Screenwriting : Two People Talking at a Table by Maurice Vaughan

The Irishman takes the cake on that one... Pesci and De Niro

The HEAT scene is one of my favorite table scenes too, Mike Childress. Maybe my favorite.

I like those ways to make a table convo scene interesting, especially having quick flashes to something going on somewhere else.

"Of course the cliché thing is one or both participants has/have a gun(s) on the other under the table." Knives under the table to put a spin on the cliché? Or water guns, etc?

I still need to see THE IRISHMAN, Charles V Abela. I'm looking forward to it. I'll look for the table conversation scene(s).

Two people talking at a table, only if the stakes are high, and I like mine rare. You can dissect each scene and each character apart line by line, but isn't it all about the whole, and why have I been waiting this long for my food, what time is it?

Theres the classic Hitchcock example where there is a bomb under the table that will go off in 5 minutes. Every second they talk becomes more and more tense after the audience knows that.

This however doesn't need to be taken literally. This can be an emotional time bomb (something one has to say to the other and finds it harder and arder to do so as time goes on - or the opposite) for example.

High stakes will definitely make a table conversation scene interesting, Ken Turocy. Yeah, where's my food??? Haha

An emotional time bomb is a great idea, Ewan Dunbar! I'm gonna try it. Thanks for the idea.

Sometimes two guys sitting across a table just talking is so good they get their own action figures https://youtu.be/5WwZkbAvBtk?si=HyZn_xY2fdQAdeLs

Maybe it's just me but I really like table conversations just as is lol. But I also wrote several such scenes in Finding Elpis, like where one character, frustrated at being on the wrong end of a love triangle, very aggressively cuts his steak. I'd say little things like that can at least give them some flavour (pun intended).

I know what WHEN HARRY MET SALLY scene you're talking about, Mike Childress.

That's another way to make a table conversation scene interesting, Tucker Teague. Give the characters props.

Yeah, some table conversation scenes are interesting just by the dialogue, Banafsheh Esmailzadeh. And making one of the characters frustrated is a way to make the convo interesting.

Yeah, I think table conversation scenes usually work better in certain genres, Mike Childress. Like Sci-Fi, Mystery, Horror, Thriller, Comedy, and Crime. I think the location and what's going on around the table can help keep the conversation interesting too.

Inglorious Basterds (both the scene before the bar shootout and the one just before the end of the movie) and Heat are the standout examples. Also some good examples of this in Resident Alien as well. These scenes can be a great study in the shifting power dynamics in a scene - who has control over who? Who can afford to get up and walk away and who needs the other to stay and why?

I wrote a short story once about a Preacher who gambles the money away he raises for a woman's husband is terminally ill. The preacher meets her at a diner to confess. I made it very tension filled and just as the preacher is about to confess, she also has a confession just as her husband walks in. He's actually been out of town for a while on business. Both are liars and realize they both used one another. Basically the audience knows without them actually confessing.

Tension and twists are definitely ways to make a table conversation scene interesting, John C. Bounds. I think they're two of the best ways.

And you gave the audience an opportunity to put two and two together, John C. Bounds ("Basically the audience knows without them actually confessing").

Maurice Vaughan Yes. It took me several drafts to get it right though.

This is very good. Thanks Maurice Vaughan

Thanks, Michael David. You're welcome.

Excellent idea Maurice for compelling dialogue. This would be a great exercise for a class group.

Thank you, Jamie Sutliff. That sounds like a great idea.