Screenwriting CRW5372 Syllabus Fall 2011

Fall 2011
Tentative Syllabus:
Professor:
Lex Williford
Sections :
On-Campus Hybrid: CRW 5372, Section 001: CRN 17085
Online: CRW 5372, Section 002: CRN 17087
E - mail:
[email protected]
Office Phone:
(915) 747-8806 (309 HUD), (915) 433-1931 (Mobile). Please call me at my cell weekday afternoons 2-4 p.m.
MST only.
Course Hours : On-Campus: 4:30-5:50 p. m. TR, Worrell Hall 205
Online: Asynchronous
Office Hours :
On-Campus: 1-3:30 p. m. TR, Hudspeth 309
Online: 1-3:30 p. m. TR MST, via Apple FaceTime or iChat, Elluminate, Skype or AIM, or by appointment.
Please e-mail ahead to set up a time during either my regular office hours or at a time that we both can agree on
for an appointment. If I’m online you may also chat with me on Blackboard.
Course
Description:
Intensive study and practice in various forms and approaches of screenwriting, including workshop discussion
of individual student screenwriting. This course will be an intensive study of screenplay format for the feature
film, screenplay structure and screenwriting, including a workshop of student pitches and Ackerman
Scenograms, treatments, screenplays and synopses. Students will be required to write a feature-length script
(- minutes/pages).
Required
Text s :
Screenplay: Writing the Picture,
Robin U. Russin, William
Missouri Downs, Silman-James
Press (July 2003); ISBN:
1879505703.
Note: You may buy the previous
edition, new or used, but its page
numbers won’t correspond to those
in the new edition.
The Hurt Locker: The
Shooting Script, Mark
Boal, Kathryn Bigelow,
Newmarket Press
(December 22, 2009)
ISBN-10: 1557049092
ISBN-13: 9781557049094.
Williford
Optio nal Text:
Fall 2011
Syllabus: CRW 5372
Synecdoche, New York: The Shooting Script, Charlie Kaufman; ISBN-10:
1557048134, Newmarket Press (November 4, 2008).
Note: This originally was the required text when I first started developing the course, but
now we’re reading The Ghost Writer (a free Adobe Acrobat file included on
Blackboard) as our second text. You do not have to buy this text, since you may now
download it directly from our course, but we may discuss it as a reasonably successful
experimental script that uses a nonlinear or modular structure.
Also
R ecommended
For Serious
Screenwriters :
The Complete Guide to Standard Script Formats, Part 1, CMC Publishing,
(December 1989). ISBN: 0929583000.
Though somewhat out of date and difficult at times to follow, this is the formatting
bible for professional screenwriters and directors, emphasizing mostly shooting script
format but also some information about the reading or (spec) script. If you’re really
serious about screenwriting, this book is a must have.
Story: Substance, Structure, Style, and the Principles of Screenwriting, Robert McKee, It
Books; (November 25, 1997), ISBN: 0060391685. Also now available in paperback.
Though we may discuss some concepts from this book indirectly, I highly
recommend your reading it (and watching Charlie Kaufman’s Adaptation, which
includes both a homage to and a satire of McKee’s principals and traditional linear
dramatic structure. I’m not a great fan of the movie, especially the ending, but it’s
definitely worth watching from the POV of a blocked screenwriter having trouble
figuring out her screenplay’s structure).
recommended
Formatting
software:
I highly recommend that you buy the latest version (FD8) of Final Draft (Final Draft
Educational), especially if you intend to continue writing screenplays. You may also
receive other educational discounts from studica.com, campustech.com or
academicsuperstore.com, which may come at a better price (all around $100). Other
screenwriting formatting software such as Movie Magic Screenwriter is also available,
though I’ve always preferred FD, which makes it easy to register your script and
export it to PDF format for workshops. You’re not required to buy this expensive
software, of course, but it will save you countless hours of formatting when you want
to focus mostly on your writing instead. Unless you plan to write commercials,
training videos and documentaries, I don’t recommend your buying Final Draft AV.
The only free screenwriting program I can recommend is Celtx, which you may
download at http://www.celtx.com/download.html. If you can’t afford Final Draft
or another screenwriting software, I’d prefer you use Celtx rather than any other
word processing software, including (no, especially) Microsoft Word, which is almost
impossible to format correctly. If you have any problems using Celtx, go to
http://www.celtx.com/support.html.
You’re not required to use Celtx’s Studio ($4.99 a month), but the program has a few
interesting add-ons, including an iPhone and iPad app ($9.99) and it can export your
final scripts from Celtx to Adobe PDF format. Simply click on TypeSet/PDF on the
second bottom tab and then Save PDF. You can then e-mail the PDF to me for
workshop. While the formatting isn’t as “correct” as Final Draft’s, it’s getting close,
and it’s acceptable for this course.
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Williford
Fall 2011
Syllabus: CRW 5372
UTEP’s English Department Plagiarism Policy:
Plagiarism:
Don’t even
“Plagiarism is defined as the use of another person's ideas or words without giving proper credit.
think about it.
Plagiarism occurs whenever a student quotes, paraphrases or summarizes another person's work
without providing correct citation. Plagiarism occurs whether the work quoted is a book, article,
website, reader's guide like Cliffs Notes or SparkNotes, another student's paper, or any other source.
An entire essay is considered fraudulent even if only a single sentence is plagiarized.”1
Attendance:
Creative writing doesn’t mean creative attendance. If you must miss class or weekly discussion
boards, please notify me beforehand to let me know, especially if you’re signed up for workshop for
that week. Excessive absences may affect your grade, simply by creating a low class participation grade,
usually reflected in your comments grades, listed below. I may not always respond to discussion
boards, but I do read the postings and keep track of who’s posting. At the end of the semester, for
both hybrid and online courses, I determine discussion board and Adobe Acrobat comments grades
by tallying the number of responses for each student and then dividing the total for each student from
the class average. Of course, the quality of these responses is more important than the quantity, so I’ll
be checking both and will adjust grades, especially for those with more insightful and in-depth
discussions.
