The Politically Wrong presents

What to Expect:

SCRIPTWRITINGFor the Tortured Mind

PrefaceMany times in life (alright, twice. Once?), we find ourselves in a situation where

a well-crafted script is necessarily. Many such situations, however, also feature such

terrors as chronic manic-depression1, or a herd of cannibals. If you’re reading this,

congratulate yourself. You are one step closer towards living your life to the fullest

despite minor impedimenta like your life being a horrific failure, or your mental

health2. This particular work was crafted to follow the annoyance of one particular

such tortured writer3 as he attempts to deal with several such problems on his way to

becoming an Academy Award-winning screenwriter.

Alright, so you’re in some weird play-writing gig thanks to the kind words of

some friends and the idiocy of some frenemies. Scriptwriting is a little like giving

birth to a child: you have to start making it, and protect it from miscarriages or

teratomas. It can also bring you a lot of pain. This article is all you need to confront

exactly such a situation, to help you navigate your long arduous way through 3

months of this sinning task. Not of writing but of dealing with people associated with

writing scripts. This article is a work of drugs and lots of hurting, as it attempts to

provide all the answers, month by month, to the questions you are likely to ask. Don’t

judge.

1 See also What to Expect: Self-hating for Morons2 Or lack thereof.3 Me.

MONTH (-2)It’s 2 months before the production. As you find yourself trying desperately to get

that blasted hour of sleep, your phone rings. It’s someone come to find your much-

needed talents for playwriting! Good start, definitely, but here’s a look at how the

remaining of your vacation will look like.

Week (-10): Introduction to Existence

Your phone rings. This is the exact defining point of the beginning of your trauma. If

this were a real pregnancy, your test kit will also start showing the tell-tale two lines.

At this point, your body is furiously resisting all urge to start doing work, sort of like

what happens when E.T. takes over your body. This is a good time to take it slow, as

no one is really pressing you for deadlines (at least not physically. On your creditors’4

part, this is the week where they realise their hopes are all in their mind, and has no

telepathic counterparts. Whatsoever.)

Thematic Studies

“There’s a theme for this thing, and I don’t know what that is. How do I make my efforts NOT an effing waste of time?”

From years of experience and numerous advanced studies5, scripts almost never follow the themes they’re based on. It’s what makes them sell. Historically, only two plays are written exactly based on the themes they are set on: Shakespeare’s The Tempest (“The Tempest”) and This Writer’s Life (“Black Hole Sucking All Pain In From This Goddamn Universe”). Only the first has been known to sell at all.If you’re really concerned, however, do bear in mind that if you try to keep the

4 For convenience’s sake, we’ll refer to them as Them from this point on.5 In this article, you will find that the “years of experience” and “numerous advanced studies” will be cited as sources of much information. While the credibility of these is not clearly established, do not try to doubt them. These are the same experiences and studies which concluded that Queen Elizabeth was really a queen, or that cat faeces isn’t a component of humans’ diet. In other words, pretty damn reliable.

The exact sales figure of This Writer’s Life, in tickets.

6

following topics in mind while crafting your work, you will never go wrong.

Typically, if your play is based on any of the following themes, they will follow any theme a human being could possibly think of:

Birth and Death Morality and Judgment Insanity and the Human Mind Triskaidekaphobia Newton’s 3rd Law The Krebs Cycle

“Where do you get your inspiration from?”

You have just asked one of the most frequently asked questions coming from wannabes about how to succeed in life. A good response to this would be, “Oh, from nature, and just my surroundings.” which translates to “I stare at my ceiling until it comes to me.” Another excellent answer is, “Oh, from the surface of the sun.”

Dramatic Irony “You just said no one’s really pressing me for deadlines. Explain the 14 phone calls.”

What you’ve just experienced are the preliminary signs of discomfort, as Them attempts to start pushing you around. This is exactly analogous to the way a baby would give its mother a kick to remind her that it’s still there6.

Believe or not, there is a standard way of getting over this little problem, particularly if your script’s not at all formed yet. What you need is a diversion, which is a fancier way of describing how work is being done when in fact nothing is being done. What you need are excuses which no one will be able to verify or disprove, sort of like a Confundus Charm, which buys you time. For the more uninspired, the following steps will come in very handy7.

