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Day 6 Assignment
Reply to post your assignments.
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27 Replies
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I hope this is the right spot for the Beat Sheet. This is first Act…two and three to follow.
*********Cheryl – I still cannot paste into the forum. I am working in Word. It worked before but with the new module 4…will not paste. I am more than exasperated.
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Hi Mary,
I can’t paste from Word either. But my workaround (on a Mac) is to paste into TextEdit and from there into the Forum.
My understanding of where to post our assignments is that, for example, Day 6 corresponds to Lesson 6. It could be clearer.
Hope that helps.
Every success,
Andrew Boyd
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George Petersen REVEALS!
My Vision is to direct one of my screenplays as a low-budget indie feature.
What I learned from this assignment is, well, I’ve always wanted to do a treatment, like they used to do in the 30s, but I could never make it happen. Now, with the developing beat sheet, the bones of a treatment seems to be forming.
The Summer of Haight
Genre: Thriller
ACT 1: Story Goal: To introduce the inexplicable problem of the will
INCITING INCIDENT: Jonathan inexplicably commands Longfellow to draw up a will leaving all his wealth to a good-for-nothing hippie no one has ever heard of.
Longfellow Action: with the instructions for the new will in his hand, Longfellow is forced to choose between giving the paper back to Jonathan or putting it in his pocket. He puts the paper in his pocket.
Longfellow PJ1: Longfellow solemnly promises never to interfere with the will, understanding that it would end his friendship with Jonathan forever.
SET UP: Jonathan claims that Youngblood is a respectable doctor.
Longfellow PJ2: Not able to endure the mystery anymore, Longfellow wants answers and breaks his promise and follows Youngblood on one of his escapades into the Haight-Ashbury, risking his friendship with Jonathan, which means more to him than anything.
Longfellow Action: in the middle of the night, Longfellow takes his place amidst the shadows across the street from the cellar door of Jonathan’s mansion and waits.
Youngblood AJ1: Youngblood introduces himself to the story as a hippie who feels liberated to indulge himself in insatiable self-gratification on an insane level, without limits.
REVEAL: Longfellow learns that Youngblood is no doctor — he’s a crazy.
Youngblood Action: Youngblood indulges in painting flower girls nude bodies with DayGlo colors.
Youngblood Action: Youngblood splays his painted nude body down long stretches of butcher paper, creating abstract “art” in the process. Prudish, aristocratic Longfellow is aghast.
Longfellow Action: Longfellow photographs Youngblood in action.
Longfellow Action: in a thick fog, Longfellow blocks Youngblood’s path to the cellar door.
SET UP: Longfellow PJ3: Longfellow confronts Youngblood, threatens him with legal action if he harms Jonathan in any way. Longfellow implies Youngblood has no right to be here.
REVEAL: Youngblood has a key.
Longfellow Action: Longfellow picks up the key, holds it out to Youngblood.
TURNING POINT 1: Youngblood presents his personal key to the back door of Jonathan’s mansion. He has a right to be here. Back off.
Deeper Level: Longfellow has no idea that Youngblood is an expression of Jonathan’s dark side.
ACT 2: Story Goal: to transfer Jonathan’s wealth to Youngblood.
SET UP: Jonathan demands that Longfellow give Youngblood the respect that he deserves.
Longfellow Action: Longfellow presents his black and white photos of Youngblood going crazy in the Haight.
REVEAL: Jonathan is confronted with Youngblood’s craziness.
Longfellow PJ4: Longfellow presents a passionate report to Jonathan on the out of this world craziness of Youngblood.
Jonathan Triangle 1: Jonathan explodes at Longfellow for investigating Youngblood.
PLACEHOLDER: What does Longfellow do to make the will issue go away?
Longfellow PJ5: Giving up, Longfellow presents the will to Jonathan for his signature. It’s final.
Jonathan Triangle 2: Jonathan breaks off his friendship with Longfellow.
Longfellow PJ6: Longfellow goes into a deep depression over the loss of his beloved friendship.
Longfellow Action: Longfellow takes comfort in a bottle.
