How to write a Commercial Screenplay with Lucy V. Hay

#screenwriter #screenwriting #filmpodcast 

This week on the podcast I’m talking to script editor, published author and blogger Lucy V. Hay. Lucy has been the script editor and advisor on numerous UK features and shorts and has also been a script reader for over 20 years. She’s had several books published and regularly runs courses and workshops on screenwriting.

This is a really good one if you want to be a screenwriter or improve you screenwriting/ Lucy gives me some great tips on plot, story structure, characters and dialog as well as tips for starting out in the industry.

You can find out more about Lucy's script writing services here: https://bang2write.com
You can read Lucy's books here https://lucyvhayauthor.com

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Transcript

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[Music] hi Jim here and you're listening to the honest filmmaker podcast career advice from people in the business this week I'm speaking to script editor published author and blogger Lucy V Lucy's been the script editor and adviser on numerous UK features and shorts and has also been a script reader for over 20 years she's had several books published and regularly runs courses and workshops on screenwriting this is a really good one if you want to be a screenwriter or if you want to improve your screenwriting Lucy gives me some great tips on dialogue plot story structure and also we talk about the industry itself and how to get started in the business enjoy I'll start off with what would be your advice for somebody who's just starting out decided that screenwriting is their passion they want to be a screenwriter what should they do in your opinion well I think if somebody's really passionate about screenwriting the first thing they should do is read some scripts because most people people when they're you know looking at TV shows or movies for the first time uh think they know what goes into it in terms of the storytelling they don't and on top of that even when you look at the craft of the screenplay there's all the other stuff that goes with the story as well in terms of things like funding and you know actors and casting and you know whether there's stars in involved and how to get like things like um uh Lottery funding I I mean there's so many things that go into making a film or a TV show people think they know what it is they think that it's just about the story and the answer that anybody in the industry ever kind of makes for that is we wish we wish it was just about the story it's not and so knowing as much as you can about the actual Logistics of film making and also how they get funded and how the industry works as well as the craft of Storytelling that's that's what screenwriters need to learn and that's how you get the reality check that you need to basically survive this crazy business because it is crazy I mean how anything gets made is still Beyond me and I've been doing this for 20 years now um and everybody on the internet's got like some pet theory about how they can save Hollywood or or change the way the industry works and blah blah blah blah blah um and the reality is you know all of those people get chewed up and spat out before they even begin because it's not even remotely what you think it is yeah wowers okay so then that's an interesting thing you brought up there about um obviously all this the other side of the industry and the things you need to consider when you're when you get given a script and somebody says right I feedback on this or can you give me some notes on this can you edit this how um much is that commercial aspect of the script in your mind or do you have a specific thing you're looking for in that script I mean it depends who's given me the script I mean if I'm doing a script edit for a private client one of the things that I always like to do before I even take on any work is to assess how commercial it is and what they are planning to do with it because one of the worst things I think a script edit editor can do is basically string their clients along and make them think that they stand a chance in a scenario that there's no chance that I mean I have seen plenty of scripts where I go yeah that has got no chance no chance whatsoever and I don't want to take people's money and string them along um because I know it's not just about the story it's about whether you can sell it or not now those private clients might be well I'm going to make this myself I'm you know it's a short film or it's it's this that and the other um and if they're going to do it themselves and I go okay but you know these are these are the things that you're going to be up against is that something that you want to do because the last thing I want to do is string anyone along because it's just it's it's not good karma I don't think you know and most people I mean there are people that want to do it just for hobby film making hobby writing and there there's nothing wrong with that is completely valid and if they tell me that it's just a hobby to them then that's absolutely fine then I'll just talk to them about the craft of the story but I would say 90% of people want to sell their work you know that's why they're making that investment in script editing so with that in mind then there have been occasions where I've done calls with writers and they've pitched me their work and I've had to say to