COLI B. SYLLA
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Where do you live (City, State, or Country)?
I currently reside in New Jersey but travel back and forth to Los Angeles when time permits.
 
Your script stood out among hundreds of others. What was the inspiration for your story and why did you write a script instead of a short story or a novel?
The Inspiration for The Informer came from television series such as The Wire, Breaking Bad, and Mad Men. My co-creator Sherese and I set out to create a world of complex characters forced to realign and reassess their own moral compass as they adjusted/reacted to pressures of an external nature. We were inspired by the love of seeing characters survive and evolve. I wrote it as a script mainly because that’s where I feel the most at-home in terms of the various forms of writing I do. Something about visual storytelling always compels me.
 
How long did it take you to write your script...and what is your writing process? Do you outline...use index cards...white board...or just start with FADE IN?
It took roughly a month to complete the 1st draft, 2 months of consistent screenplay coverage and notes from trusted associates for subsequent drafts. I don’t outline, nor do I use index cards. I establish the major elements that my main characters want/need and who or what is standing in their way. From there I jump in. I’ll write the first scene then step away, when I return, I start from the beginning and rewrite my way to a 1st draft if that makes sense.
 
What is your ultimate ambition as a writer?
My ultimate ambition as a writer is to create/co-create and sell a series I’d love to watch.
 
Was your entry at The Wiki Screenplay Contest a full script or “the first ten pages”? Why did you make that choice?
I went “the first ten pages” route because I feel like if I can’t hook you in 10 pages, there’s really no need to read all 60-70 that I’ve written, unless of course you like me as a human lol.
 
What’s your all-time favorite movie or television show...and why?
Always a tough question, my co-creator Sherese is the tv watcher on the team, I’m the researcher. There isn’t a series on television that she hasn’t at least explored. She watches everything and is able to relay what works and what doesn’t necessarily translate for her. I on the other hand, don’t watch a lot of television. This may seem highly counterproductive as an aspiring tv writer but I prefer to remain as sheltered and shielded from a lot of current programming because I don’t want to write in the vein of, the style of,  or the way of, unless I am hired to do so.
 As an aspiring writer, I prefer to showcase my own voice using my own vein, style and way of writing and in order for me to advance. I am highly selective of the content I consume. That being said, if I had to choose, it would be The Wire. Not because it was such a visceral story about corruption, blight, and hanging on to hope where it’s scarce because it was, but The Wire resonated with me because there were real flesh and blood characters that lived and interacted in these worlds no different than mine. Worlds that didn’t need massive heists,  explosions, or highly coordinated elaborate action scenes, just characters trying they're best to keep the devil way down in the hole.
 
What advice do you have for writers hoping to win a contest or place as a finalist as you have?
I don’t know that I have advice other than, as an aspiring writer, you’re going to be told which contests are the cream of the crop, which contests are meaningless, a lot of the minutia that can discourage a writer form entering at all. I say enter them all, the ultimate goal is to get better and the only way to get better is to get out there and spar with your peers. If 5 people enter a competition, then you’ve got to show up as if 5,000 entered. At the end of the day a win is a win and that’s ultimately the goal. Granted, there is a hierarchy of contests that vary in difficulty and competitiveness but again, that shouldn’t discourage you from entering.
 
What else are you working on that the world needs to know about?
I’m working on another series I have in development as a result of a Grand Prize win in a previous competition. While I’d love to go into detail, I can say it is an exciting, complex story of characters with divergent inner conflicts.