Spent the whole day pecking away at my script. It wasn’t a concerted effort. There was lots of futzing between bouts of musing. I’m having some serious navigation issues.
I know where this story ends. The way there has been shored up and reenforced. I’m at the bottom of page 35 and all these delicious mysteries that I’ve been nurturing have been coming together delightfully well. Now I’m in a place where I have all my key characters in one location, and I need to find a way to break up the scene, or I’ll wind up stuck with ‘em talking to each other for the next 15 pages.
There’s nowhere to jump to. I thought about some 1/8 of a page passage of time montages, but that seems a bit cheesy. Six characters (one who happens to be dead) are at a stand off in a cemetery. They aren’t completely sure what circumstances brought them there, and they definitely don’t know how to move forward. They don’t know who among them is trust worthy, and they certainly know that one wrong move will result in bloodshed.
It’s a perfect powder keg right now. I’m in the exact place where this story will implode on itself if I, as the writer, make the wrong move.
I tried to think of examples in film & television where the entire cast were stuck together for long periods of time in one location. I watched an episode of Firefly. Timed the scenes and broke down the story structure. Went for a walk and shortly thereafter had an epiphany. One of the characters is not who he claims to be. Don’t even have to change anything that came before. If anything, potential holes in the story design have been filled.
That’s great, but I still have a problem figuring out how to pay it all off with out having everyone stand around talking to each other for 15 pages. How do I translate exposition into action?
The Mind of Jarrett 