"Drew, writing romantic comedy outlines is like a night at the beach!"
Since I'm hot-n-heavy on the trail of writing spec. script # 31, which just so happens to be a raunchy romantic comedy, so I thought it would be apropos to do a post on how to write an outline for a such a thing.
Sure, there's not a lot going on in the world of romantic comedies these days. It's nearly been a year since Sydney Sweeney's Anyone But You got a wide release, and some modest buzz. Before that we had Jennifer Lawrence's No Hard Feelings. Now that was definitely a raunchy romantic comedy. But a little over a years after it's release it's like that movie never existed. Wading back a little further Amy Schumer made some noise in the genre doing I Feel Pretty (2018) and Trainwreck (2015). Being real one would hafta confess that this genre has been pretty low profile since Jennifer Aniston, Drew Barrymore, and Katherine Heigl stopped doing rom-com material back in the early 2010s. This led me to think the genre needed a new rom-com queen... Now I also realize it needs more great minds committed do doing such fare. Where is the next Richard Curtis, who is famous for British accented rom-coms such as: Four Weddings and Funeral (1994), Knotting Hill (1999), Love Actually (2003), About Time (2013, which helped launch the Margot Robbie)? Or the next John Hughes: Sixteen Candles (1984) The Breakfast Club (1985), Weird Science (1985), Home Alone (1990), Career Opportunities (1991)?
Thankfully for you the next big thing in the rom-com industry is the one typing you this message. I'm back in my element. Back where I'm most happy, which just so happens to be penning romantic comedy material. Done screenplays 30 to date. And by the end of the year I should have my latest done. Right now, however, I'm hot-n-heavy into its outline and character building. So let's dive in and explore what goes into the process when E.C. Henry writes an outline.
"Yay, a true champion of the rom-com cause in the house!"
Thanks, Amy! I'll do my best. And just so you know, I like you too!
Now, when it come to content creation I think it's best to take a multi-pronged approach. I don't subscribe to the belief that you compartmentalize aspects of story building. Rather, I believe you build them all up at the same time. First, off inspiration rule! So when you commit to rom-com material always act on what "pops" at any given moment and record that down on a piece of paper or in a computer document. Having an amble stable of critical mass really helps write an outline and then later the spec. script screenplay.
The outline stage comes after you have committed yourself to writing a projects. Even if you don't have a lot critical mass: plot points, scene ideas, good dialog; you can begin the outline stage, it will just be a little tougher. I write ALL MY SCREENPLAYS using a basic three act structure. I've read some of the how-to books that detail other ways of looking at story structure, but I really don't give them any credence when writing my own. It's ACT I, ACT II, and ACT III for me. I also like to use the ACT Breakpoints for ACT I and II, what my INCITING INCIDENT or CUTE MEET is -- in the case of romantic comedy, and a THE END declaration statement of the last impression to the audience the story ends at. In between all this are scenes. The are the master beats of the story, where all the action takes place. I try to use catchy phrases to define the master beats or scenes in my outline.
So on the surface I don't have overly complicated stories. My outlines are very legible. I use an outline template in word perfect which proves spacing between the major delineations. Here's where I left off in one of my past screenplays entitled Kathy Smith Conquers Duboose High School:
This will give you an idea of how I format and use my outlines. Recently I've been tacking on a logline entry to them as well. You'll notice that for the first part of the outline I had page numbers, and then they stopped, and it looks like their was a break in the sequence of events -- there was! I think I outlined this story until I had enough critical mass to feel I could complete the screenplay. I think when writing Kathy Smith Conquers Duboose High School I started page budgeting (summarizing pages the scenes were taking up) because I was worried about not falling within the exceptable range of pages for a completed, feature-length screenplay which is 90 to 120 pages.
An outline doesn't have to be pretty. Your notes and writers scratchpad are by reputation shabby things. The PURPOSE of an outline is so that you can see the flow of you scene and see your story a whole -- not to win to spelling contest! Your romantic comedy screenplay's outline is is like an areal view down on the forest, where you see the whole track from beginning to end. If at anytime you feel led to write scenes in Final Draft (professional screenwriting software) so for it! An outline exists to help a writer make sense of his or her story, and find out what works and what needs some work. Moreso your outline is a place to hone your story logic. An outline is not the actual screenplay itself, but more of a map or proof of your thoughts of how the story should go.
I didn't write a "CUTE MEET" in the outline for Kathy Smith Conquers Duboose High School because it was a TEEN COMEDY, it's just in this teen comedy it had a major romantic comedy B-storyline between Kathy Smith and one of her classmates, Dustin Maddox; and in the logic of the story Kathy slowly befriends Dustin and over the course of events they trend closer to being more of a romantic, first foray into dating relationship.
A good "cute meet" can happen anywhere -- even at Smart Tech!
