On the Corner of 85th and Fifth by Aleksandra Harbour - Drama - When Barbara Styles, a 25-year-old graduate student from New York City, is mistaken for a prostitute by David Jones, the man of her dreams, she decides to play along with the misunderstanding, leading her on a captivating journey of self-discovery and unforeseen romance. As their relationship deepens, Barbara is unaware that David is carrying a secret of his own that threatens to unravel their newly found love. 109 pages - pdf format

New writer interested in feedback on this work, please be nice

Nice story. I liked the happy ending. The dialog was believable as were the characters. You followed the formula for a romance story nicely.

I felt David’s secret was developed a little late but that’s just my opinion. I feel there could be a little less build-up and more time dealing with David’s failing health. However, I did appreciate the bread crumbs that were laid out, like the fact that he didn’t drink. I’m not that great a writer to help you with pacing. I’m just offering an opinion.

I do have some comments for things that I can help you with.

About format:

You need a formal title page. What you have at the top of your first page doesn’t work even though you included everything you need on a title page.  You really need to make it a complete, separate page.

You need page numbers. Since you didn’t place any, I will use the PDF page numbers when addressing examples on specific pages.

Also, you have a problem with line spacing. In several places, there are extra spaces between paragraphs, scene headings and the following action text, and, between characters and their dialog.

You have widow/orphan problems in which a character title and the associated dialog are on separate pages. This happens first where at the bottom of page 3 you have BARBARA and at the top of page four you have her line.

I don’t know what software you used to compose this so I can’t help you with that. Most screenplay writing software packages will fix these problems. They will at least do the page numbering. If you did use a screenplay writing software package, I apologize. In my defense, there are places your software is letting you down.  For example, at the top of page 80, the dialog paragraphs for Barbara and David have messed up margins.

However, you did set your margins correctly. Also, you capitalized your characters when introduced so I know you did some research or had some knowledge in writing screenplays. You are not flying into this blind.

About writing style:

You should break up your action text into paragraphs no longer than four lines. I know some writers like George Lucas wrote long paragraphs but that was a long time ago and far, far away. Scripts have shorter paragraphs now. It reads faster that way and it’s easier on the eyes. That’s something that is important if you want your work produced.

You should avoid using verbs that end in “ing”, aka passive verbs. You do avoid this in many places but in several other places you do have passive verbs. The worst place is in your opening paragraph. It set a bad example right away and would turn off a producer. Barbara is sitting on a sofa, reading a book. This reads more like a novel, not a script. You need to re-word this so that it’s sits on a sofa, reads a book. I admit, that’s a challenge.

Also, you need to cut down on your use of parentheticals. In many places they are unnecessary because what the character is saying and the situation they are in dictates the tone.  For example, on page 56, you don’t need (fishing) or (teasing her). It’s evident in the dialog. On page 72, you don’t need (defensively).

Also on page 72, (her tone is stern) is awkward and reads like a novel. It should be shortened to (stern tone) and later on page 73 (softer tone).  

In some places you use parentheticals where you should pull it out as an action line. At the bottom of page 92, you have in Barbara’s dialog, (startled, looking up at Alexa). That should be pulled out as an action line after Alexa says, “Barbara!” and the line should say,” Startled, Barbara looks up at Alexa.” Then Barbara should say, “Sorry, what?” On page 57, George shakes hands with Barbara should be an action line preceding his dialog, “Hey barbara…” and not as a parenthetical.

Also on page 57, you have a long parenthetical that should be pulled out, even though it’s in the middle of a dialog paragraph. It should read, ”…Alicia here –“, followed by the action line ,”He points to a waitress who stands next to the table.” followed by the character heading “GEORGE (CONT’D)” followed by, “-will be your server…”  Notice that I cut the dialog and sandwiched in an action line. Where the dialog paragraph is broken, I placed dashes to indicate that the dialog is continuous around the action text. I hope I'm clear.

There are many places you break the cardinal rule of “Show, don’t tell.” In a novel, you can narrate what people are thinking and feeling. You can narrate what people know and what they have figured out. In screenplays, you cannot. The general rule is that if you can’t point a camera to it or a microphone cannot record it, don’t put it in your script. You can cheat a little bit if you describe an expression or a gesture first. For example you can write, Oscar taps the garbage can with impatience.

On page 15 you have (lying but not get it) and (knowing there is more to the story).  This works in a novel, not in a script. You have to let the setting and the dialog define the situation. The director and the actors have to sell it, and the audience has to figure it out.

I hope you find my advice helpful. I won’t be insulted if you researched it and found mistakes in what I stated.  I have been wrong before.

I think this is a nice, producible story and worth the effort needed to clean it up. If this is your first story, I think you did quite well. My last piece of advice it to read the other work posted on this site and read the comments. It’s a great resource for learning.