How to Write Great Dialogue with Screenwriter Aaron Sorkin | SWN

In this video, learn How to Write Great Dialogue like Screenwriter Aaron Sorkin!
Aaron Sorkin is an award-winning screenwriter, playwright, television writer, actor, television producer, and film director.
Aaron Sorkin’s screenwriting credits include The Social Network, A Few Good Men, The West Wing, The Trial of the Chicago 7, and Molly’s Game.
Sorkin started acting before discovering his passion for screenwriting, this passion started when his parents took him to watch plays as a child and Sorkin loved listening to the dialogue. Hence why his screenplays are now known for being dialogue intense, The Social Network is an example of this.
In 1992 A Few Good Men was released to the big screen, making Aaron Sorkin a major Hollywood player in the film industry.
If you are a screenwriter or filmmaker looking for tips on how to tell a story, then you've come to the right place!
Which screenwriter or filmmaker would you like us to cover next? Let us know in the comments!
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This video was curated and edited by Roman Weston.
#screenwriting #screenplaytips #AaronSorkin #thesocialnetwork #westwing #stevejobs #davidfincher #afewgoodmen #writingtips #SWN
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[@ScreenwritersNetwork]

Screenwriting tips from the master of dialogue! What screenwriter/filmmaker would you like us to cover?👇

[@user-mt6hr4qf9n]

I love this channel - some filmmakers/screenwriters I'd love to see you cover: Michael Haneke, Andrea Arnold, Coen Brothers, Roy Andersson, Mike Leigh, Lynne Ramsay ... some TV writers too: Vince Gilligan + Peter Gould, Sally Wainright, David Chase, Alan Bennett, Nic Pizzolatto.Thanks again for a wonderful channel!

[@pal54321]

Darabont, the master

[@moniquedurant2289]

Odenkirk

[@marknewbold2583]

Yorgi

[@Claudg2008]

David E. Kelly, Fréderic Raphael, and Joseph L. Mankiewicz (if you find someone to evaluate him)

[@JustSomeCanadianGuy]

The key to Sorkin dialog is to have a dumb character say something and have the other character have the absolute most perfect retort a human being could possibly come up with.

[@alexandersargeaunt2643]

Another way of putting it is to have one character come into the conversation with the upper hand. The point of it all is to reveal who has the upper hand. And what I love about Sorkin, is that he often has his main characters lose these battles.

[@benrosn8154]

Yo, damn, you just figure it out this man's whole career

[@ginc31]

congrats, you just found out the key for 99% of the scripts lmao

[@missajimas675]

Wow good advice 👍🏼

[@hinduismwithpremananddasbhagat]

I've heard this bit of advice from others - to act the dialogue while writing it. I started doing that years ago. It changed how I wrote. If you're writing a monologue and out of breathe and bored in your living room, than no reason to think your audience isn't going to be bored. LOL I haven't written many plays, and am more focused on fiction. I do this with fiction now. I go through a character's lines and read them like a play, ignoring the rest of the writing. I recommend doing this. ....... I have a friend who wrote a novel I read a draft of last summer. I swear he didn't read the dialogue out loud. Everyone spoke the same, nothing was realistic, things were horrible. Everything sounds good in your head. Read it out loud and see how it really sounds.

[@laluenbaires]

After watching "The trial of the Chicago 7" I thought "THIS is storytelling!" What a genius.

[@kadeemk4679]

Same literally watched it for the first time last night

[@QuintonKappel]

The way he layers things is incredible. Steve Jobs is also exquisitely composed.

[@theexpresidents]

Weird, TotC7 is the only script I thought was mediocre.

[@adamtheblondie]

this is a treasure trove of screenwriting

[@ObnoxiouslyFrench]

Ducking the soundtrack under the dialogue would have been a great idea. Even more so on a video about dialogue and Sorkin's emphasis over the actual sound of dialogue.

