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Day 5 Assignments
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7 Replies
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What I learned doing this assignment is…to accept changes as they come to improve the script/story.
Give us the following:
Concept – A social media mom influence must face the reality and her viewers when her husband comes out of the closet in a live stream.
Main Conflict – Katie must come to terms with her new life.
Old Ways – Perfect image of family
New Ways – her life is actually a mess
2. Fill in each of these with the answers you have right now.
Act 1:
Opening – Katie has an IG account that goes viral due to her impeccable life; I think she might be a real estate personality, internet famous
Inciting Incident – Her husband confesses to being gay during a live stream
Turning Point – He files for divorce, making it official
Act 2: She thinks she can use this as a marketing for her account as she gains more followers and tries to spin this as a dating in your 40s account
New plan – She documents the do’s and don’ts of dating in your 40s or after divorce
Plan in action – She goes along with the recommendation of others to move on, date, see what else is out there
Midpoint Turning Point – she meets a woman who fears no one and tells her the truth that this isn’t going to be a public journey but a private one
Act 3:
Rethink everything – Her husband is attacked and she is at his side
New plan – he tells her this was a mistake and he’d rather stay married than be happy because he knows there’s safety
Turning Point: Huge failure / Major shift
Act 4: She knows she can’t do that to the man who’s been her best friend all these years and tells him they must follow through the divorce
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I learned it’s a work in progress and can shift all over the place and I can still track it and keep improving. The process is way more fluid than I realize and it’s ok.
Concept: A lonely, small town woman loses her mother after a long illness and moves to the city to reinvent herself and find her dreams .. or bust.
Main conflict: Kayla struggles to overcome her sense of loneliness and despair and find out what makes life worth living.
Old Ways: Naive, co-dependent, people pleaser, no sense of self, depressed, nurturer, self deprecating, low self esteem, fearful, suicidal
New Ways: Assertive, strong, self possessed, honest, energized, strong sense of self, risk taker
Act 1
Opening: Meet Kayla looking after her mother, who is highly critical. Kayla is dutiful but spineless and depressed.
Inciting incident: Kayla’s Mother dies, funeral
Turning Point: Kayla moves to the city, gets a job at a prison, gets an apt, meets her neighbor and possible new friend.
Act 2
New Plan: Kayla dives into her job and making friends, looks for love.
Plan in Action: Job is spectacularly hard, Kayla is too desperate for love and has real difficulty making friends. She’s back to feeling lonely and depressed. Neighbor suggests online dating.
Mid-point: Kayla ideates suicide and scares herself.
Act 3
Rethink everything: Kayla faces some truths in herself and reconciles that if things don’t get better in 3 months she will take her life.
New Plan: She agrees to try 10 online dates, and approaches her work in new ways. Kayla meets someone on a date, it seems to be going well and the job is improving, she makes progress with a couple of inmates.
Turning Point/Huge failure: The date cheats on her and the prison erupts in a riot where the inmate she was closest to is killed trying her approach to solving problems.
Act 4
Climax: Kayla goes on last date but holds out no hope, she’s moving past the need to find someone but they fight for her. The prison warden mistakenly blames her for the riot violence and she quits. Kayla does things she loves, alone.
Resolution: The last date starts to win her over and the warden realizes his mistake and apologizes. She did good and feels strong in herself now.
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Rachel’s 4 Act Transformational Structure
What I learned doing this assignment is:
– that I might have even been wrong about who my leads/protagonist/antagonist are. Still working on that one.
– importance of not judging where the project is at (imperfect, clumsy, evolving). The structure already looks SO different from when I started, in a good way. I think some of the beats in the draft are probably not in the right order yet in the act structure (but that’s also okay for the first iteration).
– that having lots and lots of iterations of the main concept is okay and a good thing, because it helps to see the main concept in many different angles.
– also that sometimes I have the right ideas in pictures in my head, but the words that I collect into groups on a page don’t quite express those pictures perfectly just yet.
Concept:
A grieving widow must protect her troubled stepdaughter from the girl’s vengeful mother.
Main Conflict:
– Vic and Sarah can’t see eye to eye, Vic struggles to be a parent (and keep the ranch afloat) while Sarah feels Vic is an interloper. They must both come to realize they do mean the world to each other.
