From Page to Screen in Ten Steps

 

From Page to Screen in Ten Steps

Adapting a Novel to a Screenplay

With KIM HORNSBY

www.kimhornsby.info

 There are so many reasons to take a novel to a script! Hollywood LOVES adaptations for one. Also, if you are the novel writer, that means you have a great understanding of story and beats and the journey of the protagonist. If you spent a year or more with these main characters, you are most likely the perfect person to write the adaptation. If you're a newbie and you sell this screenplay, there will be rewrites anyhow and there's a big possibility that another writer will be hired to take your baby to the ship shape the producers want and need to film. If that happens, don't be precious. Let it happen. Making a movie is a collaborative effort unless you are the filmmaker/director.

Let's talk about writing a 2 hour feature

Step One

Reduce your story to a single sentence (logline) with protagonist, goal, conflict, consequence

After an inciting incident, a really interesting Protagonist must do something against all odds or something terrible will happen

Step Two

Expand to a blurb, including the ending. 5 sentences about the premise, write the blurb to cover the entire story, including the ending.

Step Three

Find the beats in your story that are crucial to furthering the story. Use Save the Cat's 15 Beats to measure your story against a tried and true formula.

Step Four

Watch at least four successful movies in that genre, paying attention to the pacing. Take notes!

Step Five

Find scripts and read them, study them. SCRIPT FINDER SITES 

Step Six

Map out your story by listing each cinematic scene on a beat sheet using SAVE THE CAT's 15 Beats. Then plot out your scenes with index cards to fit in the movie 3-Act structure.

 Buy and familiarize yourself with FADE IN screenwriting software www.fadeinpro.com

Step Seven

Combine, eliminate scenes or write new scenes to make the story flow. Imagine it on a screen.

                          My Thriller, CHAT, on the big screen at Regal Cinemas (Seattle Film Festival)

Step Eight

Write the script! ACT 1, ACT II, ACT III

Step Nine

Let the vomit draft marinate while you watch more movies, read more scripts

Step Ten

Rewrite and keep rewriting as many times as you need to get it polished before you send it to contests (Film Freeway), producers, agents

Don't stop learning! 

TAKE CLASSES

Mine:

Contact me for my YouTube/Go At Your Own Pace VIDEO CLASS for beginner screenwriters on how to ADAPT a story to a screenplay that I've taught nationally.

I have a ONE HOUR CLASS 

or  

FIVE HOUR CLASS

There are 7 instructional videos, each 35-45 minutes taking the student through the whole process of turning a book or story into a movie.

 EMAIL ME: Paisleyhatprod@yahoo.com

Subject: Screenwriting Class Inquiry

Other Online Classes Available online

www.networkisa.org

www.roadmapwriters.com

OTHER RESOURCES:

                        Screenwriters University