Neil Gaiman chats with the nerds about American Gods, describes scenes that were cut from his Doctor Who episode, The Doctor’s Wife and doles out phenomenal advice for aspiring writers.
If you’re interested in listening to the entire interview:
Sally forth and be writeful.
— Rhyan Scorpio-Rhys
“There’s this inherent screenplay structure that everyone seems to be stuck on, this three-act thing. It doesn’t really interest me. To me, it’s kind of like saying, ‘Well, when you do a painting, you always need to have sky here, the person here and the ground here.’ Well, you don’t.” — Charlie Kaufman
“Oyez, Oyez, Oyez!” That’s the town crier outside your window, all decked out in a red and gold robe, white breeches, black boots and a tricorne hat, clanging his handbell and making the public pronouncement that “Hollywood is broken!”
A statement which isn’t close to being accurate. Even if the industry fails to rake in the desired opening weekend profits from their current crop of mega-budget box office bombs, it will continue to churn out content even if it has to scale back production costs and cut salaries to do so. The real problem with Hollywood lies within its mindset, the outdated mode of thinking it still employs.
The simple fact is what used to work a few years ago no longer does and unless you’re Amish, a hermit, a bunkered-in end-of-the-world survivalist, or possess a serious dislike for 24-frame-per-second entertainment, you’ll have noticed a decline of late in the quality of Hollywood movies. And you’re not alone. Not only has theater attendance been dwindling and the grousing of movie critics and cinema snobs increased regarding the lack of originality springing from the loins of Tinseltown–particularly during this painful remake, reboot and prequel/sequel franchise phase—but even the average LCD movie-goer has begun to experience a touch of ennui in the midst of all the fast-paced, mind-baffling CGI and excessive explosions.
No big news if you’re a screenwriter, aspiring or otherwise, as this has been a source of debate and complaint for a couple of years now and it didn’t truly become headline worthy until Steven Spielberg and George Lucas spoke at USC, weighing in on the subject and predicting the inevitable “implosion” in the mega-budget film industry. Which, of course, led to a series of articles speculating, finger-pointing and assigning blame.
The latest target is American screenwriter Blake Snyder, who released a screenwriting manual in 2005, Save the Cat! The Last Book on Screenwriting You’ll Ever Need. His book provided a by-the-minute pattern for screenwriting, which included 15 essential plot points or beats that all scripted stories should contain (the example below is based on a screenplay 110 pages in length ):
1. Opening Image (Pg. 1) – Is a snapshot of the world before this story begins.
2. Theme Stated (Pg. 5) – Where you state what your movie is about before the adventure begins.
3. Set-Up (Pgs. 1-10) – The introduction to the world, the protagonist and the overall problem within the story.
4. Catalyst (Pg. 12) – Often referred to as the inciting incident, this is the point where something happens within your protagonist’s world that sets the story into motion.
5. Debate (Pgs. 12-25) – Though it’s obvious that your protagonist must accept the “call to adventure,” he/she doubts the journey they must take.
6. Break into Two (Pg. 25) – Your protagonist has faced the now-or-never choice and proactively steps into Act 2 where the story begins to ramp up.
7. B Story (Pg. 30) – Usually associated with the “love” story, this is where the protagonist encounters the person to whom they can confide what’s happening. But the role isn’t restricted to a love interest — it can be a Mentor, or a bunch of new characters that will help the protagonist understand this strange new place, assist him/her, and teach them the lesson of the journey.
8. Fun and Games (Pgs. 30-55) – This is where you find your “trailer moments.” The plot gets put on hold as your protagonist explores the new world (essentially it’s your pitch for the movie when it comes time to sell it).
9. Midpoint (Pg. 55) – Is the “no turning back” part of your movie, where your protagonist faces a whole new problem — even bigger than the one they started out with. This is where we get either a “false victory” (high) or a “false defeat” (low). It’s also where “time clocks” appear to pick up the pace of the story and rush to the end.
10. Bad Guys Close In (Pgs. 55-75) – From this point, both internal (problems inside the protagonist’s team) and external (the antagonists tighten their grip) pressure is applied that makes life tough for the hero.
11. All Is Lost (Pg. 75) – Something (an old belief system) or someone (the mentor) dies at this point in the story, forcing the protagonist to change in order to grow into the person they need to be to accomplish their goal(s).
12. Dark Night of the Soul (Pgs. 75-85) – The “Why hast thou forsaken me?” part where the protagonist is bereft and wondering, “Now what?” They have lost all hope.
