A bit exaggerated but ...

From the mail bag:

hi charles.......i read your article on the vertical script format last year.......it changed my life.......i had written 10 screenplays in as many years, but i turned-a-corner when i adopted this format......i love it.....it's organic, perfect....

I've written several articles on "vertical writing," the latest being
this one from Screenwriters Utopia.

It's true. It's a technique that instantly improves a script, even if you don't change a word. Next to verticality, the next "easiest" way to improve a screenplay is to change complex sentences into two simple sentences. Then, here and there, simple sentences into sentence fragments.

The goal is to create something that is easy to read quickly, something easy to skim for the story, rather than something that must be read slowly to be understood. Someone said that screenwriting is the art of writing for readers who hate to read. That's not a bad premise. When you realize that prodco readers, the first who judge your script, get paid by the script, not by the hour, you realize their incentive for making the quickest possible decision about your work. If you slow them down by your writing style, you lose brownie points. Trust me.

Screenwriting is the only writing form about which it can be said: Don't let your writing get in the way of the story. What a strange thing to say about writing! But screenwriting really is as much about storytelling as writing. The writing is as economical as poetry. Thinking of a screenplay as a kind of prose poem also isn't a bad premise. A zinging economy is what you want.