[@RattledPan]

TY! I have hearing aids, which I can Bluetooth to my monitor. I'm mostly deaf, so if I hear something weird, I tend to look for a source outside of a film I am watching that sounds very out of place. That said, I can't pee on much of anything else. The film, editing, the flow, were all top notch.

[@oldsoul3576]

Sorkin & Sheridan should do Writers on Writers (Actors on Actors), that would be priceless. i'd love to watch those two...and he is write about dialog being Music. my youngest son & i had this conversation yesterday about him taking up Hebrew, he could hear me smiling as I said non-English languages were like Music to my ears as a lil kid and it still was. He knew i spoke some Spanish/Italian as a child not how much. Growing up i spent just as much if not more time in the homes of Jewish, Italian, Spanish, Korean, Middle Eastern, et al family/friends/neighbors as my own, got to live with the World because 1-by-1 bordered w/families like my grandparents to attend/work at/visit Howard Unv/Freedmans Hosp because back then they couldn't stay in hotels

[@theexpresidents]

Who the fuck is Sheridan?

[@baylee8659]

Hey this was delightful, thank you very much for making this.

[@judichristopher4604]

"BRAVO Darling... BRAVO"

[@johnphares3358]

This was exactly what I needed to hear. Thank you. Amazing channel.

[@M2BzombieBait]

Thanks for the upload. I really needed the inspiration. Wrote my first feature length film and after a couple of drafts the dialogue is still trash. This gives me some new ways of attacking each scene. Thank you!

[@ClarkPotter]

Have ChatGPT rewrite parts you don't like in the style of Sorkin ;)

[@ladyheroin.v4143]

​@@ClarkPotter lame

[@ClarkPotter]

@Ladyheroin .v4 I don't disagree, hence the winky. It's ubiquitous use is inevitable tho, however "lame."

[@ladyheroin.v4143]

@@ClarkPotter You're right. My bad

[@theexpresidents]

​@@ClarkPotterChat GPT will never be used for anything meaningful. Only novelty, like that episode of _South Park_ (that sucked).

[@mxjokereh]

This video is so great man, keep it up !

[@ScreenwritersNetwork]

Thank you so much :)

[@NIKONGUY1960]

Duffer Brothers. That show!!!!! Monster high on crack. So beautifully done.

[@RattledPan]

Gosh, I LOVE a YT that gets me pumped up! I'm not the jump up and dance kinda guy. No, serious. Jumping up and down because I was excited was thirty years ago. That doesn't mean the passion isn't there, it's redirected. Sometimes screaming "I love you" as I whiz by someone going fast the wrong way on a one way street. Shut up! I've never hit anyone yet and the reactions from people are worth writing down. It's not that easy to get people to react fast, blurt out what their first thought is and will share with you what they look like in a fetal position, which few dare to show. That's the type of dialogue and character action that is hard for me to write myself. I'm a Stone Pacifist. My Scandinavian side of the family considers raising their eyebrows as harsh words. I need dialogue for people's reaction after the subway just came down on the back end of their car, what would be the reaction? Probably like a car barreling at them, donchathink? I'd write more, but I feel a trip to the mall and stir up a group of shoppers. Macys is good for that. Thank you for this wonderful step into the thinking of Sorkin! Great stuff!!💋

[@Hedyeh32]

This is great. I'd love to see one with Susannah Grant and/or Steven Knight. Thank you!

[@Cowgirl77Hikes]

I heart Aaron Sorkin!

