Screenwriting 101: Miguel Flatow

“People sometimes ask me, ‘Do you meditate?’ And I say, ‘Yeah, I meditate like four hours a day,’ because that’s the time I’m writing. I’m not in myself. I’m not thinking about myself. I have no problems. I’m not thinking about my friends, about my health, about my finances. I’m not even thinking.

When you’re writing, so many things need to be happening at once. You have to be moving the plot forward. Checking the page count. Hitting your beats. It needs to be formatted correctly. The dialogue needs to be interesting. It needs to be dynamic. It needs to flow nicely. The character’s decisions need to make sense. Grammatically it needs to be impeccable. You need to alter your sentence length. Write in an active voice. Be economical with your words. Write exactly what you mean. Add emotion. It needs to be visually clear…

All of these things need to be happening at the same time, it’s so complex, that I think the more conscious you are, the more you’re not going to be able to hit all of the notes, as opposed to being able to lose yourself and let all the training kick it and let the unconscious do its thing.”

— Miguel Flatow

From Go Into The Story interview, March 2023

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