Making Sure Your Script is Industry Ready

In this session, we’re going to focus for a change on the more creative side of screenwriting: all the elements your script needs before it’s ready to share with the producers, directors and other vital ingredients of the filmmaking process.

So many different things need to fire on all cylinders for your script to stand out from the crowd: concept, character, structure, plot, dialogue, not to mention some less commonly discussed aspects such as what your story is actually trying to say, and to whom.

Understanding your audience, knowing how it fits in the marketplace, how you want it to resonate with your reader... All these things need careful consideration and can strongly influence what you actually put on the page.

Come ready with any questions you have to ask about the script itself: how to write at a professional level and make sure your project is ready to send out into the wild!

When: Wednesday September 24th at 7:00pm
Where: Zoom Video Call
Who: MFJF PRO Members
Cost: Free for MFJF PRO Members!

Content

What makes a Great Concept?

• The Essential Ingredients of Story
• Who’s it about?
• What’s the Big Idea?
• Writing a Stellar Logline

Form vs Formula: How Can I Be Original If I Follow A Template?

• Different Approaches to Structure, and Finding the Right One
• What are the Best Screenwriting Books?
• Creating your Original Voice
• Weaving the Different Elements Together

All The Different Elements You Need to Get Right

• Three-Dimensional Characters
• Creating Pressure: the Role of the Plot
• Visual Storytelling
• Writing Great Dialogue
• Nailing Those First Ten Pages

The Stages of Development

• How Do I Get it from My Head to the Page?
• Logline - Treatment - Outline - Pitch – Script
• What It’s Really All About: the Importance of Knowing Your Ending
• Knowing When It’s Ready

Course Leaders

Jon Gilbert

Jon is a screenwriter with a twin passion for psychological thrillers and human interest stories, who has developed projects with production companies including Kudos, Big Talk, Range and Bedlam, as well as with the BFI, and collaborated with directors such as Joel Schumacher and Jaume Collet-Serra.

He wrote for the Channel 5/Netflix thriller THE TEACHER, starring Sheridan Smith, and C5’s LOVE RAT, with Sally Lindsey and Neil Morrisey, as well as co-writing award-winning feature film THE ZIGZAG KID, starring Isabella Rossellini.

Jon started out in the industry reading scripts for Universal Pictures, the Works, and the BFI, subsequently working extensively as a teacher and script consultant at places such as the London Film School and the Met Film School, where he was a senior screenwriting tutor and Programme Leader of the BA in Practical Filmmaking.

Tickets

Eligibility