[@josealfredo1987]

Great vídeo, thanks

[@KP-zd3hc]

I loved Newsroom :))

[@jq8974]

I'm in my 50's, just a little younger than Aaron, and studied acting and directing (theatre & film) in the 90's. Everyone was enamored with Mamet in the 80's with his direct, terse, tough talking characters constantly interrupting one another. It was ALL dialogue. Knowing S's background after this compilation, I can certainly hear him in Sorkin. Too funny - it all makes so much sense now! But Sorkin's female characters (I'm a woman) are faaaaarrrrr superior. Much more humour and depth in his stuff, too. But Mamet definitely was an influence in Aaron's combative, interruptive, dialogue rhythm. 😉♥

[@mickeyaugrec7560]

Agree - I came up on Mamet dialogue too, love the fits and starts, percussive / staccato utterances (American Buffalo; Speed-The-Plow; Sexual Perversity in Chicago; Glengarry Glen Ross). And Mamet pretty much cannot write women; Oleanna was practically two different plays between Act 1 and Act 2. To Mamet's credit, the great Charlotte Rampling's character in movie The Verdict (as well the ex-nurse character Kaitlyn Costello Price) had something of an identifiable-to-strong arc.

[@theexpresidents]

​@@mickeyaugrec7560Try _Boston Marriage._

[@paulschrum4727]

Here is some sample dialog: Wife: Do you want to see such and such a movie? Me: Did Aaron Sorkin write it? Wife: Yes. Me: Yes.

[@abhijiththampi]

The dialogue was too brief, Paul 😂

[@benjamintaylor7950]

And it sounds like dialogue normal people would say.

[@williampowell3378]

2:32 Four beats of measure

[@ShutUpWesley]

Here I came, and I was so sure this would be another short useless KZbin video about writing, with no substance at all... Man I was wrong. Thank you, finally a video that was useful.❤❤❤

[@ryanweaver962]

Arts and beyond. The scope and values… process and real life intersections with arts.

[@jayashreechakravarthy4949]

Aaron Sorkin is head-writer. And he’s hired.

[@KnightEnterprises]

Amazing video. Please cover Terrence Malick!!!

[@jfrancis6191]

Not sure if this will help you or not, but it certainly helped me. Remember that everyone is living under a shadow.

[@lanceevans1689]

Just....great!

[@christopherwatkins6342]

Can you guys do one on Jordan peele

[@ScreenwritersNetwork]

Yes of course! We will cover Jordan Peele soon 🤎

[@murrayr7703]

Considering almost all his shows and movies are trite Hollywood formula pieces I will choose to learn from the best

[@TVproducerLA]

Loved this. I’m a television producer and I’m in awe of how good scripted tv has become in the last decade plus. Would love to see more coverage of this.

[@theexpresidents]

What? It's gotten worse, apart from Sorkin or certain HBO shows.

[@crazycatzmum]

I fully agree. Both my screenplays we're written in one night. I was charged. Then I go back and spend a few months editing, but only to fix grammar and to make sure all objects mentioned are actually relevant and necessary as with all the words. So far only two screenplays since my BA and two years of film school. Literary agent wanted.

[@theexpresidents]

Give it up.

[@jayashreechakravarthy4949]

Benny is hired as an assistant to Aaron.

[@viviensfilms3604]

Excellent video except for the music, which is very distracting.

[@howardkoor9365]

👍👍👍👍

[@cynthiahamil9801]

Which film maker should you cover next? (You asked this at the end of your video): Steven Spielberg, Lucas, M. Night Shyamalan

[@murrayr7703]

WOW Good job you just named three awful filmmakers. Just add Scorsese, Eastwood, and Tarantino and you have the Mt Rushmore of Lowbrow Filmmakers

[@tytanrosencrans3249]

⁠@@murrayr7703Hey, man. It’s okay to like popular things. I’m sure you’re cool enough deep down that you can find a distinguishing character trait outside of “Everybody else likes it, so I have to hate it.” Originality and individualism doesn’t equal contrarianism.

[@murrayr7703]

@@tytanrosencrans3249 Wow so you can read minds since you know why I don't like those filmmakers. I don't know if you're aware of this but I am free to dislike what I dislike and you are not courageous for telling me that I should like what you like. You're a dimwitted fool, similar to an Eastwood or Spielberg. so I can see why you like them. There are hundreds of directors and thousands of movies. Must I like them all? I suggest you avoid commenting on things you don't understand and maybe when you grow up you will see how foolish you've bee. Just to be clear Scorcese made a couple of good movies 30 years ago, and Spielberg made 1 Jaws, and they were very popular movies and I like them silly boy. Now go help your mommy clean your room and please watch something other than the most popular.

