Lecture 3: The Principles of Drama: What is Story?

1. Lecture 3:The Principles of Drama: What is Story? Professor Michael Green Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007) Written by John Logan (screenplay) and Christopher Bond (musical adaptation) & Steven Sondheim (musical) and Hugh Wheeler (musical)

2. Previous Lesson • How do I get started writing? • What is the writing process? • Proper screenplay format • Writing Exercise #1 Annie Hall (1977) Written by Woody Allen and Marshall Brickman

3. In this Lesson The Nature of Story Conflict and Goals Emotion, Action and Dialogue Approaching Form Writing Exercise #2 The Road Warrior (1982) Written by Terry Hayes & George Miller & Brian Hannant

4. The Nature of Story Lesson 3: Part I The Constant Gardener (2005) Written by Jeffrey Caine (screenplay) and John le Carre (novel)

5. Story • Stories are how we understand the world. • Stories are everywhere around us - in movies, television, theater, literature, video games, comic books and journalism. • But we also tell each other stories to explain our lives. The stories we tell help define our joys and struggles.

6. Form But only if stories make sense can we make sense of the world. In fact, stories need to make more sense then life in order for them to communicate meaning. So they obey certain rules and follow certain form. In life, experiences usually become meaningful with reflection in time, but stories are meaningful now, at the instant they happen. 6

7. Detail in Story • One of the ways that we create such meaning in stories is by the accumulation of detail. • In conveying events, we often invent detail to make our stories more comic, dramatic, frightening, comprehensible, awe-inspiring, etc. • The detail creates verisimilitude, which allows for a story to approximate the truth of real life.

8. Using Detail • A generic story about a truck driver who chases down a motorist in a road rage can be effective and evoke emotion. • But give that trucker scars on his face and bulging biceps, put a gleaming skull and crossbones on the grill of the truck, and give the motorist a baby in the back seat, and suddenly the accumulation of detail makes for a more compelling story. There is now more at stake.

9. Example of Use of Detail DR. LECTER'S CELL is coming slowly INTO VIEW... Behind its barred front wall is a second barrier of stout nylon net... Sparse, bolted-down furniture, many softcover books and papers. On the walls, extraordinarily detailed, skillful drawings, mostly European cityscapes, in charcoal or crayon. DR. HANNIBAL LECTER is lounging on his bunk, in white pajamas, reading an Italian Vogue. He turns, considers her... A face so long out of the sun, it seems almost leached - except for the glittering eyes, and the wet red mouth. He rises smoothly, crossing to stand before her; the gracious host. His voice is cultured, soft.

10. Incident • Often, young writers and filmmakers believe that assembling a string of incidents - distinct pieces of action or episodes - will somehow create a dramatic story. • While incident is crucial to story, a story must be much more than simply the compiling of incidents. It must follow rules of drama.

11. Conflict and Goals Lesson 3: Part II The Savages (2007) Written by Tamara Jenkins

12. The Principles of Drama • Drama relies on two important rules: • A main character (the protagonist) must take action to achieve something. • This character must meet with conflict. The Empire Strikes Back (1980) Written by George Lucas (story) and Leigh Brackett and Lawrence Kasdan (screenplay)

13. Character Goals/Desires • Drama needs characters who desire, who want, who need and who act. This kind of character will drive a story forward and provide an understandable framework for the story’s action. • On the most superficial level, every story is about the quest to obtain a goal and whether or not a character will achieve it.

14. Active Characters • An active main character takes charge of the story by doing something to get his/her goal. She may make mistakes, or even take the wrong action--but the important thing is she's active. Juno (2007) Written by Diablo Cody

15. Passive Characters • Inexperienced writers often make the mistake of creating passive characters. They claim that such characters are more modern or more representative of “real life.” • Passive characters may evoke sympathy and engage the reader's believability. But the audience will get bored with a character who sits around waiting for something to happen and who doesn’t act/react to something done to her.

16. Active Character Goals In The Silence of the Lambs, Agent Starling acts on her desire to catch the serial killer Buffalo Bill and save a Senator’s daughter. In Star Wars, Luke Skywalker acts on his desire to help the Rebellion and become a Jedi Knight. In Finding Nemo, Marlin acts on his desire to find his son Nemo, after he is lost in the open sea. 16

17. Conflict • Conflict - a clash of actions, ideas, desires or wills - builds the tension that keeps the audience interested in what happens next. • Conflict casts doubt on the character’s ultimate success and increases our interest. • Conflict creates stress and problems that we want to see resolved. • Conflict can be internal as well as external.

18. Conflict (Continued) • If the story’s action is mere activity or characters talking about their feelings, ideas and events, little tension develops and the audience’s attention dwindles. • Conflict and character goals work together to provide the story with an organizing structure, make connections between characters and events, and create meaning. 18

19. Goal/Conflict Examples While attempting to capture Buffalo Bill and save the Senator’s daughter, Starling comes into conflict with Bill himself, as well as Hannibal Lecter, Dr. Chilton and others who present obstacles to her success. While trying to help the Rebellion and train to be a Jedi Knight, Luke comes into conflict with the forces of the Empire. 19

20. Emotion, Action and Dialogue Lesson 3: Part III 25th Hour (2002) Written by David Benioff (novel and screenplay)

21. Emotion • Every successful film, short or long, and no matter what it is about, gives the audience an emotional experience. • The audience craves this emotional experience, and when a film gives it to us, the audience connects with it. • The key is to feel something. The worst thing is to leave a film feeling nothing.

