Would crap by any other name not still be shit?

There's an old writing teacher's mantra that goes something like, "You need to turn off your inner critic and allow yourself to write garbage." Every screenwriting book and every screenwriting instructor says some variant of that.

The logic is sound. We writers tend to tighten up. Nobody's watching, yet the pressure is on. "God, this line needs to be wittier!" We watch a movie like Juno and think to ourselves, "Waaaah! I'll never be that glib!" We beat ourselves up because our plots are going nowhere, our characters are apathetic avatars, and our wonderful wit is not on display.

Then in comes Mr./Mrs. Writing Teacher with their wonderful advice, "It's okay to write crap. Just get it on the page." So, we sit down an spew out whatever inane, contrived, convoluted crap we can. Our fingers become jointed turds, clicking away crappy line after crappy line. But "It's okay! I'LL FIX IT IN THE REWRITE!"

And then...

We finish. We have our little celebration and tell our friends that we just finished the first draft on our screenplay. Just need to polish it up and send it out. Sadly, this is where writing dreams die.

The writer who wrote crap (by their own allowance) suddenly realizes, "This script is shit!" Well... duh! Of course it is! What else did you expect?

The writer is left with three options:

1. Give up. "Yeah, I tried to be a writer once. But then I realized I didn't have any talent. Hahaha." Ah, sweet self-deprecation. This is the fate of probably 90% of people who ever considered having writing ambitions.

2. Put a scarf on the crap, sprinkle some perfume on it, and hope nobody notices. This option means the writers doesn't give up on the script. They'll add some witty lines and maybe give their character some clever backstory. They'll polish and nudge pieces into place. But on the whole? The script is still crap. And everyone knows it. But the writer has now spent several months polishing a turd, so they send it out to agencies and competitions. When the universal "It's shit!" comments come back, the writer defaults back to Option 1.

3. Page 1 Rewrite. Ugh. Does anything sound like it sucks more than that? Start again?! From scratch? Conjuring up the motivation for this option is not easy, although it's the only option that allows for forward momentum. It's starting again. Most people decide that a Page 1 Rewrite isn't necessary. Instead, they opt for Option 2 - scarf and perfume. And what happens if you allow yourself to write crap for the rewrite? Ummm... well, shit.


It's a bleak way of looking at it, but screenwriting is a bleak career choice. It's like being that guy (I'm too lazy to wikipedia his name, do it yourself) who has to push the boulder up the mountain only to have it roll back down again. Silly, Greeks.

That's why I don't adhere to the "Allow yourself to write garbage" theory. When you allow yourself to write crap, you end up with crap! And only established writers can sell crap. You and me? We gotta aim higher.

So much higher that I'll dedicate an entirely different blog post to it.