Grades:
Your grades will be determined by your completion of:
1. One Pitch of your screenplay (no more than about three well-crafted sentences)
and
2. One Ackerman Scenogram, a graphic representation of your script story.
3. One Critical Analysis of an already-produced Screenplay (8-10 pages).
4. One Treatment of your screenplay (no more than ten pages, no exceptions).
5. Format Quiz
6. One Feature-length Original Screenplay (90-120 pp.)
and
7. One Synopsis of your screenplay (no more than one double-spaced page in Courier
font), included with your Script as part of your final portfolio.
8. Discussion Board Comments (readings and other discussions).
9. Adobe Acrobat Comments (workshops)
Note: absences
can affect
These tentative
percentages
significantly.
W riting
Assignment
Deadlines :
Percentages:
5%
10%
10%
5%
50%
10%
10%
Final drafts of all workshop assignments and writing assignments are due no later than midnight Monday
the week they’re due (except for the script, due on Friday of Week 15), so please plan ahead. (See Weekly
Schedule and Deadlines below.)
Week
5
7
10
15
Assignment
Pitch and Scenogram
Critical Analysis of a Produced Screenplay
Treatment
Final Portfolio: Script and Synopsis (including cover sheet under the first page of the
script).
1 http://academics.utep.edu/Portals/1559/docs/resources/Avoiding%20Plagiarism%20-%20Syllabus%20Statements.doc
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Williford
Screenwriting
Format:
M anuscript
Guidelines:
Fall 2011
Syllabus: CRW 5372
Follow the format guidelines in Screenplay: Writing the Picture closely. Hollywood screenplay readers often
toss out screenplays that don’t follow the accepted screenplay formats for reading (or spec) scripts (not
shooting scripts, a distinction we’ll discuss in class). These rules, like many rules of grammar, may seem
arbitrary at first but are logical and usually consistent once you know them. Remember, too, that the format of
published screenplays or those Acrobat scripts supplied by script websites (in Screenwriting Resources) are not
models for formatting or, for that matter, quality. They’re simply screenplays for study and discussion,
sometimes with flaws of form, formatting and content, especially unformatted or poorly formatted scripts
people have written while watching the films; many of the scripts available online are either shooting scripts or
early drafts of well-known scripts, so they may be significantly different from the edited films you’ve seen. I
highly recommend using final drafts of scripts for your Critical Analyses of Produced Scripts, unless you want
to compare earlier versions to the final draft.
The best way to learn how to write screenplays is to read as many as you can get your hands on. Students may,
if they wish, download other screenplays from the internet; I’ve included links (under Screenwriting Resources)
in Blackboard.
Creative writing doesn’t mean creative grammar. Carefully revise all manuscripts, making them free of
grammatical errors and typos before you turn them in for workshop or upload them for a grade. Think of the
workshop as submitting the manuscript for acceptance by a screen agent or director and present your work as
professionally as you would submit it to a script reader at Paramount or to the Sundance Film Festival. One of
the most common complaints of script readers (other than their jobs being awful) is that most of the scripts
that come into them are so riddled with format, grammatical and spelling errors that script readers never get
past the first five pages.
Class
Pacing:
This class will be fast paced, and your progress will depend greatly on how well you can keep up with the
deadlines, for both reading and writing assignments. I don’t recommend taking this course with another intensive
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Fall 2011
Syllabus: CRW 5372
writing course this semester or with a heavy class load of writing or reading.
This course is set up like a three-act screenplay: the first act of the semester focuses on a little dramatic theory,
story generation and development; the second act moves directly to critiquing your own treatments and scenes;
and the third act focuses on critiquing and revising your screenplays for a final grade. Almost as soon as we’re
finished critiquing treatments, we’ll begin analysing drafts of screenplays, so begin writing immediately as soon
as the semester starts and keep up with your deadlines, which will come at you so fast you’ll forget you blinked.
This course isn’t designed for procrastinators; you simply can’t wait until the last minute to do your work. If
you get stuck, don’t hesitate to call me or make an appointment with me during my office hours; I may be able
to save you some time and hours of procrastination, but if you wait until the last minute to meet with me, I
won’t be much help. Set up a regular weekly writing schedule and keep to it, at least an hour or two a day.
Adobe
Acrobat
W eekly
Shared
Comments
Deadlines:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
If you haven’t got the latest version of the free Adobe Acrobat Reader, please download and
install it now from http://get.adobe.com/reader. We’ll base all our workshops upon Adobe
Acrobat comments. (Only the most recent version of Adobe Acrobat Reader will work
best, so please upgrade or uninstall the previous version before installing the new version.)
Shared Reviews in Adobe Acrobat Reader allow students to share (or “publish”) their
comments through an online server, making it possible for them to make comments,
publish them online and read other students’ comments, constantly syncing everyone’s
comments in the document you’ve saved to your computer.
Here are the steps we’ll follow for workshops:
• A student up for workshop will write her workshop document—say, a treatment—in
Word or Rich Text Format or her script in Final Draft, Celtx, or another standard
screenwriting program, then export it to Adobe Acrobat format if possible and e-mail it
to me following the Weekly Schedule and Deadlines above. (We’ll comment on
everyone’s pitches and Scenograms as a single Adobe Acrobat document.)
• If it’s not already converted, I’ll convert the file to an Adobe Acrobat document. (If the
student is writing in Final Draft, he may convert it to Adobe Acrobat format for me by
clicking on the File menu, then Save as PDF, then e-mail the document to me. Celtx
also has a Print to PDF function.)
• Using Adobe Acrobat Professional, I’ll enable the document for comments, listing the
e-mails of all the students in the course so they’ll have access to the online document’s
comments repository, then upload the document to a server for comments.
