End of a Long Week

Another week winds down for the Wave-inatrix. My recycling bin is full to overflowing with scripts; I read five scripts from Monday morning until late Friday afternoon. One children's animated adventue, one action adventure, one science fiction and two vague dramas. That's approximately fifteen pages of notes and 20 hours of my time. Not a bad schedule this week. Sometimes I read closer to eight scripts. That's a bit too much, I find. When a production company asks for coverage though, you don't really have a choice. Unless you don't care if they drop you from the team which is what happens if you don't take assignments.

About half my work this week was private clientele, actually. Which I much prefer because those notes I put my heart into. If I don't know the writer from Adam because it's for a production company, well, I'll be honest, I time myself and I try to be efficient. I just want to get through it. PASS or CONSIDER - that's the bottom line.

That's why I started doing this privately. I care more. I guess that shows because Script Whisperer clients call me just to say hello sometimes and tell me how they're doing. I've gotten cases of wine, flowers, lucky plants and E-cards. Oh and a boomerang and tea towel from Oz once.

At the end of a long week of reading scripts, my desk is covered with brads, highlighters, pencils and post-its. Those are the tools of my trade. I pull out the brads first, lay the title page face up for over-all notes as I read through, and start reading. I highlight anything I think is either egregiously wrong or really really wonderful. I scribble pencil notes in the margin. When I'm done, I straighten out the whole script and pull all the pages with notes, reorder them and then write my notes, pulling pages for examples as I go.

I am amazed at my memory. Sometimes a script and writer will return to me after several weeks and yes - I remember the title, I remember the story. There are certain scripts I've read at production companies that really stuck with me. Books too. It's a strange sensation when you see a movie trailer and it s-l-o-w-ly dawns on you that you read that script three years ago. Oh yeaaaaaah!

And at the end of another long week of script reading I realize I already have next week completely booked too. Hey, it's a living, and one the Wave-inatrix is extremely grateful for. How many people pay their way by reading stories all day? It's a pretty cool job.

Have a lovely weekend, Rouge Wavers and remember to vote for the Whiskey Tango Foxtrot Competition if you haven't already. This has been a real nailbiter!

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