Youngblood Action: Youngblood exits the mansion’s front door, catches sight of Longfellow, walks away hurriedly, avoiding him.
Longfellow comes to the door, asks for Jonathan. Alfred tells him that Jonathan has disappeared. Longfellow: I thought Youngblood only used the back door.
INCITING INCIDENT: Jonathan inexplicably disappears, kicking off the timer for the 100 day disappearance clause in the will.
Youngblood AJ2: Youngblood demands that Longfellow execute the will.
Youngblood Action: Youngblood shows up at the mansion with a suitcase. Starts barking orders to Alfred and the staff, who plead with Longfellow to intervene.
Longfellow makes excuses. Delay tactic.
PLACEHOLDER: it gets ugly between Longfellow and Youngblood.
Longfellow Action: Determined to find out what Youngblood has done with Jonathan or his body, Longfellow follows Youngblood into the Haight again. Youngblood senses he’s being followed. Another murder. Longfellow is seriously wounded. A hippie photographer, Hubie, saves him.
SET UP: Longfellow PJ7: IRONY: making one last gasp effort, Longfellow goes against Jonathan’s last wishes and disputes the will in a behind the doors arbitration.
REVEAL: Longfellow is told, to his horror, that it is his friendship with Jonathan that makes the will irrevocable and credible. A bitter pill to swallow from the legal establishment.
Youngblood Action: Youngblood pulls up to the mansion in a small moving van, the cab crushed with giggling flower girls. Youngblood physically moves all his belongings and the flower girls into the mansion to the horror of Alfred the butler and the staff. The cook complains that Youngblood eats nonstop, like a ravenous animal.
Alfred comes to see Longfellow, pleads for his intervention.
Longfellow action: Longfellow shows up at the mansion with a police officer and a letter of eviction.
Youngblood Action: Youngblood presents the key as proof of Jonathan’s intentions that he and he alone should have access to the mansion. After all, where’s Longfellow’s key?
Youngblood AJ3: Youngblood forces Longfellow to execute the will. The 100 days are up.
Longfellow PJ8: Jonathan’s “disappearance” is finalized and confirmed.
Longfellow Action: Longfellow takes the new will to Youngblood for his signature. Longfellow is a broken man. It strikes him as odd that Youngblood should know so many details of the will.
TURNING POINT 2: Youngblood inherits Jonathan’s wealth lock, stock and barrel.
Youngblood Action: Youngblood holds all-night wild parties with vagrant hippies in the mansion to Longfellow’s dismay.
Longfellow PJ9: Longfellow sinks into a deep depression.
Longfellow Action: Longfellow takes comfort in the bottle again, smashes a cherished framed picture of Jonathan and himself in better times, a symbol of their unbreakable friendship.
Deeper Level: Longfellow has no idea that Youngblood is an expression of Jonathan’s dark side.
ACT 3: Story Goal: to execute the plan with a Haight-Ashbury hippie photographer, Hubie, to capture Youngblood red-handed.
SET UP: Hubie shows Longfellow photographs he has taken of Youngblood, which reveal a mysterious luminous quality about him, a quality that leaves a physical trace. Potential evidence.
Longfellow PJ10: determined to get back at Youngblood and with the aid of a photographer who hangs out in the Haight, Longfellow puts together a plan to capture Youngblood red-handed in the act of murder.
PLACEHOLDER: What is Longfellow’s plan?
And what is Youngblood’s weakness that Longfellow targets?
And how does Youngblood discover the plan?
TURNING POINT 3: but a thick blanket of fog rolls in at the worst time; the plans fails miserably, ending in the photographer, Hubie, getting killed by Youngblood.
REVEAL: The physical trace of Youngblood’s luminous quality backed by the photographs proves that indeed it was Youngblood who killed Hubie.
Longfellow PJ11: Longfellow sinks to the lower depths. All is lost.
Longfellow Action: Longfellow drowns himself in sorrow.
ACT 4: Story Goal: to coordinate with the entire police force in a plan to capture Youngblood red-handed.