them no I'm not taking you on as a client um because I don't believe that it is something that the industry wants at this point you know it might come round again but yeah I'm not taking anyone's money for no good reason um so and and I think that that's good karma as well because it means that people know that I'm 100% behind my writers I don't want to to you know take advantage of anybody you know it's a lot of money to to in invest in the development of your work and the burden of development is still on the writer which I personally think is wrong you know we have to invest a lot of money in our development and our professional development as writers as well uh when the industry should be taking a lot more of that in my opinion um but you know that's another that's another story so yeah so if it's for a private client then yes I always talk to them about the commercial element usually if it's come through a producer or a production company or a scheme of some sort there's um you know some kind of thing dve ding it so for example if it's coming through a scheme or something like that then it might be to develop marginalized writers in some way so we're not looking necessarily at the commercial aspect we're looking about giving people you know training and professional development to get get to give them a leg up because they are marginalized in some way um alternatively the producer will already have thought of the commercial aspects of the script and very often they do want me to comment on that as well you know uh frequently I get hired by producers for example to give my opinion as a woman on female characters for example or on lgbtq representation as part of that Community or or mental health you know those are like my three Specialties in terms of what they call sensitivity reading but what I prefer to call authenticity reading you know um so yeah it's it's it's it can be a it can be a number of different things but yeah I don't want to take anyone's money for For No Good Reason sure and with that in mind so say I'm a first-time writer I you read my script you go okay I can help him I can make this better I can give him some advice obviously if you're a firsttime r you might have poured your heart and soul into this script and with any creative Endeavor even now when I'm making films you do take it personally when someone says well this don't work and do you ever uh I guess you think the question is is there any advice for handling feedback that you would give people and do you ever frontload your feedback with any kind of uh disclaimer before you say it um yeah that's a really excellent question and feedback is something that's really hard for a lot of new writers to hear especially because 90% of the time a new writer will have quite a lot of work to do now I trained as a teacher and one of the things they taught us was that if you start with bad stuff it doesn't matter if you then go on to the good stuff they won't hear it so you always start with the good stuff and then you move into the stuff that needs more work and I always talk about um uh scripts needing more development not needing more work or being bad or or using any of the trigger words that can make people very upset I mean I train script readers as well um I do a a course every year for London screenwriters Festival uh where I actually train script readers in the art of feedback but I also have quite a lot of um writers joining uh that class every year just to see what script readers are told to look for and and how to you know how to actually deal with feedback so we talk a lot about how feedback needs to be constructive and how it is much easier to say that what's wrong with something than what's right with something so during that class and during and I practice what I preach as well is I always always strive to find what what is good about a script and there's nearly always something there's very few scripts where I go God Almighty there's nothing there's no redeeming feature here whatsoever and frequently with new writers they tend to be very bad at structure and plotting just generally that seems to be the thing they struggle with most that the other thing they struggle with is the concepts the controlling idea behind the story very often they'll make it quite wooly or muddy or even have like more than one idea and it's all kind of you know vying for attention they usually are pretty good with characters um generally um especially with reference to the protagonist and the antagonist and it used to be that that new writers would fall into expected character tropes and even toxic tropes quite a lot uh you know unconscious bias that kind of stuff and that was a real struggle for a real long time but in the last five six years in particular uh writers have started to get on board with the notion that you know when we tell stories we are especially if we want to represent certain communities or types of people that we're not we have to take a bit more care you know we don't want to to read stories with white savior tropes in we don't want to see stuff with homophobic tropes in and and dis aess tropes in as as standard you know it was as little as 10 years ago writers were like I don't care it's not a big deal why is everybody being so Ott about it but in screenwriting in particular uh new screenwriters are very very uh up on um marginalized characters and uh representing them respectfully in fact they possibly have gone too