• Open the e-mail I sent with the document. If the program prompts you, save the
document to your desktop (or to a new folder you’ve created for workshops).
• Open the document. Then using the Comment and Mark-up tools in Adobe Acrobat
Reader make as many comments as you’d like—at least the number I’ve recommended
each week—including a paragraph-long end note. (Right clicking the toolbar gives you
the option to select the tools you want to use.) Use the Sticky Note tool for most
comments, and avoid using the Call-Out tool, which tends to cover up the document
so it’s difficult to read. (I’ve included links under Course Content: Workshop Resources
for instructional videos on the commenting process, if you have any trouble.)
• When you’re finished making comments, make sure your Internet connection is on,
then click Publish Comments to make your comments available to the rest of the class.
• If you want to see what others’ comments are, click on Check for New Comments.
Workshop Discussions:
• Hybrid Courses: We’ll conduct most of our discussions in class based upon the Adobe
Acrobat comments class members have already made. I’ll project these comments onto
an overhead screen so that we can discuss them.
• Online Courses: I expect students to do most of their discussion in the actual
workshop documents. Students may look back at each other’s comments and reply to
them as if the students were in an actual classroom.
Important:
• I’d rather have unfinished work than late work.
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Williford
Fall 2011
•
•
Syllabus: CRW 5372
Please don’t wait until the last minute to meet your workshop deadlines. If you’re
unable to complete your treatment or screenplay, e-mail me what you’ve written so far.
If you must miss class the week your screenplay’s up for discussion, please let me know
immediately so we can arrange to workshop other screenplays. Our schedule will be
tight.
Please write concrete, helpful comments for your fellow writers, based upon technique
rather than vague, subjective judgments. If you write, “Cool, dude,” or “I like/don’t
like this idea/scene/treatment,” you’re not helping other students. If you find a
problem with a treatment or script, please offer a specific helpful suggestion or two to
get the writer on track. You’d want the same for your work. It’s okay to say you like
something; you just need to say why, as concretely as you can. It’s probably best not to
say you don’t like something—that’s a subjective comment that often doesn’t help and
ends up creating conflict, something we want on the page and not in class.
FADE IN:
Act 1: Imagining, Proposing and Pitching
The Script Story and Preliminary Structure
Inciting Incident:
Your decision to take this course and to write a feature-length script in fifteen
weeks.
PREMISE:
Will the protagonist (you) overcome all the obstacles—external and internal—to
finish a script by the end of the semester? Can you find the time, passion and
level of commitment you need to write and revise, to do all the assignments, and to
comment on other students’ work?
EXTERNAL CONFLICTS:
Deadlines, assignments, grades, an incredibly mean professor (the antagonist/
villain).
INTERNAL CONFLICTS:
Writer’s block, insecurity, envy of other students who you’ve convinced yourself are
better writers than you, fear of failing (or succeeding), something your dad or mother
or brother or sister or aunt or grandmother, et al, said about your frivolous decision
to write rather than get a practical degree like Engineering or Accounting.
DRAMATIC QUESTIONS:
Is the script idea you’ve been telling your friends about for years really doable? If
not, can you come up with a compelling script idea based on a similar premise? Can
you write the entire arch of the story in just three sentences? One page? Ten pages?
A feature-length script? Can you keep up with the class’s gruelling schedule? Can
you meet all the deadlines on time or before? Can you make an A? Can you make your
script marketable? Can you get your script produced? Is it even possible to get a
script noticed? Should you move to LA and wait tables until your big break (fat
chance)? Watch Sunset Boulevard and Barton Fink again? Follow your parents’ advice
and get a real job? And so on.
Daily Schedule
Note: For simpler navigation, the subheadings below correspond roughly with the left-menu items in Blackboard. All readings,
including those for Screenplay: Writing the Picture (SPWP), below are shown for the weeks they’re due, not for the weeks they’re
assigned, so you need to keep looking at least two or three weeks ahead to meet important deadlines. The Weekly Schedule menu lists
6.
Williford
W eek 1:
Introduction
August 22 - 26
2
Fall 2011
Syllabus: CRW 5372
these dates with direct links to the assignments to help save you time finding them.
1. Important: Don’t freak out when you look at the complexity of this course! (Okay, calm down.) It can be a
bit intimidating when you first look at it, but what appears to be complexity is simply comprehensiveness.
After working on this course over many years, I’ve supplied you with as many helpful tools to write
screenplays I know of, in the most practical way I know how, in a step-by-step process that’s worked well
for most of my students over many years. Because students have asked for specific instructions how to
write each assignment, I’ve included them here; because many of these assignments simply aren’t available,
either in books or online, I’ve had to write many of them myself over many years. If the instructions feel a
bit prescriptive, just remember you have a great deal of freedom in your choice of script content, form and
structure, that I’ve designed this course so that it matches most of my students’ writing processes in a
helpful way that will make sense to you when the course is over. I’ve adapted each assignment, from story
development to the final script, in a way that will help you focus on each step at the right moment. The
first few weeks might seem overwhelming, but do your best to keep up with the reading assignments early
on, and they’ll slack off a bit by the third week. If you focus on your assignments and deadlines week by
week, looking two or three weeks ahead as you go to help you plan ahead, you’ll be fine. In other words,
look ahead, yes, but don’t get too far ahead of yourself.
2. Click on Getting Started in the left menu and follow the instructions to get your computer ready for this
course.
3. Click on Course Content (Home Page), then on Introduction, then the sub-links, including my YouTube
video that presents an overview of the course.
4. To get a broad overview of how to navigate this course in Blackboard, click Course Content at the top of
the left menu, then on Blackboard Course Map. You should be able to zoom in and out, though this
ability depends on your browser.2 I’ve also attached a copy of the map to this syllabus.