Longfellow PJ12: The detective shows up at Longfellow’s trashed apartment, sobers him up.
SET UP: Longfellow claims that there is nothing to be done. He can’t prove that Youngblood has killed Jonathan or anyone else.
The detective presents him with new evidence, offers to help.
REVEAL: PLACEHOLDER: What is the new evidence?
Longfellow PJ13: Longfellow makes the case to the department: The stimulating environment of the Be-In will be too much for Youngblood to resist. His heightened animal like instincts will go wild. He won’t be able to control himself.
Climax: Longfellow coordinates a plan with the full police department to catch Youngblood red-handed at the Be-In. Hippie garb for everyone, including Longfellow.
SET UP: Longfellow claims that Youngblood has killed Jonathan. And now he must pay.
Youngblood AJ4: sure enough, at the the Be-In, Youngblood’s desire to kill for pleasure is irresistible once again.
Youngblood AJ5: Youngblood is caught in the act of killing by Longfellow.
Longfellow PJ14: Longfellow leads the chase across the city to capture Youngblood.
IRONIC DEEPER LAYER REVEAL:
REVEAL: Metamorphosis: Longfellow is faced with the reality that it is he, not Youngblood, who has in fact killed Jonathan.
That is, in killing Youngblood in an effort to protect Jonathan, he has in fact killed Jonathan, his best friend.
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Andrew Boyd’s Reveals
My Vision:
For Hitler’s Choirboys to be such a compelling screenplay that Steven Spielberg and Mel Gibson will battle it out to produce their best WW2 blockbuster since Hacksaw Ridge or Schindler’s List. That this screenplay will confront racism as everybody’s issue and show that it’s never too late to receive mercy.
What I learned from this assignment:
The need to carefully layer in satisfying setups and payoffs throughout the screenplay.
Genre: Drama / True Story
ACT 1
Challenge to go to Nuremberg to keep the leading Nazis alive until they hang for their crimes – and to break the Nazi legend.
Fuller PJ 1: Fuller is telling his story years later: the odd couple: the hustler and the chaplain working together in a military hospital in Munich as the war comes to an end. For Fuller, it’s play the organ in chapel, or go to jail.
CAT1 Hot playing, wise-cracking, entertaining sidekick of the Chaplain, who hits the keys while his boss jams hot on the trombone. Lights up the room. Sardonic approach to the parole board – older, wiser, but still sassy.
Setup: Hustler.
Payoffs: Act 1, in jail, several times, including later, in Act 1 and 4.
Henry PJ 1: Henry and Fuller working together in post-war Munich. The soldiers love it when Fuller hits the keys of that piano and Henry plays his beloved trombone hot.
CAT1 At the end of Chapel service, with a twinkle in his eye, Henry gives everyone what they want – he plays his trombone hot and loud while Sam pounds the piano. A great rapport with Sam and the patients in his care.
Set-up Friendship.
Payoff: Act 4 Friendship restored.
Setup: Blind eye. Everyone turned a blind eye to the Nazis.
Payoffs (Throughout) WW2 and the Holocaust.
Setup: Henry turning a blind eye to Fuller’s black marketeering.
Payoffs: Act 4 Almost costs Fuller his life.
Henry PJ 2: The war may be ending, but those ambulances keep coming. It’s exhausting. His catchphrase is ‘And this too shall pass.’
CAT2 Exhausted, bloodied, still kindly, still smiling, still hanging in. Treats a patient whose face has been blown off. Almost, but not quite lost for words. Overcoming the horror to put the other man first.
Henry PJ 3: Henry gets news his boys have been seriously wounded in the war.
CAT3 Keeps the pain of the news about his sons to himself. Goes straight into caring for Sam Fuller.
Henry PJ 4: Flashback to home, Henry encourages his boys to sign up. Alma says she’ll never forgive him if anything happens to them.
CAT4 Suddenly aware of his wife’s needs and fears. Instead of hitting back against her unreasonable reaction, he responds with empathy when their son goes off to war. Already beginning shouldering a burden of guilt and apprehension.
Setup Guilt over sending sons to war.
