Attacking the Myths of Public Speaking

John Richters, JR. Attacking the Myths of Public Speaking: Winning with Individuals and Groups. (The National Underwriter Company)

The Quick and Easy Way to Effective Speaking, by: Dale Carnegie&Dorothy Carnegie

Screenplay; by: Syd Field

Syd Field, Screenplay: The Foundations of Screenwriting (Delta; Revised edition, 2005).

Introduction [selected from pp. 1-30]

Movies are a combination of art and science; the technological revolution has literally changed the way we see movies and therefore, by necessity, has changed the way we write movies. But no matter what changes are made in the execution of the material, the nature of the screenplay is the same as it has always been: A screenplay is a story told with pictures, in dialogue and description, and placed within the context of dramatic structure. That's what it is; that is its nature. It is the art of visual storytelling.

The craft of screenwriting is a creative process that can be learned. To tell a story, you have to set up your characters, introduce the dramatic premise (what the story is about) and the dramatic situation (the circumstances surrounding the action), create obstacles for your characters to confront and overcome, then resolve the story. You know, boy meets girl, boy gets girl, boy loses girl. All stories, from Aristotle through all the constellations of civilization, embody the same dramatic principles.

In Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, Frodo becomes the ring bearer to return the ring to its place of origin, Mount Doom, so he can destroy it. That is his dramatic need. How he gets there and completes the task is the story. Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring sets up the characters and situation and narrative through line; it establishes Frodo and the Shire, as well as the Fellowship, who set off on their mission to Mount Doom. Part II, The Two Towers, dramatizes the obstacles Frodo, Sam, and the Fellowship confront on their journey to destroy the ring. They are confronted with obstacle after obstacle that hinder their mission. At the same time, Aragorn and the others must overcome many challenges to defeat the Ores at Helms Deep. And Part III, The Return of the King, resolves the story: Frodo and Sam reach Mount Doom and watch as the ring and the Gollum fall into the fires and are destroyed. Aragorn is crowned king, and the hobbits return to the Shire and their life plays out.

Set-up, confrontation, and resolution.

It is the stuff of drama. I learned this when I was a kid sitting in a darkened theater, popcorn in hand, gazing in awe and wonder at the images projected on the white river of light reflected on that monster screen.

…

ACT I IS THE SET-UP

If a screenplay is a story told with pictures, then what do all stories have in common? A beginning, middle, and end, though not necessarily, as mentioned, in that order; it is a story told in pictures, in

dialogue and description, and placed within the context of dramatic structure.

Aristotle talked about the three unities of dramatic action: time, place, and action. The normal Hollywood film is approximately two hours long, or 120 minutes; foreign films tend to be a little shorter, though that's changing as we bridge the language of international film. But in most cases, films are approximately two hours in length, give or take a few minutes. This is a standard length, and today, when a contract is written in Hollywood between the filmmaker and production company, it states that when the movie is delivered, it will be no longer than 2 hours and 8 minutes. That's approximately 128 pages of screenplay. Why? Because it's an economic decision that has evolved over the years. At this writing, it costs approximately $10,000 to $12,000 per minute (and getting higher and higher every year) to shoot a Hollywood studio film. Second, a two-hour movie has a definite advantage in the theaters simply because you can get in more viewings of the movie per day. More screenings mean more money; more theaters mean more screenings, which means more money will be made. Movies are show business, after all, and with the cost of moviemaking being so high, and getting higher as our technology evolves, today it's really more business than show.

The way it breaks down is this: One page of screenplay is approximately one minute of screen time. It doesn't matter whether the script is all action, all dialogue, or any combination of the two— generally speaking, a page of screenplay equals a minute of screen time. It's a good rule of thumb to follow. There are exceptions to this, of course. The script of Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring is only 118 pages, but the movie is more than three hours long.

Act I, the beginning, is a unit of dramatic action that is approximately twenty or thirty pages long and is held together with the dramatic context known as the SetUp. Context is the space that holds something in place—in this case, the content. For example, the space inside a glass is the context; it holds the content in place— whether it's water, beer, milk, coffee, tea, or juice. If we want to get creative, a glass can also hold raisins, trail mix, nuts, grapes, etc.— but the space inside doesn't change The context is what holds the content in place.