Old Ways:
– Vic is hobbled by grief and the past
– Uncomfortable trying to be a parent
– Fearful of risk and overly concerned for Sarah’s safety
New Ways:
– grounded, adaptable, able to think forward and make changes in how she does things and relates to people
– feeling that she is “home”; understands what’s truly important in life
– can step confidently into the role of parent
Act 1:
Opening:
– Vic struggles to get through her husband’s funeral without breaking down. She struggles to connect with Sarah who is resentful of her presence.
Inciting incident:
– Vic refuses to let Sarah help work with the horses for fear of accident, which drives a wedge between them.
Turning point:
– Sarah secretly tracks down her real mother.
– Vic receives a shady offer to sell their ranch, which she refuses.
Act 2:
New plan:
– when Vic refuses to sell out, someone mysterious starts sabotaging ranch operations.
– under this stress, Vic and Sarah’s already fragile relationship begins crumbling. Vic is ready to give up on things ever being positive between them, and Sarah is keeping a lot of secrets these days.
Plan in action:
– Sarah attempts to ride a horse she can’t control, and narrowly escapes being hurt. Vic freaks out and they have a major falling out over it.
Midpoint turning point:
– Afterward, Vic finds Sarah gone, and a ransom note left in her room.
Act 3:
Rethink everything:
– Vic goes to rescue Sarah only to find out Catherine (Sarah’s mother) staged the kidnapping to get Vic out there.
New plan:
– The betrayal grows – they find out that Catherine was not only behind the mysterious sabotage, but is willing to betray Sarah into harm’s way, to gain control of the ranch.
Turning point: Huge failure / Major shift:
– Vic gives Sarah the chance to escape, instead of taking it herself.
Act 4:
Climax/ultimate expression of the conflict:
– Catherine causes a horse stampede, attempting to get Vic trampled.
Resolution:
– Sarah thinks that she was responsible for Vic’s death, but it turns out that Vic survived. Almost losing each other made them both realize what is truly important to them, and they are able to start rebuilding their relationship.
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What I learned doing this assignment: by breaking my script down into structural chunks of information with focused points of protagonist and antagonist action, the process feels more manageable and enjoyable.
1. Give us the following:
Concept: Disillusioned with his parents and elementary school, Bobby finds a new life through petty crime and by joining a street gang.
Main Conflict: Rebelling against his mothers religious dogma, Bobby’s troubles at school soon escalate delinquent acts of crime and theft in search of a better life.
Old Ways: Troublemaker, low-self esteem, ignorant, chaotic, pessimistic
New Ways: Maturity milestone, knowledgeable, optimistic, hopeful
2. Act 1:
Opening: Bobby exits school and “skeetches”(illegally shoe-skiing from the back of a car while trying not to be seen by the driver) – in front of a bunch of students and teachers in the snow filled street.
Inciting Incident: Bobby gets in a fight with Angela over laundry money.
Turning Point: Bobby befriends the neighborhood gang boys. He tips them off to an approaching rival gang.
Act 2:
New plan: He gets to know gang life, exposure to a “good life” filled with cars, weed, beer, junk food, neighborhood girls etc.
Plan in action: Even though Bobby has made these new friends, he feels isolated and knows that what he is doing is wrong, but he doesn’t know a way out, he turns to Mrs. Williams, the only teacher at school who “gets him”
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Midpoint Turning Point: Bobby’s new friends start robbing freight trains, one of them is caught and goes to juvie. One of them also dies in a horrible accident gone wrong….
Act 3:
Rethink everything: Bobby ponders that maybe gang life is not for him.
New plan: Bobby tries to get involved with extracurricular activities after school with Mrs. Williams, his friends try to draw him back in. He also vows to get his mother psychological help.
Trying Point: Huge failure / Major shift:
Bobby and his mother have a huge fight. She finds a stash of drugs Bobby’s been holding for his friends. She flushes it down the toilet. She crosses the line and tries to burn him with the shape of a cross above his heart. He runs away.
Act 4:
Climax / Ultimate expression of conflict
Bobby is in trouble and needs to come up with the money for the drugs. He is chased down by his friends and cars and hides out at school. He confesses to Mrs. Williams about his trouble and his mother.
Resolution:
Mrs. Williams calls child services and Bobby’s mother is taken to a psych ward. Bobby tracks down his father who is revealed to have another family on the other side of town. He agrees to house Bobby out of guilt and Bobby goes to a new school with a sense of renewed hope.
