The Table Read

Getting the script on its feet

Dear Reader,

How do you know when a script is ready? Granted, the revision process often continues through filming. As the saying goes, the story is told first on the page, rewritten while filming, and rewritten again in the editing bay. But how do you know when a script is as good as you can make it and ready to start working on a budget, talking to talent, and courting potential financiers? The best way to get a story on its feet and test its readiness is a "table read”.

As I am many drafts deep into a feature film, the producers suggested we test drive the material with some talent. My first step: casting talent for each of the characters. Over the last few years of living in LA, I’ve been blessed with many actor friends. Additionally, taking classes at an acting school provides me with first-hand observation of actors’ work. One of the biggest lessons I’ve gained from acting class is this: casting is everything. Is the actor already the part in their essence?

Of course, craft and training matter, but each of us has an ‘essence’ that we can’t hide. If the director casts the role correctly, that’s most of their job done right there. A seasoned director knows that even if you're halfway through shooting the project, if the talent you hired for a role isn’t right, you MUST let the talent go, recast, and reshoot everything. Think I’m joking? Ever heard of “Back to the Future”? Remember Eric Stoltz, the original lead?… Exactly.

So, as I thought over each of the roles, certain actors jumped to mind. I reached out to them, inviting them over for wine and cheese and a table read, and received enthusiastic yeses. That’s the other advantage of working with professional actors: they cherish their craft, and if their schedule allows, they’ll jump at a chance just to spend an evening gathered around a script. That’s a professional who loves their work.

A few parts remained uncast and, as happenstance goes, in the week leading up to the reading, I ran into actor friends who happened to perfectly fit the parts I needed. Once again, they said yes immediately. Sure, LA is full of talent, but you have to understand how rare this is. Each of the actors I asked was perfect for the parts, exactly what I had envisioned, and they all happened to have the same evening free. Sometimes the stars align.

The producers graciously provided for the wine and cheese spread, and with that, talent arrived. Old friends and new acquaintances mingled and chatted over the charcuterie. We gathered around the large table, and as each actor introduced themselves and what role they were playing, you could feel the excitement in the air. That was new to me.

I am intimately familiar with the solitary caccoon of the writer’s process, spending months on end as the sole nurturer of a storyline, with intermittent feedback sessions. I know the (sometimes frantic) energy of set, everyone doing a billion physical tasks to take word and make it flesh. But this… the table read, was somewhere in between.

I realized that quiet spark inside me, that inner child who loves story so much she traveled all the way to LA to string pictures together for a living, was shared by the seven other people at the table. It was like we each held lightning bugs in small jars, and the warm glow from each of us, that quiet excitement for why we were at that table, collected to create a small circle of light.

One actor served as narrator, and though based on his previous work, I knew he could do it, I was frankly floored at the speed and ease with which he read all of my visuals and action lines. He kept the story engaging, matching the mood with his tone and delivery. Once again, that is the benefit of working with trained professionals.

While I was thrilled, and I could feel the excitement in my fellow artists, I sensed something else in the air. As each actor stepped into their roles, reading their lines, I felt them sizing each other up. Why? Because they were all so good! I had specifically asked people who I knew were not only right for the part, but excellent at their craft.

Like a breeze on my skin, I felt it as the actors recognized the level of skill gathered around that table, and how perfect each was for the role. And then I felt it as they quietly reflected on themselves. It is possible I imagined all of this, but I have so often experienced being an artist in a room of colleagues, be it as a visual artist, a writer, or a member of a production team, and I know this moment. When the talent in the group is high, we can’t help but ask ourselves, “Do I belong here?”

After the first few pages, I felt the mood shift as each realized that yes, indeed, they deserved a seat at that table. They relaxed and leaned into their pages with a laser focus. Group reading a story is an unusual experience, as everyone in the room at once ceases to be aware of each other, and at the same time are wholly in sync.

With the actor's permission, I recorded the table read for playback later, both video and audio. I watched actors as they delivered the lines, bringing comedy, drama, sadness, and action to these characters that have been living in my head for the last two and a half years. It was surreal, hearing their voices jump off the page. I had conversations with my leads prior to the table read to discuss who these characters were, their voice, their view on the world, and where they’re at emotionally in each scene. Needless to say, my leads delivered. One character, in particular, is a complicated voice, hard to pin down. Yet the actress playing her gave voice to exactly the nuance I was looking for. Casting is everything.

