An excerpt from my script review for Blink Twice which will be available 10/14/24:
5.) Format
Don’t take your reader’s time for granted.
My son is currently applying to colleges.
As I reviewed his essays and answers to the various questions I had two main pieces of advice.
Check and double check your spelling and grammar.
You’re asking someone to accept your argument that you’re ready for the next level of education, so you should be able to spell things correctly and string basic thoughts together.
The other piece of advice was to clearly state the questions you’re answering.
For a few of the schools, you’re given multiple prompts and told to pick one. From some of his answers it wasn’t clear which prompt he was addressing.
That was a problem.
You can have the most creative entry of writing known to womankind #FuckThePatriarchy! but if it doesn’t answer the question, you’re screwed.
Before I left him to it, I specifically cited this script, mentioning his father wasn’t famous and he would have to win the admissions office over on his merit and accomplishments.
And that’s what this script boils down to.
Are Zoë Kravitz and E.T. Feigenbaum bad writers?
I don’t know, but I would argue they didn’t present their “best” with this sample.
Did they take for granted that Zoë Kravitz has a famous dad and knew they didn’t have to do simple things like proofread or formatting checks?
Again, I don’t know, but similar to M. Night’s daughter in Trap, I can bet an undiscovered singer with moderate talent isn’t getting a film built around her.
And that’s what bothers me.
Any of us submit a script full of typos, inconsistent capitalizations, easily remedied format errors, etc. (all in the opening pages) and we’re getting deleted without so much as an afterthought.
Why should a professional reader not do the same for somebody’s kid?
Just to be clear, most of the typos were simply missing words so dialogue and description didn’t make sense, but rereading the script and someone could have caught ninety percent of them.
If you’re reading this review, you’re probably an unproduced writer wanting to learn, and lucky for you this is the easiest skill in screenwriting to master…
Simply respect your reader’s time.
Present the most polished version of your story you can by taking the time to proofread your script, not because you want to, but so no one else has to.
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