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What I learned: it is so easy to “not write” because you don’t have 2 or three plot points, and are missing the other 5. But when I actually start putting them down on the computer I can slowly weave them together with other points as they manifest one at a time. This is impossible without the disciplines of faith, persistence, and patience. Even though I’ve been through this before with 5 other scripts, I still believe that this script idea would have lingered in my head and taunt me for years before I started fleshing it out if I hadnt signed up for this class.
1. Give us the following:
Concept – A middle-aged couple have just set off on a cross-country drive to California in their newly acquired, used RV to start their early retirement, and discover they are being chased by an unidentified smart-car.
Main Conflict – Cat and mouse between small, new high-tech vehicles, and large old-school RV. The new and young is trying to destroy the old/old-fashioned.
Old Ways – Older generation, which caused wrong with the world: wars, inflation, global warming, mass-shootings, divorce, etc.
New Ways – the “new” works differently and we must be open to new ways of thinking to understand it and live in harmony with it. In the same way, the young generation and the old generation truly can live in harmony, each with a different role in society. Can the Young learn from the Old? Can the Old teach/communicate and impart wisdom and hope in ways that the young feel respected and valued and affirmed?
2. Fill in each of these with the answers you have right now.
Act 1:
Openings – Unidentified male loading up a high-tech remote controlled car
Inciting Incident – Couple pulls out of gas station in an aggressive self-centered manner, after filling up with good ole-fashioned petroleum-based fuel. The remote car takes the road behind them.
Turning Point – After time with the couple getting to know them, their dynamics, and their subtext, the remote car makes its first attack. Then it disappears. The couple contacts highway patrol, but highway patrol cannot locate the car.
Act 2:
New plan – They see the car again and confirm it’s unmanned. Husband goes against wife’s wishes and attacks back somehow.
Plan in action – cat and mouse battle ensues. Husband is now convinced that traditional societal norms for resolving highway conflicts are not going to work.
Midpoint Turning Point – Husband takes aggressive action and takes the car down somehow. They just took down the one thing in life the car-creator loved like a son. Full of rage/revenge, he decides to personally go after the couple. Now, a high-tech car is following them. we learn, along with the couple that our enemy is a nerdy 20-year old kid.
Act 3:
Rethink everything – Husband has to start listening to wife. Wife has to get involved even though she’s not “a fighter”
New plan – They will have to work together to come up with a solution.
Turning Point: Huge failure / Major shift. – Wife using psychology to evaluate the driver’s next move.
Act 4:
Climax/Ultimate expression of the conflict – They set up a trap to outsmart him, but they risk destroying the RV, which represents not only their escape from him, but their own personal escape from their lifelong struggles. But if they lose that, then they risk returning to their “old life”.
Resolution – Plan works, and now the kid is trapped in his car. Do they approach? Do they leave him for dead? Do they finish him off, or call an ambulance? Their act of approaching proves to the kid that they are a worthy opponent and earns his respect. Wife ends up being the “healing” this kid needs.
2. Who is your Hero and what is their Character Arc that represents a transformation?
Hero is Husband for choosing reason and logic over aggressive/defensive/fear-based instinct, and for listening to wife instead of just ordering instructions. Wife is the hero to the kid to give him the words of forgiveness and hope he needs to hear to accept help and have the courage to continue to live after this incident.
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Will’s 4 Act Transformational Structure
Today, I discovered that the first act, which I’m having so much trouble with (oddly, it’s not the middle) can be whittled to a couple basic beats, and that clarity helps me push past the roadblock I’ve been kicking at.
BLOOD & DUST
CONCEPT
At the end of the great Western era, the small town of Ambition, Arizona finds itself beset by vampires, and their hopes of defeating them falls almost entirely upon one young woman, a drug-addled outcast named Lauren Kilkenny.MAIN CONFLICT
Lauren embarks on a journey (along with six others) to rescue a young woman kidnapped by an old, wicked vampire named Jean Cayatte.OLD WAYS
- Numbing her pain and fear with opium
- Ashamed of her Native American blood
- Always looking outside to others for help
NEW WAYS
- Sober and clear-eyed
- Proud of her heritage and finding a balance between the two halves
- Accepting a role in leading others herself.
