Time to Write

The key to great characters is "why"

You always hear about how important it is for your protagonist to have a goal. That's true, but equally important is the "why" behind their goal. You'll create a better-defined and more compelling character if you also spent time coming up with the most powerful motive for their actions. 

Let's say that both Adam and Gary have the goal of completing a marathon.

Adam wants to do it to raise money for a charity. Not a bad reason.  It suggests that Adam is a good guy, willing to go out of his way to benefit others.

Gary wants to do it because his daughter is running and he wants to show her that he can actually follow through doing something together--which he never did when she was growing up. He hopes she'll give him a chance to be a better father.

Which character do you think you would care about more? 

I think it would be Gary because his goal is personal and emotional. If we've ever let anybody down or have ever hoped for a second chance in any relationship, we may identify with him at least a little. 

WHAT'S AT STAKE?

The other difference is that if the charity doesn't get the money one participant hoped to raise it probably won't be a huge blow. But if Gary doesn't finish, or at least make a massive effort, his daughter will feel he hasn't changed and there's no reason to trust him now. We can imagine how painful that would be for both of them.

The more your protagonist has at stake, the more we will care about their goal. What's at stake doesn't have to be objectively huge. Sure, in many stories it's a matter of life and death; however, you can get equal drama from a story in which what's at stake is whether a young girl is able to earn $20 to buy her ailing mother a Mother's Day gift. Her "why" is that she wants to show her mother how much she loves her.

THE "HOW" CAN CHANGE, THE "WHY" USUALLY STAYS THE SAME

Sometimes in the course of the story, the protagonist realizes the "how" they have chosen is not actually going to deliver the result they want. For instance, Adam might start off thinking he can buy his daughter's forgiveness with presents. But then he realizes he will have to give of himself instead, and that's when he signs up for the marathon.

Likewise, maybe the little girl comes to understand that something she makes herself will mean more to her mother than anything she could buy.

Thinking about the different ways that your characters try to fulfill their "why" can be a rich source of incidents and turning points for your plot.

DON'T FORGET THE ANTAGONIST

Antagonists have their own "why" as well--or at least they should. If they don't, they won't seem three-dimensional. An antagonist who does evil things just for the sake of being evil comes across like a cartoon character. An antagonist who does evil things for a reason we can understand is much more realistic. 

REVEALING THE "WHY" IS PART OF THE AUDIENCE ARC

The character arc refers to the transformation your protagonist undergoes as a result of the events of the story. There can also be an audience arc. By that, I mean a change in how the audience sees your character. Let's look at an example:

Recently I saw a reality show in which a restaurant owner was hostile to customers who asked for any minor change in a dish (like 'no onions'). Why? It turned out that when she was a child she was constantly criticized for not being able to do anything right and told she would never amount to anything. When a customer asked for a change in an item, the restaurant owner heard it as another insult and she responded angrily. When that was revealed it changed the way I regarded her.

A movie that has an audience arc is "As Good As It Gets," in which the Jack Nicholson character was mean and seemed to try hard to make sure nobody would like him. As the story goes on, though, we come to understand how he got that way, and it changes how we regard him. He also has a character arc, but our feelings about him change before he does.

The shift in an audience's perceptions is one of many ways of keeping them involved in your story.

HINTS MAY BE ENOUGH

If understanding the 'why" is crucial to your story, you may want to go into some detail and maybe even use flashbacks to reveal it. However, that's not always necessary. Often giving the audience some hints is enough to have them become more invested in your story. 

A great starting point: What do you want your readers to feel?

Halloween stories and horror movies are always about making people feel scared, but every kind of writing has the goal of making the reader or viewer feel something. Deciding what that is can help you develop your plot and characters.

Ads provide a good model. Some companies create new things to fear. When I was young there was a campaign with the slogan “No more ring around the collar!” in which people spotted that a man’s inside collar had a ring around it (due to poor washing powder) and were repulsed. “Ring around the collar” was sung in a kids’ mocking way and implied that people would think you were dirty. The way to avoid this humiliation was to use Wisk laundry detergent.

EMOTIONS ARE THE GATEWAY TO YOUR STORY

To bring the reader into the world of your story, it helps to have four elements:

• A protagonist with whom they can identify on an emotional level. If you introduce us to a character who yearns for love, for instance, it doesn't matter whether it's a prince or pauper, an innocent young girl or a lonely widow, a little mouse or the last dinosaur on earth. It's the emotion that is the basis of the reader's or viewer's bond with the character. 
  
