Time to Write

That Exposition -- It's Naked!

"Beautiful Boy" was a well-acted and generally well-made film that earned Amazon Studios some critical plaudits but didn't do too well at the box office. With an estimated budget of $25 million, its worldwide earnings were just over $8 million.

One thing that surprised me was the naked exposition in the opening scene.

Steve Carell, as the boy's father, is talking to a therapist. He says he's there on a personal matter, not as a journalist, and then this is the dialogue:

DAVID It’s about my son.

DR BROWN (O.S.) Okay, how can I help?

DAVID There are moments that I look at him, this kid that I raised who I thought that I knew inside and out, and I wonder who he is? He’s been doing all sorts of drugs, but he’s addicted to crystal meth, which seems to be the worst of all of them. And I guess I am here because I just want to know all that I can about all of it. Know your enemies right? So... my two big questions are, what is it doing to him and what can I do to help him?

FADE TO BLACK.

Whoa! If this had been the first page of a script by one of my students I would have advised finding a scene that would intrigue the audience, not spell out exactly what the story is.

Stories about addiction tend to be predictable (on drugs, off drugs, on drugs, off drugs), the only question usually being whether or not the addict survives. Therefore this script needed to find fresh ways of keeping the audience's interest and that first speech didn't help. Yes, the point of view of the father desperate to help his son and willing to go to extreme lengths to do so added depth to the story, but the way it was presented didn't. 

THREE WAYS TO PUT CLOTHES ON NAKED EXPOSITION

There are a few ways to disguise exposition. The first and best is to show the information, rather than telling it. There are plenty of scenes in the movie that establish the boy's drug habit, the father's frustration, and the dad's extreme desire to help. I don't think this speech was needed at all. 

Another method is to put the exposition into an emotional scene. Instead of saying that he thought he knew his kid inside and out but now sometimes wonders who he is, it's easy to imagine that being built into a dramatic confrontation scene between the father and son in which the father's anger turns to tears of frustration. 

The third strategy is to involve an outsider who doesn't know the full situation, ideally someone who has an emotional connection to your protagonist rather than a neutral figure like a therapist. For instance, a close friend of the father, who has noticed how distracted and torn up the dad is but doesn't know why, could ask, "What the hell is happening to you?!" There could even have been a bit of irony if the friend asked, "You're not on drugs, are you?"

If you find any naked exposition in your own scripts, quick, cover it up!

Writing "improvised" dialogue

Can you write dialogue that sounds improvised? Should you? 

Eric Roth, co-writer of the current version of "A Star is Born," talks about how he abandoned his usual approach to writing dialogue:

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/eric-roth-having-mindset-writing-a-star-is-born-1161322

I saw the film recently, and I did wonder how much of the dialogue was improvised--and Roth says in the clip that some of it was. 

Obviously, any dialogue can be improvised, but it seems to work best when it's side-comments that help establish the nature of the relationship of the people talking. That might take the form of teasing or being playful, as in "A Star is Born," or maybe some other additional subtext.

I find that a good strategy is giving your 'final' draft one more look and seeing whether loosening up the dialogue that way will add to the richness of your characters. Of course, the specifics depend on the nature of your characters, but by loosening up, I mean something like this:

Original line: "Would you like that?"

Looser exchange: "Would that float your boat?" 

(Other character:) "Float my boat? Did you just escape from the 70's?"

While dialogue is almost never the same as actual speech, strategically bringing it a bit closer can help your characters come alive.

 

 

Put our prejudices to use in your fiction

Our prejudices--our tendency to pre-judge people--can be pernicious in real life, but you can use it to your advantage when creating characters for your fiction.

A study at the University of Texas at Dallas found that our first impression of people is based, at least in part, on their body shape, according to a report by ScienceDaily.

Generally, heavier bodies were associated with laziness and carelessness. (I know--unfair, but I'm just reporting the results!)

Lighter bodies were associated with self-confidence and enthusiasm.

Bodies considered classically masculine (broad shoulders, smaller waist) and classically feminine (pear-shaped) were associated with being quarrelsome, extraverted, and irritable.

