ADAPTATION

My first ebook, "Halifax", was something I originally wrote as a film script. Well, to be even more precise, I originally wrote it as a t.v. series, then someone expressed interest for a feature film version, so I expanded my hour t.v. script into a 100 minute film script, then that financing entity disappeared (as they often do) and I decided to write it as a book. So, unless I come up with a musical version, I think I've covered all the bases!

I've been on both sides of the adaptation fence. I adapted a series of books into a feature script once and learned a lot from the experience. I had always thought books were mangled by bad screenwriters when they were turned into bad movies (and I'm sure this does happen), but there are many factors that determine how the process works. In my case, the books I was given to adapt didn't easily lend themselves to adaptation. There was very little structure and no clear plot to work with. I basically had to throw out everything from the books to come up with a script. There was no other way around it. I would have felt really awful (and probably wouldn't have even taken the job) if not for the fact that the series was written by a group of ghost writers. So it wasn't someones life and heart poured onto the page that I was messing with.

When I sat down to do the complete opposite, to reverse the process, to turn my script into a book, I learned a few new lessons.

1. Writing a book is nothing like writing a movie --- In screenwriting, your entire craft is built around brevity. How much information can you convey in the least amount of lines? In a scene description you have to say as much as you possibly can about characters, intent, action, and location, in the fewest possible words. It's an art unto itself. When writing a book, it's the opposite. I found myself wanting to just write a few lines of description and get on to the dialogue, but I had to remember that I was describing something to a reader --- not a viewer. The reader was going to have to envision what I was writing in their head. An actor wasn't going to be there to show them! Admittedly, I didn't always succeed in my attempts at expanding my prose, but I'm still learning and trying.

2. You find the things you missed --- As I converted my script, I discovered mistakes I had made. Some things from the script didn't make as much sense as they should have. Some things didn't play out as successfully as they could have. The script actually benefited greatly from the book. I was able to go back into the script and change things for the better. Often the process of making a movie gives you a little bit of a pass on some things. You have a hundred other people pouring over your work, from directors and producers and actors to make up artists and wardrobe and technicians. If something isn't quite right, someone else usually catches it and fixes it or somehow uses it to expand on their own ideas and add a new element to the process.

3. It IS just you --- There aren't 100 other people with their hands all over your work when you write a book. (At least not when you write an ebook and don't have the benefit of editors and marketing people, etc.) Many screenwriters complain that their scripts are ruined by all the hands that touch it (and they often are and I'm often one of the complainers), but making films is a group effort. It ISN'T writing books. If you write movies, you have to accept that it is what it is. It's a collaborative medium for better or for worse. Sometimes things ARE ruined and sometimes one of the 100 or more other people actually makes something BETTER.

So, after turning my script into a book and after having turned some books into a script, I have a better understanding of the process. I wouldn't say that I'm any better at either but I'm definitely more sympathetic to screenwriters and book authors and their very different processes.