Using the "pause" and "silence" in scriptwriting...

Probably the most important nonverbal element in scriptwriting, especially playwriting, is the pause, or silence in the middle of a line or between lines of dialogue.  Often the most potent moment in a scene is during the silence that ensues after a poignant line, that moment when a profound decision or realization is made.  The audience witnesses this happening during the silence.

These moments are very much part of the writing.  You are creating a script that includes both verbal and nonverbal elements, and it's how the two interplay with each other that determines the shape and rhythm of each scene.  All nonverbal physical actions influence how your characters relate to each other and what they say and think.  And this is especially true for silences.

Subtext: A key to the script writer's art

One of the most significant elements in this difficult game of script writing is working with that elusive and dynamic "thing" called subtext--that submerged nine-tenths of the iceberg underneath those words on the page.  How do you use it to drive your dialogue and your characters' motivations and behavior and to fill those silences and pauses with potent energy and lightning-like insight and meaning?  Why is it that some writers are able to have the words that are actually spoken in a scene consistently take on a power far beyond what they are communicating on the surface? How do they do that?  What strings are they pulling to create that kind of special excitement between characters that pulls the audience ever further into the story that's unfolding?

The answer to these and similar questions involves backing up quite a bit when it comes to the process of creating a new script.  It demands that you know your characters inside and out before you attempt going into draft--what makes them tick, what specific milestone events have emotionally shaped their lives and how, and in what ways have they been involved with the main issue of the story that the future script is going to focus on--meaning knowing thoroughly their involvement with life in the past, before they first enter the action of your tale.

Subtext is that baggage--emotions, memories, and relationships--that every character is carrying with them as they enter your story.  And if your story is a good one, it will create its own ways that that baggage is felt and exploited as your characters face the dilemmas placed before them.  How they behave in certain moments of crisis or accusation, how they relate to other key individuals, how they respond to a sexual advance, and on and on....   And much of this behavior is nonverbal and very subtle.  A silence when a question is asked.  A hand going for that third drink when a certain topic is broached.  A shift in tone or volume in a character's speech.  These are well-crafted signals good writers constantly weave into their work and that point the audience to that subterranean place where the real story is continually percolating.

One of the masters at this is Harold Pinter.  His work is a study in the dynamic use of subtext.  Here's what he has to say about the famous silences in his plays:  "There are two silences.  One when no word is spoken.  The other perhaps when a torrent of language is being employed.  This speech is speaking of a language locked beneath it.  It is a necessary avoidance, a violent, sly, anguished or mocking smoke screen which keeps the other in it's place. When true silence falls we are still left with the echo, but are nearer nakedness.  One way of looking at speech is to say that it is a constant stratagem to cover nakedness."

That nine-tenths under the surface.

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I'm the Program Director of the low-residency MFA in Writing for Stage and Screen being offered by the New Hampshire Institute of Art.  Our next residency runs January 3-11, 2015 and we are currently accepting applications for starting the program at the following residency that runs June 19-28, 2015.  I'm also a playwright and screenwriter, producing partner in my production company Either/Or Films (The Sensation of Sight and Only Daughter), and a professional script consultant.

An essential step in the script writing process

I often wonder why so many playwrights and screenwriters--both beginners and experienced--don't consider pre-writing exploratory work more essential in their creative process.  I know that I harp on this a lot on this blog and certainly to my students in my MFA in Writing for Stage and Screen.  But I am continually amazed by the number of writers I consistently come in contact with who don't have a tried and true method of initial exploration of their characters and other aspects of their story before tackling their first draft.

Is it simply impatience trumping common sense?  Is it a belief that the writer has such innate talent and genius that he or she can just make up a brilliant script as that draft is written?  Or that the backstory is so closely based on the writer's own life experience that there's no need to spend any time upfront exploring it?  Or that these kind of "discoveries"--including what the story is ultimately communicating to the audience--are best left to be surprises that pop out of the writing of that draft?  Or that if thorough pre-writing work is undertaken the sense of adventure of actually writing pages of script somehow vanishes or is reduced to drudgery?

