| Phases of Script Development |
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| Marguerite Pigott | |
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Page 1 of 3 Three key organizations determine the phases of script development in Canada: Writer’s Guild of Canada, Telefilm Canada and The Harold Greenberg Fund (HG Fund).They recognize roughly the same phases of development for the purposes of contracting and financing:
OutlineWhether your story is based on an original idea or on source material, the outline is the first attempt at putting it into dramatic structure: identifying the protagonist, the main conflict, the beginning, middle and end of the story, the theme and concept. The outline should communicate the dramatic fundamentals of your story, from catalyst to climax, and should give a strong sense of character as well. The writing style should be evocative of the tone of the film. Outlines are usually short, under five pages or so. They are submitted to funders, and are written in prose rather than in bullet points. You may or may not include a cover page, and sample scenes are typically not required at this stage.TreatmentA treatment is a more detailed version of the outline, with one key difference; rather than telling the story in prose form, the story is told in scenes. A treatment is a list of all the scenes in the screenplay, with a description of the action of each – how it advances plot and/or character. It is essentially the ‘plan’ for the script, and occasionally contains short bits of dialogue.Like the outline, the treatment needs to convey all the dramatic fundamentals. It also needs to illustrate who your characters are in greater depth and show how they develop through the story. A treatment also includes more information about subplots and visual storytelling than the outline. At treatment stage, funders typically require two or three sample scenes as well. You should choose to write the scenes that showcase your strengths as a writer. One scene should be fairly climactic, showing your ability to handle intense drama; the other may fulfill a function that’s important for your film’s genre or tone (create comedy, contain a great action sequence, develop character in an unexpected way). Because treatments are intended to show that the story can and should be told in cinematic form (as opposed to being a novel or something else), they are most useful when applying for development financing. Continued... |
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