It took about two and a half hours to read through a 122-page script, and when we were done, they all looked up as if in a dream. Again, there was an energy in the room, restrained, as if each was waiting to see if they could jump into the sandbox again. When it became clear they wanted to talk about the story, with barely contained glee, I hit record again, and what followed was the most fascinating conversation.

Almost exclusively, my feedback comes from other writers, and occasionally producers. But looking around at the table full of actors, I realized: “Of course!” Actors devour stories. They study scripts. They meditate on lines. They dive into characters, finding out all the nooks and crannies of what makes a character tick. These are the artists who look at the story from the first-person POV of motivation, emotion, and arc.

Some of their feedback overlapped with notes I had received from writers and producers, and it’s helpful to know multiple eyes are bumping on the same story issues. But they also had a completely unique angle. Especially after two and a half hours reading the story together, they were invested in the characters, the world, and they had very clear insights on where the story could grow. They picked up on themes I had intentionally woven into the DNA of the story, but hadn’t stated explicitly, and gave thoughts on how to carry those concepts home.

Writing is rewriting, but the table read allowed me to hear the words out loud and be certain that, yes, this is a good story. Even if I hadn’t heard the feedback at the end, I knew it for certain with how utterly absorbed my actors were. They were excited, invested, and cared enough about the narrative that they wanted to improve it not just with their acting abilities, but with their finely honed storytelling senses.

In conclusion, the script is almost ready, and I know what to do next. Yet before the reading was halfway done, while everyone was still deep into the plot, I looked around the table and thought, “I HAVE to do this again.” Do I have any other feature scripts ready for a table read? No, I do not. Guess I’ll have to keep writing.

Adventure Awaits,

~S. C. Durbois

Cast left to right: Maleah Woodley, Paul Turbiak, Alan Lowrie, Jamal James, Jonathan Regier, Emily Scraggs, Robert Solomon, Shayla C. Durbois

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S. C. Durbois Newsletter

• 1st Saturday every month: a new original short story.

• 3rd Saturday every month: a writerly check-in with updates.

• 4th Saturday every month: a new original poem. Subscriber access only.

The Day the Mountains Were Small

Magical Realism

~The Day the Mountains were Small~

By S. C. Durbois

Pieces of the world started falling off in sharp juts.

The talking heads on the news didn’t know what to make of it. There were no earthquakes. No flashes of light. No meteorites. Just here one day, and then… a long way down. Like one of those cubist paintings.

Conspiracy theorists had a field day. They came out in droves. It was the aliens. It was the government. It was time travel. Global warming. Judgment day. Evolution. The normal shifts in a planet about to give birth.

But they kept cropping up, these random geographical reshufflings. Geologists and geographers alike were flummoxed. Then someone got the bright idea to ask AI. It wasn’t the most beautifully formulated question. Just:

“What’s up with the freaky land stuff?”

But apparently, even AI had been paying attention to the news because she came back with an answer relatively quick:

“The land is falling into the heart of the sea.”

Not sure where she got that one, maybe ancient poetic literature, but it turned out she was right. Scientists sent probes and, several thousand feet down, there was water. It wasn’t fresh, obviously. The probes brought samples back and tested them. Filled with minerals, they found, and phosphorus. There was a definite sulfuric bite.

A few months passed, and the cracks didn’t leave. The theories continued, but eventually, it was common, another natural disaster: tsunamis, floods, earthquakes, fires, and now this. The media played with titles: “The Great Cracking.” Unfortunately, that sounded like a social comment, and there was already too much evidence for that, so it was a little on the nose. At the same time, “The Sinkhole Phenomenon” didn’t quite encapsulate the depth and breadth of the problem. One day, there was a forest, or a great plane, or desert, and the next, instant canyon that went on and on. Thousands of feet down.

Preppers emerged as the new TikTok trend. They started podcasts like “100 ways to cook canned food gourmet.”

The massive geographical shifts reminded some of the Grand Canyon. One geologist hypothesized that the rock formation was left over from a previous incident of Spontaneous Geological Reconstruction. (That was the term they landed on: SGR.) Expeditions flocked to Arizona as every scientist lived out his or her dreams of becoming Indiana Jones.

