The Fine Art of Revision

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again… revision has never been my strong suit. In fact, I’ve never really revised. Sure, I’ve read through the first draft, maybe changing commas and a couple of lines, but never got into the deep, intensive work that is true revision - which is why I finally justified forking over some cash to take a screenplay revision course at Columbia University.

Granted, the course was pricey… pricier than I would have liked. (Since I haven’t been billed yet and might possibly get a small discount, I haven’t yet posted the final charge in my expenses section!) I entered thinking there was nothing I could get from 6 weeks that would actually justify the cost, and telling myself that I was doing it more to report back to all of you on my experience… what surprised and delighted me, though, is that I found the course to be absolutely worth it.

This super-intensive workshop required a total reworking of an already finished screenplay.  I speak for everyone in the class when I say we started off feeling like:

And ended feeling like:

Everybody loved it: but the intense rewrites, workshops, and massive amounts of required reading left everyone exhausted and dazed by the last class (yesterday).

I brought Left, a feature-length dramatic script I wrote in grad school, to work on. It won Emerson’s Evvy Award back in 2005 and, in true go-getter fashion, I hadn’t touched it since. I never imagined how much richer the script could become since, having the award in hand, I already considered it to be pretty great. My eyes have been opened.

The professor for this course, Jessie Keyt, was amazing (you can check out her credentials here, just scroll down to her name), but what really put this workshop over-the-top was the other students. Two of them already have financing for their films, and they all have background with filmmaking and writing. Their input and advice on everything from character to structure were invaluable.

The best technique I picked up from this class, though, is to start your revisions with your outlines. Not all screenwriters start to write from an outline (although they probably should) but whether you start with one or not, make sure you have one after your first draft is done. Then, after a re-read of the script, look to the outline to start adding in what you felt the script lacked. Start your rewrite by rewriting your outline – then follow it when you go back into your script. Trust me, this is a billion times easier, both practically and psychologically, then starting a revision/rewrite in the script itself.

After this incredibly exhausting adventure, my big plan is to take two weeks off from Left. Then, I’ll go in for another rewrite (having just done a rewrite throughout the six week course), which I then am so lucky to be able to send to the professor and the other students from this class to get their feedback once more. I’m determined to whip it into way-better-than-average submission shape before the year is out.

As an aside, I was able to speak with the professor on the pros and cons of going all-in on MFA programs, and she was actually the first to say not to do it unless you have a fellowship to pay for it.

If instead you put up the full MFA program amount, you could wind up feeling like this: