Long Short Assignment Write the best 10 page or shorter screenplay you can using the techniques you have learned to tell a good story that makes us connect A pattern of human change that makes a difference to your main character and to us

Follow these Guidelines Choose an idea that has rich resonance for you Make your story simple and your characters complex Make sure the story makes a difference to your main character

Surface Action and Deep Action Surface action=external events Deep action=character arc Make sure both are interrelated How do external events create inner change in your character?

Conflict and Connection Conflict can grow out of the need for connection or Vice Versa

Write a film you want to see…

Choosing and idea A passion An obsession An emotion A person An experience An image A perception A principle

“A true plot is is an assertion of meaning” —Arthur Miller

“You can’t tell another—but with hard work and luck, maybe you can show him.” –Shelby Foote

Write flesh and blood characters that come alive on the screen

Write “I want” speeches for all of your characters

Questions Who is your character? —write a character id What must your character be connected to otherwise she will wither up and die? What is your character’s goal? Why? and Why now? Why is this day different from any other? What does your character do to get what she/he wants?

Questions Continued What obstacles—internal and external—does your character meet on the way (conflict)? What’s at stake—lost if your character fails? Does your character succeed or fail? What connections, disconnections, reconnections does your character go through in the story? How is your character changed in the course of the story?

Motivation, Action and Goal

Motivation, Action and Goal for Back to the Future Motivation: A beefed-up Delorean forces Marty into the past Action: He overcomes mother’s advances, seeks out the professor, fights with Biff, dresses as Darth Vader to motivate George to ask Lorraine out. He cajoles, persuades, and manipulates in order to… Goal: Survive and get back to the future

Premise Lajos Egri, The Art of Dramatic Writing “theme, thesis, root idea, central idea, goal, aim driving force, subject, purpose, plan, plot, basic emotion” a premise “…contains all the elements the other words try to express “A good premise is a thumbnail of your play”

Premise continued… implies character, action and The premise of Romeo and Juliet is that “great love even defies death” The premise of King Lear is “blind trust leads to destruction”

Expand your premise to a paragraph summary The summary gives a brief overview of the characters and the story

You can expand to a treatment or an outline of the plot A treatment is an expanded prose telling of the story. You can also bypass this and develop your story on index cards The important thing is to know your story and the moments of change that move it along from beginning to end

Plot vs. Style Too often equated with story Story is the events or moments of change in the order they happen Plot is the order of events as you choose to tell them The events you choose to show and the order in which you show them is are major artistic decisions the order has a profound effect on how compelling, ironic or moving your screenplay will be Michael Clayton

Dialogue You can greatly improve your dialogue by listening to people talk You can also read screenplays by folks who write great dialogue: Clifford Odets, Elaine May, Nora Ephron, David Mamet, Quentin Tarantino, Woody Allen, Tom Stoppard, Tina Fey, William Goldman, Aaron Sorkin, Richard Linklater, Joss Whedon, Mike Leigh

Table Reads Find out of dialogue is over-written or under-written Does it sound natural? Is your structure sound? Does the emotional flow work? Page 166—draw and talk about