[@Miki-jn4vr]

Music?

[@howardkoor9365]

Crashing into each other..

[@sibusisokumalo9374]

Antoine Fuqua please

[@34jared]

John Weisskopf of the Aeolian Film Group, Inc. He's hanging out at the American University teaching film, these days, I think. Ask him when I'm going to get my money back. Todd.

[@theelderskatesman4417]

the title is oxymoronic to the greatest possible degree

[@ozgurergul9693]

I can't properly hear what people are saying because the background music is too loud

[@DFMoray]

Where was the “how to” part?

[@southlondon86]

Cover James Cameron

[@explainingpolitics]

this is already what I do. But I cant bring myself to write. I think that storytellers require an audience or else they wont create anything. perhaps for other writers being your own audience is enough. Sadly I fear I wont write unless I know who Im writing to first

[@theexpresidents]

Yourself.

[@explainingpolitics]

@@theexpresidents bad advice

[@moonshinefilms]

sean baker, mike leigh. vincent gallo.

[@theexpresidents]

I love Sean Baker!!! His last 3 movies are top-notch indie filmmaking.

[@sergeybagrov8624]

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[@ScreenwritersNetwork]

!!!!! :)

[@hughegentry8255]

Bloke can write!

[@sallyreno6296]

Sam Mendes

[@rickved]

The video is not a semi-automatic typewriter. It's an IBM Selectric which is automatic because you don't have to use your hand to return the carriage.

[@jboling513]

Mamet!

[@ryanweaver962]

Movies matter

[@Mdautkreix]

Aarambic Sorkameter, if you will.

[@crazycatzmum]

Nice Shakespearean play on

[@Kormac80]

The music playing during the dialog in this video shows the person who made the video doesn't understand what Sorkin actually means.

[@Crux_Riajuu]

Ok so what? Make a dialogue have cadence?

[@user-yb8vr2ip2t]

For Starters.

[@kuziokundera]

To write better, you watch any scene Sorkin has ever written, and never do what he does. The man writes the perfect dialogue that would never happen in real life.

[@nomecognome8737]

Yeah that's kinda true, not always, but it's true. It's cool cause it's a movie and the characters are always somehow extraordinary people even while being passed as apparantely normal, but it's just FILM DIALOGUE, not great dialogue. I think Paul Thomas Anderson is the more realistic dialogue writer, and he also manages to have great lines in doing that

[@michaelr3583]

The newsroom didnt work because all of the characters sounded like they were the same person having a conversation with themselves with the same wit and cadence.

[@kstrazz3552]

that literally every sorkin movie

[@theexpresidents]

Cadence.

[@danieldoble669]

The background music is TOO LOUD!

[@senzanome7801]

This video celebrates great dialogues but doesn't explain anything. So, what use?

[@ClarkPotter]

Big Sorkin fan, as I'm sure most of you are. The only problem I have with being a Sorkin fan is that all his characters just sound like him talking to himself in his head. Caught some Chicago 7 when a friend was watching it and two mins in said, this sounds like Sorkin dialogue. He's like, "What's that?" I'm like, you know, he wrote the West Wing and Social Network. He's like, how can you tell that? Well, the most obvious giveaway is that all characters sound the same and speak with an IQ of 140-160 and respond instantly to each other with clever stuff that would only occur to you the next day to have said in that moment. But really, you just watch enough knowing that it's him and it just jumps out at you eventually.

[@ZEKEDAWG23]

scorsese

[@kilgoretrout321]

Step 1. Find a great coke dealer Step 2. Snort lots of good coke Step 3. Never stop either writing dialogue or talking

[@2424rocket]

The video is too short and you didn’t go into enough detail with Aaron Sorkin. It’s a nice glossy piece… But it could’ve been so much more depth. Don’t be afraid to make things longer.