  
• A tangible goal the protagonist pursues. While we may identify with the character's emotional state, our interest will wane if they don't soon start doing something to try to get whatever they need or think they need. Sometimes we become aware quickly that they are taking the wrong route to get their need met, and that will make us curious whether they'll recognize their error and do something else. 
  
  
• An antagonist who gets in the way.  This could be a love rival, for instance, or a person who has some kind of power over them. As you may have noticed as you've gone through life, a person can also be their own worst enemy. When that's the case, we want to get at least some clues as to why they are sabotaging themselves. Things like the weather, an accident, or a coincidence can also serve as an antagonist. In the case of coincidences, remember that it's fine to use one to get your character into trouble, but not out of trouble (that will feel like you're cheating).
  
  
• A variety of emotions for the protagonist to experience. As the story progresses, it will be emotions that keep us tied to the character. We will feel their shifting responses as they move forward or experience setbacks. If the protagonist stays in any one emotional state for too long we will get bored. 

I've linked these points to the protagonist, but in more sophisticated stories they apply to the antagonist as well. It's easy to boo a villain, but if the antagonist also has needs and goals with which we identify, the story will be richer. It may raise some conflicting emotions in us as we follow the story. For instance, let's say the person opposing a young woman's relationship with a poor young man is her mother, who truly believes she's doing the right thing, maybe because she suffered from poverty when she was young. We still feel the mother is doing the wrong thing, but we understand that her actions come from love for her daughter. It involves our intellect as well as our emotions and thereby enriches the story.

START WITH WHAT YOU WANT THE AUDIENCE TO FEEL

Knowing what emotions you want to evoke before you start writing can help you construct a good story and design the characters.

It can be helpful to have a map of the emotions you want your protagonist to go through on their journey. When you write the script or the novel you can check to make sure that each major scene or chapter is evoking the desired emotion. Even in a horror film, for instance, you need some variety because nobody can be scared 100% of the time, You need some moments when your protagonist (falsely) believes that now they are safe, before the monster or the ghost reappears. This need for variety is true for every genre.

You also can decide what you want the audience to feel as they leave the cinema or theater or read the last page of your novel. If, for example, you want the reader or audience to feel repulsion at the destructive power of greed you can choose to have the character realize it before it's too late, or you can have them remain blind to it and suffer the terrible consequences. 

OVER TO YOU

What is the central emotion you want your audience to feel? Try using that starting point, and let me know whether it helps you develop involving plots and characters.

 

A Brainstorming Tool for Writing for Children

I've already posted about using the free Oberlo Business Name Generator to come up with the names of fictional businesses in your screenplay or novel, and for coming up with titles for a non-fiction book or newsletter. It's also a useful brainstorming tool if you write for kids.

For instance, I was thinking about writing a story in which a young child explores a pond and encounters magical versions of all the type of creatures that hang around ponds. I wanted to come up with fun personalities or identities for each creature. To start, I typed "frog" into the Generator. Here are some of the combinations it came up with:

Rock Frog

Frog Chef

Daydream Frog

Sidekick Frog

TopDog Frog

Singular Frog

General Frog

Thunder Frog

Hip Frog

Everlasting Frog

Frog Doctor

Covert Frog

If those don't give you some ideas for the kind of frog the child could encounter, you're not a writer! And I'll bet you can think of other ways that the Generator can fit into your brainstorming as well.

 

The Joy of Writing an Articulate Character

I love the old screwball comedies like "Bringing Up Baby." The characters in those typically were fast-talking, witty, and playful. 

Even if your script or novel isn't populated with those kinds of characters, often it's easy and fun to slip in at least one. 

If you'd like to be inspired in terms of their dialogue, a great resource is the 1913 edition of Webster's Dictionary, which is easy to access online here:

websters1913.com

A conventional character might call someone a crook.

One who expresses himself or herself in the screwball tradition, however, might say, "You, Sir, are knavish, fraudulent, and unjust. You have made a U-turn on the path of rectitude."

Even if there's no room for such a character in your project, spending 30 minutes randomly browsing 1913 definitions will give you more joy than an equivalent period on Facebook!