In this unit of dramatic action, Act I, the screenwriter sets up the story, establishes character, launches the dramatic premise (what the story is about), illustrates the situation (the circumstances surrounding the action), and creates the relationships between the main character and the other characters who inhabit the landscape of his or her world. As a writer you've only got about ten minutes to establish this, because the audience members can usually determine, either consciously or unconsciously, whether they do or don't like the movie by that time. If they don't know what's going on and the opening is vague or boring, their concentration and focus will falter and start wandering.

Check it out. The next time you go to a movie, do a little exercise: Find out how long it takes you to make a decision about whether you like the film or not. A good indication is if you start thinking about getting something from the refreshment stand or find yourself shifting in your seat; if that happens, the chances are the filmmaker has lost you as a viewer. Ten minutes is ten pages of screenplay. I cannot emphasize enough that this first ten-page unit of dramatic action is the most important part of the screenplay.

In American Beauty (Alan Ball), after the brief opening video scene of the daughter Jane (Thora Birch) and her boyfriend, Ricky (Wes Bentley), we see the street where Lester Burnham (Kevin Spacey) lives, and hear his first words in voice-over: "My name is Lester Burnham. I'm forty-two years old. In less than a year, I'll be dead _ In a way, I'm dead already." Then we see Lester as he begins his day. He wakes, and then we see his relationship with his family. All this is set up and established within the first few pages, and we learn that: "My wife and daughter think I'm this gigantic loser, and they're right I have lost something. I don't know what it was, but I have lost something _ I feel sedated But you know, it's never too late to get it

back." And that lets us know what the story is all about: Lester regaining the life he has lost or given up, and becoming whole and complete again as a person. Within the first few pages of the screenplay we know the main character, the dramatic premise, and the situation.

In Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, and Peter Jackson, based on the book by J. R. R. Tolkien), we learn in the first six pages of the screenplay the history of the ring and its magnetic attraction. It's a beautiful opening that sets up all three stories. It also sets up the story as Gandalf arrives in the Shire. We meet Frodo (Elijah Wood), Bilbo Baggins (Ian Holm), Sam (Sean Astin), and the others, see how they live, and are introduced to the ring. We also get an overview of Middle Earth. This opening sets up the rest of the Fellowship, including the two sequels, The Two Towers and Return of the King.

ACT II IS CONFRONTATION

Act II is a unit of dramatic action approximately sixty pages long, and goes from the end of Act I, anywhere from pages 20 to 30, to the end of Act II, approximately pages 85 to 90, and is held together with the dramatic context known as Confrontation. During this second act the main character encounters obstacle after obstacle that keeps him/her from achieving his/her dramatic need, which is defined as what the character wants to win, gain, get, or achieve during the course of the screenplay. If you know your character's dramatic need, you can create obstacles to it and then your story becomes your character, overcoming obstacle after obstacle to achieve his/her dramatic need.

In Cold Mountain, Inman (Jude Law) struggles over two hundred miles to return home to Cold Mountain. This dramatic need is both internal and external: It is Inman's longing to return to a place in his heart that existed prior to the war, and Cold Mountain is also the place where he lived and grew up, as well as where his loved one, Ada (Nicole Kidman), resides. His desire, his dramatic need to return home, is fraught with obstacle after obstacle, and still he persists, only to fail at the end. Literally, the entire movie is overcoming the obstacles of war and the internal will to survive.

In Chinatown, a detective story, Act II deals with Jake Gittes's collisions with people who try to keep him from finding out who's responsible for the murder of Hollis Mulwray and who's behind the water scandal. The obstacles that Gittes encounters and overcomes dictate the dramatic action of the story. Look at The Fugitive. The entire story is driven by the main character's dramatic need to bring his wife's killer to justice. Act II is where your character has to deal with surviving the obstacles that you put in front of him or her. What is it that drives him or her forward through the action? What does your main character want? What is his or her dramatic need? In Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, the entire film involves Frodo, Sam, and the Fellowship's confronting and managing to overcome obstacle after obstacle, leading to the climactic battle at Helms Deep.

All drama is conflict. Without conflict, you have no action; without action, you have no character; without character, you have no story; and without story, you have no screenplay.

