Writing in Real Life

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To BOLD or not to bold?

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The Dos, don’ts and no, you didn’ts of Bold, Underlined, Italics and CAPS in scripts.

Who would think that bolding or underling in a script could cause so much controversy. Scripts that utilize these tools are looked down upon as being falsely showy, immature or reaching. But bold, italics, CAPS and underlining are fast becoming industry standard and for good reason. Your agent, network executive and POD are reading five to ten scripts a day and need help to stay engaged. Utilizing these styles focuses the reader on the VITAL story points and creates visual stimulation for the weary eye.

Let’s look at how these stylistic choices help.

Peter M. Lenkov employs style and FLARE in “Hawaii Five-O” with the use of bolds and CAPS to illustrate a sense of urgency and importance to the scene/action. The result of these additions is a script that successfully depicts the severity and emotion of the scene. Therefore, the reader is engaged and more likely to pay attention when the script demands ATTENTION.

Teleplay – Hawaii Five-O

In Steven Lilien & Bryan Wynbrandt’s “God Friended Me”, these techniques are utilized to control the pace and anticipation of the scene. The main character, Miles begins to go into great detail about how God is not real and at that exact moment, Bzz-Bzz, hereceives a friend request from GOD. Not only do these tactics create greater suspense for the scene, they ultimately keep the pace for the reader.

A common misconception is that the use of Bold, CAPS, and underlining can only be used in the action or comedy genres. This is not the case. In the pilot of David E. Kelley’s critically acclaimed drama “Big Little Lies”, the strategic use of CAPS successfully illustrates the severity of a description as well as heightens the tension of the scene. For this script in particular, there is a heavy use of CAPS. One can argue that the different use of fonts from lower case to all CAPS helps create a feeling of urgency and intensity for this scene.

                                                                                                 Pilot – Big Little Lies

When there is energy and excitement in the format it makes the words jump off the page. If I were to say that this word is more important than this word, you wouldn’t be able to tell the difference. However, if were to say that this “word” is more important than this “word”, you would easily be able to tell the difference. As a result, the extra additions make the script more pleasurable to read.  

Any example of where there is an emphasis on imagery is in Chris Fedak & Sam Sklaver’s, “Prodigal Son”. From the start of this scene, there is a compelling draw from the dialogue alone. However, what puts this scene over the edge is from the imagery, “injections into Vanessa’s arm and legs. Her eyes frozen open.” Normally this scene would memorable but when the imagery is bolded, the image is hauntingly more memorable.  

“Out with the old and in with the new” is not cliché, it’s the truth. Innovation in screenwriting can attribute to keeping agents and executives engaged which can lead to more original content being read. As a result, more content can be created. We are in the golden age of content creation, it’s TIME for rules to change.   

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