Is Your Screenplay's Protagonist's Problem Big Enough?

The weakness of a lot of screenplays is that the protagonist's central problem isn't big enough. It has to be something formidable enough to keep them challenged for the entire script.

While many stories are about matters of life and death, the definition of "big" in this case is not objective but rather how important it is to the protagonist. 

You can write a compelling screenplay featuring a character whose goal is objectively small, like winning a school race. The key is making sure it is of huge importance and consequence to the protagonist.

For instance, if the protagonist is a girl who is participating in a contest that is traditionally only for boys and if she's bullied, made fun of, and misunderstood even by the adults in her life we will feel the urgency of her quest and root for her to win. 

IT HAS TO BE RELATABLE

The protagonist's challenge has to be relatable, but not necessarily in its specifics.

For instance, a protagonist may be striving to overcome a challenge with which we don't have any personal experience, but we can all relate to the feeling of having a big goal and having to fight for it.

When you are thinking about the central conflict of your protagonist, consider what makes it relatable for the audience. What is the emotion or goal that's driving the protagonist? For instance, it might be survival against a deadly force, the desire to better themselves, or righting a wrong.

THE PROTAGONIST HAS TO BE RELATABLE, TOO

Going back to the example of the school race, a big part of what makes us care in that example is the underdog nature of the girl. Most of us can relate to being misunderstood, to being made fun of, and to wanting to prove ourselves, just like her. 

In many cases, the protagonist is likable from the start, but that's not essential. As long as they are interesting, we'll stick around, especially if we get the feeling that the story will give them a character arc that transforms them in a positive direction.

THE PROBLEMS HAVE TO ESCALATE

If the problem your protagonist faces seventy minutes in is the same level of difficulty as it was twenty minutes in there's a good chance we'll get bored before we get to minute seventy.

Just as a boxer has to fight opponents of increasing skill levels before taking on the champ, make your protagonist come up against bigger and bigger challenges. Let them have some small wins along the way, too, to keep them motivated, but each step of the way they should be in great danger of failing.

BE MEAN!

A writer I used to know never made it because he was too nice. Even in fiction, he couldn't bring himself to subject somebody to the kind of cruelty you'll have to impose upon your protagonist. In fact, he couldn't even imagine such cruelties in an original way, so his scripts were too derivative, relying on specific plot elements he'd seen in other films. 

Don't be nice--this is one instance when any cruel impulses you may have can be put to good use!

ASK THESE QUESTIONS AT THE IDEA STAGE

It's unfortunate when a writer goes to all the effort of writing a complete screenplay before they discover that one of the above elements is missing.

Actually, often the person who discovers this first is an agent or producer for whom this lack is the reason they reject the script.

You can save yourself a lot of time by making sure at the idea stage that each of these is present. Ask yourself:

• Is the protagonist someone the audience will like or at least find interesting? What is it about them that the audience will find of interest or to which the audience can relate, like being an underdog or being confronted with unfair treatment?
  
  
• Is the challenge one the audience can relate to on a basic level? What is the protagonist's essential drive in facing this challenge, like righting a wrong, protecting their family, etc.?
  
  
• Does the conflict escalate as the story proceeds? What are the major steps of the conflict? (Tip: if you can put them in any different order without affecting the story, they're not escalating.)

If you have a strong answer to each of these questions, the odds are that your story will work.

The two things you have to know about your screenplay or novel plot

Screenplay and novel plots are ambitious, complicated things. I've found that making sure you know the answer to two questions is helpful from start to finish.

 

1. What's the story about?
   
   
2. What's the story REALLY about?
   

 

WHAT'S THE STORY ABOUT?

This simply means, what's the basic idea?

It's similar to a logline, but since the latter is designed to get somebody else interested in the story, it needs to be carefully crafted. That's not necessary here. All that's required is a simple statement like:

"It's about a husband and wife who let their divorce turn into a force that destroys both of them."

"It's about a group of middle-aged male friends whose attempt to re-create a wild night they had when they were in high school ends in disillusion about their past."

"It's about a superhero who has to give up the love of his life in order to keep saving the world."

Notice the elements: the protagonist(s), the conflict, and the outcome.

The answer will guide you through the rest of the process.

If you developed the plot of the first one, for instance, you would check that every major scene revolves around the husband and/or wife, that whatever they do keeps escalating in destructiveness, and that by the end they've both been destroyed (financially, emotionally, or literally).