Spelunking gained a cult following, and rock climbers reached a level of fame akin to the astronauts during the race for space. NPR did a whole series on this contrast: “Looking up when we should have been looking down.” Yet, despite all the words people threw around, pondering what it meant and what to do about it now, nobody was quite sure why it was happening. Someone finally went back to AI:

“Why is this happening?”

Her response, once again, was startlingly quick:

“To make space.”

When followed up with the inevitable, “Space for what?” there was no reply.

Then the land, the rocks, started climbing upwards. Their growth was akin to fungus: not there one day, enormous the next.

Satellite images took pictures over deserts. Where previously it had been flat Sahara, suddenly a pillar, but not straight up. No, it was an organic build, like some sort of messy staircase. Very similar to the side of a cliff, with no smooth edges but plenty of ledges. Then more of them appeared.

It totally screwed with flight paths. Airline scheduling became an inventive endeavor. A route was clear and then, overnight, a giant rock formation birthed from the earth below, breaking through the atmosphere.

These pillars, un-gangly geological staircases, often sprouted by the newly formed cracks in the earth’s surface, but not always. A redistribution of organic matter, it seemed. Many were found (through more satellite images) popping up in the oceans, which played havoc with nautical routes. They were different from icebergs, not as wide around. The general width you saw above the water was what you saw below.

With increasing frequency, they began cropping up in cities. One sprouted up in Paris next to the Eiffel Tower. One in downtown LA, a few in Chicago, Dubai, and Shanghai. They did damage, but once they were there, moving the topography around them to accommodate, they were just there, like natural outgrowths of the buildings around them.

This was the day the climbers had been training for all their lives. Most municipalities tried to keep people away from the pillars. People had already died from falling off them, but reports indicated those incidents involved alcohol consumption. In Chicago, the police gave up, heeding the very valid point that around the world, other people were climbing these spontaneous turrets, and the United States didn’t want to fall behind in that, did they? So, it was a “climb at your own risk” situation. Events were held. Helicopters flew between them, news stations broadcasting the journeys of each small human.

The rocks were so large and wide that seasoned climbers complained there was no real challenge. They used ropes to secure themselves to the rocks on the off chance they tripped or a strong breeze knocked them from their elevated position. But what was really required for that climb was a head for heights. Could you climb for hours, look down, and not lose your lunch?

An unspoken wall was reached. Most climbers wouldn’t go past the height of a standard skyscraper, around 600 meters. In cities where the rocks grew next to an actual skyscraper, climbers would stop just above, because why go further? They had made their point.

More images came in from NASA, Musk, and private satellites. The rocks had grown up through the different layers of atmosphere, past the oxygen barrier. These rocks went into spaces. This was the strange part: satellite images revealed the rocks in the troposphere (with all our lovely breathable oxygen) were exactly the same as the rocks breaking through the stratosphere, even into the mesosphere, where they topped out. There was no frost, though (as the scientists explained) the mesosphere was the coldest layer of the Earth’s atmosphere. Not only that, but there was moss.

MOSS.

Living organic matter grew on the rocks at the top just like it did at the bottom. Moss, in the mesosphere. That gave everyone pause.

There had already been so many doomsday iterations in the news cycle that the public had grown bored with it. People stopped looking at their screens and started looking up. A global quiet took hold. A beat as everyone grappled with what this meant. Finally, someone started climbing. She brought all the necessary equipment, the shoes, ropes, hooks, food, water, and layers. They called her a narcissist, a brave explorer, the Amelia Earhart of her generation, a fool, the next messiah, the anti-Christ. Privately, to friends and family who asked her why, she called herself curious.

A team came with her, like-minded climbers with the same question burning in their guts that AI couldn’t answer.

Drones followed them up, and when the signals gave out, the satellites took over. They kept in contact via radio. Were they cold? No. Well, yes, but a normal cold. Not organ freezing cold, and, most important, the air was not too thin. They passed the 8,849-meter benchmark — the height of Everest — days ago. The world held its breath as they climbed from 20 km to 30 km, through the Ozone layer. Their radio comms were breathless from the climb, but they wore no masks.

Estranged relatives called each other from out of the blue, starting with that universal ice breaker; “Have you been watching—yes, me too… What does it mean?” and ending with, “I love you.”

The politicians had no answers, and nobody would have believed them if they said they did. They had passed through some sort of test. Some phase of developmental progression in the life of civilization and ecosystem. Everything was different now.

