But more often than not, all the plans, all the outlines become irrelevant as soon as I start writing, becoming something for me to ignore whilst I’m discovering what the story is *really* about.

Story structure for any medium is tedious, screen, stage, book. Writing IS Hard!

Perhaps it is the NYU-kid in me that makes me feel like all the charts and outlines and beatsheets are imperative to a strong story. Most of my screenwriting classes there wouldn’t even have you start writing until about halfway through the semester. Before that, it’s all planning.

Of course, I can’t really know what works for me until I complete one I’m satisfied with. Which didn’t happen at NYU.

One thing I can say with confidence – this scientific approach to playwriting is one that has not worked for me. I’m still a big fan of structure, and while I do tend to make a lot of notes and outlines when I’m stuck in a play, the more closely I end up following the outlines the more stilted the writing seems to be.

That said, I don’t think I have a bodily function metaphor handy to describe the process of screenwriting. Perhaps this will do: screenwriting is like taking an eye exam. You can see the shapes from a distance, but depending on how well you can see, you can only clearly see to a certain point. And if you’re like me and almost completely blind, everything is blurry until a lens pops down in front of your eyes, and you are asked whether one lens is clearer or the other.

One, or two?

Slowly, you are able to see more and more clearly, to a smaller and smaller line, and point. If all goes well, and your prescription is matched, you are able to see the entire chart clearly, and you marvel at how you didn’t see that one squiggle on line three was *obviously* the letter M.

This relates to my feeling that while screenplays often are associated with meticulous planning, my own experience writing screenplays actually feels more organic, and more akin to writing a novel in which you’re vaguely aware of what needs to happen at the end, but you’re not quite sure how to get there. True, a screenplay needs more refinement (and this is the itch we’re talking about here–whittling scenes down, deciding what characters need to say when, what details to exclude), but the actual screenplay writing process, for me, only turns out to have a plan in retrospect.