far the other way now and they worry too much and so it ends up you know tying itself in knots as well the like anything you've got to be somewhere in the middle rather than either end of the end of the scale yeah um and what I was going to ask then was is there anything uh when you get a script is there something that you see a lot that just makes your heart sink and you go oh it's another one of these um I mean there's always what I call zeit gu stories as soon as something big happens in the news um then there'll be a story about you know there'll be multiple multiple scripts about this big thing you know about 10 years ago there was that story of those pensioners who uh robbed a bank I think it was in Germany um and then there was another one over here that became the Hatton uh Bank Job movie as well and so there were a lot of old people doing crime no uh scripts for a long time it it's only started to kind of reive now I mean it was 10 years nonstop then when there's like any big anniversaries around there'll there'll be a lot of of scripts about that so for example um 2012 was I think the bicentennial of the um abolition of slavery in the United States and obviously some movies like 12 Years a Slave came out and things like that so around that time there were lot of speculative scripts that were dealing with that anniversary um uh around the time that Dolly the sheep was doing the rounds there was loads and loads of of speculative scripts you know sci-fi scripts about cloning and and loads of ones about um witchcraft as well um around the time that there was another anniversary to do with that I forget what it was but yeah as soon as there's anniversaries as soon as there's like a major thing happening in the news as soon as something does really really well at the box office you know people want to to write the you know rewrite the next Blockbuster um with their own spin on it you know those kind of things you know they always infect the um the spec pile generally then there's ones that just turn up out of nowhere for seemingly no reason I remember there was a period between about 2012 and 2015 where I was non stop reading speculative screenplays about a washed up 1980s or 1990s pop star who enters a contest of you know tribute a of themselves and either wins or doesn't win and it's like where did that come from I have no idea um but for some reason that was in the National kind of Consciousness for a long time um uh there's always ones that just do the rounds just generally because everybody loves it there's like Doctor Who style ones you know there's this rag tab group of people traveling through time for some reason that is always in there uh there's an xfiles one that's always around you know they two people who you know one is a cynic and the other is a Believer and and they're they're hunting ghosts or hunting aliens of some kind uh X-Men style ones where they're superheroes but with a difference because um you know they're not good guys or or they've got or it's an allegory for racism or mental health or something like that uh vampires are always popular zombies werewolves time travel just generally you know there are things that just go round and round and round and then there's like what I call like the the kind of uh cozy crime ones the the amateur detective who opens a bakery and she she in you know goes after crimes and then there's the moms who are cancer survivors uh or their children have died so it's a support group or something something like that and they go up a mountain to say yay we can do it and then they come down again it's they can be as specific as this which is why it always makes me laugh people go oh they stole my idea it's like mate I've read your idea over and over and over again yeah yeah yeah although that's an interesting selection of tropes and ideas there and I've I've yeah definitely seen and read those type of movies before um one thing that writers always worry about and panic about is is how do I protect my script what do I do do I need to get a lawyer do I copyright it what what what's your response to that usually when people ask you I mean at the end of the day under the burn convention copyright is automatic as soon as you write the execution of your script you know and generally speaking it's not something that we worry about over here over in America it's slightly different it's much more litigious Society but you know at the end of the day when I'm working with professional screenwriters I never have the conversation where they go oo I better go and copyright my script that just doesn't happen you know so and this notion that your script is in danger every single time you send it out is is not true in my experience I mean obviously have I seen copyright issues absolutely 100% but usually much much further up the chain you know to do with companies spying on each other and trying to like steel ideas you know corporate Espionage all of that kind of stuff yeah seen that every day of the week but the notion of somebody you know getting a getting a script and going oh this is really good I'm going to steal it and I'm going to make it as is it's just not going to happen plus on top of that you can't copyright an idea which is actually a good thing because if we could copyright ideas there would only be one science fiction world one werewolf story one time travel story you know all of that kind of stuff so um yeah I mean as I always say to my writers you