"Allen Bridge" blog #16...

It's been a month since I last did any writing on the script because, as I said in the last entry in this series, a new editing project had come around and I had to make a start on that - I wanted to get a push on with it to get it established, before transitioning to working on both things at the same time.

Anyway - with one of the three films essentially complete, and with the second well underway, and being that it was a nice round figure of a month since I'd last done any writing (May 17th) - I figured it was about time to head back to Allen Bridge.

When I paused I was at a convenient point - I'd just completed Act II (to Draft 1.1 standard) - and so I knew that when I'd resume I'd be able to go-over Act II (to bring it up to Draft 1.2 standard), which would be helpful to get my head back into that world. Indeed, I'd somewhat underestimated how easy it would be to - once stopped - stay stopped. So the time spent re-drafting the second act will be most valuable. However, already - just a few pages into that process (today was more about just establishing a new starting point - getting the ball rolling again - not shredding through a ton of pages) - I can see that Act II (Draft 1.1) is in ruder health, so-to-speak, than Act I (Draft 1.1) was ... which is nice.

Now, while I've not done any writing on the script for a month, that doesn't mean I haven't been thinking about it - indeed I've got a variety of ideas and notes and bullet-points, that'll need implementing, but only when I come to do Draft 2.1 ... most of the ideas require starting fresh from the very beginning (of a completed version of the script) and filtering the necessary tweaks throughout the entire screenplay ... elements of subtler nuance, if you will.

So the idea now is to alternate between the editing (which is coming along nicely) and the script. An ideal situation would have been to have gotten an earlier start on the script (by 2 or 3 weeks), so that when the editing project came around I could have paused with a complete version of the script, rather than a two-thirds-done version. Although, once I've re-drafted Act II, I'll be onto the third act, and that's - naturally - nowhere near as long as Act II, and considering what I have in mind to write, there should be a good thrust of momentum when I come to put fingertips-to-keys.