A few weeks back a few of my improv troupe members and another actor gathered on a Sunday afternoon and did a full read through of ”In Sheffield’s Company”, a script I’ve been working on for several years now. It was all of our 1st times and such a fulfilling experience to hear my story come out of other peoples mouths. To hear my characters in their voices and to see their reactions live as the drama unfolded. It really gave me the butterflies I hadn’t felt in quite some time and the adrenaline to push through the cringeworthy moments, or when a stupid spelling error was caught. I treated the group to pizza and soda as a thank you for their time, recorded it and took their suggestions and questions to heart. Overall, they were impressed with the story. Overall, I was on another planet just being in the room for this. I tried to sit back and be an audience member as much as I could but every now and then I stepped in to play a character and what not. Overall, it was a great experience and I’d love to hear some stories of your 1st table reads or read through with friends or actors, please share:)
Screenwriting : 1st table read ☺️ by Adrianna Agudelo
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Adrianna Agudelo that sounds like an amazing experience, I've not done that yet,
I have been thinking of how to plan something like that by bringing in local friends to a facebook event and it is a great step naturally to bring the screenplay to life!
What a cool creative experience that must be, good for you for making it happen!
Improv is the magic. You may want to check out the Writers' Room here on Stage 32 as well, if you haven't already.
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I’ll check that out for sure! Thanks for your feedback!
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They are amazing. One actress asked “why is mum like that?” I explained a back story that was lost in an 11 page cull. She said she would have liked to have known that. Which was interesting.
It was great seeing actors slowly get to know the characters. Once they knew them it was complete different. For me, it suddenly felt like a film. I could see performance. It also showed me a few low bits. Things that could be dropped because we had covered that ground.
People have heard this story before. In a rehearsal read for a different film an actor read gave a sexy lean to the read. I was a bit surprised. She said that if a man is comfortable ringing a woman at 2am and the first words out of her mouth isn’t “what’s wrong”, they have slept together. Something I had never seen in the character’s relationship. She was right of course. So it is now part of the script, this backstory.
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Table reads are one of the most productive things you can do as a screenwriter. The main thing I'd suggest is having someone read out the scene headings and description. Although these are still mostly virtual at the moment, the biggest benefit for most is that it places the writer in the position as an audience member "watching" their own work and allows you to take a step back and see your screenplay from a different angle.