How To Respond To Feedback On Your Scripts

I recently posted a blog about how to give writers feedback on their screenplays in a way that’s helpful and constructive.

But what about when you are on the receiving end? How do you deal with feedback on your own work that feels challenging, confusing or contradictory?

Here are some tips on how to respond both practically and emotionally.

TREAT IT LIKE MARKET RESEARCH

When screenwriters receive notes, a common response is to jump down the throat of the person giving the feedback, pointing out everything they’ve supposedly got wrong.

But you don’t need to verbally respond to feedback at all. I know writers who just: “shut up and listen”, writing down every point and observation without saying a word, or who only say: “Thanks, I’ll take a look at that”.

Instead of shooting the messenger and antagonizing someone who’s just trying to make your script better, you can do the same.

A good approach is to treat the feedback like it’s market research. Rather than a defensive writer, you’re a consumer researcher, finding out what people like, don’t like and don’t understand about your product. You can decide which notes to address and which to disregard later. For now, you’re simply gathering information.

GIVE IT TIME

If you can, give yourself space and time to reflect on the notes before working on your next draft. This isn’t always possible if you have deadlines, but try to work on something else first.

If ideas for the new draft pop into your head, write them down, but don’t dwell on them for too long. When you come back to the script with fresh eyes, you might be surprised by how many of the notes you now find yourself agreeing with.

GET TO WHAT'S NEXT

In The Screenwriting Life podcast, Meg LeFauve and Lorien McKenna break a screenwriter’s emotional response to feedback into three stages: f*** you, f*** me and what’s next.

Typically our first reaction is to feel anger towards the person delivering the notes. We often then turn that anger inwards, blaming ourselves for all the script issues that have been raised and feeling we’re not good enough.

It’s only once we’ve got through these two stages that we turn our attention to actually addressing the notes and refining and improving the script.

Personally I tend to oscillate between all three stages when I first receive feedback, but you need to get to the: “what’s next” stage as fast as you can. Even if you don’t work on a new draft straight away, the quicker you can focus your brain on addressing the issues, rather than on blame and self-recrimination, the better.

LOOK FOR PATTERNS

Ideally, at least three people will have given you feedback on your script. When you’re ready to begin your new draft, a good place to start is to identify notes that highlight similar issues.

Where have readers pointed out the same basic problem with a character, story beat or scene? Even if they’ve made different observations, where have readers stumbled over the same part of your script? These are the notes you need to pay particular attention to and address.

In his excellent book On Writing, Stephen King encourages writers to play the numbers game. If one reader likes an aspect of your story and one dislikes it, you get to choose what to do, but if everyone who reads your work says you have a problem with something: “you’ve got a problem and you better do something about it”.

FIND THE UNDERLYING PROBLEMS

The idea that you need to fix: “the note underneath the note” has become a cliché, but it’s a cliché for a reason. Readers often struggle to articulate why something in a script didn’t work for them, and may not know the root cause of the problem. They just know a bump in the road interrupted their read and it’s up to you to figure out why they tripped up.

Rather than getting too hung up on the specifics of a particular note or script suggestion, ask yourself: Why did the reader give this note or suggestion in the first place? How could I amend the script so that no one would ever give me this note again?

BE HONEST WITH YOURSELF

But what if you don’t agree with the feedback? In my experience, writers resist notes for one of three reasons: ego, task avoidance and the notes genuinely don’t feel right.

If addressing a note would go against your intention for the story or the characters, wouldn’t fit thematically with what you want to say, or would mean other aspects of your script now make no sense, you can disregard it.

Ego and task avoidance are not good enough reasons, though, no matter how much work you’ve already done on your script. Every time you start a new draft, you need to be willing to blow up your entire script and start again from scratch, if that will give you the best possible version of your story.

So be honest with yourself about why you feel resistant.

DON'T BE AFRAID TO EXPERIMENT

As writers, we have a tendency to become entrenched in our work and to treat scenes, sequences and story events as though they’re set in stone. But screenplays are malleable, fluid documents that continue to evolve and change all the way into filming.

So don’t be afraid to try things out in response to feedback. Play around with new scenes, different characters and alternative ways of telling your story and see what happens. You can always put things back to how they were if they don’t work.

Above all, take what’s useful and ignore what’s not. Although it might feel that way, feedback isn’t an attack on you personally as a screenwriter. It’s just information and what you do with it is up to you.

LUKE FOSTER

Writer | CenterFrame Team

Check his profile on CenterFrame