Killing Your Darlings

What exactly does that mean? Oh, come on Rouge Wavers, you know. In your heart-of-hearts you know. It’s that character in the crowd scene, plot twist or bit of GREAT dialogue you just can’t let go of. It’s that scene that is just so freaking brilliant that you roll it up and sleep with it under your pillow every night. It’s that opening sequence that ROCKS and that you wrote while on vacation in Tijuana and that would RUIN your script if it got cut!

Try sitting across the desk from an executive who smilingly tells you to kill one of your darlings. It sucks, no two ways about it. But, Rouge Wavers, the experience is freeing. Because it’s usually one of these darlings that is actually gumming up the works and disallowing you from moving on and writing the scene or opening or ending that the story needs.

The story is master and the writer is the servant. Everything is always in service to the story. As in other areas of life, your resistance to killing a darling – the sheer, vein-popping, hackles raised response at the mere suggestion of it – is usually completely relative to the need for it to happen. Quid pro quo. It’s the cycle of life, dear readers.

Darlings are usually scenes or bits that you love but that nobody else gets. They have emotional importance to you – because YOUR dog from growing up used to do that exact trick, or the house in the opening sequence looks just like your grandparents house or the music you’ve written into the closing sequence is the same one that you danced to at homecoming in 1978!

Listen to your outrage and defensiveness when someone is brave (or stupid) enough to question your darling. What is that telling you? Something I do is to save two versions of my script. The one that I am currently working on I set aside, and then I go ahead and make the stupid change that some know-it-all-who-is-dead-wrong suggested. Just to see how the script responds to the change. I have been writing scripts for almost ten years and have not yet seen an instance where killing my darling did not improve the script.

How do you tell if the item in question is a darling versus a legitimate creative choice? Same way you tell if you’re on the way to becoming a professional writer versus an ego-invested hobbyist; a professional writer will listen calmly to the advice, check it out, try the page with or without the item in question, and make a measured yet flexible decision about the integrity of the moment. A hobbyist will FREAK THE HELL OUT. They become like those parents who scream spittle, red-faced at their 6 year-old’s soccer match. When you feel the blood pressure and resistance going up…stop right there and take a step back. You're probably having a darling-moment and it brings up a lot of insecure ego and fear issues. Certain Rouge Wavers are thinking oh there she goes again with that California b.s. - "issues". Rouge Wavers, I work with writers every day, all day, approximately six days a week. Believe me, we have issues. But. I digress.

As my good friend Gabriel says: When I am afraid of something – I go straight toward it.

Remember, as intimate as your script is to you, it’s not your baby once you set it out into the big bad world. A script has to stand alone independent of you and your peccadilloes; it’s very personal and yet not personal at all.

Get out your shovel and try killing a darling today. Your script will thank you and you’ve taken a crucial step toward becoming a professional writer.

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