13. Break into Three (Pg. 85) – But thanks to a fresh idea, new inspiration, or last-minute advice or information from that person representing the B Story, the protagonist takes a proactive step into Act 3, devising a brand new plan of action and committing to going all the way!
14. Finale (Pgs. 85-110) – By adding what he’s learned to what he was before, the protagonist applies all that they are in a brand new way. Here is when your hero is at the doorstep of defeat yet “digs deep down” for that last ounce of strength — and faith — to triumph!
15. Final Image (Pg. 110) – Since all stories are about “transformation,” this is reverse of the Opening Image, a “snapshot of the world after,” proves that a change has occurred within the protagonist and their world.
Unfortunately, Mr. Snyder passed away in 2009 and is unable to defend himself, but is his book actually the reason that more and more people are becoming disenchanted with new releases? Screenwriters fall on both sides of this argument. There are those who see Save The Cat as a boon since the book instructs writers on producing unique, hot concepts, requires that they carry out the “promise of the premise” and beseeches them to “escalate the stakes” with full force in a bold new manner. While others think Mr. Snyder’s formula is best suited for high concept family comedies and has no business being applied to adult-themed stories that operate in black/grey moralities, as shoehorning them into the rigid 15 beat structure chokes the life out of the original work.
When it comes to the subject of creating beat sheets, not to sound like a fence-rider, but I find myself being both pro and con. On the plus side, hats off to Mr. Snyder for analyzing the composition of Hollywood films and further segmenting the 3 Act structure into smaller more manageable parts, much in the same way Gustav Freytag did in the nineteenth century with stage plays (see: Climbing The Freytag Pyramid). It really does help you gain a better understanding of the basic anatomy of an average studio-produced movie.
On the negative side, you have what I call the Nostradamus Effect, and if you’ve watched more than a handful of movies in your lifetime, you’ve experienced it to some degree. It occurs whilst viewing a film and suddenly you’re able to predict all the salient plot points, the futures of the supporting characters, and spot each and every twist and turn as if you’ve read them on signposts a mile off. That’s your brain recognizing the pattern, the formula. And I firmly believe that formulas cannot produce art, nor can they possess the spontaneity necessary to shock and surprise the modern day movie audience.
Having said that, I take a “Hey, man, whatever gets you writing” approach to Mr. Snyder’s methods when it applies to other writers. And that’s not to say that I don’t use the Save The Cat formula on occasion, but only when a stubborn story refuses to take shape. Once I get that bad boy locked down, I shake things up accordingly in the rewrite. Rules are meant to be broken, after all, and any writer worth their salt knows this. But guess who doesn’t? Yup, the rest of the industry.
Studios employ script readers who provide coverage–the analysis and grading of screenplays with Pass/Fail marks—which takes the whole beat system a bit too literally about hitting all the 15 marks on exact page counts. And if a script happens to be lucky enough to make it past these literary sentries, it will go through an additional series of rewrites by various screenwriters, adding studio-suggested bits stolen from other popular films “that worked previously”—whether the recycled bits fit the theme of the current script or not–often resulting in a frankenfilm. Sorry, you can’t hang that on Save The Cat.
I can’t tell you the number of early draft screenplays I’ve read that were far and away superior to the finished product. A few recent ones that come to mind are: Jon Spaihts’ “Alien Engineers” (Prometheus), Evan Daugherty’s “Snow White and the Huntsman,” and Kurt Wimmer’s “Edwin A. Salt” (Salt).
In closing I’d like to invite all the doomcasters to stop picking on a dead man whose system is quite possibly the victim of misuse and put their sandwich boards away. Hollywood is getting a much needed wake-up call–thanks in no small part to the internet and other modes of content distribution–and isn’t in danger of imploding, it’s just experiencing some growing pains. The first thing it needs to do, in the process of mitigating its risk in the creation of new product, is to focus a little more on forecasting what will sell tomorrow (#innovation) rather than duplicating what sold yesterday.
Sally forth and be structurally knowledgeable yet rule-breakingly writeful.
– Rhyan Scorpio-Rhys
Irregardless isn’t a word. The one you’re looking for is regardless.
So not a word. Supposedly is, though.
The only way this exists is if flustered and frustrated had a baby. And they didn’t.
Can we conversate a moment about the proper usage of the word converse?
Random doesn’t mean weird or goofy. It means, “without definite aim, direction, rule, or method.”
It’s sherbet.
So that means you do care a little bit? Perhaps you mean you couldn’t care less?
Intents. And. Purposes.
Please enunciate when you make up words. Or even annunciate. Certainly don’t announciate.
