Co-Screenwriting a Feature Film

You don’t have to go it alone

Co-screenwriting

Early in 2021, I co-wrote a short film script with another screenwriter. We are both writer / director / producers and have had a lot of experience on set. I was always impressed with how well his short films did on the festival circuit. We talked early in the year about co-writing something. He pitched me an idea and I agreed to help him co-write it. We talked about our ideas for the script and worked out a loose beat sheet.

A month later we decided to turn the short film script idea into a feature length screenplay. At the time, I don’t think he realized the time commitment this would be. We took our original beat sheet and using the Dan Harmon Story Circle started building out a beat sheet for the feature. We already had a fair amount of material and we could take scene we had already written and plug them into the feature.

The Beat Sheet

Because we had a detailed beat sheet we could assign scenes as we went through the first draft. We would each pick the scenes which spoke to us for each sequence. Every time I sat down to work on the script I felt refreshed and ready to write. There were blanks in my script, but I knew my co-writer would be working on them.

Working on this screenplay helped me to facilitate the beginning of a daily writing practice. I would sit down to work on script pages every day. I wasn’t worried about how many pages I wrote, just that I was completing my writing assignments.

I knew what my next scene was for the script. This let me go about my daily life while my writing assignment ran in the background. When it was time to sit down to write I felt like it was much easier. The process gave me more ideas and encouraged me to write more.

I would sit down and listen to the playlist I had for this script. It always felt like I was going somewhere for a mini vacation. So much of my writing is in my own head and this felt like going somewhere else.

This also spurred me on to write an entirely different feature on my own. I was able to get pages written every day and sit down at my desk feeling energized and ready to write.

When it came time to compile all the scenes, everything worked. The beat sheet helped us keep the story on track and there wasn’t a moment when a scene or a character went off on a tangent. Working with another writer towards the same goal made the writing easier.

Communication

During the writing process we would meet up once a week via FaceTime. We would usually meet on the weekend to talk about the pages we wrote the previous week and plan for the next sequence in the script. Those check ins helped us to keep a good flow. Before meeting up we would read each other’s work in case we had any notes. Then we would talk about the next sequence and decide on writing assignments. Sometimes other obligations would come up, but the weekly check ins made sure that we knew what was going on. They also helped with accountability.

We were counting on each other to finish our respective assignments.

If we had ideas for the other writers pages or even edits to pages we wrote ourselves, we would mark up the script. That way both of us could see and talk about the proposed change. If we both agreed to the note, we would update the script.

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Over the next few months we went from an eighteen page short film script to a one hundred and forty three page feature length screenplay. We were both surprised by the length of that first draft.

During the rewrites which followed we always assessed which scenes we really needed and what we could cut.

Conclusion

With the script now in a good place, and a lot shorter we have started sending it out to festivals and screenplay competitions. We are also in the process of co-writing our next script.

Co-writing a short film script is a good way to get to know another writer’s style and learn how they work. Different writers bring different strengths to screenwriting and this can help the script be better than something written alone. It can help the screenwriter think about things they haven’t considered before.

If you want to write a script with another screenwriter make sure you have clear and defined goals. Talk about the writing process and figure out how you will work together. Accountability and communication are very important for this process. You are working as a team towards the same goal. You both want to write the best script you can.

If you do it right you’ll have a stack of pages, you’ll enjoy sitting down to write, and you might even feel like you’re going on a mini vacation.

I plan on making a spooky micro short, a creepy short, and a horror / thriller feature this year. To make these films happen, I need you, your friends, and your creepy cousin. Filmmaking will happen in Chicago. If you would like to support this horror slate, please connect: lance@hungeranddread.com

Next week I will talk about How to Write a Horror Short

Check out last week’s blog post: How I wrote three feature films in 2021