I write to announce in completion, in part, of the script of “General Observations On Quadrupeds”. After over 6 months of intense character development and improvisations, we have created, written and developed the script. This stage of the process was not without it’s problems though. We began the ‘writing’ process by improvising the meeting of our two primary characters and the subsequent visits to the butcher’s shop. This played out very well and drama came naturally. The process lead us to a fairly unexpected, yet controlled outcome.

The script started at 17 pages, with scenes still not improvised, then it swelled to over 25 pages; far too long for a 10-minute short so we, brutally, cut it down to the 13-pages it is now. With the process being fairly organic, the director took us down the route of editing the script down with our actors, a decision I whole-heartedly disagreed with. I felt that them changing the dialogue outside of the context of an improvisation was wrong. It was as if all of the work we had done was a waste of time. I transcribed the dialogue from recordings of the improvisations and it lead to a more natural and more rounded script. To change the text was wrong in my opinion.

Since the script was finalised a week ago, a storyboard has been drawn up which both myself and Stephen Roe, the cinematographer, is happy with. I was really proud of Rosie for doing such a good job of drawing up the first load of story boards. It was exciting to see her vision for the first time, although myself and Ste did make some changes to suit ourselves, and the amount of thought she had taken over each shot was very, very good. I shall post some of them up once they are scanned in and digitised.

We progress to further development of the scenes with our actors, as I finalise the plans for the Hitchin shoot next month. We are in exciting times, exciting times indeed!