finish my screenplay

I have a completed first draft of my first script!

I’m almost finished with the first draft. I wrote the last scene today. Later today or tomorrow, I need to go back and add in some more scenes explaining some plot points that are a little weak. It’s been really fun to see this project develop.

I’ve made some big strides in this one. It’s still a very rough first draft, but I’ve gotten to some of the really interesting plot lines and more of the “meat” of the story in act two and I think I’m nearing Act Three at this point. My characters still continue to surprise me. The last time I printed this out, I had over sixty pages. I still need to go back in and add in some of the scenes from the romantic sub-plot I’m working in, but otherwise this project is progressing at a nicer clip than I expected. knock on wood :-)

This has proved to be more difficult than I expected. I’ve been having trouble sitting down to write. At the moment, I’m blaming it on the chaos of a new term and figuring out my schedule, dealing with homework, and figuring out how to maintain my social life, etc. I finally sat down today and re-wrote my opening. It felt so good to get back on the wagon. Now I know that I need to work on this regularly in order to feel like I’m making progress on my long-term goals and setting myself up to get what I want out of life. :-)

So, in order to make this whole thing seem less daunting, I’ve decided to approach it one act at a time. My goal is to get Act One finished by the end of Monday which, for me, means two or three a.m. Then, since endings are tough, I’ll probably try to attack the third act next and then do act two at the very end. Then, I’ll have half the semester to revise and do final research on it.

I have a first draft. A very, very bad first draft. I should take the intro to screenwriting class offered here, but I’ve head that the teacher’s a nightmare, so the jury’s still out on that one. I’m also taking online scriptwriting classes at UCLA and am hoping to finish my script by the end of the summer. Looking forward to script frenzy this year.