[@rainereece5640]

Well, sure, with Sorkin, longer would've been better, but just that 7min. 44 sec. was so nourishing, fun & insightful it made my day. As for this being a "nice, glossy piece", I dunno...I thought it was absolutely atomic! I found it interesting that he & his parents & sibs conversed, like, all the time, and everyone seemed to enjoy using words & voice to Change People's Minds." He basically work-shopped dialogue from childhood on. That's what I call great parenting! I love how Sorkin's use of language is so attuned to music & poetry. No wonder he's not enthralled when actors take liberties and ad lib. It's not that I'm anti-free speech...I'm just pro-writer 😅 Anyway, thanks for the tight video and to my fellow viewers for their comments.

[@bobpowers9637]

You can do that rocket

[@jayashreechakravarthy4949]

20% of the work I can do, I think. I don’t remember exactly what I asked the fact-checkers, Abhigel. I really shouldn’t care too much about that.

[@bencheshire]

Oh please, give me James M Cain and then ill listen.

[@timnewton62]

Very interesting content but the music you gave pumping through the whole video is sooo unnecessary IMHO

[@kentallard8852]

I hope this is a joke, have you never seen the Sorkinisms video?

[@stevewight6563]

Pretty much everything Aaron Sorkin has to say about writing and movie making is worthwhile. This would be a great video without the pointless, annoying "music," which makes it unwatchable for me. Sorry to sound like a troll. But what is this attachment to generic music-as-noise accompanying videos like this?

[@rudetc]

Narrator - "The answer....was cocaine."

[@SpizawkDaKizowz]

Ironic that a piece about writing has music that's too loud over the dialogue. Great writing doesn't need music to 'punch it up'.

[@makoshark69x96]

ESPECIALLY BAD MUSIC !

[@RickAGauna]

Love your site but stop with the loud music it’s annoying.

[@SaneSociety1]

This would have been a really great video without the needless, too-loud, over-busy background music. A shame!

[@matthewsanger6482]

It's ironic. You make a video about the Art of Dialogue, then put in wall-to-wall music mixed so loud that one can't hear what anybody's saying.

[@saulshennan6825]

The majority of those who want to be screenwriters and who try to be screenwriters just aren't cut out for it.

[@douglasphillips9381]

Back ground music is driving me away.

[@malloryscinematography7021]

Fr

[@richardv.7826]

Those who came here are a special type of IQ :)

[@jaysonp9426]

Forest Gump level

[@djdavehall]

To the edior: you don't need epic inspirational music, its distracting and takes away from the real content.

[@Blackmuseops]

Completely agree

[@SCharlesDennicon]

So... Sorkin, not a big fan of improv.

[@thetiktokman]

Jesus fuck, cut the background music FFS!!!

[@ethanmulvihill7177]

Really just cringe to be honest. Basically just saying "errr der something magical about GOOD dialogue" (doesn't explain how to implement or even recognize it), tells basic tips that my second grade english teacher told me, and says that if you're easily writing the dialogue you're doing it wrong. Buddy, you are not everyone, and many of the greats would disagree with you on a bunch of these subjects. Snobbery like this makes aspiring artists think that competence is unattainable and I think it's uncalled for.

[@theexpresidents]

Dialogue can't be taught. You still haven't learned that? Give it up. Go ....."teach" or something.

[@ethanmulvihill7177]

@@theexpresidents I've taught piano for 5 years. Not sure where your nutcase take came from. Maybe a faulty definition of the word "teach"?

[@ShowCat1]

How about this... Do NOT add loud music during narration! Annoying and rediculous. Evidently you have no confidence in your narration.

[@ElectricLabel]

Aaron Sorkin has never done anything interesting.

[@jaysonp9426]

Finally found the comment that makes sense.

[@maucaduto]

What's with the annoying soundtrack? Is his voice not good enough? What he says not interesting enough? I'm half way and I'm sorry, can't listen to it any longer.

