MAY
16

Scripts for Stage vs. Screen:  Aren’t They Interchangeable?

By Christina Hamlett 

Former actress/director Christina Hamlett is the author of 42 books and 175 plays.  For Pioneer, she and her writing partner Jamie Dare have penned three “Seusspeare” comedies as well as a contemporary script titled “Fandemonium.”  She is also a professional ghostwriter and a script consultant for stage and screen.  http://www.authorhamlett.com. 

Whenever I do a post on Facebook that I’ve just wrapped work on a new play, someone will invariably ask, “Oooh!  Do you think George Clooney will play the lead?”

Um...  not unless he’s switched from being a movie star to a stage actor.

I then attempt to explain the difference between plays written for live theatre and screenplays written for the movies.  However, this fails to register and, sadly, affirms a mistaken belief that these two forms of scripts are seamlessly transposable.  Some have even asked me, “Are they different industries altogether, or just different writing styles?”

Apples and oranges!  Although both sets of scripts are roughly the same length and follow a classic multiple-act structure, that’s where all similarities end.  Movies are about action and visuals.  Stage plays are about character development and dialogue. 

Let’s examine other differences.

• In a play, we don’t mind watching characters talking at a kitchen table as they drink coffee.  In a movie, this static tableau would drive us crazy!  The reason is that when you’re sitting in a theatre, there are plenty of other things you can look at while the conversation unfolds (i.e., the set design, furnishings, props, etc.).  In a movie, you’re only seeing things from the perspective of the camera lens — in other words, not the full picture. 
• Theatre is a more immediate and intimate form of storytelling.  Not only does the plot develop in “real” time as opposed to “reel” time, but the actors are the same size as the people in the audience and, thus, feel more relatable to us as human beings. 
• In theatre there is no ability to zoom in on an actor’s facial expressions.  This means that stage scripts rely more heavily on the power of words since not everyone in the audience will be able to see, for instance, a flicker of doubt cross an actor’s face, depending on the size of the venue.
• Movies don’t have intermissions.  This wasn’t the case in earlier times when intermissions were necessary for film canisters to be swapped out.  Multiplexes today want to be able to run as many films as possible; intermissions would eat up valuable time and revenue.  In contrast, a play’s intermission is a chance to thoughtfully reflect on what has transpired in Act One and to anticipate what will happen in Act Two.  Accordingly, play scripts create midpoint cliffhangers to make audiences want to come back for the second act!
• The finished product on the silver screen is the result of multiple fingers in the pie and is oftentimes far removed from the author’s original script.  The production of a play, however, more closely emulates the author’s vision.  Further, a play can be launched in hundreds of different venues and with different casts worldwide over the course of decades, or even centuries (just ask William Shakespeare).  A film is a one-shot deal with no latitude to grow.

“But isn’t a play limiting?”  is another question I get asked.  Quite the opposite. 

After 40-plus years in this business, I’m a tad biased in thinking that theater-goers are more sophisticated than film-goers and can process what they see at a higher level of abstraction and suspension of belief.  Whereas someone who goes to a movie wants to see all the details spelled out, a theatre audience can be told that a scene is taking place in the middle of the Black Forest or on a street corner in Berlin in the 1920s, and their imaginations will easily fill in the trees and bushes or buildings and cars — even if the actors are standing in a soft spotlight on a completely bare stage. 

Computer-generated imagery (CGI) which so dominates today’s films has come at the expense of compelling plots and characters.  Audiences have become so accustomed to special effects, car chases, pyrotechnics, and explosions on the big screen that it’s hard for them to fathom why anyone would want to go to a play where, presumably, none of these elements can physically occur.  This completely discounts the use of sound, lighting, dry ice, revolving platforms, hydraulics, scrim curtains, wing space, fly space, mesmerizing set designs, and even holograms.  As an example, Titanic the Musical opened on Broadway in 1997, the same year as James Cameron’s epic romantic disaster about Jack and Rose.  With nary a drop of water in the entire production, the musical not only sinks the fated ocean liner right before our astonished eyes but also delivers something the film fell short of — specifically, characters we genuinely cared about.

When it comes to the plays vs. movies topic, once I’ve introduced clients and students to the magical possibilities theatre can yield, they tend to become hooked for life.  Just call me The Pied Piper of Hamlett.  Our only challenge now is writing a play that will make George Clooney want to drop everything he’s doing to come and star in it.