by Trevor Mayes | Apr 13, 2010 | Scenes, Style, Writing
Short And Sweet I’m fortunate enough to have two friends named Donna. Curiously, they both share a trait: they get straight to the point — no padded sentences or beating around the bush. I love it. You always know where you stand and it saves a ton of...
by Trevor Mayes | Dec 28, 2009 | Style
Sunday Pop Quiz There are at least seven ways to improve the following short script excerpt. Can you find them all? INT. PATRICIA’S HOUSE – UPSTAIRS – BEDROOM – DAY Patricia is sitting at her computer. She looks at her monitor, then angrily...
by Trevor Mayes | Dec 23, 2009 | Style
What’s a slug line? It’s another way of saying “shot heading” or “scene heading.” What’s a naked slug line? A naked slug line is a scene heading that has no direction below it — only dialogue. It’s considered bad...
by Trevor Mayes | Dec 12, 2009 | Formatting, Style
The Continuing Use of CONT’D I’m still seeing a ton of people using “(CONT’D)” unnecessarily in their scripts, so it’s time for a quick rant post. In years past, it was common to use “(CONT’D)” whenever a...
by Trevor Mayes | Dec 9, 2009 | Style, Transitions
Often times, the trickiest part of screenwriting isn’t finishing your first draft — it’s paring the dang thing down to 115 pages or so! Every line becomes critical. It’s therefore key that we don’t use any superfluous transitions....
by Trevor Mayes | Nov 23, 2009 | Dialogue, Formatting, Style
First, what are they? Parentheticals, or actor/character directions, or “wrylies,” are those little descriptions that sometimes appear after a character’s name, in dialogue blocks, to spell out tone, intent or action. In the poorly written example...