[@jacobambos3885]

Aaron Sorkin's school of writing is to write a one-sided political rant and have the character representing your real life opponent look down in shame. I can't count how many times I've seen him do that.

[@bigoj7917]

But it’s entertaining as hell to watch

[@murrayr7703]

@@bigoj7917 Yes it is if you haven''t read a real piece of literature in your life or you find everything on Netflix is AMAZING!!

[@willpeony5534]

Sort of on the same point, I've discovered from KZbin videos that most of the great minds of the last century captured on video didn't speak like a Sorkin puppet. Very often fast talking word salad is a cover for having nothing original to say.

[@murrayr7703]

@@willpeony5534 USA RIP 2023.

[@jaysonp9426]

And then everyone will praise you as a great writer

[@benjamintaylor7950]

I just hopped on here to laugh as Sorkins writing is insufferable (not as insufferable as people who enjoy his work).

[@theexpresidents]

Was this before or after your shift at What-a-Burger?

[@jaysonp9426]

Rule number 1 to writing great dialogue. Don't be Aaron Sorkin.

[@marknewbold2583]

How not to write

[@inkwyvern5171]

It's always a funny coincidence when rich boys portray themselves as "just a poor kid down on his luck", who happens to have a friend's/relative's typewriter handy as if they're A. a common household item and B. writing is something someone poor would have the time for. Considering they're writers you'd think they'd come up with something original

[@scratchy996]

I was a poor kid who had a typewriter in the house, when I was growing un in Communist Romania during the '80s. That's because my father worked in the mayor's office and he got a typewriter. Also poor people have more spare time than rich people.

[@scratchy996]

@@Antonio-Gransci Rich people hustle all the time, they have to work in corporate jobs with overtime, to climb the corporate ladder. Poor people just hang out, live on social welfare , or have part time jobs and spend their time drinking beer.

[@theexpresidents]

​@@Antonio-GransciI'm poor, and I spend all day thinking and writing. I don't want a job, or money, because that saps creative energies. I think _you're_ the gullible one.

[@oscarless3227]

With all due respect his Masterclass sucked. I wish they got Tarantino.

[@crazycatzmum]

If you don't get Sorkin you really don't belong in this craft

[@oscarless3227]

@@crazycatzmum another one of those pathetic fan babies, nice. Did I say his work sucked? This masterclass sucked.

[@TomEyeTheSFMguy]

How did his masterclass suck?

[@theexpresidents]

​@@oscarless3227His actual Masterclass or this video? I liked his actual one, but Mamet's is _way_ better.

[@AnthonyAcriaradiocomix]

If all else fails always ask, what would Preston Sturges do...?

[@theexpresidents]

"People always like what the don't know anything about." ----_Sullivan's Travels_

[@StraLo90]

The most exhausting and pretentious dialogue there is.

[@hampusheh]

Sorkin's dialogue is often awful though, in my opinion. But I guess that's due to overexposure to it...

[@blaisetelfer8499]

I wouldn't say the lines themselves are awful, but his scripts are definitely ones where everyone sounds the same and everyone has these constant, Hollywood-ized mic-drop moments. Sometimes it works, sometimes not. I've never been too fond of A Few Good Men, but I love Moneyball.

[@hampusheh]

@@blaisetelfer8499 Yeah, he's written plenty, so it's unfair to call it all awful. But Newsroom and, to be honest, The Social Network all have TERRIBLE dialogue. I can't stand the tone of those.

[@TomEyeTheSFMguy]

How so, asking all of you

[@hampusheh]

@@TomEyeTheSFMguy I don't like that smart aleck tone, I mean his characters sound all the same. It's just Aaron Sorkin all the way down. No distinction. And if he goes outside of his comfort zone, he can't hide to contempt for any character who doesn't sound like or think like Aaron Sorkin.

[@TomEyeTheSFMguy]

@@hampusheh how do they sound the same?