A screenplay is a blueprint for a film detailing the story, characters, dialogue and action in a specific format.

Films are a collaborative effort, screenplays are the first step in that process and are written for the reader. The purpose of a screenplay is to create a plan to allow each department in a film to understand the visual requirements.

Unlike novels, screenplays show action rather than tell, they avoid things like inner monologues and extensive description to further story and character. Screenplay structure is often, like the traditional novel, in 3 acts. Set up. Confrontation. Resolution.

Screenwriting is a unique discipline with a writer charged with conveying a story in a finite amount of space and time using their own special set of tools and skills.

I love Cemeteries and Rail Stations. All of my books of screenplays are titled after cemeteries and burial grounds. Mostly because they are within walking distance of rail road stations. There is life in rail stations. People going home. People arriving home. People greeting loved ones. People saying goodbye. People wandering. People ‘looking’. I also love graveyards. There are no people ‘looking’ in graveyards. Every destination is known. Your eyes wander, ‘looking’ for a sign from the dead or ‘looking’ for the stone of the one no longer capable of ‘looking’. If you are dead and I walk by your grave? I am happy to acknowledge your unique contribution to this world-even though I may have no idea what it was. I love grave stones. I notice birthdays, death dates, inscriptions and symbols. In particular I notice names. Every name in every story I have ever written is some combination of a name I have seen on a gravestone or vault. When I leave a cemetery I always smile and say 'thank you'. Thank you for being alive.