The Beat
So we did it. Sarah and I wrote and finished a script in April, and we learned a lot in the 101 pages of sometimes not-so-bad, sometimes ridiculously bad, many times funny-to-probably-only-us scenes.
I learned:
- That it’s really easy to forget all your character’s distinguishing features, such as accents, quirky wardrobes, or entire personalities by page twenty, never to introduce them back into your script again.
- That it’s really hard to write a script about the apocalypse and keep your characters from totally freaking out. Would you develop as a character, or fall in love, if the world were really coming to an end? I mean, really.
I can’t believe it’s happened. Script Frenzy 2008 has officially come to a close and I miss it already!
The initial numbers are in! 7,898 writers took place in the Frenzy, writing an astounding 129,743 pages, which resulted in a grand total of 889 winners! As Hawaii rounds to May 1, we’ll report back with the final stats.
Congratulations Frenzies! You rocked the pages!
We’ve rolled out our I wrote a Script, Now What page. Keep an eye out over the next week for some great cameos on editing and revising.
On film sets, the last shot of the day–that is to say the shot that stands between you and your bed–is called the martini shot. And that, my scriptwriting colleague, is where we are right now.
There are precious few moments left in Script Frenzy 2008. (I am already starting to miss it.)
We have winners popping up all over the site! As I write this there are 459 victorious scribes enjoying the limelight.
To get your share of the celebration, get your scrambled, PDF verified by our robots before 11:59:59 on April 30. If it is before midnight local time and you can’t see the validate button, check your time zone! You’ll want to make sure it is set properly.
Dearest Script Frenzy participant,
Hi. It's Chris Baty again—Script Frenzy's Executive Director and head cheerleader.
I've spent the past weekend fasting and meditating to achieve a state of Universal Writing Consciousness. I do this at the end of every April to commune directly with Script Frenzy scripts worldwide, and get a solid read on how things are going out there.
During my vision quest, I chatted briefly with your script, and it asked me to pass along the following two messages:
1) Your script loves you very much, even if things between you have been a little difficult
I can’t believe what I am about to write. No matter where you are in your page count, please sit down before reading on. What I have to say is a bit shocking…
This is the last weekend in Script Frenzy 2008!
I’m not sure how in the world the time flew by so fast, but it did. Almost a month ago you said goodbye to your friends and family, and hello to your story. Now your fans are gathering, chilling champagne, and unrolling the red carpet. When the warm applause welcomes you back in just a few days there will be one question on everyone asks: What was your page count? There is no getting around it. So, my advice is to have a page count that will knock ‘em dead. Simple, right?
At midnight local time on April 25th–if you’ve completed your master piece–you can start winning! To make sure our robots know that it is April 25th in your part of the world–set your time zone.
Here’s how you set your time zone:
1. Login.
2. Click the Edit tab.
3. Scroll down to Locale settings and use the drop down box to set your current local time.
4. Hit Submit at the bottom.
Dear Script Frenzy Writer,
Hey there! My name is Chris, and I'm the Executive Director of the Office of Letters and Light, tiny-but-mighty nonprofit that runs Script Frenzy. The Frenzy rocked my writing world last year, and it's been difficult for me to sit out this year's Frenzy to focus on administrative projects.
The upside to missing out on this year's fun is that I've been able to put a lot of creative energy into serving as a cheerleader for Tavia and Jennifer as they work on their screenplays. I'm proud to say that my friendly support—along with intimations that staff coffee rations will be cut for underperforming scriptwriters—has everyone on track for complete victory.
But I'm not here today to talk to you about our staff's scripts. I'm here to talk to you about beans.
Quantum Tornados of Hypothetical Moments
This is the second installment in the saga of my Script Frenzy 2008 script. You can read the first installment here.
This week my writing partner Sarah and I discovered why Week One was so full of wonderment and high fives! Just like a three-year-old giddily banging a Lego space ship against the floor until it becomes a mine field of sharp-edged Lego bits, we found writing about emotional and universal destruction to be not only easy, but fun in a morbid-toddler kind of way.
Unfortunately, all that fun had a price. We began Week Two with a script full of problems with absolutely no idea how to solve them. This became very clear to me on Thursday when our characters were sitting in a café sipping coffee and discussing the infinite possibilities of the universe instead of falling in love and saving the world from its imminent collapse.
This weekend is a pretty cool weekend. It is the second weekend during the Frenzy and it falls just before the halfway point.
Where ever you are with your page count I urge you to take full advantage of these two glorious writing days. Get up on Saturday morning and write three pages–even if you have to set your alarm clock or tether a rooster to your bedpost. In the afternoon get in three more pages. Cancel your plans for that 80’s bash you were going to tease your hair for and write three more pages Saturday night.
Here at the Office of Letters and Light we consider writing 100 pages in a month to be nothing short of heroic–super heroic that is. And, like all good superheroes, a dangerously attractive outfit is in order.
Send us photos of you, your write-in group, or your posse sporting the look and we just might show off your awesomeness in our store! (Send photos to info@scriptfrenzy.org!)
Need the look to proclaim to the world you are part of the Frenzy? With a click of your mouse and a quick change in a phone booth it can be yours!
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