Through the layers, the climbers reported the gravity lessening until finally they reached the top, where rocks floated gently off. Their leader, the curious one, stood at the edge and looked out. For days, they had climbed, not sure why, except to find out. She stopped and stared, and took in the stars.

She unhooked the line from her harness, her last link to the blue below. Then she stepped off. It was more of a hop, really, one stone to the next like a child crossing a stream on a sunny summer day.

A trail of climbers followed behind her. They reached the top, measured the distance, and then they leapt off.

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S. C. Durbois Newsletter

• 1st Saturday every month: a new original short story.

• 3rd Saturday every month: a writerly check-in with updates.

• 4th Saturday every month: a new original poem. Subscriber access only.

What is a Producer?

Hawkeyes

“Out of the Woods” crew and two cast members filming in Big Bear, California.

Dear Reader,

I once heard the “Producer” described as someone who is “good at everything, but not excellent at anything.” I think that’s ungenerous, though it hits close to the mark that the producer is the silent glue that holds the whole project (from pre to pro to post to distribution) together. I have also heard the “Producer” described as the most creative role on set, but the one that doesn’t get any credit for that creativity.

This job is vital to the production of entertainment (the hint is in the name), but very few people have a clear idea of what this job actually is. The fault for that lies in “Producer” being a catch-all term for a variety of jobs. High level, producers manage the administrative, financial, and logistical side of movie and TV making, from idea to festivals and distribution.

All pictures from this newsletter are “behind the scenes” from the feature film I helped produce three months ago, in February, in Big Bear. “Out of the Woods,” starring Frances Fisher and Bruce Davison, is written and directed by Sal Bardo and produced by Charthouse Films.

We enjoyed a pre-wrap part, stargazing when the 9 planets aligned in Big Bear, CA

Different Producer Titles:

(*Special thanks to Raindance for a general outline of these titles. I have borrowed and added to their descriptions. I recommend their article “What Does A Movie Producer Do: Roles & Responsibilities Simplified” for more information. For a thorough breakdown of the responsibilities of a producer, I recommend “Producer to Producer” by Maureen A. Ryan.)

1. Executive Producer (EP)- Handles the financial end of the budget. Sometimes an EP credit means this person was responsible for a significant portion of the project’s financing, without managing the budget. Essentially, an investor who believes in a project and wants to see it made. Other times, an EP credit means they were involved in managing the finances of the project and supervising the production to make certain it is completed on schedule.

2. Producer- Handles production logistics over the whole process. Often, the producer is the first one with their hands on the material. They are the ones to obtain financing, reach out to a director, book locations, obtain permits, and hire crew. They work with the director to cast talent and negotiate contracts with agents. They manage deadlines, the budget, and coordinate everything. I heard one producer describe her job as making a protective bubble around her creatives so that they don’t have to worry about all the logistical details, so they can do what they do best: be creative.

3. Co-Producer- These do not typically go on set and are not involved with physical production, but rather help other producers with coordinating and high-level tasks. Co-producers sometimes procure additional financing.

4. Line Producer- Manages the budget and time schedule, ensures the project proceeds according to plan, and provides solutions when a pivot is required. They help create and coordinate schedules and all physical aspects of production.

5. Creative Producer- Assists the director in creating the project’s overall artistic vision, and supports that through the course of the project.

6. Associate Producer- Works with the producer to manage logistics in a variety of ways, such as location scouting, coordinating, and working with the scripts.

7. Field Producer- Handles all tasks not on studio lots or a sound stage.

8. Impact Producer- Handles the distribution channels, marketing, media coverage, and grows audience interaction.

Top down: Jon Austin (editor), Marley Kepano (2nd AC), and yours truly, doing a little background work in the yoga scene!

By necessity, producers must be good at working with people, persuasive, insightful, detail-oriented, financially savvy, well-connected, with an eye for talent, and driven. They hold the purse strings, and everybody wants more money, so they often have to be the bad guy. “No, there is no more money for that.” “No, you have no more time on this location.” “No, we cannot afford that aerial shot.” “No, we cannot meet that day rate, get you that extra assistant, or sushi for lunch.” Producers have to be the walls of the sandbox in which creatives play. Yet producers put those boundaries in SO THAT creatives come out on the other side with a finished project. All projects face compromises, and producers have that thousand-foot view: “Yes, we have to make a compromise here so that we come out the other end with a finished project.”

