It is easy to hit a roadblock and get stuck when attempting to be creative. When writing, the difficulty is often pronounced because of the solitude involved. This is why I find it imperative to receive feedback from people that I trust in order to workshop the idea. Recently, I met with two of my friends who have experience writing. The purpose of the catch up, among other things was to air our ideas for different projects and to give and receive critical feedback so that we could develop our ideas further.
The catch up reminded me of the John Cleese quote about collaboration, which applied to our situation: “I always find that if two (or more) of us throw ideas backwards and forwards I get to more interesting and original places than I could have ever have gotten to on my own” (Cleese, John 1991 A Lecture on Creativity, 36:39 mins).
The writing forms that we discussed varied from advertising copy, short film, short story to novel outline. The process involved a pitch or a presentation of the written content and then a discussion. During the discussion I founds that many possibilities arose from new ideas being thrown around.
Cleese emphasises the importance of open and closed modes. The open mode being important in “playing” with problems and ideas in order to come up with creative and original solutions. The closed mode having the purpose of following through with the idea. The closed mode is often seen as actually producing results, however without the open mode to spur creativity, the closed mode is limited in it’s creative capacity.
The creative process is never clear cut, it is full of twists and turns and lots of re-writing, however bouncing ideas off people in a constructive and supportive environment is important. While catching up we joked that meeting up to discuss writing was our form of therapy. There is some truth to this, because without a frame of reference it is impossible for you to objectively value your own work.
I was working on a short film idea that had just been developed and was aware that I needed input. I was receptive to the feedback offered and it really helped for my friends to ask the hard questions. The environment was non-combative and supportive with some of the problems being identified in the form of questions. I knew that if I could not answer those questions on the spot, I must work on finding an answer. Asking questions assisted me in identifying areas that need to be focused on a fixed. This was possible because of the trust that I placed in the feedback that I received.
This process was then provided for both of my friends even though their projects differed significantly. The first friend was developing advertising copy and because the format was an advert, the way of approaching problems was different. In advertising, the meaning and impact of the advertisement should be immediately apparent and brainstorming and searching for examples is a fun and immediately gratifying task.
The next friend was presenting the structure of a novel, a more complex and involved process than advertising copy which involved seeing the bigger picture and how each element contributes to the whole and how changing one element impacts earlier or subsequent events. This type of problem solving is also relevant in developing my short film idea.
One piece of feedback that I received for my short film was given in regards to the novel overview also — What is the main character’s arc? This question was very important because if you can establish the arc then it is apparent what the focus should be on. That same friend gave the feedback that her process involves sorting out the ending first, then working backwards to reverse the situation in the beginning.
Therefore, collaborating with others and giving and receiving feedback is useful because it is hands on experience understanding problems and “playing” with ideas to come up with new and imaginative solutions. Furthermore, I believe it is important to find collaborators who you can trust so that you are open and receptive to feedback. Playing around with ideas is essential in bringing the world of your screenplay to life.
