Scene Action

Hello.

I'm trying to write a scene at the moment which is fully reliant on the action taking place, there is no dialogue at all. I'm not too sure how best to present this on paper though because although I know in my head what I want to happen, it's hard to put into words which when someone other than me would read, they'd know exactly what I meant. Like in the Royle Family, the scene when Jim and Twiggy are stripping the wallpaper. Has anyone seen a copy of the script? Do they just outline what is going on, e.g. THEY DANCE AROUND WHILE STRIPPING THE WALL. Or does it go into detail of every little action they do, e.g. THEY TWIRL AND JUMP WHILE USING THEIR SPATULAS AS MICROPHONES. So my question is, do I write a big block of scene action describing every single detail of what's going on, or do I summaries?

Any help is helpful. Tony.

Hi Toffee

I think you need to do a balancing act when it comes to description. Too much can be a bit of a put off to any script reader, bare minimum is fine if in fact not too much is happening (i.e. two people in a room talking). I'm dealing with this particular entity at the moment where I have two opening pages that are 60% description. I've had to gauge it on necessary description while cutting out the unnecessary. I think in comedy writing when your dealing with just a visual gag you have to be sparing with description while hopefully getting your visual gag across as best you can.

Hope that helps.

Try to describe the scene is as few words as possible, making sure that you include all relevant info.

Say, for example, you were writing that Royle Family scene and you wanted Jim to use his tool as a microphone, then you would need to mention it.

So the second of your examples, "THEY TWIRL AND JUMP WHILE USING THEIR SPATULAS AS MICROPHONES" would be correct.

Of course, saying that, you don't need to mention every twist or turn, as that would be worked out by the actors and director.