Novels and Screenplays -- Writing in both formats

Novels and screenplays are two very different mediums that both tell a story. Screenplays tell a story in more visual terms than a novel, using dialogue, descriptions of scene location and physical action to express plot, character, and emotion. Novels allow you to explore the internals of a character through that character's thoughts and the thoughts of others. Novels also allow you to explore a location, to move back and forth in time without using the word "Flashback." Novels are written in a particular voice - that of a character, whether it is first person or third, or the authorial voice. The voice of a screenplay is the visual poetry a character or characters see.

In a screenplay, all action has to be immediate - even if it is in the past. So, everything takes place NOW. "John runs from the bus, screaming." In a novel of course, John would be less likely to do his running in present tense. "John ran out of the bus, screaming and afraid." You might notice that John can also have the attribute of being afraid. You cannot relay that kind of attribute in a screenplay by telling the reader. However, you could show it. You could say "John runs from the bus screaming, his face twisted in fear."

This is also an example of how your screenplay must be told visually. Your characters in a screenplay cannot feel, think, or remember. You have to SHOW them feeling, thinking, and remembering. And again, remember, what you show has to happen in present time.

Let's stick with John. In a novel, you may write of him:

John stood alone in the old house, studying the photograph he'd found. The morning light slashed through the curtains and fell on his parent's wedding picture, catching his mother's eyes. He remembered his mother vividly, her beautiful face, rarely smiling, her haunted eyes. But he would not have known his father. Perhaps he did not want to know him. He heard Anna come into the room, felt her touch his shoulder, but he just kept looking at the photograph, looking for answers to questions he'd barely formed.

In a screenplay, you'd lay out the scene in this way:

INT. JOHN'S BEDROOM - DAY

Sunlight falls across John's shoulder as he studies a faded photograph - a beautiful young woman with haunted eyes; a smiling man, with features similar to his own. Anna moves up behind him.

He hesitates. His face hardens.

Okay, you see the difference. Of course, not every scene or story is as easy to translate from one medium to another. If your book is extremely internal, filled with a character's thoughts and perceptions of the world, you'll have to open up the internal to the external to make a screenplay.

Here's an example:

Maybe Liza just liked to cause trouble. From the minute she woke up in the morning she was always thinking what could she do to just ruin my day. She'd start out innocently enough, getting me when I was most vulnerable, half asleep after a night shift, inviting me over for coffee. Then the next thing I knew, she'd be going for the jugular, finding my weak spot, probing it like an exposed nerve, and smiling while I squirmed.

Let's try that in a screenplay format.

INT. LIZA'S KITCHEN - DAY

Carrying a cup of coffee, Liza leans against her breakfast counter. There's a phone, stack of mail, a basket of muffins. She grabs the phone. As she dials, she hums to herself.

She hangs up, smiling. She leafs through the stack of mail, pulls out one envelope, opens it, and grins. Now she's laughing to herself.

Janey slouches over to the counter, shakes her head.

Liza hands Janey a cup of coffee and pushes the envelope across the table.

Janey yawns, takes no notice.

Liza purses her lips, then tosses the envelope right in Janey's lap.

Hopefully this gives you an idea of the differences between presenting a story in the form of a novel, and in the form of a screenplay. But regardless of your medium - it's all about plot, character, and dialogue - in other words, tell a compelling story regardless of the way in which you're telling it!

As you can see - present tense, and visualization all the way. As you can also tell, writing a screenplay employs a completely different format than a novel. There are many books and software programs that will show you these basics.

In a nutshell, you have capped headers or SLUG LINES that indicate location, time, and interior/exterior; followed by simply written text that describes the location or action. Character names are capped, and beneath them follows your centered dialogue.

Screenplay structure is more than just format, however. A novel gives you experimental freedom, not just to explore what a character is thinking and feeling, but to vary the length and time of your exploration. A screenplay is more rigid.

Certainly there are variables, but basically your story must have strong action. A novel that is all internals, all thought and no action would be difficult to translate to screen (note, not impossible, it's been done.)

The action needs to be broken into three acts - the first begins with an inciting incident, something that sets the plot in motion (pages 2-10). Plot point one (page 25-30) leads the reader/viewer into escalating stakes, a twist or turn in the story. The midpoint (about half way through your script) again offers a twist in the story, or a revelation. Something which significantly changes or reveals something about your protagonist (s). And the second plot point (page 90) will again increase the odds, up the risk, change the direction, and lead directly into the conclusion. And remember to conclude at about 120 pages, although current fashion is about 115 for a spec project.

If you do start turning your novels to screenplays you may want to begin by breaking your story down into the three act structure.

Genie Davis is a produced screen and television writer. Her work spans a variety of feature film genres from supernatural thriller to romantic drama, family, teen, mystery, and comedy, including the feature film Losing Hope. She's written on staff for ABC Daytime's Port Charles, TLC's A Personal Story, and for HGTV, PBS, and Discovery. Her novel The Model Man, romantic suspense, was published by Kensington in 2006; Five O'Clock Shadow is just hitting the stores in February '07. Her first novel, the noir Dreamtown, was published by a small press in 2001. She also writes erotic romance under the name Nikki Alton her novella Rodeo Man, August 2006, is a part of Aphrodisia's The Cowboy anthology.