know if you've got something worth buying or if you've got something worth stealing people will buy it because it's much much easier to just buy your script and either bury it because it's too much of a threat or start developing it and if you're too um inexperienced they'll just pay you off and get an experienced person in to develop it with instead you know it's much much simpler why it's bad business for them to steal your script that's just the way it is yeah and and also I think there's part part of that is also wrapped in when you first start out you don't you almost hold on to the script because you don't want the feedback you don't want to know what's wrong with it you don't want to let it out into the world and you're also you haven't figured it out yet yourself so you can't even pitch it to people because you don't really know what it is and a way of a way of that manifesting is you I'm worried about copyright I don't want everyone reading it I don't want it going everywhere which really it's you not opening yourself up to that feedback and being honest about what it is you've written um yeah I think it is I mean it comes from a place of fear and when we are afraid we are not rational thinkers that's that's the reality um so yeah I I always say to my writers don't worry about it just send it out the more people who see it the more likely you will get a deal you know hiding it away is actually the exact opposite of what you want to do yeah absolutely okay so so talking about actually writing a screenplay um so what are what are your Essentials for a good screenplay I mean I always talk about what I call the Holy Trinity of wri and craft so you need a bomb prooof Central concept and it needs to and when I say Central concept I mean things like the premise the seed of the story controlling idea whatever whatever jargon you use and in that concept you need a discernable genre um that's very obvious and a hook that makes us really kind of sit up and take notice a hook is that thing that gets people's intrigued that gets people through the door eventually of the cinema or gets them calling up on Netflix whatever and there's two types of hook one is called the dramatic hook which asks us to put ourselves in the protagonist's place the other is a commercial hook which is something the audiences genuinely love for reasons you know like dragons or dinosaurs serial killers time travel werewolves vampires those are those pre-sold elements that people love so if you can actually combine a commercial hook with a dramatic hook the dramatic hook says you know uh you know this terrible things has happened to this protagonist what would you do in his or her place you know a really good example of this was a kids movie recently on Netflix called damsel starring Millie Bobby Brown now in that movie are dragons princesses and princesses who rescue themselves now that is a commercial hook every day of the week because that is something that people absolutely love con at the moment another pre-old element of course is Millie Bobby Brown she can't do any wrong everybody loves her uh star starless um uh star power is real that's that's a fact people watch her because they love her um so that's the commercial hook aspect of that movie the other part is you're a young princess a young girl who has to save your country save your family by marrying this Prince that you don't want to marry and yet you are doing it for the good of your people which is bad enough anyway most women and girls particularly in that scenario we go oh no poor princess don't don't like that idea and then it turns out that it's all a big trick and that he's going to throw her into the lair of the dragon as a sacrifice I mean wow okay so I mean what how betray trade would you feel so it's a really excellent example of both commercial and um dramatic hook together and as a concept that was concept gold so I'm not surprised it's done especially well for Netflix because of course they know exactly what they're doing in terms of appealing to the teenage girl demographic who love Netflix because of course Netflix skews very young now um the other things that I think are really really important are characterization as I was saying earlier um audiences in particular have shown that um they're really really behind so-called woke tropes in other words you know characters that aren't the the usual you know sis hat male white able-bodied characters which we had for such a long time and then everybody else was issues all the time was issues now we want now we want marginalized characters coming to the Forefront we want more female leads we want more lgbtq leads we want more black and Asian leads uh we're still not getting quite enough disabled leads coming through but they are coming through with slow slow but sure it is happening finally after all these years um and also just looking at those tropes and those kind of things we don't want the same old same old when it comes to characters basically and and that even includes uh you know white male characters as well we don't want the same kind of her Heroes that we had before we want something slightly different all the time so you know audiences are much more um what's the word I'm looking for they're much more Discerning than they used to be I mean obviously there are the very loud dude flakes who say oh it's this that and the other it's go woke go broke and all that other crap um but they are a minority they