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Pictured: My writing partner and I at the 1997 Academy Awards.

Last week, I recommended taking on a writing partner to someone having trouble with story ideas. You can check that entry out here. I received a lot of comments and questions about the ins and outs of writing partnerships, so I'm devoting today's post entirely to that subject. I speak from experience here, I have had a writing partner for two years. I'd like to give you a completely honest look at how the two of us write, warts and all, and the pros and cons of being in a partnership.

My writing partner Sonny and I met while Pages at NBC. As a Page, I wrote a play that I was really happy with. I did a read-through with my friends that went really well, and I nearly got the show produced in New York. And then Garden State came out, and had roughly the same premise. Damn you, Braff! Months later, Sonny was unhappy at his job, called me at 3AM, and asked if I'd like to write a television pilot about our experiences as Pages with him. We embarked on a lot of hung-over Saturday morning writing sessions with no pressure, no deadlines, and frequent breaks for pizza and episodes of Undeclared on DVD.

That lack of stress changed pretty quickly once our script was enthusiastically received. The next thing we knew, we were flying out to Los Angeles a couple of times a month and signing with agents. Once agents entered the fray, we quit our (well) paying gigs in New York and made the trip to La La Land. Now, we weren't writing for fun, we were writing to survive. This put a lot more pressure on us as a writing partnership and even as friends. We worked through it fairly quickly, but this is why it is a good idea to discuss details and "rules" of your partnership early on, even if you're good pals and it's an awkward conversation. Sonny and I never did this, so when we had to bring up issues down the line, things got strained. Below are five major points I learned from the issues (formerly) in my partnership:

Welcome back to The Write Stuff, Stuffers! Hope you found last week's interview helpful and entertaining. Adam's closing thoughts coincided beautifully with what I had planned for this week's post. A lot of you have questions about getting an agent and making contacts, and that's all important and we'll get there. But a majority of you just want to know how to come up with an idea and get started. Read on...

1) Watch a ton of movies and read a lot of scripts.

Sure, you watch a lot of flicks already, but you need to become an active viewer. Ask yourself questions. Who is the protagonist? Who or what is the antagonist? What does the lead character want? What obstacles are standing in his or her way? How does he or she overcome them? What are the characters saying in a given scene? What are they thinking? Are these two different things?

If you're watching a comedy and it makes you laugh, how did it make you laugh? Whether it's sparkling dialogue or a kick in the balls, there's an art to it. Are you scared watching a movie? Why? Cheering the climax of a film? What got your fist in the air? See what I'm saying? And you can learn something from every film, good or bad. If you're watching a movie that sucks, why does it suck? What did this screenwriter do wrong? If it's a thriller and you're bored, why are you bored? Once you pinpoint it, you'll know what to avoid when you sit down to write your script. Try it with the next movie you watch -- really watch, and ask yourself questions.

And even better, get yourself some scripts. They're available all over the internet and at most libraries. How can you write a script if you've never read one? Study your favorites. This will help not only with story construction but also formatting, which we'll get to in the coming weeks.