22. Strategies for Creating Emotion • How do you give your audience an emotional experience? • Characters and their emotional responses allow the audience to experience empathy. • Humor • Surprise and suspense • Put your characters in difficult situations and force them to make hard choices in which they have to sacrifice.

23. Emotion through Cinema • Cinema is a visceral art that creates emotion through specific techniques, such as images, music, and acting. • Though the screenwriter is not directly responsible for creating these elements of the film, the screenplay should easily facilitate them by being clear and direct and by telling a story in which something is at stake for the characters. Make your story about something.

24. Action vs. Dialogue • Many inexperienced screenwriters mistakenly think that the story is mainly communicated through dialogue. • Dialogue, however, should only support the action, which should drive the story. • Telling the audience everything through dialogue lessens a story’s impact, reduces the tension and ultimately results in a boring movie.

25. Involving the Audience • Audiences like mystery, like to figure out a little of what’s going on for themselves. • The audience is already in a passive relationship with the movie, and if you tell them everything through dialogue, it gives them little to do. • It also sounds forced in the mouth of actors who are able to convey a lot about character through little dialogue.

26. Involving the Audience (Continued) By giving the viewer just enough so that he or she understands what is going on, and then allowing the characters to reveal themselves through their actions and reactions, the viewer follows along, putting information together and making sense of it. What is unsaid is as important as what is said.

27. Example EXT. MOSCOW OUTDOOR MARKET – DAY BOURNE -- leaving the market -- taking a swig of VODKA and knows there are TWO NEW COPS on his ass. EXT. MARKET PARKING LOT – DAY Another CAB STAND. CABBIE by a YELLOW CAB, looks up to see BOURNE coming toward him and also the TWO COPS. As BOURNE nears, the CABBIE shakes his head. Bourne pivots casually like he doesn't know they're coming until HE SPITS VODKA into one of the cop’s face! -- blinded as BOURNE takes him and his PARTNER out. The CABBIE raises his hands in surrender, steps aside as BOURNE takes his car.

28. Approaching Form The Bourne Supremacy (2004) Written by Robert Ludlum (novel) and Tony Gilroy (screenplay) Lesson 3: Part IV

29. Exceptions to Form • A short film, particularly a funny one, can sometimes get away with breaking some of the fundamental principles of drama. • Humor can sometimes be an end in itself, though it generally works best when it is fraught with conflict and the character goes after what he or she wants. The obstacles make it funny.

30. Sketch Comedy • Sketch comedy, such as the kind found on “Saturday Night Live,” can be very effective—in short doses. • The danger with sketch comedy is that the longer it lasts, the more the audience wants it to become a story. • If your short film is hilarious from start to finish, it may get away with not following the rules of drama. But if it lags in the least, your audience will desert you.

31. Example Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975) Written by Graham Chapman & John Cleese & Eric Idle & Terry Gilliam & Terry Jones & Michael Palin

32. The Difference between Shorts and Features • Many writers approach their shorts with stories that are just too big. • Though many of the principles of drama apply to both, a short film differs as much from a feature as a short story does from a novel. • Shorts differ from features not only in size and scope, but also in plot structure.

33. Differences (Continued) • Shorts might have an off-screen inciting incident, while in features it is on-screen. • Shorts might follow an unsympathetic protagonist. • Shorts focus on one conflict, often in less detail than a feature. • Short films can deal more effectively with difficult themes that mainstream films might avoid for fear of alienating audiences.

34. Endings • Regardless of the structure you choose to follow, you should begin thinking about your film’s ending almost immediately. • The audience wants a strong finish to a film, but many screenplays for features and shorts build to endings that are flat and unsatisfying because nothing definitive happens. • Think of your ending in terms of theme. What are you trying to say with your film?

35. Choice • You should also think of your ending in terms of a choice that your protagonist must make that will define him or her. • This choice should be made at the story’s highest point of tension and it should be an either/or proposition in which the character is called upon to make a sacrifice. • Forcing such a choice on a character makes for a more satisfying conclusion. 35

36. Famous Examples • Sophie’s Choice (1982) • Casablanca (1942) • The Empire Strikes Back (1980) Sophie’s Choice (1982) Written by William Styron (novel) and Alan J. Pakula (screenplay)

37. Assignments Boyz in the Hood (1991) Written by John Singleton Lesson 3: Part V

38. E-Board Post #1 Identify the choice made by a protagonist in either a short film or a feature film that you have seen. Does the choice define the character? How does he or she come to be in the position to make it? 38

39. E-Board Post #2 Watch the short film from the lesson, Ten Minutes and then discuss it in terms of the principles of drama from this lesson. Among other things, you should talk about how detail, action and emotion work in the film. Also, is the structure notably different than the structure for most feature films? 39

40. Writing Exercise Write a page of prose in which you sketch out two characters who are in conflict over something. Try and make the conflict arise out of their personalities. Sketch the characters and their situation with as much details as possible. Think about the emotions you are trying to evoke through such a conflict. 40

41. End of Lecture 3 Next Lecture: The Characteristics of a Good Short Film