Get Your First Drafts Done - My Writing Steps

I hate it when my good play ideas end up in the "idea graveyard". Less of that! Here's what I do to get first drafts done:

1. Spark Phase: Focus on anything that has energy/momentum. A snippet of dialogue, a character, a situation, etc. Quickly capture spark details in an Idea Dump document. START WRITING A SCENE BASED ON YOUR SPARK. Don't get stuck in planning; capture any new ideas/questions in an Idea Dump doc.
2. Idea Dump - Best done with a trusted colleague. Identify the strongest ideas, questions/uncertainties, what the script feels like it wants to be (at this point). Let this be a rambling, conspiracy-theory-esque monologue with tangents and new ideas.
3. Focus In to Expand - Capture the leading ideas and questions. Begin to sketch out a rough (often incomplete) outline of the story.
4. Identify Main Action - Specify the main conflict, major incidents, specific obstacles, end or resolution of the story. Create a macro outline of the sequence of main action.
5. Plot Outline - Turn macro outline into scene outlines, creating a skeleton for the whole play. Each scene has its own major actions, also note key moments or lines. Just enough to connect one major moment to the next. Question marks are totally fine!

​Then I follow my Plot Outline and write a rapid "vomit draft" (I'm trying to find a less gross term). Done is better than good! 

I work with an organic flow between structure and play. The steps and outline helps with my anxiety, I feel that I always know where I'm going next. Then within that container I have freedom to follow impulses - even to break the container and steps. 

May our idea graveyards be empty,
Jos​é                                                                                   This process was developed in collaboration with my writing partner, Taylor W. Couch