6 Mind you, if the baby kicks in the first week of its conception, the first thing a mother should do is watch the ending of Rosemary’s Baby.7 I believe. If you’re uninspired why the hell are you writing a play? Go play soccer or something.

If done exactly to the letter, this will help you pull through to the next week8.

Step 1 Send a nice email. Don’t forget to insert a cute yet secretly cynical cartoon to hint at what you really think of Them. Most importantly, “forget” to attach your file.

Step 2 Wait 5 – 10 hours for them to realise this fact.

8 For best results, we recommend that you actually start some writing in tandem with these measures, to help you also survive next week.

Step 3 If desired, repeat Steps 1 and 2 again. Attach a password-encoded file.

Step 4 Wait another 5 – 10 hours for them to realise this fact.

Step 5 Tell Them the password. Make sure the smiley is found at the end; you’re trying their patience for too long already.

Step 6 Make sure your file contains something funny when opened. On hindsight, this should have been Step 3.

Step 7 By this time you pretty much know how to handle the remaining 2 days. So I'm just going to leave you to it.

SAFETY ALERT: Try to phrase your emails as nicely as possible. You’re doing something that gets on their last nerve, so the last thing you want is to come across as malicious and indifferent. You’re going for a different image, the one where you come across as innocent, naïve and trying to be nice. A moron, but an innocent moron.

Week (-9): When the Going Gets Tough… 9 Like it or not, you’re eventually going to have to start work. You were commissioned10 to do this, so you have to. Granted, you’ve had fun over the last week trying to deal with your evil superiors, but here’s where the pain really starts. Here are a few tips to get you started.

Claustro…what? “Self-help books on play-writing advocate this claustrophobic setting thing. How can I achieve this?”

My advice to you is to burn those books immediately. A “claustrophobic” setting is allegedly designed to force interaction – if you’re going to have a scene with Madonna and a farmer in it, chances are, your script will look like this:

Farmer: It’s another great day at the farm!

(12245 miles away)

Madonna: I can do anything because I'm Madonna!

Not very exciting, is it? But have Madonna and the farmer in a claustrophobic setting (such as a lift), and suddenly the conversation becomes much more interesting.

Farmer: Oh dear, I’ve got to feed my cattle! Someone let me out of this blasted lift!Madonna: I’ll just try to force the door openFarmer: You can do that?Madonna: I can do anything because I'm Madonna!(Madonna attempts to force lift door open)Madonna: Eek!Farmer: What is it, is it budging?Madonna: I broke a fingernail!

As you can probably tell, claustrophobic settings are a great way of making conversation come alive. This, however, has to be used with discretion. A lot of characters cannot be locked up in a lift or a freezer compartment, for one reason or another. One of the most ironic points about drama, for instance, is that a claustrophobic setting cannot be used to contain a claustrophobic.

9 The smart people will get up and run as far as they can. I swear.10 Or coerced. Whatever.

(Man and Woman are stuck in a lift)Man: We’ll just sign the papers and we’ll never have to see each other again.Woman: I couldn’t agree more.(Lift breaks down)Man: Oh dear…this must be some sort of omen.Woman: Eek! I'm claustrophobic!Man: Maybe we’re fated not to be divorced.Woman: ARGH! I'm claustrophobic!!Man: Clam down, I'm still here!Woman: CLAUSTROPHOBIA! THE WALLS! THEY ARE CLOSING ON ME! CLAUSTROPHOBIC!!!

Writer’s…um… “My mind’s a complete blank when I try to write! What is this mysterious malady I

must be suffering from?”

What you’ve just experienced is a very common illness in the world of writers. It’s

known as Writer’s Block, and it’s usually caused by breathing unpasteurised air or

eating cat faeces. And Writer’s Block can kill. Many writers in history have ended

their career because of it. So you better start doing something about it.

Mind you, a completely uninspired mind can also be the symptom of a few other

deadly conditions, such as a brain tumour, myxoma or Alzheimer’s disease. So what

you need are a few confirmatory tests to verify that you indeed have the condition.