Sometimes this kind of simple statement reveals that the story is flawed, and it's good to find that out at the start rather than after you've written the whole script or novel. 

For instance: "A man turns to crime in order to raise money for expensive medical treatment for his child but is able to return to the honest ways he prefers when he wins the lottery." What's wrong with this, of course, is that the solution to his problem comes out of nowhere instead of somehow being the result of his struggles.

WHAT IS IT REALLY ABOUT?

Here we're talking about the theme. If you don't decide on one it's more likely you'll lose your way in the writing process.

The three elements (character, conflict, outcome) will point toward the theme.

If the divorcing couple is fighting over who gets what, the theme might be that greed is destructive.

If their conflict stems from a desire for revenge because each thinks the other was responsible for betraying them, the theme could be that revenge is destructive to both parties.

Since the story about the middle-aged men ends badly, the theme could be that it's better to look forward rather than back.

If your story was, "By recreating a night they experienced when they were in high school, a group of middle-aged men rediscover the sense of fun they'd lost," the theme could be that it's never too late to experience the fun of youth."

Which one is right? Whichever one you believe.

If you have a story description for which you can't identify a theme, that may be an indication that the story is flawed.

Going back to the earlier example, what's the theme of, "A man turns to crime in order to raise money for expensive medical treatment for his young son but is able to return to the honest ways he prefers when he wins the lottery?"

I can't think of one.

If the ending is that he gets caught but not before he's paid for the child's treatment, then the theme might be, "No sacrifice is too great for the life of your child."

If the ending is that he gets caught and then it comes out that the child's illness was misdiagnosed and he never actually needed expensive treatment, then the theme might be, "Life is a joker and the joke is on us."

WHICH COMES FIRST, PLOT OR THEME?

Some writers start with a theme they consider important and fashion a story that fits, but in my experience, most start with a character, a moment, or the seed of a story, and then figure out what it's really about.

For example, I'm working on a script about a small group of people who go to a personal development retreat, struggle with their inner demons, and end up getting not what they want but what they need.

The theme is that when you try to find yourself, the person who turns up may not be the one you want to meet.

Note that this story, like most, could be a comedy or a tragedy. Because my experience is that life is a combination of the two, so is my story. 

WHAT IF YOU'RE NOT SURE OF THE THEME AT THE START?

Sometimes it happens that you're not sure of the theme at the start. That's fine, just develop the story until you figure out its basics, especially the ending. When you've done that, the theme will emerge.

AREN'T THESE THEMES SIMPLISTIC?

Yep. That's why you build a story that represents a more sophisticated embodiment of the theme. The theme should be so well clothed in the story that the viewer or reader is not aware of it until much later--if at all. We're telling stories, not preaching sermons. The theme will have an impact on the subconscious level even if the reader or viewer never thinks about it.

"Love conquers all" has spawned a million stories and there's room for a million more. There's also room for stories which suggest that "Love can't conquer all," for those writers who believe that.

KEEP THEM VISIBLE

I recommend that you write the answers to the two questions on an index card or a sticky note that you keep visible as you write. If you get stuck, go back to these and the chances are you'll find your solution.

 

What is your character's secret?

One thing that makes a character in a screenplay or novel interesting is their secret.

If you need proof of the power of secrets to attract us, notice how often people trying to sell you something use the lure of secrets, especially secrets that some hypothetical "they" supposedly don't want you to know.

SECRETS ARE NOT ALWAYS NEGATIVE

In character terms, we tend to think of secrets as being about negative things, but they can also be positive, neutral, or open to interpretation:

• The person who anonymously pays another person's bill;
• Someone who, even in middle age, still harbors dreams of becoming famous;
• The woman who lets her husband think their child is his, even though she knows it isn't.

HOW SECRETS INFLUENCE PLOTS

While it can be interesting to consider what secrets your characters might harbor, the important secrets are those that influence the story in some way. 

A story typically confronts your protagonist with an internal as well as an external conflict, and a secret can be useful in both.

A dark secret may influence how open a character is about their background, and it can make them take drastic action to preserve the secret.

An embarrassing secret can be especially useful in a comedy.

A secret goal may suddenly set your protagonist on a new path if something happens to make the goal more accessible. 