When writing I'm never tethered to the outline. Rather, this support, is more a crutch. A good outline will logically go through the story and organize your former inspiration: dialog, potentially parts in scenes, cinematic camera shots, and what the scene accomplishes.
I also outline each individual scenes or master sequences in my story. In this outline I break it down to Master Sequence Name, Scene Essence, Goals, Beat, Pre-writing, and finally Author Notes.
"Scene Essence" is like the logline captitualization of the sequence, and in it it just summarizes what this master sequence is all about. The "Goads" section specifies what I think this scene should accomplish. The "goals" section is a good area to chart the development of the romance if you're writing a romantic comedy. Most of the time I use the goals section to chart the arc of the characters as they're going through the story.
"Beats" is a summary of individual act in a story. "Pre-writing" is where I include aspects of inspiration that I think belong in this sequence that are screenwriting. I use "pre-writing" to capture my imagination on page when outlining starts to become more actual screenwring: shot heading, dialog, transitions, exc. than mere outline form. "Author Notes" is where I put songs the soundrack song that encapsulate that sequence, my thoughts on how big or small the scene will be, and any other consideration that don't belong in the beats or pre-writing section.
Besides outlines I also write master character rosters and individual biography pages of major characters. In my author friendly master character rosters I summarize the character in a brief paragraph detailing their function in the story, most times adding a physical description, and their role using such descriptors as: main protagonist, main antagonist, romantic rival, mentor, comic relief, supporting character, minor or bit character, and referenced character for those who are named by don't have any screentime.
Outlines depicting story action, and the main character arcs, play-off each other. I don't write them separately. Characters and the story belong together and feed off each other. There is only so much one can tame the "chaos of creation". With this in mind EXPECT your story outlines and character bios and listings to be a little disjointed. Realize that outline and character bios are scaffolding, not the physical building itself. But a good outline and character bio really helps when it comes to putting pen to paper and writing your first draft of the screenplay.
If you do not outline your chances of having a story that is lacking clarity goes up exponentially.
Outlines and character bios have value! So don't think you're "not writing" when you outline. Actually when you lay these blueprint out, you are doing one the hardest aspect of writing which is to provide structure to all the inspiration that you've acquired.
As pertains to rom-coms you can use colors or identifiers to track comedy and romance in a romantic comedy spec. script outline. I like to use red to track key beat of romance, orange or green to track comedy beats, and the a third color tied to the overall story to track key beats. I think it's wise to track the development of your story romances using red or "ROMANCE" identifiers. Color coding or using the "COMEDY" in your beats also helps you see if your story has enough funny stuff in it.
Finding and identifying possible comedic moments in the romantic comedy you're writing is a very, very big deal. Romantic comedies are supposed to be comedic in spots as an audience follows the stories of the characters involved in possible romances evolve over the course of the story. Comedy is much harder to write than the romance aspects of the story. The more comedy you find when your main couple is together, the better. Realize that conflict and completing motivations is a writer's best friend when writing romantic comedies.
Anyone But You TRIED to have this be one of their major comedic sequences, but...
When you write your character bios and go into the idiosyncrasy that make up your character who they are, usually therin in lies the uniqueness that makes them come alive. Sometimes the action they do that makes them memorable. Each main character in a romantic story should have an "arc". A character arc is the growth or change that happens in them because of their role in the story.
A lot of times when diving deeper into who your main character are you get ideas for necessary scenes in the script. This happens to me all the time, and is one of the main reasons I've been able to write to complete so many scripts, it's because I have rich characters that feel alive.
Creating characters that jump of the page and basically write themselves is one of the real joys of writing. Doesn't always happen. Sometimes it's a grind filling your world with non-cliche characters. Not that cliche is always bad. But you gotta know and have a feel for when it's okay to have a cliche character and when you really can't afford to have a character like that in such a role.
So was it the centerpiece couple in No Hard Feelings:
or the uninspired story and supporting characters that made it so forgetible?
So it all plays off each other, write the outline and your supporting character stuff at the same time. Follow your moments of inspiration and record them. It is always better to have more than enough material to complete a story, than to have everything under thought and developed. So don't be hard on yourself if it takes you a while to build up the outlines for your screenplays. A good outline helps you see the story as a whole and chart the actions of your characters as a story with romantic elements unfolds.
Hope this helps.
Sincerely,
P.S. The goal for my latest rom-com project is to give the outline for it another month, then begin a screenplay document over the Labor Day weekend. The first scene is really coming together, so I'll probably jump the gun and write that. But I know the rest of the story, and interlinking character connections needs more work and development. Writing My Big Fat Greek Wedding meets The 40-Year-Old Virgin, raunchy romantic comedy hasn't happened overnight. Like a lot of things takes putting in the time and giving the project amble dedication. Imagining --
As one of the stars, is really helping me on this one... (More to come)