A writing kind of day

About a month ago I started working on a new pilot script. One that I'd been mulling around for over a year. Last summer I was challenged to come up with a huge list of ideas for stories and I did. Some were good, a couple turned into really great scripts, others were obviously meant for the old idea recycle bin in the sky. And still some? They stuck with me. This new idea was one of those. In the back of my mind for the past year, I've been thinking about these characters. I've been thinking about this place. I've been thinking about their story.

So I started the laying the ground work. I came up with character sketches and outlines. I batted around plot ideas and story lines. I finally came up with a beat sheet/outline I really liked and then I started writing.

I wrote the first scene, the cold open in sitcom terms (I'm writing a multi-camera sitcom this go around which means it will be filmed in front of a studio audience, performed like a play, on limited sets, this is a new genre for me in pilots though I have written a Big Bang Theory spec). It came out over the course of two days, five pages worth. I though, bam! check that off my list. (I actually do have a to-do list when it comes to writing, it helps me keep track of everything.) And then I started to write the first act. And I stopped.

I had Angela, my trusty first reader of all things, read the cold open. I was excited to get her reaction. And she gave it. She said it was fine. Fine was not what I wanted. I wanted a laugh (which is hard to come by from my first trust reader). I wanted a smile. Something. Anything. Not, "it was fine". So I looked back over the pages and guess what? That was my reaction too. So the next day I sat and sat, staring at the screen, trying to figure out what to do with it. I knew I couldn't go any further until I fixed this problem but I didn't know how to fix it.

That was weeks ago. I'd since taken the character charts off the wall, put away the outlines and pages of notes. Moved the file from my MacBook's Desktop to the deep recesses of the TV Writing folder. And I tried to quit thinking about it. I started rewriting my baseball pilot, which I love, which everyone loves. But it had to be stripped down and built back up again, this I knew. I knew it could be better because it has to be. It has to be the best out of thousands of scripts out there.

I started a new writing project. I worked on teaching Angela the little I know about statistics for her grad course. I busied myself with other projects. But still, the sitcom story and characters stayed with me, almost like elevator music. Always there, never fully recognized. Until this morning.

I was listening to a podcast, checking email, paying bills, doing too many other things at once. My mind was anything but focused. Cookies in the oven. Busy busy busy. And that's when it happened. That's when something in my brain clicked and I scribbled this down on a piece of paper:

what if he's mourning her and she's the one who comes in...

That's all it took and I was off, back on track. Out came the character charts, the outlines. I buzzed to the internet, looking for photos of actors to help me visualize who I wanted in my show. More scribbling, fingers moving faster than my brain. The same Alanis Morissette song on repeat for inspiration for this particular scene. And before I knew it, before lunch, the cold open was rewritten. Funnier, tighter, better. Two characters swiped away, two new ones marched in. Dialogue figured out. Story moving forward.

I can't explain how it happens, no more than a painter can tell me how to move the brush or a doctor the scalpel. But when it happens, it's great. That moment when things start to come together. When I can see actors I don't yet know, walking through the sets in my mind. When their mouths open and words come out, words I never even knew they knew. They have a fight I was not anticipating. Then in walks someone else. A laugh, a movement, a story takes shape.

Writing. I don't really understand how it happens but I'm sure as hell happy when it does.