—–ACT ONE—–
Opening
LAUREN is living the life of an outcast in her town, which is plagued by people going missing, and spends much of her time in an opium haze, keeping a low profile.Inciting Incident
When a Chiricahua APACHE sees the flaw in Lauren’s eyes, he tells her she needs to come with him to meet their chief. That she’s special. She, of course, refuses.Turning Point
JEAN CAYATTE attacks the town and takes the daughter of the town’s new pastor.—–ACT TWO—–
New plan
The townsfolk put together a large, bad-ass posse on a hunt for this mysterious Jean Cayatte.Plan in action
The posse rides, splintered at first by disorganization and tension. But eventually they reach a homestead whose prominent tenants have gone mysteriously quiet. Lauren teams up with eventual love interest, BEN.Midpoint Turning Point
The posse are attacked in the homestead, not by Cayatte, but by a swarm of vampires they didn’t even know existed, many of them people who had gone missing from Ambition. The posse is wiped out, save for one or two resourceful (lucky) folks.—–ACT THREE—–
Rethink everything
Having barely escaped with their lives, Lauren and two other posse members are rescued by Apaches, who take them into the mountains to meet the chief and a strange man named JOHN KELLEY. He has cool weapons. He has knowledge. And he’ll take it from here. Lauren realizes she has a say in how things should go, and convinces him to accept their help. And a new posse of seven is born.New plan
They enter the old copper mine where Cayatte is holed up, looking for Sarah and hoping she’s still alive. They find a weird, gothic nest carved from the stone cave – a central knot of dozens of vampires. And they find Sarah, but she’s well on her way to becoming a mindless eating machine.Turning Point: Huge failure / Major shift
Everything goes to hell quickly. They succeed in defeating the vampires, but Cayatte is too strong, and makes quick work of them and their plan to destroy the nest and everything in it with the Threshold equivalent of a nuclear bomb.—–ACT FOUR—–
Climax/Ultimate expression of the conflict
Lauren, trying to escape, is caught by Cayatte. They fight, but he bites her. The bomb goes off, blasting them out of the mountain, just before sunrise. Realizing he’s lost, Cayatte spares her life and allows the sun to destroy him.Resolution
Lauren is slowly transforming into a vampire and sitting on the mountainside, exposed to the sunlight. Three colleagues of the late John Kelley find her at the crucial time and work their magic, inducting her into the organization, telling her that her previous life is gone.Coda
50 years later, Lauren’s love interest, Ben, is on his death bed. Lauren visits him in his final moments, not having aged a day. -
<div>David Harper’s 4 Act Transformational Structure</div>
What I learned doing this assignment is that the story will outline itself if I know the character arcs.
Act 1
Opening<div>
Danny is leaving work early, boss isn’t happy. Danny goes to pick up his dad from prison. Dad’s girlfriend Elle wants to go with. Danny doesn’t like her, but takes her anyway.
Inciting Incident
Danny picks up Arlo from prison, brings him back to town. No one wants to see Arlo there.
Turning Point
Rooster and Patch show up and demand their money. Arlo goes to get it. It’s been destroyed by the elements. Rooster and Patch start breathing out threats and give him an ultimatum.
Act 2
New plan</div><div>
Danny has to help his dad. He decides he’s going to confront Rooster and Patch. It just makes things worse.
Plan in action
He reports them to the sheriff, but the sheriff can’t do anything because there is no evidence of a crime. Even his dad won’t testify against them. Rooster and Patch show up to beat the shit out of him, he tells them he can get the money. He goes to get a bank loan. He is refused. He gets a little crazy and is escorted out of the bank by the sheriff. He is arrested. Reports of a wildfire are coming in.
Midpoint Turning Point
Danny is released, the bank won’t press charges. He goes to see his dad. Agrees with his dad that the banks are corrupt. They get word of the evacuation orders. They get ready to go. Rooster and Patch show up. They want their money.
Act 3
Rethink everything</div><div>
Danny loads everyone up in his truck and they take off, he thinks to evacuate. But they have other plans. They force him to participate in a bank heist while the town is evacuated.
New plan
Danny finds out his dad is the one who started the fire, just so he could get his revenge, and he’s using it as cover for the bank heist.
Turning Point: Huge failure / Major shift
Elle takes off with the truck and escapes. Danny goes to escape, but he can’t leave his dad to die. Meanwhile Arlo kills Rooster and Patch and heists the bank himself. Danny ends up riding back with Carter (sheriff) who is trying to get people out.
Act 4
Climax/Ultimate expression of the conflict</div>
Carter confronts Arlo, there is a shootout, Carter is shot. Danny takes Carter’s gun and kills Arlo. Then they have to escape.
Resolution
Danny ends up marrying Becca, so he has a family after all.
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