Unlike a reader who can pass on a script after the first awkwardly constructed page, a competition reader must read on, deeply, in order to provide feedback to the writer. You want this reader on your side immediately.
Dialogue can help. Even how it looks on the page helps.
BALANCED WHITE SPACE IS YOUR BEST FRIEND – The ratio of dialogue to action lines on your pages may seem cosmetic. You may have read the Oscar-winning screenplay of Django Unchained and feel that your voice and vision belong in that category, or you may offer the rebuttal that filmmaking is a visual medium so action lines should be as densely luxurious as a neckbeard. However.
When you submit your script to a competition, you have to get a yes from the first wall of readers, who are under tough deadlines on a next-to-volunteer basis. Crisp and balanced white space on your pages is like good foreplay, it tells the reader you are serious about making this a wonderful experience for them. You want the reader to approach your script with hope in her heart.
So your dialogue and your action lines should look accessible.
Because…
BAD DIALOGUE LOOKS BAD ON THE PAGE – The ways to make your dialogue look bad before it’s even read are legion.
Pages full of long speeches look bad. Speeches in films are often the ONLY speech in that film, which has taken the entire film to set up. They look like tedious reading.
Pages full of very short lines of dialogue unbroken by action lines look bad. They look like they can’t possibly justify the space, and are generally full of greetings and pleasantries, the enemies of getting in to your scene late and exiting early.
Pages full of dialogue in which an action line interpreting the dialogue precedes each line of dialogue look terrible. “He squints, confused.” “She averts her eyes playfully.” They double the read time, and if they are all necessary, the dialogue doesn’t speak for itself.
Talking head scenes that go on for pages look bad. Do some scenework. If you need people to talk to each other at great length, put the scene somewhere with some visual interest, preferably somewhere that tells part of the story for you, or while they are doing something important to the plot.
So now that you have your white space looking inviting, the actual words you write in the dialogue must live up to their promise of professional-level punch-packing.
It basically comes down to one thing.
EXPOSITORY DIALOGUE IS DEATH – Most of what kills your dialogue is an expository style. In short, telling me what’s going on. This reaches far beyond backstory and repetition, it is a style of dialogue that habitually states the obvious.
The greatest joy in dialogue is the unexpected. A reveal, a dropped bomb, a reversal, a threat, a lie. That kind of dialogue sizzles and excites. Expository dialogue is everything else. Explanations, indications, illustrations.
Good dialogue reveals and develops characters with what they don’t say and when they don’t say it more often than not. The last thing you want to waste dialogue on is what we already know, or what we are already looking at, or what we are about to look at. Subtext is more interesting to read.
Then there are pet peeves.
DIALECT SHOULD NOT BE VISIBLE – No extra apostrophes or words spelled to reflect a pronunciation, please. It takes time to solve dialogue like an acrostic.
DON’T INTRODUCE YOUR CHARACTER FIFTEEN TIMES – Special Agent Catherine Clay, FBI. This is Special Agent Catherine Clay, FBI. I’d like you to meet Special Agent Catherine Clay, all the way from the FBI in the big city. Catherine Clay, Special Agent, FBI, she’ll be working with us.
DIALOGUE IS NOT FOR DOGMA – The writer’s position on a given issue can be revealed in a lot of ways, but it falls flat on the page when it’s spoken aloud by a character whose sole function is to educate the reader about it.
PROOFREAD FIFTEEN TIMES – There is a well-known phenomenon that writers are blind to their own typing errors. In dialogue, it’s especially important to proof relentlessly, because that’s where the errors jump out at readers. Missing words, misspelled words, extra words, wrong character names. Readers may skim action lines to get the gist, but the dialogue gets more scrutiny.
Put that entry fee to good use! Get a yes. Move on to the next round.