CUT OUT THAT 'AND' and that 'but'

Example:

SITUATION: Soldiers (Jim and Tom) in the jungle, about to go into an enemy attack.

SCRIPT FOR ANALYSIS

JIM: You can't think like that. We're here to do a job and we stick together, we do it well. You know the drill and we've done this before.

COMMENTS:

Jim does not sound emotionally 'true' to me. This is a situation of high emotion, and his stressed breathing does not come through here. YOU HAVE TO MAKE THE CHARACTER'S SPEECH BREATHE.

So chop this up more. Incomplete phrases help too. Cut out the 'and'. And the 'but'.

Jim is doing too much talking. What has Tom to contribute? This will be much livelier and give the actors more, if Tom contributes here too. But what has Tom to say? He cannot just echo Jim, however much they are buddies in war.

Back to the initial scene set-up. You have to introduce conflict and structure.

WHAT TO DO:

Rewrite Jim's lines and get Tom into it too.

 

 

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