The Kitchen Table Test: What Writers Can Learn from Film, Theatre, and Video Games

Everyone in your life thinks your book would make a great movie, play, or video game. But adaptation isn't a copy-paste job because every medium solves storytelling problems differently. This week, we put one scene through four different mediums to see what each one reveals about craft, whether or not you ever plan on adapting anything.

Overthinking Couch Topics:

1. Why "the book was better" misses the point of what adaptation actually does
2. The kitchen table scene: one moment, told four ways
3. What novels can do that film, TV, and stage cannot
4. The screenwriting habit every novelist should steal
5. What television teaches about sustaining relationship dynamics across a series
6. Why playwrights understand subtext better than novelists
7. What video games can teach you about giving your characters real choices
8. Environmental storytelling, and why your hostage scene needs more than a metal chair
9. This week's overthinking prompt: running one scene through four lenses

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Music licensed from Storyblocks.