FROM SCRIPT TO NOVEL TO TRILOGY (part 1)
It’s been a strange journey going from a screenwriter to novelist and back again. I’ve never written the triumphs and tragedies before, so get in, sit down, buckle up, and prepare for an honest punch to the gut.
My sci-fi thriller screenplay, MECHCRAFT, had been doing well in the contest circuit. 6 entries, and 6 quarterfinals. Never did break beyond. I was gearing up for a rewrite to remedy this, when I got a couple meetings with gatekeepers. In all, four entities communicated with me and gave me the same answer: we love the concept, love the script, but no one is going to take a risk on an unknown property.
Friends in the business validated these responses. “Yep, that’s how it is now.” Accepting this reality, I had pondered burning the script and moving on to new ones, but my gut wouldn’t let me give up on Mechcraft. This was The One™.
Plotting my next move, I met with a long-time friend in the industry. He’s done it all; reader, screenwriter, producer, executive, CEO, etc. Over lunch he suggested converting Mechcraft into a novel. The studios and agents won’t touch an unknown IP, fine. Publish the book, build a fan base, and those studios will come to me.
I groaned at the thought. I’d just dropped blood, sweat, and tears on multiple drafts of the script. Last thing I wanted to do was recreate it as a novel. Fuck me. After pounding my head against the wall, his words of wisdom finally sunk in. He was absolutely right. Converting Mechcraft to a novel was the best path forward if I wanted a shot at getting it made into a film franchise, which was my endgame.
I fooled myself into believing the process would be simple. A piece of cake. The material was already there, just fill in some blanks and done. Yeah, that feeling lasted about five minutes. Let me tell you now converting a screenplay into a novel is damn hard. Everything changes. I agonized over the first chapters. But then something clicked.
I found freedom in the prose. No longer limited to what an audience can see. No longer limited to a page count. I explored the characters on a deeper level, really getting in their heads. I expanded the story, adding characters and scenes not found in the script. I fell in love with the process.
My sci-fi thriller screenplay, MECHCRAFT, had been doing well in the contest circuit. 6 entries, and 6 quarterfinals. Never did break beyond. I was gearing up for a rewrite to remedy this, when I got a couple meetings with gatekeepers. In all, four entities communicated with me and gave me the same answer: we love the concept, love the script, but no one is going to take a risk on an unknown property.
Friends in the business validated these responses. “Yep, that’s how it is now.” Accepting this reality, I had pondered burning the script and moving on to new ones, but my gut wouldn’t let me give up on Mechcraft. This was The One™.
Plotting my next move, I met with a long-time friend in the industry. He’s done it all; reader, screenwriter, producer, executive, CEO, etc. Over lunch he suggested converting Mechcraft into a novel. The studios and agents won’t touch an unknown IP, fine. Publish the book, build a fan base, and those studios will come to me.
I groaned at the thought. I’d just dropped blood, sweat, and tears on multiple drafts of the script. Last thing I wanted to do was recreate it as a novel. Fuck me. After pounding my head against the wall, his words of wisdom finally sunk in. He was absolutely right. Converting Mechcraft to a novel was the best path forward if I wanted a shot at getting it made into a film franchise, which was my endgame.
I fooled myself into believing the process would be simple. A piece of cake. The material was already there, just fill in some blanks and done. Yeah, that feeling lasted about five minutes. Let me tell you now converting a screenplay into a novel is damn hard. Everything changes. I agonized over the first chapters. But then something clicked.
I found freedom in the prose. No longer limited to what an audience can see. No longer limited to a page count. I explored the characters on a deeper level, really getting in their heads. I expanded the story, adding characters and scenes not found in the script. I fell in love with the process.
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