10 Minute Script Project

Your play script idea should be long enough and short enough to hold only 6-9 pages of dialogue. Your 10th page (or 7th) should be your title page and you should also include a cast list as per usual.

What this means is that you have to consider what SINGLE action in the lives of your characters you want to focus on. Again, it is important to start a short play very close to the climax. When writing longer pieces, you have more time to build and may move your POINT OF ATTACK earlier.

• Using your brainstorming from last class (or coming here today with your brainstorming), write a 10-minute play that weighs in at about 6-9 pages in length. You should not have more than five characters. Remember that if you bring a character into the play, this character should be developed fully by the end of the play. In such short plays, it is better to have only 2-3 characters. Limit your minor characters to one or two at most. 
• Consider that minor characters have to be cast by real live people who are busy. If your part is not important to the story or has no reason to be on stage, omit or remove this character. Downsize your cast. 
• The lines you are giving the characters to say should be well written, specific, and full of potential. Characterization is driven by dialogue in a play. Allow characters to talk about what they want to achieve at this given moment on stage.
• Having trouble getting started? Have a character finish this line prompt: I want...
• Plays are called plays for a reason. Your play should be interesting and creative. Try to think outside the box. People go to the theater to see things they couldn't see on TV or in film. Keep this important pointer in the back of your mind for the rest of your script-writing life.

After the quiz on play formatting from your reading homework last class, please begin working on your 10-minute play.

We will be getting and reading The Miss Firecracker Contest from the library.