Script Writing Notes and LOTR book to script

Slugline: Sets the scene. Tells the person reading the script whether it is inside our outside (INT and EXT)
             Gives the time of day and where the scene is. Usually in all caps and bold

Action Description: Tells the actors and director what should be happening at that point in the script

Character name: Usually in caps and bold. signifies where the actor will start speaking

Dialogue: is always indented. What the actor says in the scene

Personal Direction: Advice to on how to say their line.

Commissioning editors (Film and TV):

Can be seen as a Talent scout -  they search around for the people to fill the positions for the film like the best writers. They also look for the best looking treatments so that the ideas for the films are good

Producers:

The producers pretty much does all the work by making sure that ever thing goes to plan and make sure that it all happens. 

The executive producers are normally well known and usually drum up money and their name makes the films popular

Directors:

Have pretty much complete control over the actors and everything else while filming

Script editors:

Script editors are there to ensure that the dialogue works while they edit the scripts. The do this throughout the production of the film

Agents (Film and TV)

The agents represent the artists that will be used and will seek work for those artists in their books. This also includes the technical crews needed for the films production.

Writers:

The writers will write the script initially then the scripts are given to the script editors so that they can change around the dialogue if they have too. In the end the writers have to make that big transition of turning a book into a script for a film. This is no easy task as they have to cut out quite a few parts if it doesn't add to the overall plot.

LOTR book to script notes

A script is never really 100% complete, it is always a work in progress. The script is always being updated even during the actual filming, as Peter described it, its like putting the rails in front of a train while the train is moving.

The three scriptwriters Philippa, Fran and Peter (Fran and Peter are married). The scriptwriters also had alot of input from the actors about what should be in the script.

They had turned the book into a 90 page treatment. They said this was like cracking the code of the book

This was originally was for two films but in the end they were told that they should make it into three films so that they didn't leave out too much detail from the book. They also ended up switching the lines around for different characters so what one person said in the book wasn't really the same person as the one who said it in the film.

With parts of the script Philippa and Fran left gaps like ' Men Fight '. They then gave that part to Peter to write and it ended up with Peter doing the fight scenes while Philippa and Fran ended up doing most of the romance parts in the film.

Most of the actors would get several different drafts of the script every week as they kept editing it and some of the scripts weren't even looked at because they would be too tired or they would know that there would probably be a new script the next day.

Some parts of the books they had to leave out because they did not add to the plot that they had which was Frodo taking the ring to destroy it. Other than things that didn't add to the plot they follow the book religiously like it was their Bible.

They never really just sat in a room and wrote the script. For example Fran preferred hand writing the the script while Phillipa would type the script. This meant that one scripts would have been quite clean while the other script would have had different notes written onto it. They also made sure that it wasn't just their input but also the actors contributed with the script writing. They also kept going back to the book to make sure that their script fits with the story.

Role of the writer 

There were quite a few changes that had been made to the original book for it to work with the script.

Female characters in the book did not have that big a role to play. This was changed in the script and the female characters that were in the film had bigger roles to play and had more lines. An example of this is the character Arwen, in the book she only had the role of saying a short poem whereas in the film they had given her a larger role and even had parts of the plot revolve around some of the things she said.

They had omitted different parts of the story from the book when they were writing the script. They had taken out a part about Tom Bombadil because it did not add to the story of the plot. This meant that if the scene in the book did not work with the plot of the film they would take it out of the script for the film.

The script writers had decided to make an exposition so that it explained what was going on in the film when it started. They had done this by using Gandolf to talk about the story of the ring and about the war for the ring. Gandolf is also used throughout the film to explain what is going on. The exposition is the part at the beginning of the film before the actual film starts.

The actors had also contributed to the script with many parts. for example an actor who would play a dwarf would be told to go and research what a dwarf would sound like and speak like. They would then have an interview with the actor and ask them what their character would sound like, that would be what their character would sound like in the film