Day 2

Planning is always a pain.

I’d far sooner be doing the actual writing. But I know that without the plan, things could get out of control.

Hence, today I have to generate the synopsis. That leaves Days 3 and 4 to generate the scenario. That will then give me 10 days of writing at least 8 pages a day.

Why 8 pages? Because, that will give me two acts of approximately 40 mins.

But there is something wonderful about writing the synopsis (yeah, I managed to do it, so I’m on target so far). While planning isn’t developing the dialogue, which is the part that gives me the biggest thrill, but it does give me a thrill of another sort.

Every time that I have sat down to write a synopsis, it has always felt like a chore that you know has to be done, but will give no pleasure – a bit like taking the bins out, or loading the dishwasher after a dinner party.

But there is another reason I hate it. It’s because, there have been far too many times that I have tried to write one, and I realise that the story is either crap or isn’t ready. It has been the death blow to far too many of my ideas.

There is a thrill though, when the synopsis takes you by storm. You type slowly and get the first couple of sentences down. Suddenly, from no where, a new plot development jumps into your mind that fits perfectly. It makes perfect sense! The play will work far better if you use it! Damn! Type it quickly!

Bang! Another one drifts past your eyes. Hell, that’s good. That fits with the play and you last good idea. Quick! Get it down!

Before you know it, more and more of these ideas pour from your imagination and have to get onto the page.

Here’s where the danger comes – you can’t make the plot too complicated, else you run the risk of losing your audience. This is why you have to be disciplined about keeping your synopsis to one page, else there could be too much to achive.

Tonight’s work, went over that one page limit. The thrill was replaced by disappointment.

But not for long. I read the synopsis again and realised that the first few sentences did nothing other than enable me to start writing. They were dead lines as far as synopsis is concern – they didn’t develop a plot or the scene.

Magically, deleting these sentences – it ran to a single page!

So… Now to write the Scenario. And only 2 days to do it.

Enough blogging for today… Just a cryptic clue about one think that tonight’s synopsis has reminded me to blog about in the near future… Where do you get the names for your characters?