Bodies that were more rectangular were associated with trustworthiness, shyness, dependability, and warmth.

In fiction, you can choose to use these assumptions to help define your character--or to subvert the stereotypes by, for instance, creating a self-confident, enthusiastic character who also happens to be heavy, or a lazy, careless one who happens to be skinny.

I prefer the latter, not only because it may be a tiny step toward undoing this kind of pre-judgment but also because readers like being surprised and if they subscribe to the current stereotypes, this kind of reversal will surprise them.

 

 

 

 

A documentary trick that also works for fiction films and novels

What makes a character (or a real person) interesting?

An article on Ozy.com reveals, "For filmmakers Elizabeth Delaune Warren and Danya Abt, quirk is key. The eccentricities and complexities that drive people also drive their documentary filmmaking.

'You take someone who’s a potato farmer in Idaho, and you expect a certain thing from them,' Abt says. 'How do they subvert those expectations?'

For Abt, the answer is in resisting the instinct to simplify and instead focusing on those very traits that don’t seem to fit the usual narrative. She believes this is the point at which a character starts to have dimension."

This works great in fiction as well.

The trick is not to automatically go for the opposite--for instance, the pro football player who is an opera buff, or the granny who rides a Harley-Davidson.

That's not to say that there aren't football players who love opera or grandmothers who ride Harleys, but it feels a bit by rote. Instead, it might be a football player whose hobby is woodworking, or a grandmother who coaches a kids' baseball team.

For inspiration, think about the quirks of your family members, your friends--or your own. 

"Sure I'm a homemaker, but I also enjoy taxidermy. I've got a moose in the basement right now."

 

 

A top agent's tip about creating characters

Top agent Jonny Geller, who represents John le Carre, among others, offers this writing tip on the Curtis Brown site:

"Every character you write is living a moment in time and it must be true and real in the moment. It must also hint at a past and to an unknown future that we care about."

Let's break that down. 

TRUE AND REAL IN THE MOMENT

As well as having a general idea of who our character is we need to know who they are in the moment we're writing about. What are they feeling at this point and how is that feeling influencing their action?

HINT AT A PAST

Of course, none of us are separate from our past, so another thing to consider is how the character's emotions and actions are being influenced by what has gone before.

We don't we don't need to spell that out; as Geller says, a hint is enough. The hint doesn't have to be in the form of dialogue (although it can be).

For instance, sometimes the pictures on the wall, or a piece of jewelry, or an unexpected reaction can do the job. If the character reacts nervously to the appearance of a police car, for instance, that suggests he or she may have had a run-in with the cops before or has something to hide.

HINT AT AN UNKNOWN FUTURE

The character's actions can give us some clues about what's coming up. Again, we want this to be a tantalizing hint, not something that's spelled out. The example of a character who is nervous when he or she sees a police car suggests not only that something happened in the past but that they'll encounter the police again at some point in the story.

THAT WE CARE ABOUT

This refers to the most fundamental aspect of a protagonist--we have to care about this person. That can be because they are likable but it can also be because we find them fascinating but not sympathetic. 

WHEN TO CHECK FOR THESE 

I think these criteria are best applied during the planning and re-writing phases. If we get too caught up in applying them in the writing phase, it can stop the flow. 

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For more ideas about creating characters who come alive on the page, see my book, YOUR WRITING COACH, published by Hachette and available from Amazon or your other favorite bookseller.

HOW THEY GOT HAN SOLO WRONG

In The Weekly Standard, John Podhertz gets it right about why the makers of Solo got Han Solo so wrong:

"There’s no bad boy to Alden Ehrenreich’s young Han; he’s a boy scout who is determined to save the love of his life. All he does is sacrifice things and help people. But the Han we know and love from the original Star Wars movies is someone who sticks his neck out for the first time when he shows up in the last act to help blow up the Death Star and transforms his life as a result. Solo should be a movie about what made him so cynical yet charming in the first place."