5. Set aside a few hours to become familiar with the course’s somewhat complex structure and most if not all
of the course links, including all the left Blackboard menus and all the links and sub-links under Course
Content.
6. Though the left menu items can be helpful, I’d suggest starting each week, first, with Announcements to get
a sense if I’ve updated or changed the schedule, then with the Course Content page, the best place to
navigate to other sections of the course. I usually send Announcements by e-mail early each week, too.
7. Review closely each of these links:
a. The Course in Three Acts
b. This Syllabus
c. Weekly Schedule and Deadlines
d. Weekly Course Calendar (especially Weeks 1-3)
e. Reading and Writing Assignments, especially in Home Page › Reading and Writing Assignments ›
Creative Writing Assignments: Dramatic Summaries: Introduction to Dramatic Summaries, and
all assignments relating to the pitch and the Scenogram. The first act of this course focuses on
these assignments.
8. If you have any questions about any of these links (or any broken links), please post them in the FAQs
rather than e-mailing me. I try to answer all questions each week by Tuesday or Wednesday, especially in
the first three weeks. Originally, I designed the entire course for the UT Telecampus before it lost its
funding in budget cuts, and, alas, I was unable to copy over the course to this course shell. Luckily, it gave
me a chance to start over and rethink the entire course, but it’s been time consuming to rebuild since I got
short notice this summer. Please bear with me as I try to get it right. Any suggestions, please tell me.
9. If you don’t have the recent version of the free Adobe Acrobat Reader, download it here
(http://get.adobe.com/reader) and install it on your computer. We’ll be using Adobe Acrobat Reader
exclusively in workshops, especially because Acrobat keeps script format in tact as is. This course relies
heavily on PDF plugins to view PDF files within the course, too. If you need a plugin to view Acrobat
Reader files in your browser, especially on Mac machines, do a Google search with the name of your
specific browser type and the key words Adobe Acrobat Reader Plugins.
10. Weeks 1 and 2, we’ll focus primarily on writing, revising and workshopping your pitches and Scenograms
so get started on those right away, reading all the documents related to them in the first week if possible.
You may also click the down arrow next to Course Content in the left menu, but this map’s hard to read for most.
7.
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Fall 2011
Syllabus: CRW 5372
Screenplay: W riting the Picture Blackboard Reading and W riting
( SPW P )
Assignments
1. Though we won’t have weekly discussion boards
1. Please set aside a day or two to read this week.
for SPWP readings, please do bring up each
We have quite a few Blackboard reading
week’s reading when discussing issues in other
assignments at the beginning of the course that
discussion boards—just a way of keeping us all
I’d like you to begin reading now and finish by
honest and on a similar thematic track.
the end of week three (Home Page › Reading
2. FADE IN: xi.
and Writing Assignments). Read c., d., e., f., g.,
3. CHAPTER 1: How to Impress a Reader, 3.
and h. before you begin the first draft of your
4. CHAPTER 16: The Pitch, 331.
pitch and Scenogram:
a. Chinatown (under Scripts)
3
b. Conflict, Structure and the
Discussion Boards
Imagination
Please join the discussion boards listed here each week
c.
Summarizing and Dramatizing
and follow the instructions in Blackboard (Home Page ›
Skills Chart
Discussion Boards):
d.
Introduction to Dramatic
• Meet and Greet/Chat Discussion Board (all)
Summaries (under Creative
• Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) (all)
Writing Assignments: Dramatic
• Chat Discussion Board (optional)
Summaries)
• Screenwriting Course Map (YouTube Video)
e. Writing the Pitch
Discussion Board
f. Writing the Scenogram
• Course Documents and Presentations Discussion
g. Ackerman Fill-In
Boards, especially those on the course map, “Conflict
h. Chinatown Ackerman Scenogram
and the Imagination” and “Introduction to
2. If you’re like me and have brainstorming
Dramatic Summaries.”
and structuring long writing projects like
3.
SPWP
W eek 2 :
A Few Basics
1.
2.
3.
CHAPTER 4: The World of the Story, 43.
Appendix C: Who Wrote What? 417.
Appendix F: Where to Find Scripts, 425.
August 29September 2
3
scripts and novels, I highly recommend you
take a look at the links listed under
Screenwriting Resources and Mind-Mapping
Links to check out Mind-Mapping and
nonlinear writing programs that can help
your write what’s burning in your belly first
rather than trying to write a long linear
project.
I also suggest you download and install the
Final Draft Courier font while you’re at it.
W riting Assignments and
Deadlines
1. Due: E-mail me Draft 1 of your pitch and
Scenogram no later than Monday
midnight Week 2. I’ll combine these all
into one document each week for workshop
discussion and send them to everyone for
comments in Weeks 3 and 4.
2. Revise and refine your pitch and Scenogram
for workshop next week.
3. Due in 1 Week: E-mail me Draft 2 of your
Please note that I don’t grade individual discussion boards or Acrobat comments each week, but I do grade them. At the end of the semester,
for both hybrid and online courses, I determine discussion board Adobe Acrobat comments grades by tallying the number of responses for each
student and then dividing the total for each student from the class average. Of course, the quality of these responses is more important than the
quantity, so I’ll be checking both and will adjust grades, especially for those with more insightful and in-depth discussions. I don’t expect
students to have as many comments as my exclusively online courses, but I do expect them to write comments in discussion boards each week.
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Williford
Fall 2011
Syllabus: CRW 5372
pitch and Scenogram no later than
Monday midnight Week 3.
Discussion Boards
Blackboard Reading Assignments
Click on Screenwriting Resources, then Online
Scripts to Read for Your Critical Analysis of a
Produced Script and begin searching for a script
you admire so that you can begin reading it and
preparing for writing your Critical Analysis of a
Produced Script in Week 7. If you’re interested
in ideas for techniques to learn more and write
about early on, click on Reading and Writing
Assignments, then Guide to Critical Analysis of
Produced Scripts and check the list of
screenwriting techniques in the document.