are not the majority the majority of people want to see uh their realities reflected back at them if they are marginalized in some way uh by Society or they you know the the majority people they're interested in seeing things that aren't the same old same old you know novelty and and and diversity and understanding things that they maybe didn't have any personal experience of that's all part of Storytelling now we love that um so characterization Concepts and the last one would be structure uh plotting is so important and the average screenwriter just doesn't know enough about plot in they don't even have the vocabulary to really describe plotting to themselves so when they get feedback talking to them about plot and script editors producers directors they're very well wor well versed in plot and if you can't hit the ground running on plots you they're not going to hold your hand and so as a result if you can't keep up with them they will you will get fired you will you will get get replaced um so you have to know a lot about plot and also your plotting has to be excellent in your script as well these days because the competition is so high it used to be that if your characters were pretty good and your concept rocked but your plot was a little bit they go oh we can we can fix plot um but we're now in a space where people realize that actually car uh good characterization and good plotting they go together it's not one or the other um you know plotting should inform your character and character should inform your plot it's a symbiotic relationship and we're finally in that space now so if you don't know how that happens if you're listening to this at home and thinking I'm not really sure isn't it all about character you're back in 2009 mate that's what people were saying in the industry back you know over 15 years ago so now you have to catch up and make sure that you know how cling and character go together all right so with that in mind where do I go if I'm in 20 9 apart from obviously your website's awesome and it's got like a bazillion PDFs to help figure stuff out apart from your site where else do I go resources online to learn this stuff or books I should read well I mean one of my favorite books is this one which is uh the seven basic plots by uh Christopher Booker I think he's died now uh he's an interesting guy saw him at London screenwriters Festival about 10 years ago um he thought the pass of smoking doesn't cause cancer which I thought was weird but the book is pretty good and he actually talks about the seven basic plots uh which obviously would include the hero's journey which most people understand but there's so many more plotting archetypes than that you know there's Rags to Riches overcoming the monster the quest aka the hero's journey voyage and return comedy tragedy rebirth you know that's just for starters okay cuz this is it's a very dry book it's like 600 pages long and there is an audio book which is about 40 hours it's so long but it is worth waiting through uh just kind of using it as a textbook really that's I mean I I don't recommend reading it cover to cover because you'll just want to jump out of a window uh because it's so dry um there's also another book that I always recommend to people called teach yourself screenwriting by Raymond Frenchman It Was Written in the 1990s so it's really old and so all of the uh kind of examples he gives about pling archetypes in that book are obviously from the 1990s but the good thing is the 1990s was a really excellent decade for plot was really really good maybe not so great for characters you know often re watch a 1990s movie and go oh my God ah how racist or sexist is this you know it was a pretty pretty dodgy decade for that but in terms of plot it was was excellent um and SE 60s and 70s movies as well were excellent for plot 80s were a little bit bloated and a little bit all over the place uh which is why I always find it funny that people kind of worship 1980s movies and kind of haven't watched 60s and 70s or 1990s movies which I think are far superior in terms of plot um so uh yeah I would I would start with those two books I think there's also another book called um called constructing a story by Eve Leander and he's French and of course the French invented movies and and all of that kind of stuff so he he kind of has that inbuilt kind of French sensibility uh to do with things like plots and characters and and and Concepts and things like that um so if you can learn from French uh instructors I did as well and it's it's it's really Illuminating to see the difference between British plot American plot French plot and then other you know other nations as well you know kind of comparing and contrasting between the cultures can be fascinating I think my favorite culture for making films is probably Australia I I don't think I've ever seen an Australian film that I haven't just been wowed by and really loved um so um you know and and kind of comparing and contrasting all these different cultures and all these different ways of making things or describing things and all of that kind of malaky that's that's where you start that's how you develop a vocabulary for understanding how structure works because most people they're only watching what their their local uh Multiplex offers them you know why aren't you going to the picture house why aren't you going to the Arts Center why aren't you watching short films why aren't you going