Sometimes the secret just helps us to understand the character better, other times the entire plot revolves around a secret. Let's look at some examples.

SECRETS IN MOVIES

If you think back to your favorite movies you may find that secrets played a significant role. Here are a few of mine:

Citizen Kane revolves around that secret of the meaning of "rosebud," Charles Foster Kane's last word.

In Sunset Boulevard, the young screenwriter hides his relationship to the old movie star.

In Schindler's List, Schindler has to keep his intentions secret from the Nazis.

In The Wizard of Oz, the Wizard has to keep it a secret that he's just a mortal.

In E.T., the boy has to keep the alien secret from the feds.

In Silence of the Lambs, the FBI cadet tries to keep her fear and her background secret, but Hannibal Lector figures them out.

In Some Like it Hot and Tootsie, characters have to keep it a secret that they are men pretending to be women.

In Romeo and Juliet, the young lovers have to keep their relationship a secret from their families.

In Hamlet, the Prince has to keep it secret that he suspects his uncle poisoned his father.

In A Streetcar Named Desire, Blanche tries to hide several facts about her past.

The list goes on!

WHAT'S YOUR CHARACTER'S SECRET?

You can start with a secret that could be the center of an interesting plot, or if you already have a plot, you can think about what kind of secret would be useful in making a character more interesting and what useful effect it could have on the plot.

A secret can also be useful when you know you need your protagonist to do something in order to advance the plot, but there's no obvious reason for them to do so. You may be able to plant a  secret early in the story that justifies their later action.

And that's the secret of using secrets in stories!

 

 

Two Screenplays Worth Studying

If you are interested in writing screenplays it's always worthwhile studying ones others have written.

Recently, Spike Lee released the screenplay for his unproduced film about Jackie Robinson, the first African American to play in the major leagues. You can read that script here.

In 2013, a film called "42," also about Jackie Robinson, was released. It was written and directed by Brian  Helgeland and starred Chadwick Boseman and Harrison Ford.

Rotten Tomatoes called "42" an "earnest, inspirational, and respectfully told biography." Critics rated it at 80%, the audience score was 85%.  You can read the script here.

I suggest you read both scripts.

I found "42" a little TOO earnest and didn't like the fact that the first page basically tells you the whole story. Lee's opening scene drew me in more, but both scripts have their strong and weak points. 

Which one do you think works better?

Why?

What can you learn from the strengths and weaknesses of each?

 

 

 

What's the secret of writing comedy?

So you want to write comedy?

Here's the problem: humor is subjective. What makes one person double over with laughter just elicits a groan from another. That's why writing comedy probably requires a little more self-confidence than writing other genres. At least you have to fake it long enough to finish the script and send it out.

How do you do it? Here's what writer Ian Southwood said about that in Screencraft magazine recently:

"I used to write what I thought other people would think is funny, always second-guessing my own sense of humor...But it never works. Never. Trying to write like someone else is like wearing a rented tuxedo. It doesn't fit. Not like it should. Now I just try to be honest, with the writing and with myself."

To the degree that there's a secret to comedy writing, that's it:

Keep it honest.

Honest to yourself and, equally importantly, honest to the characters.

Never have a character do something just because it's funny.

However crazy what they say or what they do may be, it should feel like something they would actually do.

If you want your character to beat a car with a tree branch (a famous scene from Fawlty Towers, starring John Cleese), create a character who is so full of pent-up frustration that this action is not only funny but believable. 

The source of both the humor and the plausibility is the character's attitude to the world.

Take the leads of the Odd Couple as an example. Oscar is a lazy slob, Felix is a compulsive neurotic. Put them in the same situation and they would have totally different reactions--which could both be funny.

I served my comedy writing apprenticeship with TV writer Danny Simon and I've never forgotten his most important advice: "Never sacrifice a character for a laugh."

What he meant was if you have a character do something they wouldn't really do, you may get a laugh but you've destroyed their believability.

Huh, turns out honesty is the best policy, even in comedy writing.

 

 

Your weakness can become your strength

What if your weakness could also be your strength?

In the previous post, I wrote about Dana Terrace, who persisted with an idea for a TV series that her colleague called dumb. The Owl House was renewed for a second season by Disney before the first one even aired. 

