In this post I want to talk a bit about dialogue. Obviously, when it comes to screenwriting, the subject of dialogue requires more than a 700 word blog tip. That’s why I am specifically limiting today’s advice to re-writing and dialogue.
You may recall that when I spoke about writing your first draft, I said that your dialogue would be rough. “Bad” is the word I used. And that’s just a fact of life. You don’t fully know your characters yet. You don’t have your story down completely. Plus, it’s likely that you’ll race through your scenes to get everything down, and racing is what often leads to bad dialogue.
Just accept this as fact. It happens to the best of screenwriters. But having accepted that, you must then be sure to use your re-writes - all of them - to improve that dialogue.
In my experience, there are two ways in which your first draft dialogue will suffer. First, your initial dialogue is more likely than not to be on-the-nose. If this is an unfamiliar term to you, it simply means that the characters are saying exactly what they’re thinking and feeling in the most straightforward manner. There’s no subtlety or nuance. What you hear is what you get.
The problem with this? Most of us don’t do this in our daily lives. It’s not how we talk. We phrase things in a less-direct manner, leaving whoever is listening to figure out what we’re really saying. Think of any conversation you may have had with your boss in a serious setting. Or your spouse. On the other hand, if you want an example of on-the-nose dialogue, watch a soap opera or two. It won’t take you long to hear the difference between that dialogue and, say, The Social Network.
I’ve heard it said that “movie speak” is an exaggerated version of “real speak”. I believe that to be true. Therefore, you should avoid on-the-nose dialogue whenever possible in your script. That means that when you re-write your first draft, and each successive draft, examine each line of dialogue to see if there is a way for you to say the same thing in a more interesting and less-obvious manner.
This will take some time and get easier as you get to know your characters and story better. But let me say once more that you should look at every single line of dialogue. That doesn’t mean you will have to change every line. Some you will have gotten right the first time. Other times, dialogue actually should be direct. Nevertheless, look at each line to be sure of your choice.
The second area of concern involves your characters. One of the most common mistakes I see from new writers is that all the characters in their script sound the same. And guess who they sound like? Yup. The writer.
If you want to separate yourself as a writer, this is something you must master. Your characters should all have distinct voices. Ever notice how your friends are all a little different in how they speak? How they have their own favorite expressions and language? The same should hold true with respect to "movie speak". They say you should be able to cover the character’s name above the dialogue and be able to tell who’s talking simply by reading the dialogue. Now that’s probably a bit of an exaggeration, but it’s still something to strive for.
Again, this is something you should examine in your re-writes. Look at each character’s lines and make sure that they are not only consistent with that character, but also different enough from the other characters so that they have their own “voice”. Fortunately, this part of dialogue will improve with each re-write, as you get to know your characters better and begin to "hear" their voices.
I should note that you are also likely to get better at writing dialogue in your first draft as you get to be a more accomplished writer. You’ll be less likely to write something on-the-nose the first time since your ear for good dialogue will have improved.
By the same token, with experience, you are more likely to have a good grip on who your characters are before you write that first draft, so that giving them a distinctive voice will almost come naturally, even that early in the process.
In my next post, I'll offer up another tip with respect to dialogue. Hint: it's a number thing
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