#script mag

“I try to get into a state where I’m allowing the characters to talk to me and talk to each other, because in the beginning of the writing process, I don’t know who they are yet. And this is the most pleasurable part of writing, because they’re telling me who they are and what they want and where they want to go. They’ll often say things I had no idea they were going to say, and so much of the plot is built off of me consciously going through the dialogue that’s jumping out at me. But the actual writing — the gathering of material — is a very mysterious process. You’re sort of shuttling back and forth between something that feels quite unconscious and something that feels very deliberate. The fact that the main character calls herself “Lady Bird” came about when I was struggling to write a scene, so I put everything aside, and I wrote at the top of the page: “Why won’t you call me Lady Bird? You promised you would!” And I just looked at this line and said to myself, “Who is this person that makes people call her by a different name?” I truly have no idea where that came from. It wasn’t me.”