MovieBytes Interview:
Screenwriter Amy Bailey

An interview with screenwriter Amy Bailey regarding the ScriptVamp/Attention Grabber Writing Competition.

A: "The Stavros Agenda"

A former Navy Seal finds out his missing wife is the sole heir of a wealthy shipping magnate and was living a double life. Now he's on the run with his two young daughters to keep them safe and must reunite his team of Navy Seals to hopefully find his wife alive.

A: I entered ScriptVamp before with my comedy script, "Fish Gutting for Newlyweds" and the advice they gave me helped me tremendously and that script went on to be a multi-contest winner and finalist in several contests.

But more than that, I really spent a lot of time chewing on and digesting the ScriptVamp input and it forever changed the way I write screenplays. Now with every scene I work on, I try to keep the reader constantly saying "Oh my! What next? and "Oh no! What's next?" and have the answer always be a surprise, yet be exactly what should come next.

I wrote "The Stavros Agenda" very much with the "Attention Grabber" mindset, so when I started to enter it in contests, I thought of ScriptVamp first.

When I received their email saying I was the "Grand Prize Winner," I was over the moon.

A: Very. I was just so happy to have won and when they sent me the email with all the prizes and codes, I was shocked and thrilled.

A: I dreamed the entire plot of "The Stavros Agenda" one night before I ever wrote it.

The first draft took four days. And I finished the polished script in a total of 9 writing days - with week long pauses in between drafts waiting for my many readers' feedbacks.

But even though it was very fluid, every day that I sat down, I would read through what I wrote the day before, then vigorously edit for speed and fluidity. And I would also check and double check the tracking and the story math to make sure it all lined up.

I think outlines are important.

When I first started out working with Craig Kellem as my script mentor, I outlined heavily and did written character arcs on every facet of the main characters and small arcs on all of the minor characters. I still outline and do charcater arcs - sometimes on paper, sometimes in my head.

A: Final Draft.

A: If I'm not writing or researching, I get really restive and unhappy. But as much as I enjoy research (I read thousands of pages of books and articles for every script), if I go more than a few days without writing, I go nuts.

I try not to write more than 4 hours a day anymore. This way I'm sure I'm always mentally at a peak - and there is less deleting and rewriting. But I don't gently sit down at my keyboard and type, I attack. So I usually get what I need to get done very fast.

A: No. I don't get writer's block - although I do pause a good deal to do research. But I'm a journalist and journalists are always on a deadline, so we train ourselves to just sit down and write. And if it sucks, you go back and edit until it shines.

I really encourage all writers to go to work for a newspaper. Once you have, you can always write anytime, anywhere. Noise and distractions just don't mean anything after you've crunched out a newspaper under tremendous time contraints with screaming editors bossing you around and other writers constantly bugging you and asking you for stuff. You just deal with what's thown at you, then go right back to typing.

A: I've been writing professionally for over 15 years as a journalist, a member of the Associated Press, an advertising copywriter, a humor columnist, and newspaper editor.

The editor of my published humor book bought me the Final Draft software as a Christmas present and I got hooked on the screenplay form. I really, really love the story math. I guess because I come from a family of linguists and mathematicians.

"The Stavros Agenda" was my third feature script which I finished in September 2012.

My first script, a comedy, was completed in March 2012, and the other, a thriller, in June 2012 - but I kept tinkering with this script (Death by DNA) till October.

A: No. Although I have friends and family in Los Angeles.

I live in Georgia, about an hour and a half from the Atlanta airport. My husband and I already own multiple residences, so we plan to rent or buy a house in L.A. for the sake of convenience if and when things get to that point.

A: I'm on the final pages of my fourth script, a thriller, based on another dream I had. Very creepy, borderline horror.

This time the dream was so crisp, I could remember reading the name on a prescription bottle.

And when I sit down and type into Final Draft, it's like there's an audio-visual feed running through my head. It's crazy compelling and the tone is kind of like "The Godfather." Lots of fun. I never thought I'd write something like this, but all my readers love it so far and I'm getting a kick out of scaring people.

Posted Thursday, November 29, 2012