STORYLINING; IT’S AN ART

There is nothing as frustrating as those times when, in the story lining process, a meaty, potentially dramatic and resonant storyline is not plotted to the fullest extent of it’s potential, and so what the writer ultimately writes in the script, and what the viewers see on screen, is actually a much tamer, watered down, insipid version of the storyline the producer and the writing team discussed around the table at the Story Conference. And I talk here about long running series and scripts of shows you will know; shows like Holby City, and Coronation Street and EastEnders. These are the shows that I have worked on. But I don’t want you to think that the story lining that shapes the scripts of long running shows like these particular giants is nothing to do with the story lining that you will be faced with when constructing your scripts. Far from it. This craft, this art, is the same knotty bugger you have to face in any dramatic form.

No-one is saying that story lining is easy – or even interesting – it’s not always, sometimes it’s just a hard plotting slog. But in the planning of any drama, be it a single or a series, an un-produced or production script, it is essential that your storylines are plotted properly. Story lining is something writers should do in their sleep. Do it a lot. It will get easier and with experience the obvious beats will slot themselves in place without you even noticing, leaving you to concentrate on digging out the beats in a storyline that are not so obvious, but once discovered, will make all the difference to the original idea.

Each beat of each storyline needs to be worked out carefully. I am not of the school of thought that says ‘sit down and write something and where ever your character takes you that’s the place you’ll end up’ because I for one do not have the patience or the time (and in production both of these things are in very short supply) to dig under a lot of un-necessary, extraneous writing to find the original storyline.

Because believe me, and I say this with a bleeding heart, (having had to steer script editing sessions well into the early hours after a storyline had been allowed to go walk about during the drafting process and ended up infecting a bunch of scripts ready to go to camera) you will write too much, you will veer off the point, you will write yourself into a blind alley if you do not firstly, work out the main and the minor beats in the story line and secondly, work out how this story line impacts and affects the other story lines in your script.

There is a sort of dread that sets in occasionally, from my experience, when you are faced with a white, blank board (I use a wall chart, but insert page or computer screen to make this visual work) when you know you have your character all sorted out nicely, and you know what (vaguely) you want to happen to him/her and you certainly know the best bits of the storyline you’ve conjured up for them, but, there’s those awful stages in between the best bits, that you have to fill in. You have an hour of drama to plot, or even a half hour if it’s a series/soap you are creating/working on/wrestling with.

That’s a ton of story beats and a lot of mini peaks, a whole bunch of shallow troughs and a certain amount of path-picking until you get to the summit – the grand peak of your storyline. And that, (I am sure you will be pleased to read) just about finishes the mountaineering metaphors.

And this is where the skill comes in. This is where the true storyteller comes to the fore; where the teller of tales can shine at the craft of controlling and containing the elements of the story; pulling, teasing-out and revealing the optimum dramatic impact of the narrative.

There are lots of reasons why, between creation and execution, a storyline can fall foul of the production process and ultimately end up a shadow of the original idea, but if you stick to the rule book (there are just a few essentials to remember) when it comes to story lining, your story will not go far wrong and you will find that your story lines naturally weave and loop around and through each other – thus giving your final script a real depth, a fitness, a resonance all of it’s own.

The Basic Rules of Story Lining.

1/ Know your length

Know the natural length of the story line you want to create. Think about it instinctively and you will find you will land on a ball park sort of length. Not all your story lines will need, or be able, to stretch the full length of the 15min, 30min, 60min, 90 min of drama you are writing. Some stories may be short and sweet and best plotted over perhaps only a third of your script, some may feature in the first 2 thirds and be resolved by the last ‘act’ of your script, but in all cases, every story has a natural length and this you need to ascertain from the start.

2/ Know your rank

Decide if this storyline is an A or a B or a minor C storyline and plot it accordingly. An A story is one that can best be described as ‘what the episode is about’ – it’s the central theme, message and forms the internal shape of your script/episode. A B story takes up less script space but is important in that it will have the most impact on and resonance to, the A story. A and B stories run parallel and inter-connect through the script/episode and will influence the majority of the shape of the script. A C story is a minor one, a smaller and shorter story but still important in that it can undercut, contrast too, conflict with, or highlight and augment, the A and B stories. The idea is to get all stories, major and minor, doing a cohesive job together throughout the script.