Payoff Act 3? Sons say they would have gone anyway.
Fuller PJ 2: Fuller is told the Nazis murdered his big brother Joel when he tried to surrender. [Could shift to later]
CAT2 The lights go out. Internalises his grief.
Setup Fuller’s desire to kill Nazis if he had the chance.
Payoffs Acts 2 – 4 Tormenting the Nazi prisoners / Accusing of giving Goering his cyanide capsule / Confessing to setting up the hangman to botch the executions.
Fuller PJ 3: Flashback to his home. Joel saw off their alcoholic father and brought Sam up on his own, hustling to survive. Joel signs up to fight, with Sam following in his footsteps.
CAT3 Fear and contempt for his abusive father. Brought up by his big bro to be a hustler to survive and get respect. Steal, shoplifts and always on the run, foreshadowing the incident with Brannigan later.
Setup Fuller’s hatred and distrust of father figures who get in your way.
Payoffs Act 1 Transferred to Henry when he stands in his way at Dachau / Act 4 Ends when he forgives his own father and is reconciled to Henry.
Henry PJ 5: Henry and Fuller are sent to Dachau to witness the aftermath of the Nazi atrocities and prepare him for the assignment to come.
CAT5 When everything he believes about the goodness of God and innate humankindness is undercut. Anger rises and the desire for revenge when he is at his lowest. He, too, wants to kill. This self-realisation hits him hard.
Setup Self-realisation that Henry is capable of murder.
Payoffs Act 2-3 Overcoming that hatred / Being able to empathise with murderers.
Fuller PJ 4: Fuller sets out to kill a Nazi POW in Dachau to avenge the murder of his brother when he tried to surrender. Henry want to kill him too, but prevents Fuller, which sours their relationship.
CAT4 Asks a Nazi to tell him a joke to prove his humanity – showing despite his fury and thirst for revenge, he is still looking for the best in people. Deftly lifts Lt Shaeffer’s pistol like an accomplished pick-pocket. Drunk and pushed to the brink by grief. Can’t understand the German. Out of his depth and drowning when he threatens to kill the SS POW.
Deeper Layers: Henry encouraged his boys to sign up. His wife said she would never forgive them if anything happened. Now he must deal with his guilt and get back home to save his marriage. But he needs to be in Nuremberg.
News of his brother’s murder fuels Fuller’s desire for revenge.
Joel brought Fuller up in place of his alcoholic father. The experience of his father has given Fuller a deep distrust of father figures.
For Henry, Dachau stirs up an anger that has this kindly man contemplating murder. It scares him. It also breaks his resistance to the death penalty.
INCITING INCIDENT: Henry and his assistant Fuller are assigned to Nuremberg for chaplain duties to the leading Nazis.
Henry PJ 6: Henry doesn’t want to help the Nazis. He’s seen too many good boys killed for that. His marriage is under strain, and he is overdue to be sent home home. If he chooses to stay, his marriage could well be on the line.
CAT6 Self-sacrifice and self-doubt. He takes the harder road and stays on in Nuremberg. A man who will do the right thing, whatever the cost.
Setup Guilt at staying on in Nuremberg rather than going home to Alma.
Payoff Act 3-4 She tells him to stay on and finish the job / She waits for him and remains faithful.
Fuller PJ 5: Fuller loathes the Nazis, doesn’t want to help them, and would lose his cushy hustle in Munich. Last thing he wants is to go to Nuremberg. But what choice does he have? – it’s Nuremberg or jail.
CAT5 Angry with the chaplain, angry with the world. Nowhere to turn. Forced to go to Nuremberg. Internalises his anger.
TURNING POINT 1: Henry is torn between his duties to God, the military and his marriage. He takes the hard route and chooses to go to Nuremberg. And Fuller, who doesn’t have a choice, has to go with him.
ACT 2
Into Nuremberg, a fish out of water, outgunned and manipulated by the leading Nazis.
Henry PJ 7: Into the ruins. A devastated city. Henry revealed as kindly and seemingly naïve. Fuller as bitter. Their genuine friendship under strain.
