Phil M wrote:
> >There's the part
> > where you see Mozart composing, and it's all just *there*...he's
> > writing, and it's playing in his head...he gets interrupted, he looks
> > up, the music stops, he talks to someone, then goes back to it...and
> > the music just starts playing again, every note in place.
>
> Neat. So if you were interrupted during the writing (bathroom, food,
> cats, Martian invasion, etc etc etc) you didn't loose anything? If I
> get interrupted writing a grocery list we end up not having milk that
> week because that's how my brain works. The more I stop in the middle
> of something (like writing this email!) the more I loose.
>
> Okay, this technique works for scripts, is there any variation when
> your doing short stories, novels or music or is it the same for
> everything that you create?
>
> Anyone ever tell you, "too many words?" ; - )
>

The closest I ever came to this...see, in scriptwriting these days,
where no one is supposed to have any remaining attention span, blocks
of dialogue are much to be avoided. Just a couple of sentences per
character and move on. Me, I like monologues. Always have. I like
letting the character build up a nice head of steam and rampage toward
a conclusion. Some don't like to do that. Different strokes, etc.
You're supposed to look at the page and if you see a big block of
dialogue, get rid of it.

So when I was working with Chris Carter on "The World on Fire," and
turned in my first draft, we had a script meeting. One of the first
things Chris said/did was...he looked at the script, looked at me, held
his index and thumb about three inches apart, and said, "Does that
really work for you?"

I said, "Chris, c'mon, you use what you're born with and make the best
of it."

We never discussed it again.

jms