Interview (Part 6): Julia York

My interview with the 2024 Black List writer for his script The Seven Guys You Date Before Marriage.

Julia Yorks wrote the screenplay The Seven Guys You Date Before Marriage which landed on the 2024 Black List. Recently, I had the opportunity to do a deep dive with Julia into her filmmaking background, writing her Black List script, and her approach to the craft of screenwriting.

Today in Part 6 of a 6-part series to run each day this week, Julia provides some thoughts on the craft of screenwriting.

Scott: Well, congratulations. I’ve got a few craft questions for you. We’ve already touched a bit on. Here’s one for you that I don’t normally ask, but I was noticing it’s a very professional script in the sense that it’s got wonderful setups and payoffs and callbacks. I did stand‑up comedy for two years, and so I’m very attuned to callbacks.

You have a lot of them, including bookends. The beginning, there’s this proposal that’s not, and then in the end, there’s a big, public‑facing proposal that’s very satisfying. Do you actually think of, “I want to do callbacks,” or are those the kind of things that just sort of serendipitously happen?

Julia: You know, it’s funny. I am a meticulous beat, sheeter, outliner. I really think through everything before I jump onto the page, and so all of that stuff typically is thought out, and I do love a circular moment, but I think because I do so much planning upfront, it allows me to find a lot of things on the page and have a lot of fun in ways that I don’t think I could if I was a little bit more loosey‑goosey with all of that stuff.

So I think some of it, I’m like, “Oh, wait. That would be hilarious to put in here,” but the big set‑piece moments are thought through, like, “OK. How does she meet Brooks the first time? That’s how she’s going to meet him the next two times.” Things like that. I try to keep that consistent.

Scott: When you’re breaking story, do you bust out cards, or do you have some sort of electronic version of it?

Julia: I created this beach‑y template that I have that has come out of just years of working with scripts and also directors and things like that. It’s a combination of three things. It is “Save the Cat,” which I know is controversial, but it’s like the Save‑the‑Cat arc. It is the sequence method, and it’s character goals and plans, and basically assigning new plans every sequence.

Breaking my scripts into bite‑sized pieces has just been so unbelievably helpful, and I started doing that probably in 2020, 2021. Then from there, from a pretty solid beat sheet, I bring it to an outline. For features, it tends to be 20 to 30 pages, scene by scene, and then it honestly makes writing a first draft a breeze.

Scott: That’s what I tell my students all the time.

Julia: Nobody believes you.

Scott: Yeah. It’s like, “Why would I spend all this time?” If you sell a project, a pitch or you get a writing assignment, you got twelve weeks or whatever to turn it in. They’re like, “Why would you spend four or five, six weeks on the outline?” Well, it’s just going to expedite the process, and you’re much less likely to get lost.

Julia: I always think, “OK. If you have a script, you’re writing five pages a day, it’ll take you 20 days.” Right? Only 20. That’s no time, and that’s five pages a day. That’s nothing. Right? You can do that so easily.

It’s so funny. I’m working on a first draft right now, and I said to my manager, he was like, “How is that going?” I said, “Oh, I’m on page 70.” He was like, “What? How are you on page 70?” I was like, “Well, because 30 pages of it was my outline.” Right? I already had a very comprehensive plan in place.

I’m not a vomit draft person. I’m a person who I got to plot out and need to know what needs to be in every scene, and then I want to figure out what I’m trying to say and then how do I say it in the most unique, bold, and concise way possible?

Scott: I want to talk to you about that concise part because that’s another thing that I think screenwriters would appreciate, is the efficiency of this thing. By page seven or whatever, we’re right into the front end of the story’s hook. By 15, she’s got that…I think it’s by page 11, she says, “I want to go on these seven dates.” There’s an efficiency to it.

Then the scenes themselves are not long. The scenes typically are a page, maybe a page and a half.

Let’s talk about the scene writing part of the process. Are you conscious of scene length? What are you trying to do when you’re writing a scene?

Julia: Yeah. You know what’s so funny? My first drafts tend to be really short. I have a horror movie right now that’s tight 90. I have this draft that I’m working on right now, I’m like, “It’s page 70, but I’m going to need to add some more meat to it.” I tend to be concise, which is so funny because in person, I’m extremely verbose, but on the page, I’m more concise.