We’ll be discussing many of these techniques in
class this semester. If you wish, you may write
about a script we read together, but I
recommend that you read at least another script
or two this semester just to become familiar
with script-writing conventions.
Continue reading all the Blackboard reading
assignments listed in Week 1. Have them all read
by Week 3.
•
•
•
•
•
•
W riting Assignments and
Deadlines
Due: E-mail me Draft 2 of your pitch and
Scenogram no later than Monday midnight
Week 3.
SPWP
CHAPTER 3: Theme, Meaning, and Emotion,
38.
W eek 3 : Pitch
and Scenogram
Workshop 1
September
5-9
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
W eek 4 : Pitch
and Scenogram
Workshop 2
September
12-16
Blackboard Reading
Assignment s
Finish reading the Chinatown shooting script
for discussion this week.
Begin reading The Ghost Writer script.
Depending on how many students are
interested, I may schedule a viewing of The
Ghost Writer on campus some weeknight in the
next two weeks.
If you’re online only, rent Chinatown and The
Ghost Writer to watch, preferably after you’ve
read the scripts, just to experience the written
scripts first so that you can say something about
how well directors have fulfilled the vision of the
script writers.
Writing the Treatment.
SPWP
CHAPTER 6: Historical Approaches to
Structure, 89.
9.
Meet and Greet/Chat Discussion Board
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Course Documents and Presentations Discussion
Boards
o Screenwriting Course Map (YouTube
Video) Discussion Board
o "Conflict, Structure and the
Imagination" Discussion Board
o “Introduction to Dramatic
Summaries” Discussion Board.
Scripts Discussion Boards
o Chinatown
Discussion Boards
•
•
•
•
Meet and Greet/Chat Discussion Board
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Course Documents and Presentations Discussion
Boards
o Screenwriting Course Map (YouTube
Video) Discussion Board
o "Conflict, Structure and the Imagination"
Discussion Board
o “Introduction to Dramatic Summaries”
Discussion Board.
Scripts Discussion Boards
o Chinatown
W riting Assignments and
Deadlines
Due in 1 Week: Final Draft of Pitch and
Scenogram, no later than midnight Monday,
Week 5.
Williford
Fall 2011
Blackboard Reading
Assignments
The Ghost Writer Script.
Writing the Treatment.
Chinatown Treatment.
•
•
•
Syllabus: CRW 5372
Discussion Boards
•
•
Course Documents and Presentations Discussion
Boards
o "Conflict, Structure and the Imagination"
Discussion Board
Scripts Discussion Boards
o The Ghost Writer
Act II: The Treatment
Act II: Discovering, Developing and Drafting the Script Story
INT. SCREENWRITING WORKSHOP – DAY
As you write scenes on 3 x 5 cards and sequence those scenes in either a linear or
modular way, you also begin developing your script by writing a ten-page treatment, a
concise, detailed dramatized summary of your script story. For the purposes of this
class, this treatment will be a story-development tool only.
When you market your script later, you’ll probably have to rewrite your treatment
significantly after you’ve written several drafts of your script to summarize the
script’s final draft as it is written, rather than as you discovered the story.
1.
2.
W eek 5:
Treatment
Workshop 1
September
19-23
3.
SPWP
CHAPTER 7: Power and Conflict 107
Blackboard Reading
Assignments
The Ghost Writer Script
Critical Analysis: “A Guide to Writing a Critical
Analysis of a Produced Script.”
Read Critical Analysis: “A Guide to Writing a
Critical Analysis of a Produced Script” and begin
working on your Critical Analysis of a script of your
choice.
Discussion Boards
Treatment W orkshops
W riting Assignments and
Deadlines
Due: Final Draft of Pitch and Scenogram: no later
than midnight Monday, Week 5.
SPWP
CHAPTER 8: Beats, Scenes, and Sequences, 132.
W eek 6:
6
Treatment
Workshop 2
September
26-30
Blackboard Reading Assignments
1. Review the structural issues I discus in “Conflict,
Structure and the Imagination” and finish your
discussion on the Discussion Board.
10.
•
Hybrid Course
Treatment 1:
Daniel Centeno
Treatment 2:
Online Course
Treatment 1:
Bradley
Treatment 2:
Carlos
Monica Martinez
Treatment 3:
Blake
Treatment 3:
Clifton
Discussion Boards
Course Documents and Presentations Discussion
Boards:
o "Conflict, Structure and the
Imagination" Discussion Board
o Script Discussion Board: The Ghost
Writer
Treatment W orkshops
Hybrid Course
Online Course
Treatment 4:
Treatment 4:
Diego
Robert
Williford
Fall 2011
2.
If you’ve not already read it, read Critical Analysis: “A
Guide to Writing a Critical Analysis of a Produced
Script.”
W riting Assignments and
Deadlines
Due in 1 Week: Critical Analysis of a Produced
Screenplay: no later than midnight Monday, Week 7.
SPWP
CHAPTER 9: Scene Cards, 161.
W eek 7 :
Treatment
Workshop 3
October 3-7
W eek 8 :
Treatment
Workshop 4
October 10-14
Syllabus: CRW 5372
Treatment 5:
Treatment 5:
Mari
KC
Treatment 6:
Agustín
Treatment 6:
James
Discussion Boards
Reading Ass ignments
Treatment W orkshops
Begin reading The Hurt Locker.
Hybrid Course
Online Course
Depending on how many students are interested, I may
Treatment 7:
Treatment 7:
schedule a viewing of The Hurt Locker some weeknight
Fabian
Lisa
in the next two weeks. Please read the script before you
Treatment 8:
Treatment 8:
see the film if you can.
Oscar
Monica Reyes
W riting Assignments and
Deadlines
1. Due: Critical Analysis of a Produced Script: no
Treatment 9:
later than midnight Monday, Week 7.