to film festivals you know if you're a student of the craft then you will you know get to the next level that's a reality gy yeah and the other thing is is when you go to the multiplexes now there's not that much on it's all sort of the same films in four screens You' got a lot of diverse range of options um what was going to ask you was so great book recommendations uh so looking back on your writing what's the best piece of advice someone's giving you about writing uh very early in my career someone said to me if without a great con you've got nothing and that is that is the truth absolutely when it comes to screenwriting you know there are such a things as as drama screenplays that are quite hard to pin down and art housee films that are hard to pin down literary fiction novels you know those kind of things you know but they're a hard cell for that reason because it's very hard to get people to spend their money on stuff that they're not really sure what it's about you know I mean in my case I don't care I literally watch and read everything um so I I very rarely check these things in advance um but the average person they're only going to the cinema maybe once a month tops and they're probably um you know wanting to watch their comfort watches on Netflix you know they want to watch friends for the 50,000th time they want to watch uh Brooklyn 99 any of these things that will make them laugh and you've got to get their attention with a great concept and if you haven't got a great concept it's going to be very hard to pitch as well so just getting in the room is going to be difficult um so yeah it's it without a great concept you got nothing yeah absolutely and I noticed uh one of the ones that popped out on your website your kind of free downloads was how not to write female characters so can you give me some tips on that how do we not write bad how do we not write bad female characters I think when it comes to female characters there are so many tropes that are overused and underused you know because like all characters your female character can be just about anything you like and we've seen such a vast variety of white male characters in particular and yet we see the same old same old things applied to to women and one thing that probably annoys me more than anything is the kind of of way that we go from one end of the pendulum to the other with female characters that's probably my top tip is you know if she's a wife and mother she's downtrodden she's a victim she's vulnerable it's like uh excuse me I've been a wife and a mother for a long time now and I enjoy both of those roles very much but that doesn't mean that's only what I am and I'm definitely not a victim because I'm that because I am a wife and mother that doesn't make any sense whatsoever you know we went through a period of about 10 years ago and we had what we what I call called the ice Maiden Trope where she didn't need a husband she didn't have a child she didn't have any friends you know she stood alone because she's so strong it's like really you know so we've gone way from one end of the pendulum right to the other yet again and that's probably the most obvious one and the one that women complain about the most another one that another Trope that women really really hate is when a female character has to be um abused or raped or even die to motivate a male character that that really hacks us off that really I mean even Batman couldn't save his girlfriend it's like seriously Christopher Nolan come on why are all these women always having to die to to motivate male characters does our heads in so yeah don't go from one end of the pendulum to the other um don't do that Trope where the of the dead wife or or girlfriend otherwise known as women in refrigerators um sometimes referred to as the fridged woman as well well um guy Richie is another one for fridging women all the time it's like come on guys what are you doing you know it's not 2003 anymore you know um other female characters uh let's have some older female characters you know why do women always you know we see a lot of teenage girls and we see a lot of women in their 20s we're seeing more women in their 30s and 40s now but it's still quite rare to see women the 50 and above I mean it is starting to happen Charlie's th Sandra bulock uh Julia Roberts all of those ladies are doing some really excellent work in that space and taking up space as well which is great um but you know why can't we just have more older women as standard um what else uh oh uh female antagonists female villains you know with with good kind of motives I would love to see some more that don't revolve around men you know I see a I read a lot of female antagonists who are like uh um you know their their husband left them or their kid died so therefore that's turned them evil it's like really why can't they just be evil you know there are horrible women out there who've got you know who are who are sociopathic by nature and just generally you know really horrific human beings why don't we see those women you know why don't we see more kind of anti- hit heroin style women I'd love to do see that you know we see a lot of anti-hero men not quite so many women um I would love to see the back of um uh you know the kind of good girl Trope the and also the not like other girls Trope so in other words she's hanging out with boys all the time and she's like the boys and she's like and she is a boy except She's