Script Writing - Feedback from my Second Draft

Feedback from my Second Draft

Looking at the feedback that Deborah - From the National Theatre - Gave me in response to my second draft, she liked the bases of the story around the dance school and after speaking to me liked how the dance school is personal experience to me and the events that I have witnessed growing up in that environment. Deborah suggested ways that I could develop my final script by adding some extra scenes. Scenes that she suggested could be appropriate would be to include a scene of dancing as the play revolves around the performing arts however no dancing is seen. She then suggested that the character Emma could have a monologue speech like the character Danielle has and she could speak about the trouble she is having with her mother as Emma's mother is so pushy and obsessive with her daughter being 'A star'. We then spoke about the wear and tear affect that performing has which then brought us onto the tender subject of eating disorders. I knew a girl at my dance school who has an eating disorder and that has been an issue going on around me which could be included. We discussed about the idea of Emma planting seeds in the script of saying 'I'm not hungry' or ' I ate a big lunch' to put off eating food which then could be causing Emma to become ill and start to have an eating disorder. We then said that the idea of Emma having an eating disorder could be included in her monologue speech that Deborah suggested could be included and Emma could speak about her eating disorder and talk about her feelings of her mother and how she is so overwhelmed and struggling to cope with her mother's unhealthy obsession of pushing her daughter too hard.

Deborah picked up on my dialogue that it needed to be looked over as some of it was a bit unnatural how things were written and wouldn't necessarily be how you would say it in a natural/normal flowing conversation.

Deborah said she likes the character Sharon who is Emma's mother.

She also said that she liked the opening scene of having 3 crunch points within the same area of the changing rooms/waiting rooms and that lots of things were going on, almost giving a sense of things being busy which a dance school's environment would be.

More feedback was that more time needed to be spent over Megan and Phil's relationship and the issues that they are going through about Megan leaving to go for a job. Deborah said that the dialogue's flow needed to be better and consider language choices and the way lines were said. She also felt that the two characters didn't have enough meat to them so needed to develop their story further which I in fact totally agreed with after hearing that from someone else and reading the second draft of my script back.

As a final comment about the script, Deborah liked the way that all of my dilemmas were clear and all had an interesting story to all of the characters.

Things that I now need to do for my final script is to add a scene of dancing to the play, seeing as the play is based around a dance school. I also need to write a monologue for the character Emma and her struggles of dealing with her mother and the possible idea of an eating disorder. I also need to revise the language I have used to make sure that it is not superficial and that the dialogue has a natural flow.