CAT7 Kind and considerate, even to a former SS soldier. Not a racist bone in his body. He sees the Nazi kids and they remind him of his boys.
Fuller PJ 6: Fuller shows hatred to the ex-SS soldier who watches them in the ruins – and to his children.
CAT6 Loses it when a German kid pretends to shoot him with a stick, revealing the fury and indignation still close the surface. Mad at his boss for playing along and offering to surrender – just like his brother Joel.
Henry PJ 8: The Colonel tells Henry he must prevent the Nazis committing suicide and make them take responsibility for their war crimes.
CAT8 Still searching for the higher and harder ground he chooses to exceed his military brief by staying true to his higher calling as a chaplain, and setting out to find these men who are utterly lost.
Setup Henry needs to break the Nazi legend.
Payoffs Acts 3 – 4, to a measure, he succeeds.
Henry PJ 9: Henry is introduced to his behind-the-scenes team in Nuremberg, a Catholic chaplain concealing a war wound, and a Jewish psychologist with an understandable axe to grind.
CAT9 Disarmingly affable, cheery, joking, yet evaluating and astute. Winning friends by standing with them and seeking common ground. Foreshadowing his approach to the Nazis.
Setup Sixtus’ painful back.
Payoff Act 3, His painful penance at Mauthausen, hauling a rock up the death stairs.
Setup Sixtus O’Connor’s drink problem.
Payoff Act 3, His reason for self-medication revealed – trying to silence memories of Mauthausen.
Goering AJ 1: Pleads not guilty in court, treats the Tribunal with contempt, and dominates other defendants to keep the Nazi legend alive.
AJ1 Centre of attraction. Drawing all eyes. Dominating the other defendants and the courtroom. At this stage, charismatic and powerful, joking, smiling, pointing out the sights, the ringmaster at his own circus. Narrowly escaping death when a knife is thrown. Takes it in his stride with good humour. Clearly courageous and able to laugh at himself.
Fuller PJ 7: Realises Henry didn’t tell about Dachau. So Sam the hustler finds his boss an organ and arranges for two cells to be knocked into a chapel.
CAT7 Realises the chaplain didn’t tell the Colonel about his incident at Dachau. So softens in his attitude and hustles on Henry’s behalf, finding him an organ and two rooms for a chapel.
Fuller PJ 8: Fuller, who’s black, walks out on his boss after SS prisoners hurl racial insults at him while playing the organ. To avoid jail and hold on to his hustle, he opts to guard the leading Nazis – where he can torment them.
CAT8 Fury at racial abuse by the Nazis. Walks out on the chaplain. Takes up guard duty to avoid jail and give him the chance to torment the prisoners.
Setups Racism led to the holocaust.
Payoffs (throughout) Racism is everyone’s problem.
Henry PJ 10: The kindly chaplain is treated with indifference and contempt by the Nazis, while their leader Hermann Goering tries to manipulate Henry to gain influence. Gilbert warns him the US guards think Henry is too pally with the Nazis.
CAT10 A fish out of water. Self-doubt, undermined, played for a fool, but always unreasonably respectful and kind, and still evaluating, still choosing the harder road. He shakes hands with the Nazis, in contravention of orders, and refers to them by their Nazi rank, which has been abolished. Sets himself up for accusations of being a Nazi lover.
Setup Henry believes his marriage at risk from love rival Kent.
Payoff Act 4, Alma stays faithful / Kent revealed as married at Henry’s funeral.
Setup Henry says he is playing the long game, even at risk of his reputation. [Possibly earlier]
Payoff Act 3, The long game pays off in the end.
Goering AJ 2: Goering has recovered from drug addiction thanks to the prison regime, but is back at his scheming best, at the peak of his powers.
CAT 2 Trying to exercise to show how fit he is. More self-deprecating humour. Running rings round the prosecutor. Pinching an interpreter’s bottom in court. Dismissing concentration camp film and other compelling evidence as propaganda. Unwavering in his self-belief.