In an interview in the L. A. Times, Terrace mentioned feeling left out when she was a kid because she was kind of an oddball. She patterned one of the series' main characters on herself. She says, "He's just a little guy that wants to be big, so I always related to him. He's tiny and no one takes him seriously. He just wants to be taken seriously."

The reason I wanted to revisit this topic is that I think it demonstrates not only the power of persistence in the face of discouragement but also how we can turn what other people see as a weakness into a strength.

This is especially so for writers and artists because supposed weaknesses make great material. People will relate because everybody feels defective in some way, even the most apparently confident ones.

I did something similar in an animated series I created, called Norman Normal. The premise was that Noman is the only normal one in a family of superheroes. Even his baby sister and his dog have powers.

I think this mirrors the feeling of a lot of kids that they're surrounded by parents how have all the power and other kids who are smarter, better looking, or more talented. Of course, it was always Norman who came up with the solutions or was able to help his superhero family win the day. I hope some kids watching the show were comforted or inspired by that.

TURN IT AROUND FOR FUN AND PROFIT

Sometimes we avoid writing about our weaknesses and fears, even in the form of fiction, because they make us uncomfortable.

I'm suggesting that if you face your weakness or your fear and turn it into art--a script, a novel, a short story, a painting--you may end up creating your most powerful and appealing work. It could even be your most profitable work--56 episodes of Norman Normal were produced and because I had a good "created by" deal, it was quite lucrative.

This process can also be therapeutic, as I discovered when I wrote a play called "Killing Mother." (No, my mom never saw it.)

You don't have to make the work directly autobiographical--in fact, usually it's better if you give yourself a lot of leeway to fictionalize so that you can serve the story instead of being bound by the limitations of reality.

At the moment, I'm doing this with a screenplay called Leaving It Behind, about a criminal facing the end of his life. It was triggered when I had to have open-heart surgery and considered the (admittedly slim) chance that I might not make it. I'm not a criminal nor do I have a terminal illness (the operation went well) but the story incorporates a lot of my fears and thoughts at the time.

Maybe you're already doing this, but it may be worth checking whether there's anything in the darker corners of your psyche that you might turn around by putting it at the heart of your next project.

Can You Learn to Write Funny?

An old friend who teaches at a performing arts school recently asked me to look at a script for a short film, written by one of his students, that they are planning to film. It's the story of a young man who decides that using his gift for comedy is more important than going to college.

The problem with the script is that the writer doesn't have a gift for comedy and therefore neither does the character. If you're going to write a convincing funny character, you have to be able to be funny yourself. That brings me to a question I've been asked quite a few times:

CAN YOU LEARN TO WRITE FUNNY?

Sorry, but I think the answer is no. If you are naturally funny, certainly you can learn how best to channel that into screenplays or novels or essays, and the difference between writing for stand-up, sketches, sitcoms, movies, and plays. You can also learn how how to compose works that integrate comedy and drama.

However, if you don't start with a knack for comedy--which usually means you have an ability to see things from a different perspective--reading a book about the theory of threes, or why words starting with consonants are funnier than words that start with vowels, or that exaggeration is important, probably will not work for you. 

HOW TO FIND OUT WHETHER YOU'RE FUNNY

If you don't know whether or not you're funny (plenty of people who aren't, think they are), ask an honest friend whether they think humor is one of your greatest strengths.

That gives them the chance to say, "Hey, sure you're funny, but actually I think your greatest strengths are (x, y, z)."

Translation: "You're not funny." 

WHAT IF YOU'RE NOT FUNNY?

Write to your strengths. If you're not naturally funny, write drama, thrillers, horror, romance, or any of the other genres. Your gift, like that of my friend's student, may lie in other areas. 

 

The scourge of dishonest writing

When I was a student of Danny Simon (Neil's brother and a very successful TV writer) one of his maxims was, "Don't go for the joke!" 

This may seem like strange advice from a comedy writer, but what he meant was that you should stay true to the situation and the characters. If you have them say or do something they wouldn't logically do, you're sacrificing them for the sake of a joke. If you do that a lot, you end up with characters nobody believes. A high price to pay for a cheap laugh.

I was reminded of this the other day when I watched a few minutes of a US TV series called 911. It's on the Fox network, which says, "The show draws from real-life, high-pressure experiences of first responders who regularly face heart-stopping situations that are often unpredictable, intense, and uplifting at the same time." 