ACT III IS RESOLUTION

Act III is a unit of dramatic action approximately twenty to thirty pages long and goes from the end of Act II, approximately pages 85 to 90, to the end of the screenplay. It is held together with the dramatic context known as Resolution. I think it's important to remember that resolution does not mean ending; resolution means solution. What is the solution of your screenplay? Does your main character live or die? Succeed or fail? Get married or not? Win the race or not? Win the election or not? Escape safely or not? Leave her husband or not? Return home safely or not? Act III is that unit of action that resolves the story. It is not the ending; the ending is that specific scene or shot or sequence that ends the script.

Beginning, middle, and end; Act I, Act II, Act III. Set-Up, Confrontation, Resolution—these parts make up the whole. It is the relationship between these parts that determines the whole.

But this brings up another question: If these parts make up the whole, the screenplay, how do you get from Act I, the Set-Up, to Act II, the Confrontation? And how do you get from Act II to Act III, the Resolution⁷. The answer is to create a Plot Point at the end of both Act I and Act II.

A Plot Point is defined as any incident, episode, or event that hooks into the action and spins it around in another direction—in this case, Plot Point I moves the action forward into Act II and Plot Point II moves the action into Act III. Plot Point I occurs at the end of Act I, anywhere from pages 20 to 25 or 30.

A Plot Point is always a function of the main character. In Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, Plot Point I is the beginning of the journey, that moment when Frodo and Sam leave the Shire and set out on their adventure through Middle Earth. Plot Point II is when the Fellowship reaches Lothlorien, and Galadriel (Cate Blanchett) reveals to Frodo the fate of Middle Earth should the ring not reach Mount Doom. Frodo becomes the reluctant hero, in much the same way that Neo (Keanu Reeves) in The Matrix (Larry and Andy Wachowski), accepts his mantle of responsibility at Plot Point 1: his journey as "The One” begins at Plot Point I. It is the true beginning of that story.

If we take a look at The Matrix, we can see Plot Points I and II clearly delineated. In Plot Point I, Neo chooses the Red Pill, and Act II begins when he is literally reborn; at Plot Point II, Neo and Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss) rescue Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne), and only then does Neo accept the truth that he is "The One.”

Plot Points serve an essential purpose in the screenplay; they are a major story progression and keep the story line anchored in place. In Chinatown, Jake Gittes is hired by the wife of a prominent man to find out if her husband is having an affair. Gittes follows him and sees him with a young girl. That's the Set-Up. Plot Point I occurs after the newspaper story is released claiming Mr. Mulwray has been caught in a "love nest." That's when the real Mrs. Mulwray shows up with her attorney and threatens to sue Jake Gittes and have his license revoked. If she is the real Mrs. Mulwray, who was the woman who hired Jake Gittes? And why did she hire him? And who hired the phony Mrs. Mulwray? And why. The arrival of the real Mrs. Mulwray is what hooks into the action and spins it around in another direction—in this case, Act II. It is story progression; Jake Gittes must find out who set him up, and why. The answer is the rest of the movie.

In Cold Mountain, as Inman recovers from his wounds he receives a letter from Ada. We hear her say, in voice-over, "Come back to me. Come back to me is my request." Inman nods; his decision is made: He will desert the Confederate Army and return home to Ada and Cold Mountain, return to the place in his heart.

Plot Points do not have to be big, dynamic scenes or sequences; they can be quiet scenes in which a decision is made, such as Inman's, or when Frodo and Sam leave the Shire. Take the sequence in American Beauty where Lester Burnham and his wife are at the high school basketball game and see their daughter's friend Angela (Mena Suvari) performing at halftime. It moves the story forward and sets Lester's emotional journey of liberation in motion. In The Matrix, Plot Point I is where Neo is offered the choice of the Red Pill or the Blue Pill. He chooses the Red Pill, and this truly is the beginning of the story. All of Act I has set up the elements and led Neo to this moment.

Remember, the paradigm is the form of a screenplay, what it looks like. Any page numbers I reference are only a guideline to indicate approximately where the story progresses to the next level, not how it progresses. How you do that is up to you. It is the form of the screenplay that is important, not the page numbers where Plot Points occur. There may be many Plot Points during the course of the story line; I only focus on Plot Points I and II because these two events are the anchoring moments that become the foundation of the dramatic structure in the screenplay.

Plot Point II is really the same as Plot Point I; it is the way to move the story forward, from Act II to Act III. It is a story progression. As mentioned, it usually occurs anywhere between pages 80 or 90 of the screenplay. In Chinatown, Plot Point II occurs when Jake Gittes finds a pair of horn-rim glasses in the pond where Hollis Mulwray was murdered, and knows the glasses belonged either to Mulwray or to the person who killed him. This leads us to the Resolution of the story.