Their model should have been Rick from Casablanca--before Ilsa shows up. It would have been a refreshing change from the earnest young heroes of the most recent editions of the Star Wars franchise. 

It also might have helped the movie be more successful at the box office.

 

 

How to manage an ensemble storyline

How do you construct a storyline that does justice to all the characters in a large ensemble?

An extreme version of that problem confronted the writers of Avengers:  Infinity War. 

One of the writers, Christopher Markus, described their solution in an interview with SYFYWire:

"It all started to balance out once we realized that Thanos [the villain] is the main character; he's the protagonist of this movie. He is actually the driving force. He will dictate everything that happens in the movie. Until his story or the ramifications of his story interact with certain characters, they're not in the movie. He is pulling people into the drama."

You may not have that kind of villain in your storyline but a good starting point is to ask what all of your characters have in common. That may be the key to figuring out the best way to introduce the members of the ensemble.

START WITH THE BIG QUESTIONS

It's tempting to jump right into trying to figure out the plot, but co-director Joe Russo describes how they start with the bigger questions:

"We talk about the storytelling, as directors, we talk about what we're interested in saying with the movie, what are the thematics, what's the tone of it, what are some of the bigger targets we'd like to hit."

The theme can become the criterion for whether or not a possible story element fits.

Russo says, "...the thematic question that Infinity War asks is the theme of the Marvel Universe, and can be the theme of any story which involves heroes versus villains: "What is the cost that they're willing to pay? And does the value of doing what's right outweigh the cost?"

ONE SCENE TO AVOID

Markus says, "We had written, at some point, one of those big-ass group scenes. 'Let's get everybody together in a conference room and talk about the threat that's coming.' It was cool because everyone was there, but it was awful."

It's better to let the audience see (or figure out) why and how your group fits together rather than to have an 'explainer' scene full of exposition.

DO JUSTICE TO EACH CHARACTER

Just as is true for us in real life, each character is in their own drama.

Russo describes the process that helps ensure each character's integrity in the larger story:

"It is a very vigilant and disciplined process, of sitting in a room, endlessly, going through the story you want to tell, following the story through each character's point of view. We'll spend a day going through Gamora's story. A day going through Banner's story. A day going through Panther's story. Pulling them through the movie so we understand what their point of view is, what their moments are."

A FINAL SCARY BIT OF ADVICE

A vital question that doesn't apply only to ensemble stories is how you to keep audiences interested throughout the story. Russo offers this scary advice: 

"There's a storytelling adage that says, "Write yourself into a corner." Put yourself in a place, on a narrative level, where you have no idea how you're going to get out of it. Breaking Bad is a great example of that adage. Every episode of that show ends in a place where you go, "I have no idea how this is going to continue next week. How these characters are going to move forward from here." And we've always appreciated that as good storytelling. And we love that as storytellers, because that's the great challenge.

Spend everything you have. Push everything as far as you can. Say to yourself, "Welp, that's it. I don't know how possibly there's anything beyond this." And then let it gestate for a while and it's quite possible that you find a road forward after that."

 

 

Just in case you think writing humor is easy... (Jerry Seinfeld on writing a joke and on life)

This New York Times short of Jerry Seinfeld revealing how he wrote a particular routine is revealing:

https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox/161670e5c13b8eb8?projector=1

If you thought just because it sounds effortless, it is... well, you'll see!

You might also enjoy this compilation of Jerry talking about the elements of success as a stand-up comedian and other aspects of life as he's interviewed by, among others, Barack Obama:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNlW1TZwGro

My favorite is his conclusion that you have to "find the torture you're comfortable with." Meaning, everything worth doing has aspects that are not fun but to get to the good part you have to be willing to do the other stuff.

Also interesting is the fact that when he had a meeting about his online show, Comedians in Cars Having Coffee, they all told him it wouldn't work because nothing longer than five minutes succeeds. His episodes average nineteen minutes and the series has been a big success.

Keep track of those body parts!

When you're writing, it's easy to come up with dramatic similes, metaphors, and descriptions that go a step too far. Here are a few actual examples from published books, thanks to a column David Langford wrote a while back for SFX magazine (unlike Langford, I'm sparing the authors their blushes):

"Franklin left his eyes on the floor, took a half step backward."

