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October Review Challenge, #21 - "What piece turned out differently than you planned?"
Oh, jeez. All of them, really, to one degree or other. There's always a point in the process of writing any project where I am struck by how the actual product is markedly different than what I was imagining in my head. Or at least, how the demands of realizing the idea necessitate it taking shapes I had not necessarily thought of when I was dreaming it up. That is just fine, that is what it takes to bring something from dream to reality, but it is striking how far it can drift. And that isn't even taking into account the fact that I usually collaborate with Bernie, who will bring his own perspective to things and often sees stuff in different ways than I do.
A recent example is a fairly mild one. In episode 3 of Dream Machine, "Change or Die", I wanted to include a B-plot where Derek and Josie have to run a gauntlet of technical people in order to begin work on the new show. I had an idea to represent the various technical departments as warring fantasy tribes with their own quirks and customs that they would have to navigate and appease to get them on their side. I was picturing a sort of whimsical travelogue centered around jokes satirizing techies and technical theater, which for a sitcom B-plot is acceptable. But when I brought the idea to Bernie, he wanted to give it a structured PLOT— which, as you know, is very much Bernie's style of narrative —with actual stakes. It made it much tougher to write, especially given it had to sit into the subplot of a short-form episode. We struggled with it a great deal. But ultimately it made the piece have more substance to it, allowed it to speak to our characters and not just be purely for the jokes. This is Bernie's world, after all, and he had stuff to say about it. So I'm glad we went to the extra trouble, even if in the moment it felt like torture for no necessary reason.
Good partners make you better, I guess. :-)
Oh, jeez. All of them, really, to one degree or other. There's always a point in the process of writing any project where I am struck by how the actual product is markedly different than what I was imagining in my head. Or at least, how the demands of realizing the idea necessitate it taking shapes I had not necessarily thought of when I was dreaming it up. That is just fine, that is what it takes to bring something from dream to reality, but it is striking how far it can drift. And that isn't even taking into account the fact that I usually collaborate with Bernie, who will bring his own perspective to things and often sees stuff in different ways than I do.
A recent example is a fairly mild one. In episode 3 of Dream Machine, "Change or Die", I wanted to include a B-plot where Derek and Josie have to run a gauntlet of technical people in order to begin work on the new show. I had an idea to represent the various technical departments as warring fantasy tribes with their own quirks and customs that they would have to navigate and appease to get them on their side. I was picturing a sort of whimsical travelogue centered around jokes satirizing techies and technical theater, which for a sitcom B-plot is acceptable. But when I brought the idea to Bernie, he wanted to give it a structured PLOT— which, as you know, is very much Bernie's style of narrative —with actual stakes. It made it much tougher to write, especially given it had to sit into the subplot of a short-form episode. We struggled with it a great deal. But ultimately it made the piece have more substance to it, allowed it to speak to our characters and not just be purely for the jokes. This is Bernie's world, after all, and he had stuff to say about it. So I'm glad we went to the extra trouble, even if in the moment it felt like torture for no necessary reason.
Good partners make you better, I guess. :-)
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