Script Frenzy: The Invisible Hand of the Author (Progress Update 1)

Is it wrong to want to strangle one of my characters? She's completely annoyed the hell out of me. Which is probably a bad thing when I'm trying to write her as a precocious preteen hipster temptress.

So, yeah, I haven't done much on the script just yet. I decided to try my hand at introducing one of the main character's love interests (In the broad sense of the term, as we're going for the clueless lovable loser angle here.). If you'll remember, my main character is a young teen suffering the withering horrors of thinking he's smarter than anyone else around. Nose in a book, ruminating on philosophy, mild case of Asperger's syndrom, that sort of thing. This girl is something of a reflection of that. She's not quite an intellectual but she does consider herself more mature and sophisticated than anyone else around (Key words there being “she considers herself”. But, hey, being delusional is part of what being young's all about. Especially about your self-image.). She's slightly younger, maybe a grade or two behind my main character, and she seeks him out, gets drawn to him, because she sees him as something of kindred spirit. My main character, of course, is completely oblivious and has no idea what to make of her.

The plan is to have a few of these female characters to bounce off the main character and he'll eventually wind up kissing one of them – the dramatic tension being you know he's going to get kissed, you just don't know by who and how exactly this dweeb (at the start of the film) is going to manage it. I'm at three now, although this girl is the first one I've actually put into the script as yet (The romance angle that forms the main plot is probably going to be the hardest one to write, convincingly, since the characters involved are so young and, well, goofy. I'm not exactly doing a comedy so much as I am something off-kilter with heart. But there's going to be some character driven humor as much as there will be some real drama. On a related note, I really liked Knocked Up. Maybe I'm just depressed because I'll never write that good – although if it's like other Apatow films, it's more than likely massively improvised.). Four, maybe, if I include that adventurous, boisterous cousin for that forbidden fruit flavor. Because, hey, who doesn't want to see a heart-warming treatment of incest in a family picture? The thing is, I'm not entirely sure which girl's going to wind up being the winner of that particularly uninspiring sweepstakes. It's one of those open questions I'm hoping I'll solve in the process of writing the script. So, this girl could wind up being my main character's first love.

She's supposed to be the one he keeps bumping into by accident wherever he goes. I'm having a real hard time nailing down her voice. I know I want her to be trying hard, real hard, to sound smart and witty but, so far, it's coming off like she's sitting there with a thesaurus in hand. I think – out of nothing more than spite - I'm going to actively sabotage her chances now. I've already, by complete accident, given her the most annoying laugh ever.

I don't know. This script has problems. And I haven't been very motivated today. Partly because of the sweltering heat the moment I step outside wicking away my enthusiasm. Partly because I decided to go and watch the game with some friends on the “pain is best shared” basis. I really had to force myself to write it out today. I'm not sure how much I wrote, but it's far less than I did the other day (Which is okay since I was well ahead of the pace yesterday. I figure I'm, maybe, at 2k right now. Which, after 2 days, isn't too bad.). And it's a lot more piece-meal and, frankly, sucky. Still, according the NaNo spirit, I'm not going to delete it. I just kept going until I hit my limit. I'm not exactly pleased with the results but part of the whole idea is to just write and write and eventually you'll get something worth keeping. Some days, though, you just have to clear the crud out of your pen.