"His eyes fixed like grappling hooks on AAri's face..."

"...his eyes felt as if they had tendrils growing out of them, crawling like ants across the floorboards."

"Eyes like anguished talons were clutching hers." (Eyes like talons are bad enough, but anguished talons?)

It's not only eyes doing unusual things:

"The wind was shrieking, and so were her legs."

"I said through grated teeth." (Ouch, that one hurts to even think about.)

"Her face had the fragrance of a gibbous moon."

His unruly shock of red hair towered six feet above the floor."

"He felt once again the desire to bite his own backside in fury." 

And my favorite:

"His dark face was pale."

 

 

 

 

 

 

You know about the character arc--do you know about the audience arc?

In my workshop at Raindance the other day we talked about the character arc, the transformation of the protagonist that is common to many films and novels. Less familiar is what I call the audience arc.

The audience arc is a change in the audience's perception of the protagonist.

This is an exception to the "rule" that something has to change in the lives of the characters between the start and the finish of the film, and it is especially useful in short films and short stories. 

For instance, a short film could start with a young boy smashing the windows of a church for no apparent reason. A neighbor grabs him and takes him to the priest, saying they should call the police. The kindly priest says the boy is just misguided; he'll talk to him and with God's love everything will be all right.

The priest takes the boy inside and in the course of their conversation we realize that the priest has been abusing the boy. The boy tried telling his father but was punished for lying. 

It could end with the priest letting the boy go but telling him to visit him later at his (the priest's) home or the priest will report the damage, and we know the boy will be abused again

Neither the boy nor the priest has changed, but the audience's feelings about the characters has changed in a way that engages the audience's emotions--we start off thinking the boy is a delinquent and the priest is a kind man, and end up feeling terrible for the boy and hating the priest.

What motivates your characters? (And what motivates you?)

There are four stages of motivation, says Benjamin Hardy in an article on Medium.

That may be an oversimplification, but a useful one when creating characters for your screenplay or novel--as well as for a bit of navel-gazing. Here's how he defines the four stages:

    "At stage one, you are motivated by fear. Everything you do is to avoid punishment or negative outcomes. 

    At stage two, you are motivated by reward. Everything you do is to get what you want. 

    At stage three, you are motivated by duty. You’re going to do what you believe you should whether you receive a reward or not.

    At stage four, you are motivated by love. You have moved beyond worry for your own needs."

THE UPSIDE AND DOWNSIDE OF EACH STAGE

Naturally, each of these stages has advantages and drawbacks.

Stage one sounds terrible, but there is a kind of protection implied--the fearful person may never take any risks and therefore may not excel, but they will avoid some of the negative events that befall risk-takers.

People at stage two tend to believe that everybody else is at this stage, and they don't see any problem with being selfish. In fact, often they believe that what they do also benefits the greater good (see Ayn Rand, or "What's good for General Motors is good for America.")

Stage three removes the need to make many decisions or question your actions. The path forward is defined for you by your group or your religion. 

While stage four sounds great, it has just as many potential conflicts and complications as the others. For instance, imagine a scientist whose research could potentially save the lives of many people--but requires a dedication of time and effort that makes it difficult for him or her to also devote enough time to family. That's the story of many top artists and scientists.

Of course, nobody is motivated by only one of these all the time. Probably over the course of the day, we make decisions based on all four. Even the same action may be motivated by a mix. However, one may predominate.

HOW TO APPLY THIS TO YOUR CHARACTERS

You could use these as a pattern for the character arc of your protagonist. The character could go from stage three to stage four, or even from stage one to stage four, although a change that big that would require intense events to drive it.

You could also decide at which stage the other characters are. That will help you decide what they would do at any point in your story. 

Finally, having different characters at different levels will tend to generate conflict, always useful when you're building a plot.

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Want tips on creating outstanding characters? You'll get them from the top writers of today and times past, in Your Creative Writing Masterclass, published by Nichalas Brealey/Hachette, and available from Amazon or your other favorite bookseller.

