, with valuable tips about which kinds of writing are the best starting places for new writers, which are the most difficult (creating a new series, as you've probably guessed), and which pay the best. There are also excellent interviews with pros such as Steven Bochco on his experiences with Hill St. Blues, William Bickley on how outside writers can sell scripts to a running sitcom, and Robert J. Shaw on the qualities needed to be a good soap writer. The third section tackles the business-end of writing. This includes the pros and cons of collaboration; protecting your work; an excellent chapter on pitching; finding an agent; and projecting a professional image (it's amazing how often the subject of sloppiness comes up: from writers looking for a job on soaps who've never watched the show to badlytyped scripts without SASE's). It winds up with a chapter on "How To Maintain the Craft and Discipline of Writing," highlighted by a wonderful interview with Stephen Cannell, and a resources chapter. -- From Independent Publisher

About this edition

• Publisher: Writer's Digest Books
• Publication date: 1988
• ISBN 10: 0898793254
• ISBN 13: 9780898793253
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 361