Henry PJ 11: Tensions with Gilbert grow as Henry pursues mercy while Gilbert seeks vengeance.
CAT11 Not thrown by Gilbert’s accusations. Choosing to hear and evaluate, rather than retaliate. Teachable and secure, despite moments of self-doubt.
Setup Gerecke’s fear of losing his temper. [Possibly earlier, in confrontation with guards.]
Payoff Act 3, Losing his temper with Goering in final confrontation.
Setup Shia Morontz playing violin at Auschwitz, racist murder. [Possibly later]
Payoff Shia Morontz being confronted and moved in Nuremberg by Germans and MP who was only obeying orders.
Deeper Layers: Henry and Fuller have good cause to hate Hitler’s henchmen. To a man they plead not guilty and treat the court with contempt.
Fuller’s friendship with Henry is strained to breaking point – exacerbated by his suspicion towards father figures.
Abandoned by his parents as a child, betrayed by his government during the First War, Goering is driven by his need to keep his and the Nazi legend alive.
Goering AJ 3: Plays Henry and the others to win his sympathy and to try to get the Allies to join forces with Germany against Russia.
CAT 3 Self-justifying, manipulative, scheming, charming. Winning favours from the guards by giving them gifts, including his expensive engraved chronograph.
Setup Goering’s vanity is his fatal flaw.
Payoff Act 3, That vanity kills him when he is devastated at having been fooled by a forger, and commits suicide rather than face the hangman.
Setup Goering says you’ll have to fight the Russians someday.
Payoff War in Ukraine, 70 years later.
Turning Point 2 / Midpoint: O’Connor reveals to Henry that his humiliation in the WWI recruitment line is holding him back; court artist Laura Knight shows Henry he must break through the Nazis’ denial and make them see; Gilbert shows Henry he must marshal the evidence to confront the Nazis, and Fuller shows him he must get tough.
Henry learns that the only way to break through to these Nazi defendants is to get tough with them: ‘To stand up to bullies.’
Henry PJ 12: Sixtus shows Henry that what’s holding him back is fear of inflicting humiliation on others – due to his father humiliating him in the recruitment line. We see this in flashback.
CAT12 Grateful for the wise counsel offered by Sixtus. Valuing this contribution by a man of another faith. Accepts the revelation of his own weakness and humbly learns from it.
Setup Humiliation at recruitment line (his wound).
Payoffs Fear of humiliating others, Act 3, Overcoming humiliation when it is revealed to him / Ability to get tough with others for their own good.
Fuller PJ 9: Fuller returns to the ordinary world of the hustle in his off-duty hours, pounding the keys and cracking jokes in a GI nightclub, and getting it together with his white girlfriend, Evelyn.
CAT9 Throws himself back into his black-market hustle, entertaining in a GI nightclub, flaunting his white girlfriend, ignoring the protests of his racist sergeant. Cocksure and self-destructive.
Setup Growing hatred of Fuller by his racist sergeant, Brannigan.
Payoff Act 3, Brannigan hospitalises his white girlfriend, tries to cut Fuller.
Fuller PJ 10: Antagonism grows from his racist sergeant Brannigan, who beats him up and is assigned to new duties.
CAT10 Beaten up by his sergeant, yet refusing to complain, furious when Henry has the sergeant reassigned. Foreshadowing his death wish.
Henry PJ 13: Henry gets to know the court artist, who opens his eyes to what he must do. But how?
CAT13 Missing his wife. Drawn to another woman, but recognising that, acts with restraint. Always willing to learn from another, to see things from their point of view.
Deeper Layer Reveal: The catholic chaplain recognises Henry is pulling his punches. Henry was badly humiliated by his German father during World War One. Pa hauled him away from the recruitment line where he was signing up to fight for Uncle Sam against the Kaiser. Henry must overcome his own aversion to humiliation if he is to get tough and confront others.
ACT 3
Henry gets his mojo – learns tough love and confronts the Nazis with evidence of their guilt to shatter their denial.
Henry PJ 14: Jewish witness Shia Morontz gives Henry the lead he needs to break through the Nazi denial.