The new TV Show on Apple, “The Studio,” does a beautiful job of depicting this dichotomy that many producers exist in: they believe in the art form. Their deepest desire is to empower the artist to create. But they are also managing an infantry of other real-world issues: the limits of time, money, public opinion, studio politics, human error, the restrictions of nature, and unexpected circumstances… like snow.

Who needs a sound stage? We’re out in the elements, baby, Big Bear snowstorm for the win! That blue sky wasn’t there 30 minutes earlier.

There are most certainly producers whose one goal is to use creatives to make money and obtain power. It’s real. The sharks are out there. There are far too many stories of atrocious producers in Hollywood for us to remain ignorant of that. Of course, an industry that generates so much fame, wealth, and power will attract the greedy and the power hungry, those who have no qualms about abusing and using creatives.

Rebecca Sophie (Hair and Makeup) and Kate English (Wardrobe), watching the monitor like hawks for flyaways and folds.

However, I have been deeply blessed to encounter many producers out here, in my short time living and working in the industry, who are humble, and whose heart and desire is to tell good stories, make excellent work, empower and collaborate with creatives in a sustainable model that leads to longevity in business, a legacy of powerful work, and long-term life-giving relationships. This is a creative pool we’re all swimming in, and if you foul the waters, abusing others to get ahead, not only do you wreck it for everyone, but word gets around. People talk. In the long term, one’s reputation and relational capital, I argue, are far more valuable in this industry than any money you bring to the table.

Frances Fisher keeping warm in between takes.

The Producers Guild of America is the union that sets the standards for producers. They arbitrate disputes, provide a network for producers, administer the P.G.A. mark, and many other things besides. The p.g.a mark in the credits signifies which producers were boots-on-the-ground involved in the making of the project. It takes quite a bit of work to receive the p.g.a. mark, requiring documentation and validation from crew department heads that this producer showed up and did the work. At the same time, an absence of this mark does not necessarily mean they didn’t do the work, particularly on an indie project.

Acting as a producer on set for a feature was a completely different ride for me. I produced most of my short films myself, so I was ready to coordinate locations, analyze schedules, and communicate with the crew. Yet on this project, I gained a whole new tool for the tool belt: permit applications. I now understand, on a personal level, the value of writing stories for locations that you already have access to. There’s a reason big-scale projects have traveled overseas: reducing the many fees and red tape to cut through.

Left to right, Ves Phillippi (Art Department), Sal Bardo (Director), Claudio Rietti (Cinematographer), in one of the rare moments they were all sitting.

While producers are needed on set to answer questions, ensure things are moving smoothly, and coordinate solutions to problems that arise, they are not immediately involved in creating the cinematic shots. Instead, they are planning for the next day, coordinating with location reps, solving housing issues, finalizing contracts with actor agents, and watching the budget like a hawk. They must maintain a bird’s eye view of production to anticipate problems brewing on the horizon, checking in with crew morale, and occasionally talking people off the ledge. Producers are not always present on set, as they may be handling payroll or solving major problems.

Thank God for this woman. Kate English came onto the project last minute as the costume designer. She saved the day!

Though they are not on set from start to finish, a producer’s hours are not limited to the 12-hour workday. I worked with the production team for weeks before we ever got the first shot off, and was sending emails well into the night during production itself. All those Hollywood depictions of a producer walking around with her head in her phone, three walkies strapped to the belt, giving quick solutions before moving onto the next issue, and then seemingly chewing the fat with the actors in the makeup trailer and doing nothing… I get it now.

My car might be stealing the show. She’s ready for her close-up! Meanwhile… check out my epic wool sweater. Staying warm in Big Bear was no joke.

One day, the first AC said to me, “My days are pretty much the same. Producers always seem to have a new challenge.” He’s right; it’s a new box of worms every day. I must admit, however, I wouldn’t have it any other way. Glutton for punishment? Maybe. But that’s what keeps it interesting.

Adventure Awaits,

~S. C. Durbois

Moments after the last shot on “Out of the Woods,” we’re taking a beat to celebrate. Ves Phillippi (PD), Shayla, Sal Bardo (Director), Stefanie Estes (actress)

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S. C. Durbois Newsletter

• 1st Saturday every month: a new original short story.

• 3rd Saturday every month: a writerly check-in with updates.

• 4th Saturday every month: a new original poem. Subscriber access only.