It’s foliage. FO-LEE-IDGE.
There’s no X in espresso, ma’am.
Nauseous means to cause nausea. If you’re sick, you’re nauseated.
C’mon, no Z sound!
Misestimate or underestimate. You can’t have both. Don’t be greedy. Misunderestimate is a charming Bushism that should be left in the past.
The correct phrase is simply vice versa.
Nother is nonstandard. Just say another or whole other.
Sally forth and be correctly speakful.
— Rhyan Scorpio-Rhys
Back in nineteen sixty-nine, publisher John Martin offered to pay a then forty-nine-year-old Charles Bukowski one hundred dollars a month for the rest of his life, on the condition that he quit his post office job and dedicate his time to becoming a writer. Bukowski took him up on the offer and completed his first novel, Post Office, in nineteen seventy-one, which was published by Martin’s Black Sparrow Press. Some fifteen years later, Bukowski wrote to Martin about the absolute joy at turning his back on his former full-time job:
8-12-86
Hello John:
Thanks for the good letter. I don’t think it hurts, sometimes, to remember where you came from. You know the places where I came from. Even the people who try to write about that or make films about it, they don’t get it right. They call it “9 to 5.” It’s never 9 to 5, there’s no free lunch break at those places, in fact, at many of them in order to keep your job you don’t take lunch. Then there’s OVERTIME and the books never seem to get the overtime right and if you complain about that, there’s another sucker to take your place.
You know my old saying, “Slavery was never abolished, it was only extended to include all the colors.”
And what hurts is the steadily diminishing humanity of those fighting to hold jobs they don’t want but fear the alternative worse. People simply empty out. They are bodies with fearful and obedient minds. The color leaves the eye. The voice becomes ugly. And the body. The hair. The fingernails. The shoes. Everything does.
As a young man I could not believe that people could give their lives over to those conditions. As an old man, I still can’t believe it. What do they do it for? Sex? TV? An automobile on monthly payments? Or children? Children who are just going to do the same things that they did?
Early on, when I was quite young and going from job to job I was foolish enough to sometimes speak to my fellow workers: “Hey, the boss can come in here at any moment and lay all of us off, just like that, don’t you realize that?”
They would just look at me. I was posing something that they didn’t want to enter their minds.
Now in industry, there are vast layoffs (steel mills dead, technical changes in other factors of the work place). They are layed off by the hundreds of thousands and their faces are stunned:
“I put in 35 years…”
“It ain’t right…”
“I don’t know what to do…”
They never pay the slaves enough so they can get free, just enough so they can stay alive and come back to work. I could see all this. Why couldn’t they? I figured the park bench was just as good or being a barfly was just as good. Why not get there first before they put me there? Why wait?
I just wrote in disgust against it all, it was a relief to get the shit out of my system. And now that I’m here, a so-called professional writer, after giving the first 50 years away, I’ve found out that there are other disgusts beyond the system.
I remember once, working as a packer in this lighting fixture company, one of the packers suddenly said: “I’ll never be free!”
One of the bosses was walking by (his name was Morrie) and he let out this delicious cackle of a laugh, enjoying the fact that this fellow was trapped for life.
So, the luck I finally had in getting out of those places, no matter how long it took, has given me a kind of joy, the jolly joy of the miracle. I now write from an old mind and an old body, long beyond the time when most men would ever think of continuing such a thing, but since I started so late I owe it to myself to continue, and when the words begin to falter and I must be helped up stairways and I can no longer tell a bluebird from a paperclip, I still feel that something in me is going to remember (no matter how far I’m gone) how I’ve come through the murder and the mess and the moil, to at least a generous way to die.
To not to have entirely wasted one’s life seems to be a worthy accomplishment, if only for myself.
yr boy,
Hank
(Source: Reach for the Sun Vol. 3 by Charles Bukowski)
Lately I seem to be coming across more and more authors who thumb their noses up at the thought of doing research, which makes me scratch my puzzler. Not only is it a fundamental part of the process, regardless of the type of fiction you write, it is also a chance to learn and grow as a person as well as a writer. The simple fact is, if research truly is the bane of your existence, then you’re not doing it right.
Yes, you are most likely creating an entire world from scratch, in your own image and the laws of reality obey whatever rules strike your fancy, but even the most fantastical setting must have a sturdy foundation. And that foundation must be built with bricks of solid facts in order for your story to have any sort of credence.
