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The driving force behind my determination that I needed to keep sequences short was because through the extensive outlining that I do, I knew what was coming up in the story. Plotting things out, I knew there would going to be some sequences that I wanted to be longer, as they were pivotal moments in the story, and I didn’t want to rush through them.

There were four such instances for me in the script: the opening, and then the end of each act, the last one being the big shootout that you typically saw at the end of Westerns. These sequences would be more than just action, like the ones that book ended the story. They would also be introducing or killing key characters in the story, while also giving important details about the world this story was taking place in. Also, these sequences would include a lot of characters playing out their own story arcs as they pursued their own motivations, which would be aligned with some characters and be in direct opposition to others.

So when I wanted to ensure some sequences were written as efficient as possible, it was because I wanted to give these sequences closing out each act as much room to breathe as possible.

And I had now reached the end of Act One.

The premise for this sequence was that Barclay, the main character, needs to simultaneously leave as soon as possible, but also can’t leave until he has money. He – and the audience – will know the urgency behind both of these conflicting motivations, and will then understand why every second he can’t accomplish either adds to the tension.

While he’s working to get the money so he can leave, a minor character will act as a ticking timer for the sequence. If Barclay’s still present when they perform one innocuous act, the world will come crashing down on him.

The last two main characters are also introduced in this section. The first is someone who will actively be opposing Barclay from getting his hands on the money he needs to leave. They’re in more than just this sequence, and their full relevance to the story is set to be revealed later in the script.

The second is the main antagonist, whose introduction I had delayed to this point. I felt adding him here introduces further weight to the shoulders of Barclay as he’s already dealing with his own predicament. The way I planned to introduce the main antagonist felt like it best exemplified his character. He’d already been built up as this man you didn’t want to cross, with characters saying things like “What if he finds out?” and everyone knowing who “he” is referring to.

His introduction would have three people chasing an outlaw into the main antagonist’s establishment, and halting the apprehension when they see he, Harrison, is there. Without any show of force, he simultaneously extorts the outlaw into paying him from clemency while talking the bounty hunters into leaving his establishment until he’s squeezed every last cent from them, down to how many paces they’re to wait outside before they can nab him again.

Even this interaction served two purposes: it introduced Harrison, and also established a new threat for Barclay. If he doesn’t get out with the money in time, there’s now the three bounty hunters, looking to get paid, who would happily settle for collecting the price on his head while they waited for the original outlaw they had been chasing.

It was a fun sequence to write, but I also found myself trying to move it along in a way that conveyed how much time it was taking without it feeling too long to get through. In my unique format of this first draft, it ended up clocking in at 33 pages, which, while reduced for an actual screenplay, was still going to be considerable, and a reason why I needed to shorten other scenes as much as I could

I was starting to feel the pace slip out of my control in the first act of my Western. I liked how the individual scenes were reading, with a lot going out that would allow the audience to learn about and feel immersed in the world I was creating, but I was still in the first act. There was a lot that I wanted to have happen, both vital to the plot and in terms of set pieces. If I was shooting for a screenplay that was about 90-95 pages, I couldn’t devote more than was necessary to what was essentially the setup for all of these bigger story beats.

I felt like the story allowed for a bit of a reprieve from the longer sequences that I had been writing that was introducing a lot of the characters. The next two sequences, both of which were nothing more than scenes, would only feature two characters. What’s more, the two characters had already been established. I wouldn’t have to take time introducing them to the audience. I would need to build on what the audience already knew about them, but that could be done naturally in the story.

I had wanted the sequences to not really last more than the two pages of notebook paper I was using, which was really less than half of a page of notebook paper, as I was using half of the page to note the importance of what I was including in the first draft of the script. I didn’t quite hit that target, but I didn’t miss by an outlandish amount. I think both sequences were about 4 pages apiece, maybe just dipping into 5 at the most.

Again, writing in notebook pages that were smaller than regular screenplay pages, and only writing on one half of the page, and double spacing, meant that when I ultimately converted my handwritten draft to an actual script, it would be much shorter than the 4-5 pages I’d jotted down in the notebook. I felt this was getting me back on track.

This was important, because I was approaching another sequence that was meant to be long.

As I mentioned in my last post, as I was writing the first draft of my new Western screenplay, I was starting to get concerned about the length of some of the sequences. After the second script consultation I’d had for my screenplay of Dig Down, I’d come away with the advice to target about 90 pages. As a page of script roughly equated to one minute of screen time, I was essentially targeting about a 90 minute movie.

Although I had written several screenplays at this point, none of them had been optioned, so I would still be considered a first time screenwriter. That being the case, it made sense to keep the script to about this length, as anyone looking to option the script to turn it into a movie would be taking a chance on me, so reducing that risk as much as possible by keeping the story – and by extension how much would need to be filmed – within normal limits would make it easier for them to take that chance on me.

The opening sequence felt an appropriate length and pace, mixing in some hints about characters, building up tension and then an explosive opening. The first two sequences of act one introduced new characters and having them already working toward their own goals, so that these scenes didn’t just feel like exposition dumps for the audience.

But…

I still hadn’t even gotten to the inciting incident that the main character would be forced to react to for the rest of the story. And there were still some other villains, including the main antagonist, that needed to be introduced.