3/ Look for the detail

Once you’ve got the main beats in place; those moments where the drama literally peaks and the dramatic impact is most intensely felt, then make sure you plot the lesser moments leading up to those dramatic highs. If you fail to carve out the detail of the quieter, subtler, gentler, sub-textual moments in your story line, the over all impact will be lessened and the pay off you are looking for will not happen.

4/ Work the connections

How do your story lines connect? How do they contrast and highlight each other? Look at their separate paths and it will appear obvious at first, the places where your story lines could interconnect and relate to each other. The less obvious moments of interaction and reaction between story lines is your next and more difficult job to identify. How can each story get the best out of itself and the others in the script as a whole? There are cross-over points in all stories and it is those junctions you will need to identify first. Next, plot in the parallel moments of each story line – when you allow your audience the opportunity to see and follow, your separate stories and spend time with each one.

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WRITING MISTAKES YOU DON’T WANT TO MAKE

I’ve been helping writers via SCRIPT ADVICE since 2007 and it feels the right time now to collate the most oft-made mistakes I see in scripts and hope you find the don’ts useful to know and the do’s easy to apply to your own writing.

 WOOLLY WRITING

As much as possible, screen writing is best kept clean, clear and simple. If the story line is convoluted, labyrinthine, moves across time zones, or periods in time, has many layers of plot that weave in and out of each other, it is very important to keep your layout, your script language and your telling of the story as simple as you can. The more complicated the storyline, the more transparent should be your script layout.

 Why? Because a script is there to be read, understood, interpreted and made into something else; a piece of television, a short, a play for radio or theatre. A script therefore has to be easy to follow and easy to understand.

Take it from one who knows, there is literally nothing, (bar childbirth) as painful as ploughing through a script that is dense, over-written, confusing, woolly, and ill planned.

ILL-PLANNED SCRIPT = BAD STRUCTURE

Get your homework done before you get creative. Plot out all your storylines for each character (each character arc) and also plot your main throughline (your central narrative) and make sure each plotline has a clear, separate and interesting journey through your script, from the first to the last scene. Use what ever method suits you best, post it notes, a white board, a big sheet of paper that you can cut up, do it the old fashioned way or use a spread sheet, whatever it takes. Don’t begin your script until you know where the plot is going, where the big moments are, how each plotline reacts and interacts with another and the overall shape of each character journey. To do this properly you will need to produce the following documents before you write your first script draft:

 A TREATMENT

A BEAT SHEET/or STEP OUTLINE

AN EPISODE OUTLINE

TREATMENT

Usually between 4 and 6 pages, this is a succinct, detailed, visually written, descriptive introduction to your story and is written entirely to clarify character, storyline, tone, genre and format in order for potential producers and commissioners to ‘see’ your drama and to understand it as a piece of workable film or television. It is in short, a selling document and I have written about treatments before in newsletter 11 and from that blog I add here the basic outlay of a treatment again:

 Treatment General Layout:

 Title: 

I love titles. Make yours really sell your idea by being the best you can make it. Favourite Titles? ‘Strictly Ballroom’. ‘A Matter Of Life Or Death’. ‘Call The Midwife’. ‘Roger and Val Have Just Got In’. Sometimes, it’s better that the title describes what’s in the tin so to speak, but also being succinct and summarising either the plot content; ‘In The Line Of Fire’ or giving a sense of the tone and style of the piece; ‘The Unbearable Lightness Of Being’ works better. And a title from my own stable? ‘Full English’ – a comedy drama about running a B and B in Cornwall.

 Format Description:

Is your idea A Comedy Drama? A 4 or 6 or more parter? Is this is a serial or a series? Is it a one off or Single? Action, High Concept, Character driven? Say so here to give the reader a clear idea of what to expect straight away.

There’s a lot on the Net about the difference between series and serials and you may get conflicting opinions on this one, but the definition for me and how I have used it in my career of 20 years (so far!) in television, the definition stands as I set out below:

SERIES:

A drama that is open ended. A core cast of returning characters. The backdrop remains the same and is returned to each week. There may be  several stories per episode which are resolved, but the series storyline; that which is carried by the core returning cast, remains open ended. Eg: Holby City. Coronation Street. (all of the Soaps in fact) Hustle. Merlin. Spooks.

SERIAL:

A drama of more than one or two parts, which has a serial element; a core cast of returning characters and an over-arcing storyline, but in this case, the storyline is ultimately resolved. Eg: Jane Eyre.  State of Play.  A Passionate Woman.  The Lost Prince.

