An excerpt from my script review for Mother Mary which will be available 08/03/26:
4.) Dialogue and Description
As sharp as the dialogue was when Sam and Mary get together, the description was not in too many spots, so we’ll start with that.
Page 2:
Seated at the table now is MOTHER MARY.
We know her instantly. We’ve known her most of our lives.
We’ve seen her face on every screen imaginable, on magazine
covers and on stage before crowds a million strong. We might
know her voice better than we know our own.
But we don’t know her, because you just made her up. If you want to argue the public in this universe knows her that well, fine, but we don’t. So stop saying as much.
This isn’t so much lazy as it doesn’t make sense. Do we know Mother Mary? Or are we supposed to know Anne Hathaway playing her?
It’s not a great way to convey what you’re trying to and on the very first page of your script.
I feel there’s a cleverer (not to mention simpler) way of delivering this information.
Same page:
What they are shooting is something akin to one of those
Vogue fashion videos in which a star (e.g. Lady Gaga or Kim
Kardashian) runs through a history of their most famous
looks. If you haven’t seen these, they are available on
YouTube.
Congrats! You just told your reader to go watch YouTube. Good luck getting them back from that rabbit hole!
After that, I tuned the description out when it was trying to be “too clever”.
But, and here’s why Reals suggested this one…
We’ve been discussing reading certain scripts or writers before you sit down to type your first spec.
On dialogue, Aaron Sorkin is the poster child for, “What’s the most interesting way my character can say this?” We should be looking for examples that emulate this to inspire our own writing.
Once Sam and Mary are together in private, designing the dress, they’re doing anything but in entertaining exchanges.
Page 20:
SAM (CONT’D)
I must say, I wish you’d called.
We’re a little swamped at the
moment…
MOTHER MARY
Would you have answered?
SAM
I wouldn’t have, but someone would
have, and they could have told you
to not bother.
MOTHER MARY
I’m sorry.
SAM
For not calling or for just showing
up?
That’s a fun little back and forth as our intro to Sam. This gal has a sharp tongue to go with her (understandable) grudge.
Page 30:
MOTHER MARY
The Breakdown Of The Century, if
you read the Sun.
SAM
Never. Unless it’s about you. You
had some sort of accident…
MOTHER MARY
Are you pretending you don’t know
or do you really not know? Because
it was kind of a big deal.
SAM
No. I know. I saw a video.
MOTHER MARY
Everyone saw that video. There’s
more to it than that.
SAM
I’m sure.
MOTHER MARY
A lot more.
SAM
I can’t wait for you to tell me.
Sam’s being polite, not bringing up what eventually will tie into the ghost story in a not ghost story.
At this point though, we’re still feeling out their relationship but also getting some nice subtext that Mary has a pretty big accident or similar that led to her taking time off.
When you read the text it’s essentially just two women standing in a room talking, but what they’re saying is luring us in.
One last one from page 45:
SAM
… And
besides, it would break my streak.
MOTHER MARY
Of what?
SAM
Of not listening to your music.
This is a very important aspect of Sam’s life now, not making “Mother Mary” a part of it.
The two were not only friends, and Sam was not only Mary’s original fashion designer, but was the creator of the key look that continues to sell the Mother Mary image, incorporating a halo into all of the gowns and costumes.
How was she repaid? She was left behind for something new, something different.
That’s a shitty thing to do to someone who was there before you hit it big, let alone someone you consider a friend, and Mary feels shitty about it.
I do agree with Reals that this was well written dialogue and something we should be striving for in our own writing.
As newer writers we tend to be very blunt with our, “As you know…” style exchanges when delivering exposition, but this is the way we should be doing it.
Characters don’t come right out and say things in good projects…they’re cryptic…snarky…whatever adjective you want to employ but the bottom line is subtext.
That, along with tension between characters, is the fastest way to get your reader from page 2 to FADE OUT.
This script had a nice quick pace in the middle, and then just kind of lost me once we hit the ghost stuff.
(In a not ghost story! Can’t clarify that enough!)
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