Julio
2. Due in 1 Week: 1-2 pp. scene from your script: No
later than midnight Monday, Week 8.
SPWP
Discussion Boards
1. Appendix A: The Movie Template, 408.
Scripts Discussion Board: The Hurt Locker.
2. CHAPTER 2: Format, 16.
1.
2.
Blackboard Reading Assignments
Treatment W orkshops
1. The Hurt Locker
Hybrid Course
2. Under Script Format, watch the Script Format
Treatment 10:
Notes presentation. You may want to follow along Daniel Ríos Lopera
in Chapter 2 of SPWP.
Treatment 11:
3. If you wish, you may also download the PDF file of
José
the same presentation.
Please use any extra time you have this week to
4. Read and compare the two script types in Spec and
1. Work on your script,
Shooting Scripts.pdf. We’ll be writing spec scripts
2. Prepare for the Format Quiz next week,
only, so please make note of the significant
3. Write a strong scene for workshop next week.
differences between each.
(See the instructions in Week 9.)
W riting Assignments a nd
Deadlines
Due: 1-2 pp. scene from your script: No later
than midnight Monday, Week 8. It can be the
opening scene of your script or a scene you’re
having trouble with.
W eek 9 : Script
Scene
Workshop
October 17-21
SPWP
CHAPTER 10: Entering the Story, 183.
Blackboard Reading Assignments
The Hurt Locker
11.
Discussion Boards
Scripts Discussion Board: The Hurt Locker.
Script Scene W orkshop
Williford
Fall 2011
Syllabus: CRW 5372
W riting Assignments and
Deadlines
1. Online Course: Due: Format Quiz: no later
than midnight Friday, Week 9.
2. Hybrid Course: We’ll probably take the format
quiz on Tuesday, October 20, though I may
have you take it on Blackboard to save time for
class discussion.
3. Due in 1 Week: Final Draft of Treatment: no
later than midnight Monday, Week 10.
This week we’ll discuss a 1-2-page scene from each
student. I’ll merge all the scenes into a single Adobe
Reader document. The Script Scene Discussion
Board is primarily for questions from the authors.
Act III: The Script
Act III: Writing, Workshopping, Revising and Marketing the Script
INT. SCREENWRITING WORKSHOP – DAY
You finish a draft of your script and begin workshopping and revising to begin
marketing it.
SPWP
CHAPTER 5: Character, 57.
1.
2.
W eek 10 :
Script
Workshop 1
October 24-28
Blackboard Reading Assignments
1. (Optional) If you’re interested in experimental,
nonlinear and modular script structure, read
Synecdoche, New York. You may read the book I
originally ordered or the script I’ve posted under
Reading Assignments: Scripts.
2. (Optional) Depending on how many students are
interested, I may schedule a viewing of Synecdoche, New
York some weeknight in the next two weeks.
1.
2.
W riting Assignments and
Deadlines
Due: Final Draft of Treatment: no later than
midnight Monday, Week 10.
Due in 2 Weeks: All Discussions about Screenwriting
Techniques in the Dramatic Scenes Discussion Board.
SPWP
CHAPTER 13: Dialogue, 253.
Diego
1.
Script
Workshop 2
2.
Blackboard Read ing Assignments
Dis cussion Boards
Screenwriting Technique: Dramatic Scenes
Discussion Boards: Please view all three video
clips and discuss the technique used in each
example.
(Optional) Synecdoche, New York Discussion
Board.
Script W orkshops
Hybrid Course
Script 4:
12.
KC
Script 3:
Daniel Centeno
W eek 11 :
October 31
November 4
Discussion Boards
Screenwriting Technique: Dramatic Scenes
Discussion Boards: Please view all three video clips
and discuss the technique used in each example.
(Optional) Synecdoche, New York Discussion
Board.
Script W orkshops
Hybrid Course
Online Course
Script 1:
Script 1:
Fabian
James
Script 2:
Script 2:
Online Course
Script 3:
Williford
Fall 2011
Syllabus: CRW 5372
Augustín
Script 5:
Oscar
W riting Assignments and
Deadlines
Due in 1 Week: All Discussions about Screenwriting
Techniques in the Dramatic Scenes Discussion Board.
SPWP
CHAPTER 12: Narrative, 237.
Script 6:
Mari
1.
2.
W eek 12 :
Blackboard Reading Assignments
Writing the Synopsis
Script
Workshop 3
November 7-11
W riting Assignments and
Deadlines
Due this week: All Discussions about
Screenwriting Techniques in the Dramatic
Scenes Discussion Board.
1.
2.
Due in 3 Weeks: The Final Portfolio: FeatureLength Script and Synopsis: No later than
midnight Friday, Week 15.
SPWP
CHAPTER 11: The Structure of Genres, 194.
Appendix D: Genre and General Clichés, 423.
W eek 13 :
Script
Workshop 4
November 14-18
Blackboard Reading Assignments
1.
2.
W eek 14 :
Writing and
Revising Break
November 21-25
Robert
Script 4:
Bradley
Discussion Boards
Screenwriting Technique: Dramatic Scenes
Discussion Boards: Please view all three video
clips and discuss the technique used in each
example.
(Optional) Synecdoche, New York Discussion
Board.
Script W orkshops
Hybrid Course
Online Course
Script 7:
Script 5:
Blake
Monica Martinez
Script 8:
Script 6:
Julio
Clifton
Script 9:
Carlos
Discussion Boards
(Optional) Synecdoche, New York Discussion Board.
Hybrid Course
Online Course
Script 10:
Script 7:
Daniel Ríos Lopera
Lisa
Script 11:
Script 8:
José
Monica Reyes
W riting Assignments and
Deadlines
Due in 2 Weeks: Final Portfolio: FeatureLength Script and Synopsis: No later than
midnight Friday, Week 15.