I like to keep scenes to be no longer than three pages, and I rely a lot on particularly in a rom‑com, but in anything, really, I think it’s my animation background. I rely a lot on the physical because in animation, it’s what you write that we’re going to see that’s so much more important because board artists have to interpret that and bring it to life.

I think a lot about what we’re going to see action wise. I always think, “This is what I need to convey. How do I convey it in the most fun, most bold way that I haven’t seen before?”

Scott: What about theme?

Julia: It’s a really great question. It’s not something that I tend to think about a ton when I’m writing, which I think is a little bit…Yeah, I don’t know. It’s not something that I think about a ton when I’m writing. What is the theme of this movie? It’s loving yourself or realizing that your love looks different, you don’t have to be like anyone else or you can trust your own voice. You don’t have to rely on other people for advice.

Then certain projects that I have I’m really interested in taking the theme and turning it into motifs within the story. I have this horror movie, and it’s very much there’s a lot of duality. It’s a lot of mirrors. It’s a lot of double metaphors, and so when I have a really strong theme, I think it’s really fun to pepper it in, but it’s a tough thing to think about as a screenwriter.

Scott: I’ve interviewed hundreds of writers, and theme is the one area where they most often respond with, “Oh, yeah. I don’t know.” Most of them say, “ Whatever it is, I discover it over the course of writing. I don’t start off with a theme.” You know?

Julia: Well, you know what’s funny? Because I use the Save‑the‑Cat beat sheet within my own beat sheet, page five is theme stated. Right? So it’s like I do always find a way to do that. In this case, it was, “Well, your parents’ marriage isn’t necessarily yours.” Right? I tend to do it a little bit more simplistically, putting it into that moment and then kind of letting it go.

Scott: Another question: You’re in New York. I always imagine New York writers, they go out to write in some funky, cool coffee shop. How about you?

Julia: Truly, it’s funny. I was never this much of a morning person before, but I think my divorce has changed my brain chemistry. I wake up almost…Without an alarm. I wake up at 5:55. I don’t know why. Not by choice, but just my body wakes up naturally, and so I will spend the morning kind of breakfast, hang out, getting ready.

I’m typically at the coffee shop that I like to work at by around 8:15, 8:30, and I’m a morning writer. After about 3:00 PM, I am useless, unless I’m on a deadline. So I write basically from 8:30 until whatever I’ve got going on in the afternoon, if I’ve got meetings, if I’m…

I also started coaching, so if I have stuff in the afternoon or evenings, but if it’s a day where I’ve got nothing to do, I’ll be there until about 1:30, maybe, or until I get really hungry because a lot of these places, the food is very expensive, so I’ll go home, have lunch, and either have calls or meetings in the afternoon, or then I’ll work maybe for a couple more hours.

Maybe I’ll switch it up on a different project, something that feels a little bit less pressure if I can make a little bit of progress, but really, it’s that chunk of time in the morning. Today, I had a meeting, so I went from 8:30 to 11:30, but I cranked out more during that time than I do sometimes when I have more time to write.

Scott: One final question for you. What’s the one most important piece of advice you would offer to someone who’s trying to do this, trying to learn the craft and work in the film and TV business?

Julia: I would just say that you’ve got to just keep going. Like, I had someone say to me early on and he’s now a writer who is in the…Is it the Marvel? He’s in the Marvel family, writing Marvel movies. He was in his 30s delivering pizza downtown and ultimately got staffed on a Marvel show and and now is making millions of dollars writing these movies.

He said to me, “You just have to outlast everybody,” and he didn’t mean it in a competitive way. He meant it in, like, “People leave, and all of a sudden, you’re still around.” You know what I mean? I’ve really found that to be true. That’s just it. Luckily for me, I don’t really have any other marketable skills, so I’m going to be here for a while.

For Part 1 of the interview, go here.

Part 2, go here.

Part 3, go here.

Part 4, go here.

Part 5, go here.

Julia is repped by CAA.

For my interviews with dozens of other Black List writers, go here.