Logline:

Make these as tasty as you can. I like to add a quotation from each character under their name; something they are most likely to say or something that alludes to their particular storyline. Eg: In a treatment I wrote ostensibly about The Eternal Quest For Mr Right entitled ‘A Man For All Seasons’ (another not bad title!) I created a character called PLUM; her quotation was ‘Plum is looking for a man she can spar with; so far, she has only dated those that shop at Spar’. 

Character Biographies:

In each character biog, give a suggestion of the over arc of their storyline across the number of episodes or across the span of the script you are intending to write. Make these people live on the page.

 Episode Outline:

I think this is self explanatory – but be exacting and succinct in your language whilst being as interesting as you can in your outlay of the storyline.  Give the main thrust of the A (or the main) storyline with the smaller, B and C stories if you have them, running parallel.

Main Story Arcs:

Each character has a journey and here you outline what that is in story terms. Again, pithy, evocative language is what we are looking for.

The Central Message:

This will be alluded to in your pithy Logline at the top of the treatment, but here you can extrapolate a bit more and dig a bit deeper.

The Tone:

Throughout the writing of your treatment you must also pay attention to the style and tone of your writing and as much as possible, evoke for your reader the flavour of what they will ultimately be seeing on screen when your Must Have Drama is produced.

BEAT SHEET / STEP OUTLINE

In film; a beat sheet, in television; a step outline. This document is both to use as your reference, to keep you on track as you write your script, and also to show the ‘business end’ (the producer/commissioner) of the writing process, that your script has enough drama, twists and turns, intrigue and interest to hold an audience. There is no need in this document, to go into great detail, but it is important to block out the main beats of the storyline and to mark the major twists and turns of the plot and to note the key interactions between plotlines. Also, to clarify the ending!

A SCENE BY SCENE OUTLINE

Here it is necessary to go into detail.

This is the blueprint for your script. Each scene, as you see it, should be outlined in simple terms, so at a glance, you (and the producer/commissioner) can see how the scenes interact and are juxaposed together. Literally, via this document, you can see how the script works. The scene by scene outline is essential in my view, to get right before you start the business of writing. This is the skeleton of the script, the bones of your story and will reveal it’s overall shape.

It’s also a really useful document to use as you write your drafts, as each scene can easily be referred to and can just as easily be cut or extended as your writing progresses.

 3/ SCRIPT LAYOUT:

OVER DESCRIPTIVE SCENE SETTINGS:

Short, simple, to the point and exact, these are the words that should come to mind when reading a scene setting. There is no good reason to go into any detail here, except to say where we are, whether it is day or night, and if it’s pertinent to the plotline, what year it is. Ext. Int. Time. Place. Year. That should do it.

FLASHBACK:

If you are writing a flashback sequence, or a flashing forward in time, then make this clear here by stating FLASHBACK and when the sequence is over, state END FLASHBACK. Sounds simple enough but you will be suprised by the amount of scripts that confuse the reader for the lack of these simple directions.

MONTAGE:

The same applies to the use of Montage. State the begining of the sequence and the end point. As much as possible, keep Montage sequences to a minimum and make sure they are visual and clearly carry the storyline forward.

OVER-DETAILING THE ACTION IN A SCENE:

Avoid getting too hung up on every action a character does in a scene. Keep in mind that if it does not highlight character, or add a dimension to the atmosphere, tone or story content of the scene, then it is not important to mention. Keep the scene moving – avoid internal observations (that we will not see on screen) and prose-like descriptions. Remember to use the camera as our eyes, and do not stray into novel territory by leaning on description (telling) in your narrative and forgetting the camera (showing) aspect of the story.

 4/ GETTING ADVICE AND TAKING IT WELL

Well I would advocate getting advice wouldn’t I? But it really is worth doing and once you have settled on your script editor, writing mentor, tutor, take their advice with good grace and at all times, avoid taking any of their comments personally. It’s a tough call, but taking notes is hard as it exposes the writer and their vulnerablilities. However, a good script editor will not be afraid to expose their opinions to the bright light of your response so remember that all script edit sessions with your editor or tutor, are an exchange of their creative and professional responses to your work and your reaction to their comments. Both should be delivered with respect and received in the same vein.

 Nothing separates the professional writer from the amateur as quickly as a writer who doesn’t take advice well.

 I help writers write better scripts – check me out here www.scriptadvice.co.uk