One of the situations was an old guy who was working on an old car that somehow sucked his head, or maybe just his beard, into the innards of the engine. A woman who may have been his wife or daughter calls 911 and says the car is eating the man and starts to talk about his relationship to the vehicle, and when the responders show up she tells them the car is finally getting her revenge...this is while somebody she presumably loves has his head stuck and she doesn't know how seriously he could be hurt. 

Yes, it's comic relief, designed to give the audience a breather from the more tragic plots, which is fine, but it was so obviously written to be a zany moment that it cheapened the entire enterprise.

The writer might say, "Hey, there are all kinds of crazy people who say just about anything." That's true, and if you've established that the character is like that before the moment of maximum craziness, it works. But in this case, this was the first time we'd seen these people.

I'm using a comedic example but you'll find plenty of examples in drama as well, with people saying or doing things solely because that's what's needed in order to advance the plot. It's not only dishonest, it's also lazy. 

If in doubt, it's useful to ask, "Would a human being really say this in this situation?" If the answer is, 99% of the time, no, then it's worth rewriting. 

 

Sneaky hybrid movie: Rolling Thunder's little white lies

Martin Scorses's film of a Bob Dylan concert, "Rolling Thunder Revue," looks like a typical music documentary, but as Indiewire points out, it's not.

Fictional characters are mixed in with real people in order to provide context...and also just for fun.

The little white lies include:

• Sharon Stone claiming an affair with Dylan;
• The reminiscences of retired politician Jack Tanner (actually actor Michael Murphy who played that role in HBO series "Tanner 88)";
• The testimony of filmmaker Stephan van Drop (actually actor Martin von Haselberg);
• The memories of concert promoter Jim Gianopulos (who is actually the CEO of Paramount Pictures but was never involved with promoting music events).

While I do like Dylan's music, what interests me from the perspective of screenwriting is the film's blend of factual material with fiction--maybe that's why the film's full title is, "Rolling Thunder Revue: A Bob Dylan Story by Martin Scorsese."

Still from "Rolling Thunder Revue." (Not really, just an image I like)

If you're having trouble creating a character, try the Fellini method

How do you get to know your characters well enough to feel confident writing what they do and say?

The great director Federico Fellini had a particular method. He said, "Some people get a quick handle on things by means of words, by sensations. I design. I sketch the traits of the face, the details of the costume, a person's attitudes, anatomy. That is my way of getting close to a film I'm making, of understanding what it is..."

You don't have to be an artist to use this method. Nobody else needs to see your crude sketches, the important thing is that they help you understand the character.

If you don't draw at all, you can look for images online that inspire you. 

For instance, let's say your protagonist is a young man.

I searched for: Google images young man. What came up at the top of the results page was '1000+ amazing young man photos' (these are free stock images). If you scrolled through these images I'm sure there'd be one that clicked, that made you think, "That's my protagonist!" 

You can do the same with clothing, settings, and the other elements of your story.

Give it a try and let me know how it works for you, either in the comments or via email at [email protected].

Good luck!

Screenplays: add to characters with subtle symbols

There are lots of ways to make a screenplay character three-dimensional, and one is using symbols. Of course if the symbols are too on the nose they can detract, but here's an example of a subtle one:

Actor Paul Scheer told Fast Company magazine: "My character [in Black Monday] wears a wig in the show, and that was a conscious [choice] because when we first start talking about how he’s wrestling with his sexuality, I wanted that wig to represent the idea that he’s already hiding. On the base level, it’s like he’s not even comfortable being bald in this world."

I don't know how many people watching Black Monday would pick up on that, but a lot of times we register such clues subconsciously. 

Here are some other ways of revealing character:

What kind of clothes do they wear? Are they still wearing the style they wore twenty years ago, or are they desperate to keep up with the latest fashions? Do they care more about the label than the clothes per se? Do they try too hard to be quirky--or to avoid being noticed?

What kind of decorations and furniture do they have at their residence? What kind of painting or photos are in the background? The total absence of any decoration also tells a story. 

What kind of accessories do they choose, such as watches, rings, bracelets, etc.? For example, what does it tell you when a guy wears a Rolex? (It ain't about telling the time.)

I find it helpful to think about such things because they make the character more real to me. The more real the character is to you, the writer, the easier it is to know what they'd say and do in any situation.