I personally enjoy the research stage almost as much as the construction stage, but I understand how daunting a task fact-finding can be, so I’ve jotted down a few of the steps I tend to use when I’m in that researching frame of mind:
1. Pinpoint the right questions. The assumption is that you either have a strong interest in or possess a rudimentary knowledge of the story you’re attempting to pen. And that’s all you need in the beginning when you’re plucking the idea from the ether and committing it to the page in the form of an outline. But as you rearrange the story sequentially and create scenes to flesh the idea out into proper story form, you should be asking yourself how you’re going to make the story mechanics work. If your story is a period piece, you should be knowledgeable of that era, if your main characters hold down specific jobs, you should be familiar with the basics of their occupations, if the story takes place in a different part of the world… you get the point. Your research begins when you write your outline because that’s where you’ll find the questions that need answering.
2. Locate your resources. You’re probably thinking this part’s a cinch as long as you’ve got internet access, and I can’t really argue the point. As I’ve stated in a previous post, the internet is the wise sage of our virtual village (see: Applying Life Lessons To Your Writing) but, as is true with a great deal of online content, the reliability of the source material found therein can be erroneous, so verify, verify, verify as best you can in order to avoid unnecessary embarrassment at a later date. Myself, I tend to be a bit old-fashioned in my approach to research and armed with my trusty dusty library card I visit ye olde public bibliotheca in search of books pertaining to the various subjects in my story. I only rely on the internet as a back-up resource if I come up empty at the library.
3. Make a treasure map for your gold. What good is that golden nugget bit of research that you’ve discovered if you can’t lay your hands on it when you need it? If you own the book, sure you can bookmark or dog-ear pages, underline or highlight passages–but only if you own the book, please, marking up someone else’s tome is utter book sacrilege. If the book isn’t yours to mar, you can create your own index system by jotting down the book title, page and paragraph numbers, and a few keywords on the passage’s content. Then when you’re done info-gathering, you can transfer the text to your computer (arranged by subject headings) or to a notepad if you prefer to write longhand.
4. Create a vision board. Sounds hokey, I know, but pictures have that magical ability to transport your fertile imagination to all the unfamiliar aspects within your story and adding a visual component to your research and writing can help to serve as inspiration for time periods, locales, era clothing, vehicles, weaponry, etc.
5. Walk around in your story like you own the place. Nothing worse than a writer who lacks the confidence to strut their stuff within the world they’ve created. Even if that world is rife with utter nonsense, your job is to sell that nonsense as truth. There’s a saying that used to be popular when I wore a younger man’s clothes, but I haven’t come across it in a dog’s age, “If you can’t blind them with brilliance, baffle them with bullshit.” Now, this doesn’t mean you should out-and-out lie to your audience, but if the moment arrives when research fails and you need to invent something in order to make your story work, you should endeavor to portray it with as much authenticity as possible.
All the rest of the time? You live up to the trust that your audience places in your hands by checking and double-checking your sources and making sure your facts are as accurate as they can be. Also, you need to keep in mind that despite your best efforts, you aren’t ever going to get the facts correct all the time, but that doesn’t give you a reason not to do your due diligence. And should you ever deliberately decide to ignore the facts, you should alert your audience either in the author’s notes or afterword.
One of a writer’s biggest attractions to the written art form can be best summed up as, ex nihilo omnia fiunt–from nothing, everything is created–but we owe a duty to our audience to make the lie of fiction as truthful as possible.
Sally forth and be researchful.
1. Read the Roman-Raphaelson book on writing. Read it three times.2. Write the way you talk. Naturally.
3. Use short words, short sentences and short paragraphs.
4. Never use jargon words like reconceptualize, demassification, attitudinally, judgmentally. They are hallmarks of a pretentious ass.
5. Never write more than two pages on any subject.
6. Check your quotations.
7. Never send a letter or a memo on the day you write it. Read it aloud the next morning—and then edit it.
8. If it is something important, get a colleague to improve it.
9. Before you send your letter or your memo, make sure it is crystal clear what you want the recipient to do.
10. If you want ACTION, don’t write. Go and tell the guy what you want.
1) Write your heart out.
2) The first sentence can be written only after the last sentence has been written. FIRST DRAFTS ARE HELL. FINAL DRAFTS, PARADISE.
3) You are writing for your contemporaries–not for Posterity. If you are lucky, your contemporaries will become Posterity.
4) Keep in mind Oscar Wilde: “A little sincerity is a dangerous thing, and a great deal of it is absolutely fatal.”
5) When in doubt how to end a chapter, bring in a man with a gun. (This is Raymond Chandler’s advice, not mine. I would not try this.)
