How many screenplays are you working on at any one time?

[Bachus]

I'm interested to know how others work. I have many friends that will only work on one screenplay at any time, will put their mind and soul into just that one as they cannot juggle several characters/plots at the same time. Others, like myself have two or three on the go, swapping back and forth. I find that I get bored of the same characters and story and wanting to freshen up my concentration levels will leave that particular one completely for a week or two, switching to another before returning to it a few days later. Sometimes, I will add to two different screenplays in the same day.

How do you work? Do you force yourself to get anything written down every day? Are you only satisfied if you have completed X amount of pages per day?

 

[Sweetie]

Currently 8.

I don't force the process. I have a very flexible schedule (most of the time) so I run heavy with it when I'm motivated/creative.

 

[Kingda Ka]

Boy, I couldn't imagine working on more than one screenplay at a time.

I do one at a time, but it usually goes very quickly. I got about 10-12 film screenplays I'm satisfied with, and they usually take me about 10 days to 2 weeks from the first kernel of an idea to final draft. But I can go 6 months to 1 year between them.

Nowadays I'm working on a TV series, with 23 episodes per season. Same process, I take the first kernel of an idea for each episode and bang it out in 10-14 days. The rule of thumb I use is if it is fun to write or not. I don't ever write if I'm not having fun. Luckily, the series has four story arcs (one is not known to the audience) so it's a riot to write.

My process is the first kernel of an idea goes into notes, I get key elements of the story and important lines of dialog, then cut-and-paste the whole thing over to Final Draft for the writing stage.

 

[SkyCopeland]

I was writing long before I got into filmmaking... so my workflow from short stories/novellas has carried over to my scriptwriting.

Basically I will have a number of ideas (which are all flashcards that are taped to my wall...) to pull from, normally the ones I've been thinking on for awhile will be the one I take down and being working on. I'll spend most likely two weeks to a month writing my first draft (this is a short film time frame) then I will put it in a binder and put the binder away with the rest.

Now that I've spent a time working on that project alone once I put it away I will pull out one of my PAST created scripts. This project I may have worked on from a month ago to a year ago. I can now reread this with a fresh mind and make changes. This will be the first draft editing to my second draft. I'll completely rewrite this script with it on one monitor scrolling along with my new writing. Most likely a lot of it will transfer over, but it will change significantly as well. At this time, I will hand it over to a screenwriting friend who will clean up my dialogue and make it more realistic sounding (as that's my weak point). He'll give it back, I'll read it and then put it away again.

Now I repeat the first process with a new idea, making another first draft for a project. Put it away. This is where something big comes. It's most likely time to take out a second draft from my binder pile. This is now going to be reread and given a FINAL draft. Then will immediately go to pre-production of storyboards, shot lists, character bios, etc, etc, etc... This process will most likely take a month at least. I go VERY in-depth with my pre-production as the better you do here, the better it will do in production. I promise.

Then I'll put that final draft and pre-pro away. Pull out a binder or start a new one. Eventually pull out my final draft and pre-pro again, give it some touch-ups and then build my crew to go into production.

So never am I working on two projects at the same time, but I do have a lot of shelving to keep my ideas and viewpoint fresh.