Got Boobs in a vagina you know it's like really you know that Tom tomboy style women exist absolutely not saying that they don't they're perfectly valid but you know they are still women they're not men with boobs so let's let's see a little bit more of you know the the feminine quality and also let's just see more female characters generally who are just characters and their gender doesn't really play a part in their in their story you know they might have kids they might have uh friends they might be Warriors they might be mechanics they might be astronauts they might be this that and the other you know a character like fosa is fantastic you know she is just fosa she's not necessarily a female lead um and that's why women love her so much so uh one of the other questions I was going to ask you was about dialogue um and it was about how have you got any tips for making it sound natural and not forced and not too on the nose that kind of stuff I mean when it comes to dialogue most screenwriters write way too much I mean I frequently have the conversation with writers that like when was the last time you saw a piece of television or a movie where people are speaking for five minutes plus MH or even for two minutes plus and everything is just going round and round that talk when did that happen and people will go oh well Aaron sain or Diablo Cody or something like no they're actually they are not you know there's a lot of dialogue in those scenes but it's not leading the scene and I think that's the the the mistake that most writers make is they end up writing chains and chains of dialogue sometimes for pages and pages and pages I was literally reading a script like last week and it had 18 pages of dialogue just for one scene it's like when would that happen the answer is never never and I think the average writer doesn't understand that most dialogue is you know it's not even two lines most of the time it's like onew answers here and then they're just explaining things to each other all the time um so one thing I always say to to writers is don't worry about dialogue who cares about dialogue that is the surface level of that scene what is physically happening in this scene and nine times out of 10 in these edits the the writer can't tell me what's literally happening in the scene and that's when they realize oh it's all revolving around the talk now I get it okay so characters are not what they say it's what they do so we're talking about character Behavior first and foremost telling the story and visual telling the story you know you don't want to be worrying about dialogue in fact I was talking to a Hollywood screenwriter years ago now and he said that when he was doing the first draft of these movies that he was writing some of which were big Blockbuster films he wasn't allowed to write dialogue in the first in the first draft he to he had to write each scene and then literally write the space where the dialogue would be and write insert line here right and come back to it later because that's how much Blockbusters rely on visual visual storytelling um and so I took that little tip and I took it into my edits with with writers who write too much dialogue and I've said I'm Banning you from writing dialogue you have to write each scene with the character behavior um and and that's what we're going to do David Mammoth as well said if you turn the television sound down then you should be able to understand about 60 to 70% of what's going on even in dialogue heavy pieces you should still be able to know sort of what's going on and in the Blockbusters you should definitely know what's going on and so that mind mindset shift is really important once every screenwriter has done that with me and gone through all of these different uh kind of scenarios that I make them do sometimes they hate me for it I've got one writer every time I you know he gives me a screenplay goes I know it's got too much dialogue in it and I just get my red pen and I just go yeah um so but once we've done all of that then I will say to writers probably a good a good way of writing dialogue especially in the 2020s we've kind of moved away from the stylized dialogue that was so popular at the turn of the century I love saying that in the year two so like year 2000 maybe 1990s as well styli di dialogue was very popular you the Jos Weeden style dialogue and we've got less and less interest in stylized dialogue like Jos weeden's in the last five or six years in particular um so I would say naturalistic dialogue is very much come back these days even in comedy um so in that case go get out there and listen to people's conversations and also to listen to PE uh you know things that are on TV and things that are in movies and actually just see how little dialogue there is because most people they remember the dialogue the most you know they they write you know bits of dialogue for their for their Facebook statuses and tweets I'm showing my age now because uh gen Z definitely don't do this on Instagram and Tik Tok I suppose they do do the Tik toks when they they kind of you know lip sync some of the famous dialogue but usually it's songs rather than movies so already we're seeing a generational shift away from dialogue Jen Z aren't that interested in dialogue they're interested in action they're interested in character Behavior they're interested in visuals and we're going to be writing for them predominantly so that we need to really get with