Thanksgiving Break:
N o C lass Thursday or Friday of T his W eek:
Writing the Synopsis
If you’d like, begin looking over the Agents and
Marketing links under Web Links in the left menu.
Please use this week to revise your scripts and write your synopses.
SPWP
Discussion Boards
13.
Williford
Fall 2011
CHAPTER 14: Rewriting, 293.
Blackboard Reading Assignments
Syllabus: CRW 5372
Marketing Discussion Board: Discuss your plans for
marketing the script you've written this semester.
W riting Assignments and
Deadlines
If you’d like, continue looking over the Agents and Due in 1 Week: Final Portfolio: FeatureMarketing links under Web Links in the left menu. Length Script and Synopsis: No later than
midnight Friday, Week 15.
1.
2.
SPWP
CHAPTER 15: Marketing the Script, 307.
Appendix B: Suggested Reading, 414.
Blackboard Reading Assignments
W eek 15 :
Marketing
November 28December 2
Agents and Marketing (Web Links):
1. Movie Bytes—Agent List
2. Tips on Marketing
3. Movie Bytes—Screenwriting Contests Directory
4. Script Agencies
5. Movie Bytes
6. Tips on Marketing.doc
Name
Hybrid Course
Preferred E-Mail Address
UTEP E-Mail Address
Discussion Boards
Marketing Discussion Board: Discuss your plans for
marketing the script you've written this semester.
W riting Assignments and
Deadlines
Due: Final Portfolio: Feature-Length Script
and Synopsis: No later than midnight Friday,
Week 15.
Phone Number (Optional)
Abreu Cornelio, Agustín
Centeno Maldonado, Daniel
Espinoza, Carlos
Godoy Barbosa, Oscar
Gomez, Mari
Molina, Fabian
Murcia Letona, Diego
Nemec, Blake
Pérez Méndez, Julio
Rios Lopera, Daniel
Valenzuela Palma, José
Name
Online Course
Preferred E-Mail Address
UTEP E-Mail Address
Cherry, James
Dockal, KC
Garza, Robert
Haines, Bradley
Martinez, Monica
Raphael, Clifton
14.
Phone Number (Optional)
Williford
Fall 2011
Syllabus: CRW 5372
Reyes, Lisa
Reyes, Monica
A Note on My Workshop Philosophy:
Only one rule applies to the critique of manuscripts in this class: Kindness is the only wisdom. The principal task of this workshop is
to create a safe place for writers to be honest and authentic in their discussions and their work. Some writers may be struggling to find
the courage to write stories of traumatic events that have occurred to them personally, or to people they know. The last thing we need
to do as a class is to make the discussion of these stories traumatic, too; doing so may cause writers to withdraw and stop taking risks for
fear of making mistakes or being emotionally honest. There are no mistakes in this workshop, only opportunities to see, understand,
change and revise—and sometimes we have to revise ourselves before we can revise our stories.
If a writer has troubles with his or her story, try to find a way to deliver that information in a non-personal, non-judgmental way, with
empathy and compassion and, if possible, without undo sarcasm. (Irony, sarcasm’s more subtle and sophisticated sister, is, of course,
what we’re trying to use in our stories to great effect.) One approach is simply to describe how you read the story, what it meant to you,
focusing on one or two fictional techniques (irony or sarcasm, for example) the author has used that have contributed to that effect.
Focus on what poet John Ciardi says is most important: not just what a story means but how it means, specific techniques we’ve
discussed in class which help us as writers make readers fall into the fictional dream, or awaken from it in a new way.
The more I teach writing workshops, the less faith I have in giving advice, especially the whole notion that a story is something to find
problems with and “fix.” If the author discovers that she has been misinterpreted in a descriptive analysis, then it follows that she will
have to revise. But if a student feels bullied by anyone, including the teacher, whose prescriptive critiques advise her to write her story
in a certain way other than she intends, a story she doesn’t want to write, she has the right to ignore such comments and focus only on
those that she finds most helpful, those that help her most to fulfil her own distinctive voice and vision.
Please avoid using such subjective judgments as good or bad or I really like/dislike this story. Each of us reads a story differently, and
that’s what makes workshop such effective places to discuss our work. Take what you can use and forget the rest. We all have a right to
tell our own stories in our own ways, and we all have a right to our own interpretations of others’ stories so long as there’s evidence
from the text to support our views. We may interpret the image of a child’s flying saucer toy lying upended in a bathtub as a hint that a
story is about alien abduction, but if there’s nothing else in the story to support that point then perhaps the story may be about
something else, the death of a child, say, or the grief of a father.
We show our work to others to help us when we’re too close to it to trust our instincts completely about whether what we’ve written
does what we’d intended, whether what’s in our head has gotten onto the page. Workshops should be both honest and supportive,
writers telling other writers not necessarily what they want to hear but what they might need to hear to make their stories work better,
meanwhile helping them through the sometimes painful task of revision: re-seeing their own stories clearly with some dispassionate
distance, finding their stories in the process of rewriting them, making the unconscious more conscious. Workshops should also be
open, generous, productive and tremendously fun, everyone feeling free to laugh a great deal—and not at others’ expense—meanwhile
recognizing that criticism must never be equated with cruelty or preoccupations with who’s up or down but always with the shared
difficulty of the work itself, always balancing a commitment to honesty about the work’s effectiveness with mutual respect for those
who create it and their individual creative processes and aesthetics.
A Note on How I Determine Grades:
Many students have asked me to describe how I come up with grades. If I had my choice, I wouldn’t assign a grade to creative work,
but because we don’t operate on a pass/fail basis, I have to assign grades and try to be as fair-minded and objective as I can be. While
it’s extremely difficult to quantify how I decide grades for creative writing, I’ve been writing and grading creative writing for thirty
years and I know that a C tends to cover averages (as much as we all hate being called average) and anything above that shows a writer
who’s beginning to take her work seriously. Please use this rubric as a guideline only, and remember: I always grade on improvement in
a student’s writing and the only averages I really consider are those that add up at the end of the semester.
