Revisions

I’ve been through Awaken twice now for revisions.

For the first revision I printed the script out and made a ton of changes. We talked about that last week.

The second time I read it out loud to make sure everything presented normally. Sometimes when you write something it sounds weird when you say it verbally. I built more connective tissue between elements of the script, and all the scenes are “good.” A concern is that the script is long at one hundred and forty pages without the final scenes added yet.

I also want to make sure I’m telling a coherent story. My story kicks off on page one, but I take time to develop the relationships between the three main characters. I try to make sure that each scene furthers that cause, taking the characterization and complication between them up another notch, but it feels weird, feels off. I don’t know how to explain it. Maybe I’ve spent so much time with the older version that this new version feels foreign? I really like the story, but it might take too long to get into high gear. There are four scenes where the main character gets sidelined and the two female leads take center stage to begin the set-up for the finale. I think that is a problem and I need to get him more active in that area.

The Ending

I technically have SEVEN MORE SCENES. That feels wild to me, but I want to see the consequences of the decisions each of these characters has made. Some are blip scenes, so we might max out at one hundred and fifty to one hundred and sixty pages, but it just feels off. There is a large confession that is critical to creating change within the main character. I don’t want to vomit that out in the last few pages, so I might move it back. Problem is that if I move it back, it breaks the set-up that gets us to the confession. It’s a big mess.

I think the overall theme is bobbing around in my head and I can’t seem to get a bite on it. That, above all, is my real problem. What do I want to say? The theme is muddy. I would have someone read the script and let me know, but I don’t have any friends. Let alone friends that are familiar with storytelling that could give me an accurate analysis. I’m going to give it to my “Top men” and see what they say, but I don’t know if it will be helpful in the long haul.

In other News

Since I’m waiting for the results of that to come back this week I started doing some more development on Kenobi. I’m ready to script now, so that will happen soon. If I can’t get my sheet together with Awaken I may shelve it until I have a breakthrough and move onto Kenobi in the meantime to keep things moving forward.

I was also afforded the opportunity to look at One Night With Michelle. I spent this evening actually reading over the draft I had and sifting through what I liked and didn’t like. There’s a lot to like. I need to hone in on what I want my theme to be and go from there. Then I’ll re-write the events to drive us to that point. A lot of it will just be re-working a handful of scenes. but I have to restructure the entire second half because I know my goals are different now. I want a lot deeper story than I had before.

I look forward to seeing you all next week with the verdict on whether or not Awaken was able to be reconciled.

Wish me luck.

Or don’t.

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