Hook me or I'm leaving (writing good openings)

I just started listening to a podcast of spooky stories...and turned to something else after about three minutes. Why? Because the opening was full of general information that didn't feel like it was going anywhere. Neither was there foreshadowing of anything scary or mysterious.

The narrator started with some descriptions of how he had a normal childhood, then told how his father arranged for him to go to college on a scholarship that required him to work for the school. Then he described the jobs he had to do, still in general terms....

Yawn.

Next!

The lesson is that unless you hook us with something specific, we're likely to wander off pretty quickly. 

I don't know what happens in the story after the point at which I left, but let's assume that he encounters a ghost. Here's a quick example of how the author could have grabbed the reader's attention more quickly:

"I guess it was the fact that my childhood was so normal that made it hard for me to comprehend what happened later. I grew up...(Now I'm willing to hear about his normal childhood for a bit, thanks to the promise that it's leading up to whatever happened later that would be outside the realm of "normal.")

Or it could have been something specific about his childhood:

"When I was a kid, my parents taught me and my brothers not to believe in superstitions. If anybody mentioned ghosts, my parents laughed and assured us that there was no such thing." (He doesn't have to say any more, we already expect that later in the story his parents will be proved wrong.)

A small detail or a bit of foreshadowing goes a long way--and keeps us reading.

[For useful information on writing your book, from idea through to publication, get a copy of my book, Your Writing Coach, published by Nicholas Brealey and available from Amazon or your other favorite bookseller.)

 

 

These qualities made Wonder Woman a Hit

Make sure that the characters are portrayed with heart, humor, hope, heroics, and optimism at the base, DC Entertainment president Geoff Johns told the makers of the new film version of Wonder Woman.

Heart.

Hope.

Heroics.

Optimism.

Sounds like what we need more of in our movies...and our politics....and our lives. 

Let's face it, if we want melancholy, irony, and dystopian themes, we can watch the news.

The key characteristics of an appealing protagonist (or real-life person)

Do you want your readers/viewers to like your protagonist? 

According to a report on the Psyblog.com site, the five most attractive personality traits are:

1. kindness and understanding
2. intelligence
3.  a sense of humor
4. being fun-loving
5. having an exciting personality

If you want to make your protagonist appealing, let them display a couple of these within the first few pages of your novel or screenplay.

I'd say the trickiest is "exciting personality," which is open to interpretation. For sure, don't have your character declare that he or she thinks they're zany, that's usually a sign that the person is particularly boring.

If you have a character whom you want readers/viewers not to like, let him or her display the opposite of one or more of these five.

Of course, while you're at it, you could also check whether you've been displaying these five in your personal life...

What research tells us about (fictional) heroes and villains

Why do viewers like TV and movie protagonists who do bad things? For instance, Walter White from Breaking Bad, or Tony Soprano. Recent research at the University of Buffalo sheds some light on the matter and can be useful for anybody writing fiction.

Who the audience meets first plays a role. 

Science Daily reports that heroes were judged to be more heroic when they appeared after a villain and villains were judged to be more villainous when they appeared after a hero.

It's all relative

Lead researcher Matthew Grizzard said, "What's happening here is that we're not making isolated judgments about these characters using some objective standard of morality. We're constantly making comparisons about these characters and the forces they face."

That applies to Walter White, who gradually does worse and worse things--but he's also up against even worse people.

The show's creator, Vince Gilligan, has said he expected the audience to turn on Walter, but most of them stayed loyal to him. A friend of mine who has discussed the show with a lot of people told me that they split into either the Walter camp or the Jesse camp. 

A LITTLE GOOD GOES A LONG WAY (FOR THE BAD GUY)

Another interesting finding is that villains get more credit for any altruistic actions they perform than heroes do. If you want to make our villain character more three-dimensional, having them perform even a minor good act will help you achieve that.

(You'll find lots of useful information about creating great characters in my book, Your Writing Coach, available from Amazon or our other favorite bookseller.)