Grading Rubric for Screenwriting
15.
Williford
Fall 2011
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
A
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
B
C or
Syllabus: CRW 5372
The writer moves beyond character type and stereotype, showing a growing mastery of deep characterization:
the character’s motivations are clear, subtle yet surprising, showing a strong insight into the mystery of human
motive and behavior.
The writer has a growing mastery of showing and telling, integrating sharp, surprising details into summarized
sections with a strong understanding of how and when to write dramatic scenes, trusting readers to be smart
enough to get it on their own.
The writer has a gift for dramatic or comic writing, moving the reader deeply, making the reader laugh out loud,
or both.
The writer has a growing mastery of significant detail—detail that shows and tells—using little or no static
description, making quick strokes of surprising detail in as few words as possible, showing a distinctive view of
the world and uncanny insight into individual characters and places.
The writer has a strong, distinctive voice, not a voice that just imitates a favorite writer.
The writer writes from within character, not imitations of plot he’s seen on TV or movies, understanding that
genuine plot reversals are about changes within characters.
The writer has strong, distinctive narrative authority, not just because she has confidence (many of the best
writers have little or no confidence at all) but because she has worked hard to make her work readable,
interesting, even beautiful, sentence by sentence, paragraph by paragraph.
The writer uses few if any grammatical or sentence errors, and when she uses them—fragments for effect, for
example—she does so consciously as a part of her craft.
The writer has a strong grasp of narrative conventions, how to write paragraphs, dialogue and so on with
correct indentation and punctuation.
The writer has few or no misspelled words, especially commonly misspelled words like yeah, all right, and so on.
The writer uses no unnecessary adverbs, realizing that they almost always tell rather than show.
The writer uses few if any wordy “is” verbs, especially the passive voice, using instead strong, active verbs that
make for vigorous sentences that move the reader through the story without hiccups that awaken us from the
fictional dream.
The writer uses no clichés, in sentence or character situation.
The writer knows how to write a strong balance of simple and complex sentences for effect, avoiding run-on
sentences, fused sentences and comma splices.
The writer knows how to use apostrophes for contractions and possessive adjectives and doesn’t overcorrect
(the contraction it’s for the possessive its; their or there for they’re, and so on).
The writer writes with a strong ear for spoken language, recognizing that dialogue is poetry and isn’t necessarily
the way people speak, using syntax rather than phonetic spellings or misspellings to capture dialect, trusting
that even the most uneducated speaker can speak with great elegance and insight, even if that speaker is poor
and inarticulate.
The writer uses few if any value judgments, generalizations or abstractions, unless they’re so insightful and
surprising that we have to stop reading for a few moments, smiling or frowning, to understand their depth and
complexity.
The writer uses strong, surprising figurative language (metaphors and similes) appropriate for her voice, her
story, her character and the world her character lives in, helping to make her writing vivid and utterly unique.
Rather than simply relying on her innate and unique gifts, the writer has a passion for craft and rewriting,
obsessed with making her story as close to right as possible without being a stodgy, self-punishing perfectionist.
Not writing to impress but to express—overwriting or overstating, using flowery language, Latinate or
multisyllabic words from the thesaurus—the writer uses plain English, inventing her own distinctive and subtle
lyricism, understating when others might rely on melodrama and florid, purple prose.
Includes at least 10 of the elements listed above.
1.
The writer mostly tells rather than shows through value judgments, generalizations, abstractions and clichés,
16.
Williford
Fall 2011
lower 4
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
Syllabus: CRW 5372
forgetting that writing is not simply about ideas and emotions but about surprise and reproducing the experience
of ideas and emotions by creating what John Gardner calls a “vivid and continuous dream.”
When the writer does write scenes, he tends to write about undramatic situations, his characters tend to use
exposition through dialogue, or they simply natter on about the weather or the philosophy of Friedrich
Nietzsche.
The writer mostly dwells on the superficial or the obvious or writes in prose so convoluted and abstract that no
one—not even the writer himself—knows what he’s talking about.
The writer wants to write about a universal character in a universal place, but because he doesn’t write about
unique individuals, he’s really just writing stereotypes.
The writer may have a strong sense of story and character, but he consistently misspells words and creates
numerous grammatical and sentence errors, not realizing that the rules of grammar are an important part of his
craft, helping in readability and clarity of expression, and that when he writes without proofreading he’s calling
more attention to himself than to his story.
The writer thinks that grammar should be creative, too, man, and he thinks he should be able to punctuate
sentences and spell words as he wishes, feeling that craft and rewriting are for sissies, resenting the man for
inhibiting his creativity, dude.
The writer spends little or no time proofreading, expecting others to do it for him, writing his story the night
before workshop while he’s drunk or stoned, his iPod blaring Metallica through his earphones, the TV on mute
in the background.
The writer tends to write from clichéd plots, and when he can’t decide on how to end his story he decides to kill
off his main character through suicide, a bus accident, a giant explosion or some coincidence having to do with
frogs falling from the sky.
The writer doesn’t read much and never has and shouldn’t have to, man, and would rather watch Survivor:
Tasmania or get to level ten on Grand Theft Auto IV.
The writer’s idea of conflict is car chases, light sabers, ninjas kicking ass and zombies eating their mamas.
The writer’s idea of sentiment is written in doggerel on the inside of a Hallmark card.
He-Man loses best buddy or girlfriend and his secret crystal talisman and all his automatic weapons; he gets his
buddy, girlfriend, talisman and Uzis back, then kills the bad guy and saves the girl and the world.
Girl gets boy; girl loses boy; girl gets boy back and they marry under the periwinkles.
4 Okay, this rubric is completely silly, but I thought I should least entertain you. Did I make an A describing a C? If not, give me some feedback and I’ll work on it.
17.