In Cold Mountain, Plot Point II is a quiet moment; after Inman meets the woman Sara (Natalie Portman) and rescues her and her baby from the Northerners, he reaches a point where he can see the Blue Ridge Mountains. The script reads: "Somewhere in there is home, is Ada. He goes on." That's all; such a small scene, but loaded with such emotion: He's home. That leads us into Act III, the Resolution.

Do all good screenplays fit the paradigm? Yes. But just because a screenplay is well structured and fits the paradigm doesn't make it a good screenplay, or a good movie. The paradigm is a form, not a formula. Structure is what holds the story together.

What's the distinction between form and formula? The form of a coat or jacket, for example, is two arms, a front, and a back. And within that form of arms, front, and back you can have any variation of style, fabric, color, and size—but the form remains intact.

A formula, however, is totally different. A formula never varies; certain elements are put together so they come out exactly the same each and every time. If you put that coat on an assembly line, every coat will be exactly the same, with the same pattern, the same fabric,

the same color, the same cut, the same material. The coat does not change, except for the size. A screenplay, on the other hand, is unique, a totally individual presentation.

The paradigm is a form, not a formula; it's what holds the story together. It is the spine, the skeleton. Story determines structure; structure doesn't determine story.

The dramatic structure of the screenplay maybe denned as a linear arrangement of related incidents, episodes, or events leading to a dramatic resolution.

How you utilize these structural components determines the form of your screenplay. The Hours (David Hare, adapted from the novel by Michael Cunningham) is told in three different time periods and has a definite structure. It's the same with American Beauty: The whole story is told in flashback, just like Woody Allen's Annie Hall. Cold Mountain is also told in flashback, but has a definite beginning, middle, and end. Citizen Kane is also told in flashback, but this does not detract from its form.

The paradigm is a model, an example, or a conceptual scheme; it is what a well-structured screenplay looks like, an overview of the story line as it unfolds from beginning to end.

Screenplays that work follow the paradigm. But don't take my word for it. Go to a movie and see whether you can determine its structure for yourself.

Some of you may not believe that. You may not believe in beginnings, middles, and ends, either. You may say that art, like life, is nothing more than several individual "moments" suspended in some giant middle, with no beginning and no end, what Kurt Vonnegut calls "a series of random moments" strung together in a haphazard fashion.

I disagree.

Birth? Life? Death? Isn't that a beginning, middle, and end? Spring, summer, fall, and winter—isn't that a beginning, middle, and end? Morning, afternoon, evening—it's always the same, but different. Think about the rise and fall of great ancient civilizations— Egyptian, Greek, and Roman, each rising from the seed of a small community to the apex of power, then disintegrating and dying.

Think about the birth and death of a star, or the beginning of the universe. If there's a beginning, like the Big Bang, is there going to be an end?

Think about the cells in our bodies. How often are they replenished, restored, and re-created? Every seven years—within a sevenyear cycle all the cells in our bodies are born, function, die, and are reborn again.

Think about the first day of a new job, or a new school, or a new house or apartment; you'll meet new people, assume new responsibilities, create new friendships.

Screenplays are no different. They have a definite beginning, middle, and end, but not necessarily in that order.

If you don't believe the paradigm, or in the three-act structure first laid down by Aristotle, go check it out. Go to a movie—go see several movies—and see whether they fit the paradigm or not.

If you're interested in writing screenplays, you should be doing this all the time. Every movie you see is a learning process, expanding your awareness and comprehension of what a movie is: a story told with pictures.

You should also read as many screenplays as possible in order to expand your awareness of the form and structure. Many screenplays have been reprinted in book form and most bookstores have them, or can order them. You can also go online and do a Google search under "screenplays" and find a number of sites that allow you to download screenplays. Some are free, some you pay for.

I have my students read and study scripts like Chinatown, Network (Paddy Chayefsky), American Beauty, The Shawshank Redemption (Frank Darabont), Sideways (Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor), The Matrix, Annie Hall, and Lord of the Rings. These scripts are excellent teaching aids. If they aren't available, read any screenplay you can find. The more the better.

The paradigm works. It is the foundation of every good screenplay, the foundation of dramatic structure.