the program and understand um what people are actually watching TV and movies for it's not for dialogue it's for the story it's for the character's journey and we're interested in character Behavior more than anything else so nine times out of 10 I do tell writers is not even to worry about dialogue in the first in the first sort of like few drafts because nine times out of 10 they're going to cut probably half or even twoth thirds of it yeah or end up rewriting it all anyway so that's takes a lot of stress out of the if I don't have to worry about dialogue I'll just get a script together or this isn't really a question it's more uh London screenwriters Festival I've been loved it uh great place for new writers tell us a bit about it for someone who's never been before okay well London screenwriters Festival was basically set up because you know there wasn't one in uh in the UK anymore and also I remember sitting around the table from the festival director uh Chris Jones and he basically asked me and a bunch of other people what we wished we had when we started and we said things like read throughs with actors um workshops talks panels you know talking to agents talking to set you know understanding more about things like sales agents and monies and budgets and things like that um you know things that typically screenwriting mas and screenwriting degrees and screenwriting short courses don't always cover in in enough detail um and it's kind of like we kind of wanted uh to kind of dive into the industry and its expectations to do with the craft and to do with careers in a safe environment um and I think London screenwriters Festival kind of delivers on that and you know there's an loads of different seminars you know from writing soap opera through to writing indie film to you know lowbudget shorts through to um you know more expensive kind of high-end drama um script to screens where you know we're watching a movie and then the people who wrote the movie or made the movie are talking about it so it's like a director's commentary all of that kind of stuff um and uh yeah on a pitchfest as well of course because access is a huge deal to people who maybe have day jobs who maybe have come from a um a a background where they don't have anybody in the in the um industry you know a lot of them one of the things that I wanted to really kind of put on the map for London screenwriters Festival were female creatives because I was a teenage mother I had no child care I had no help and a lot of the things that I noticed were on during weekdays and it's like how am I going to you know do this with my day job versus my child care versus School how is that all going to all play so you know I said it should be at the weekends for example because it is easier to get you know a relative or a friend to look after somebody if they don't have to take them anywhere like to school and and stuff like that they may be maybe off at the weekend um uh off their own jobs at weekends as well and things like that um so just just basically it's it's supposed to be a um a a place where you can really kind of dive in find your kind of people you know it's really really nice to be with other creatives you know a lot of us as creatives we get get ignored by our families you know or they just don't get it or anything like that so it's you know it's I really wanted it to be a an event where people could all come together and and learn and get inspired and also be a bit more welcoming in spaces that you know weren't necessarily welcoming to women and and other marginalized people in the industry before that point yeah and I'd say I'd agree with all of that obviously there's the knowledge side of it but I think also when you're writing it can be quite a lonely activity that you do on your own and meeting loads of people who are doing that at whatever level they're at is brilliant and and also networking because you meet a ton of people who are you might meet someone who's making a film you might meet someone who's written the first screenplay so yeah would definitely recommend it um and then my last question was have you got a motto absolutely I mean bank toite has a motto which is um you know helping diverse voices and characters rise to the top of the spec pile and that's that's been my life's work I want to see people who wouldn't have otherwise been included be included because when I started uh you know all the odds were against me I'm still absolutely staggered that I got anywhere at all because the odds were so against me I had no money teenage mother no child care no help uh no contacts I didn't even have any scripts that were worthwhile I read my scripts now and go holy what were that what was that so I'm I'm staggered that anyone gave me the time of day and there were a lot of people at the start of my career who were very kind to me who actually did include me and did believe in me um and they didn't have to they didn't know me from Adam or or Eve I should say um and and yet they still they did help me so I want to pay that forward and I want to get as many uh you know bang to writers up out of this spec pile and into production and into uh you know professional writing as much as I can I hope you enjoyed this week's episode if you want more advice from industry professionals who are out there at the moment working or you just want to listen to some cool stories from film sets from around the world then please do subscribe[Music]