The more scripts I critique, the more convinced I become that writing style is as important to writing a screenplay as well-developed characters, story structure, and theme. What do I mean by writing style? Some people refer to it as voice. That sounds a bit pretentious to me. I define it as the selection of words on the page that conveys a story as succinctly and as clearly as possible.

Writing a movie is all about telling a good story. The story must be the focus. The writer must stay out of the way of the story. This takes great finesse. Finesse comes from developing and refining a skill. Anyone who wishes to become a professional at some endeavor spends years honing the knowledge, proficiency, and technical facility of their chosen field. True professionals work tirelessly to continue to develop their craft.

Tiger Woods just won the Masters after a two-year drought of no wins. He was at the top of the game when he decided to recraft his swing. The arm-chair pundits thought he was washed up. He was merely a professional who realized that he could get better, so he delayed his gratification of winning to improve his game. Someone asked Pat Riley, head coach of the Lakers in the late 80s, what made Magic Johnson the best point guard in the game. His reply was that Magic Johnson understood the fundamentals of the game better than anyone else. His answer had nothing to do with Magic’s flashy game. That was the result of Magic’s knowledge and application of fundamentals.

The same is true of writing. The skill of writing has little to do with slamming words down on the page in a fit of inspiration. The inspiration is fun when it happens. The professional then gets busy and rewrites the inspiration. Sanding and polishing a piece of furniture that has been crafted from rare rough wood comes to mind. Distilling and aging wine made from choice grapes comes to mind. Contemplating and reworking each word of a poem comes to mind. Dylan Thomas, when asked how he knows when a poem is ready for publication, replied, “If I waited until I felt a poem was perfect, I would still be working on my first poem.” The distillation process is endless. The professional never “arrives.” Most people want to “Be” without “becoming.” I suggest that one learn to savor the “becoming.”

Only the amateur states that a screenplay is merely a blueprint for a movie, therefore it doesn’t require the finesse of a poet. A screenplay can be a work of art as its own entity. The more refined you make the writing, the easier the read will be. The easier your screenplay is to read, the better chance you have of selling your work. So, make your skill of shaping the words with which you tell your story as important as all those sexy elements like character, structure, and theme, because a good story deserves to be well represented on the page by excellent writing.