6) Unless you are experimenting with form–gnarled, snarled & obscure–be alert for possibilities of paragraphing.
7) Be your own editor/ critic. Sympathetic but merciless!
8) Don’t try to anticipate an ideal reader–or any reader. He/ she might exist–but is reading someone else.
9) Read, observe, listen intensely!–as if your life depended upon it.
10) Write your heart out.
1. “Fiction reveals truths that reality obscures.” — Jessamyn West
2. “Truth may be stranger than fiction, but fiction is truer.” — Frederic Raphael
3. “Fiction’s about what it is to be a human being.” — David Foster Wallace
4. “First-rate fiction lays hands on the reader, to heal him or rough him up or, ideally, to do both.” — Ellen Currie
5. “The trouble with fiction is that it makes too much sense, whereas reality never makes sense.” — Aldous Huxley
6. “Details make stories human, and the more human a story can be, the better.” — V.S. Pritchett
7. “Character is the very life of fiction. Setting exists so that the character has someplace to stand. Plot exists so the character can discover what he is really like, forcing the character to choice and action. And theme exists only to make the character stand up and be somebody.” — John Gardner
8. “In writing fiction, the more fantastic the tale, the plainer the prose should be. Don’t ask your readers to admire your words when you want them to believe your story.” — Ben Bova
9. “Basically, fiction is people. You can’t write fiction about ideas.” — Theodore Sturgeon
10. “Structure is the key to narrative. These are the crucial questions any storyteller must answer: Where does it begin? Where does the beginning start to end and the middle begin? Where does the middle start to end and the end begin?” — Nora Ephron
11. “Fiction is a lie, and good fiction is the truth inside the lie.” — Stephen King
Three characteristics a work of fiction must possess in order to be successful:
1. It must have a precise and suspenseful plot.
2. The author must feel a passionate urge to write it.
3. He must have the conviction, or at least the illusion, that he is the only one who can handle this particular theme.
— Isaac Bashevis Singer
1. “The one great rule of composition is to speak the truth.” — Henry David Thoreau
2. “If you require a practical rule of me, I will present you with this: Whenever you feel an impulse to perpetrate a piece of exceptionally fine writing, obey it–wholeheartedly–and delete it before sending your manuscript to press. Murder your darlings.” — Arthur Quiller-Couch
3. “The best rule for writing–as well as for speaking—is to use always the simplest words that will accurately convey your thought.” — David Lambuth
4. “There are simple maxims . . . which I think might be commended to writers of expository prose. First: never use a long word if a short one will do. Second: if you want to make a statement with a great many qualifications, put some of the qualifications in separate sentences. Third: do not let the beginning of your sentence lead the readers to an expectation which is contradicted by the end.” — Bertrand Russell
5. “I have made three rules of writing for myself that are absolutes: Never take advice. Never show or discuss a work in progress. Never answer a critic.” — Raymond Chandler
6. “There are three rules for writing the novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.” — W. Somerset Maugham
7. “Writing has laws of perspective, of light and shade, just as painting does, or music. If you are born knowing them, fine. If not, learn them. Then rearrange the rules to suit yourself.” — Truman Capote
8. “There is probably some long-standing “rule” among writers, journalists, and other word-mongers that says: “When you start stealing from your own work you’re in bad trouble.” And it may be true.” — Hunter S. Thompson
9. “If I were to advise new writers, if I were to advise the new writer in myself, going into the theater of the Absurd, the almost-Absurd, the theater of Ideas, the any-kind-of-theater-at-all, I would advise like this:
— Ray Bradbury
10. “Breslin’s Rule: Don’t trust a brilliant idea unless it survives the hangover.” — Jimmy Breslin
11. “One of the great rules of art: Do not linger.” — Andre Gide
12. “Do not pay any attention to the rules other people make…. They make them for their own protection, and to Hell with them.” — William Saroyan
13. “Over the years, I’ve found one rule. It is the only one I give on those occasions when I talk about writing. A simple rule. If you tell yourself you are going to be at your desk tomorrow, you are by that declaration asking your unconscious to prepare the material. You are, in effect, contracting to pick up such valuables at a given time. Count on me, you are saying to a few forces below: I will be there to write.” — Norman Mailer
14. “I’ll give you the sole secret of short-story writing, and here it is: Rule 1. Write stories that please yourself. There is no rule 2. The technical points you can get from Bliss Perry. If you can’t write a story that pleases yourself, you will never please the public. But in writing the story forget the public.” — O. Henry
MADD FICTIONAL 