Writers Craft - Friends - Screenplay Impressions -

Writer’s craft
Blog Impressions of Screenplay


The other television shows and other screenplays that I thought contrasted so similarly were that seventies show, and the eighties hit television show Cheers. Although I noticed similarities within the screenplays, and the character development, I also noticed some unique individual aspects of Friends.
The characters in Friends tend to lie to each other a lot, although in the other shows, where they lie behind their backs, Friends they lie to their faces hoping to get away.
The similarities to the three screenplays happened to be that they all formed around one dominant location. Whether it’s the coffee house, Eric Forman’s basement, or the bar. Along with Friends each show, uses sarcasm in almost every line, in order to gain laughs from the audience. It wasn’t all laughs and games for me though. I went through many different ideas, and scenarios for my screenplay. I thought it needed to be perfect, and in thinking that I got mind blocks for scenes, and how to further the plot. Not to mention the television show Friends has come up with so many idea’s it was hard not straying toward one or two episodes. My first idea for the screenplay was to have Phoebe wanting a new song to play, and a famous musician happening to show up and liking her songs. He then was going to introduce and create some songs for Phoebe. Phoebe not recognizing the musician was going to freak out and tell him he’s unworthy of telling her how to create music. As I kept trying to make the script perfect, I couldn’t think of anything, instead of just putting lot’s of thoughts and ideas on the table. My second attempt at the screenplay based off of Friends, was going to have a sport involved in the episode. They five of them were going to head to the park, and play a game of soccer. Although in the back of my head I had remembered the episode from season one called “The one with the football”. This episode includes the gang going to a park on thanksgiving and playing a game of touch football. I was going to use that episode almost like a foundation, and go a separate way with the conversations, and the game results. I thought that would be unoriginal screenplay. So on my third attempt of the screenplay based of Friends, I thought I could incorporate parts of the first screenplay idea, without the famous actor, and have a conversation about sports that leads to other dialogue in the script. What really guided me towards my final screenplay, was reading over scripts from the writers of all three shows, and how they all used funny, and well-written scripts. The screenwriters for Friends were well educated, and they had backgrounds in things that I liked and am drawn too. The actors for the script seemed to almost be on point. I think out of all the actors, Mathew Perry acts so naturally, and fluid, he seems himself out there. All in all this screenplay really helped me enjoy and try a new element of writing.