What I do know is that when writers are introduced to a method of thoroughly exploring a story's backstory before plunging into draft, a whole new world opens up for them in terms of their own creative process.  Suddenly characters become more alive and begin to breathe.  Subtext takes on a power the writer hasn't experienced before.  The story being developed opens up and the characters themselves begin to dictate action and behavior to a much greater degree, and as a result true and genuine surprises present themselves.  The writing of the draft becomes much more an experience of writing from the inside out instead of from the outside in.

Because stage and screen stories are about people taking journeys from one place to another and the changes that those people undergo in the process and the discoveries they make about themselves and their world, it only stands to reason that the writers of these stories need to know who their characters are in the most thorough possible way as they walk up to the starting line of the tale they are about to enter.  It's the only sure way that the writer can hope to produce a script that has power and any real legs.

There are a number of useful exercises out there that lead the writer into this pre-writing discovery phase.  Several are laid out in my book The Playwright's Process, where the emphasis is on character exploration, both in terms of straight forward and detailed biography and deeper, emotionally rich backstory events in a character's life that have shaped who they are up to the start of the story the script is going to embrace.  I suggest you try some of these explorations or others with the same focus if you haven't already.  I have little doubt that your writing process will be greatly enriched, taking on a new sense of adventure, and that your work takes on a new power and depth.

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I'm the Program Director of the low-residency MFA in Writing for Stage and Screen being offered by the New Hampshire Institute of Art.  We are currently accepting applications for entering the program at our June 2014 summer residency.  I'm also a playwright and screenwriter, producing partner in my production company Either/Or Films (The Sensation of Sight and Only Daughter), and a professional script consultant.    

What actors can teach script writers

The process an actor goes through in getting inside a role and bringing it to life has a lot of similarities to what a writer should experience in creating a role on the page.  I know that sounds obvious, a given in our business.  But I think it's worth looking a little deeper.

In my career I've always been struck by how many good writers I've worked with started out as serious actors.  And they have often shared with me that, to them, the creative process is much the same when creating roles, whether on the page, the stage, or in front of a camera.  Of course, not all writers are actors and vice versa, but even those who haven't combined the two artforms in their careers still acknowledge that the similarities are striking and that getting inside a role requires the same prep work and inner emotional connections between artist and fictional character being brought to life.

One of the most important attributes of a great performance on stage or film is the ability of the actor to play the subtext of a scene.  All successful actors possess the gift of being able to bring to life what's really going on under the surface when their actual lines are often saying something quite different.  This is a critical aspect of the actor's craft and what separates the brilliant from the average and raises acting into the realm of art--the ability of inviting an audience into a character's unspoken thought processes and inner life.  The actor who can dig deep and pull those hidden but very operative strings of his or her role in a story is the actor who will build a successful career and often reach stardom.

My contention is that the same principle applies to playwrights and screenwriters.  And that studying the actor's craft and how great actors prepare for and pull off amazing performances will pay huge dividends in terms of the aliveness of a writer's work.  It all starts with thorough preparation, exploring a character's past and present, and discovering what makes him or her tick.  It involves asking the right questions, like what baggage both emotionally and memory-wise is this character carrying with them into my story?  What is really going on under the surface of each line?  What is the throughline of each character and how does the experience of the story change them as human beings?  What does the diction and "voice" of the character tell us about who the person is and what they think of themselves and the world around them?

All good actors ask these kinds of questions in preparing for every role they play.  And it's the writers who supply the answers or at least hint at the answers who will be rewarded by great performances and who will stand a much better chance of experiencing their stories brought to life with richness and depth.

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I'm the Program Director of the low-residency MFA in Writing for Stage and Screen being offered by the New Hampshire Institute of Art and we are currently accepting applications for entering the program at our June 2014 summer residency.  I'm also a playwright and screenwriter, producing partner in my production company Either/Or Films (The Sensation of Sight and Only Daughter), and a professional script consultant.