Fortunately, such tests have been developed since Shakespeare’s times, and are still

fortunately simple and effective in this day and age.

The liver of Geroge Orwell, who died of the terminal stages of Writer’s Block. Are we still lax about this sort of thing?

Ye Olde Confirmatory Tests1. Word AssociationLooking at the following list of words, write down the first words that you

immediately associated them with. Then check your answers against the standard

Not-to-Feature List. If more than 3 words on your list can be found on the Not-to-

Feature List, you have a bad case of Writer’s Block.

a) Rain

b) Bad Romance

c) iTunes

d) Fire

e) Clock

2. The Madonna/Mariah TestListen to the songs of Madonna’s entire career. And Mariah Carey’s. If you are

uninspired enough to do this you most certainly have writer’s block.

Having ascertained your medical condition, we’ll now take steps towards busting

Writer’s Block. The Taylor Swift Purge has been shown scientifically to be 100%

effective at destroying Writer’s Block. Watch the music video of You Belong With Me

repeatedly, imagining yourself to be a famous superstar like Swift, and then slapping

yourself with cries of “You’re just a pathetic nobody!” Repeat until the urge to write

Ye Not-to-Feature Lista) waterb) Lady GaGac) Musicd) Hote) Time

returns11.

Occasionally, patients with severe Writer’s Block have trouble differentiating the

person called Taylor Swift. Here the Purge serves also a diagnostic function: if you

cannot realise that both the slut and the nerd here are Swift, you’re suffering from

prosopagnosia, or face blindness, one of the terminal signs of Writer’s Block. Write

your will. While you still know how to.

Congratulations! You are now completely Writer’s Block free! To prevent it from

coming back, though, here are a few measures you can take.

Don’t eat cat faeces

Don’t breathe the air in Kenya

If you must do either of the above, make sure that both are heat-

sterilised

Foiled! He cried “I’ve written this beautiful

play about my crush on Justin Bieber. And now I’ve received the theme and it’s

11 Occasionally, this fails and the subject ends up sad. Should this happen, adopt the Kanye West Purge to assure yourself you don’t want to be Taylor anyway.

‘Mitochondria’! How do I make my efforts not go to waste?”

First of all, why were you so bad-shit stupid to go write a play about Justin Bieber?

And now look at the mess you’ve created.

When confronting the fact that your chosen topic does not seem to fit the theme, you

NEVER try to alter your script to do so. No. You distort the theme to fit the story, in

an ingenious technique called smoking. Smoking is an essential skill listed under the

Transylvanian Military Survival Guide, and it can get you a lot of things. Here’s an

awesome demonstration of its power.

Romeo ATP and Justin Glucose

Everyone has mitochondria. I do, as does Justin Bieber. But not everyone has

mitochondria that know how to love. I do, as does Justin Bieber. This is the story of

the quest of love between our organelles, as they find love, or die attempting. Pun

intended.

And with almost no effort, your script now fits the theme perfectly.

Comic Relief “How do I work on creating comedy on stage?”

My best advice: Don’t. Comedy is a bit like marijuana. You try it for a first time

convinced that there’s nothing harmful and wrong with it, and find that it’s actually

rather enjoyable. Slowly, more and more of it are required to achieve that same state

of euphoria. Eventually, your story will come to an end with your life at a morgue,

where you lie after being found naked and dead due to a horrific hemorrhage on the

corner of Elm Street. My point is, it’s not exactly something you want your audience

exposed to. Oh, so you’re serious about this? Alright, don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Comedy is a little bit like fingerprints: everyone’s preference is different from the rest

of the world’s, so you’ll have a real hard time to get this started. Here are a few tips to

help you get started:

Source: National Socialist German Institute of Laughter

Inhibition

Activity Change in Brain Cell Count after 2 minutes of activity

Sleeping -0.003 %

Walking -0.062 %

Sleepwalking -0.096%

Brain Cell Reproduction -0.001 % (ironic, isn’t it?)

Sex -0.092 %

Eating -0.085 %

Writing -0.051 %

Crying -0.048 %

Laughing -8.698 %

Table 1: I'm just saying, you might not want to laugh a lot. If you’re laughing at this I suggest you stop right now.