So while I felt these scenes were going well, I also felt I was at risk of lagging behind the pace already. 90 pages wasn’t a hard cap. I felt if I went over it by a few pages, potential buyers of the script wouldn’t toss the screenplay into the discard pile because they reached ninety pages and saw there were still two to five pages left to read. But if I was going to exceed 90 pages, I felt it could only reasonably exceed it by those two to five pages, and that every page it went over that was running the risk of not being considered at all.

The pages were also a little difficult to judge because as I had stated in an earlier post, as I was putting together this first draft, I wasn’t writing it in screenplay format, I was writing actions and dialogue on one half of the page, and notes on the importance – or at the very least why these were included – in the screenplay. The notebook I was handwriting these in had fewer lines than would be on the page of a screenplay, and I was always skipping a line before writing the next action or dialogue. Even with that being the case though, these sequences were averaging over 10 pages, with the sequences in Act One averaging over 15.

I needed to start trimming these down where I could.

Although I was delaying the introduction of my main antagonist, there was still plenty going on to move the script forward. As I mentioned in my last post, there were two secondary characters that I was introducing instead, as well as a new important setting, which was vital to the main conflict.

As I was establishing the characters and location, this was where I felt the outlining I had done using the 6 essential questions was really paying off. Because I not only thoroughly knew their backstories and the motivations that had resulted from their situations in life, I could shape the actions in the character’s introductions so that in their scenes they were always working toward their own personal goal.

For instance, one of the new characters I was establishing in this new setting was a woman working in a brothel. Mapping out her backstory with the six essential questions, I knew how she had arrived there – when she was younger, she and her lover at the time had ventured out West for rich prospects, but had run out of money before they reached the coast. Stranded, they tried to earn enough to make their final destination, but her lover had died. In her financial situation, she desperately took the job at the brothel, and has been stuck there ever since.

With this backstory in mind, her motivation was to get out of this life. In the scenes at the new location, a hotel/casino/brothel, her interactions with others all have one central goal in mind, to find among the many people passing through on their way out West someone rich enough to get her out of this line of work. In the scenes, she’s borderline dismissing some potential clients because they’re hard up for cash, while focusing her attention and charm on a character that exudes wealth.

This added a layer to the scenes as this was just what her character was working toward, all while the other new character and the main character were also working through their own storylines. I felt this was giving a lot of variety to the different subplots that were going on at the same time, and would make the audience feel that it was more than just a movie they were watching, that these characters would feel alive and that the audience was watching a slice of their lives play out.

My only concern was how long this was playing out. I was attempting to fit in a lot with what was going on with these characters, but I also found toward the end of this sequence I was trying to shorten it to just making my point about what was happening so that I could get to the next story beat. It was fun writing these characters and plotting out the scene, but it was the first I was starting to get concerned about the pacing of the story.

There were still some characters that needed an introduction, the most important being the main antagonist of the story. But the way I plotted the screenplay, there would be another change in location that introduced two of the remaining characters first.

I did this for a couple of reasons. One of the characters was only going to be in the story for a few scenes, and were vital to the inciting incident that the main character, Barclay, was going to have looming over him for the rest of the script, so it was important that I establish them and their importance to the plot.

The second character was a minion of the main antagonist. The outlaw in the opening sequence was also a minion, but different in that they were a brute, using force to accomplish things. This second minion was a polar opposite, but both would be working for the main antagonist. Their introduction would showcase that the main villain, who hadn’t been introduced yet, held sway over not just multiple characters, but multiple characters who had nothing in common with one another.

I would also use this purposeful delay to build up this main antagonist even more before he finally made an appearance. Characters would establish that he’s currently out of town, but still caution, even threaten one another, with what the repercussions would be once he returned and found out what was done in his absence. To them, it wouldn’t be a question of if he found out about things, maybe not even when. He would just know.

This delayed introduction would set the table for the type of adversary they were. They didn’t have to be present to be a threat. That they weren’t there didn’t matter if the people that worked for him were, because they would be driven by the hell they would have to pay if they didn’t come through for him.

There would also be the loosest of references to his backstory. Nothing would ever be explicitly stated, possibly because the characters didn’t know the full details themselves, but it would be just enough to add to the mystique around this character, building him up further until he finally entered into the story.

I had drafted a solid opening sequence to my new Western. In the buildup would be moments that would hint at the dominant traits and motivations of some of the characters, and then there would be a deadly shootout, which would also double with giving insights into how the characters operated.

With that on paper, I moved on to the next stage of the screenplay, Act One. It begins with the characters that had survived the opening sequence entering a frontier town, one that embodied the “good side” of the central conflict going on in the story.

While I was writing the introduction to the town and new characters, I really felt that the 6 essential questions I had posed to each of the characters was really paying off here. Having clearly defined their motivations, I found it easy to envision what each of them were doing entering the scene, which allowed me to jump back and forth between them, with each of them working toward something different while still being related to the story point I needed to get across during this sequence.

It felt like the story was intersecting where they were at in their lives. The main character was collecting a bounty because he wanted to fund his good times instead of settling down to a job. The group he’d been with had been counting on getting a share of the spoils, and were in greater need as their numbers had dwindled during the shootout, and some had gotten injured. The Sheriff had put out the hefty bounty on the outlaw to make the town more appealing to enterprises looking to expand out West.

Their storylines, the alliances they forged as they strove toward common goals, and the conflicts that emerged with others who had different motivations, was feeling so natural. The dialogue felt right, and in the few action lines, I felt I was able to capitalize most of the time to compliment the characters and settings.

The beginning of act one had come together nicely. The next step was to introduce the last of the central characters.