CAT14 Respectful, kind and compassionate to this Jewish witness. Humble enough to admit he doesn’t have all the answers. Puts his hand on his in a café, comes close to tears, enrages some of the Germans in the café by standing publicly with a Jew.
Henry PJ 15: Gilbert falls out with Henry, accusing him of being naive and self-righteous.
CAT15 Giving Gilbert a hearing, even though he is rude and drunk, believing there is something to be learned in every situation, humbly evaluating the truth of those criticisms. Betraying early signs of overwork by being unable to relax in what should be a friendly card game.
Henry PJ 16: Henry learns to confront without humiliation. He challenges defendant after defendant with hard evidence, forcing them out of denial and towards responsibility.
CAT16 Learning tough love, how to confront without compromise without tipping into humiliation. And, although afraid of losing his temper, managing to keep his temper under control.
Setup Henry’s fear of losing his temper, like his Pa.
Payoff Act 3, Loses temper with Goering / But recognising keeping cool would have changed nothing.
Goering AJ 4: What the Nazis have done is plain to see. Goering’s domination is broken by the weight of visual evidence and testimony. And by being cut off from the other defendants.
AJ4 Narcissistic, self-obsessed, vain, furious at being sidelined in a dining room on his own. Like a toddler sent to the naughty step.
Setup Goering’s boast ‘Call me Meyer’ if the Allies ever bomb Berlin. [Possibly earlier]
Payoff Act 4, Kids burn Goering’s effigy, chanting ‘Meyer, Meyer…’
Setup Goering’s refusal to be hanged.
Payoff Act 3, He takes his own life.
Setup Goering’s art kleptomania, when he shows off his collection at Carinhall.
Payoff Act 3 confrontation, Revelation that he has been duped by a forger.
Fuller PJ 11 Fuller teases and torments the Nazis behind bars. [Need more from Fuller in Act 3]
CAT11 Teases and torments the Nazis behind bars. Getting his fun and his own back at their expense – but child-like and mischievous, never vicious.
Henry PJ 17: Henry goes down with pneumonia due to the cold and overwork. His sons, both recovering from their war wounds come to see him and encourage him in his work.
CAT17 His delirious nightmares betray his insecurity. His joy at seeing his sons reminds us of this father’s great love for his boys. His teachability allows him to be mentored by his sons and to let go of his guilt.
Henry PJ 18: Henry wins Gilbert round, so they can stop trading atrocities.
CAT18 Employing his new tough love to confront Gilbert and win back his friendship. Showing him the picture of the murdered priest at Dachau punctures Gilbert’s self-pity and undermines his accusations.
Fuller PJ 12: Fuller’s wisecracks at the Stork Club stoke up his racist sergeant, who tries to attack him with a broken bottle. [Need to amp up Brannigan’s threats].
CAT12 Increasingly outrageous, his wisecracks at the Stork Club are calculated to provoke his sergeant who tries to attack him with a broken bottle.
Henry PJ 19: The Colonel plans to send Henry home. But the Nazis write to Alma begging for him to stay. She relents and persuades the Colonel to keep him on in Nuremberg. But to stay on, Henry must compromise and spy on the Nazis.
CAT19 Still taking the higher, harder road of risk to self. Still pressing for what he believes to be right.
Deeper Layer: Henry’s sons exonerate him from his sense of guilt of encouraging them to go to war.
His wife now values the work he is doing and lets him stay.
Goering AJ 5: Makes contact with the Nazi resistance to try to stage a breakout. [Or at midpoint?]
CAT5 Pulls a favour from a guard to slip a note to the Nazi resistance. Cold. Dangerous. Two-faced with the guard. All smiles to his face. Coolly self-satisfied when he has gone.
Setup Getting notes to the Werwolves.
Payoff Act 4 Note unread and trampled unfoot at the end.
Henry PJ 20: Henry and the Catholic chaplain arrange family visits to try to get through to the Nazis.
CAT20 Overwhelmed by the German kids and the pro-Nazi poison they have been fed: their prayers to Hitler, their anti-Semitic schoolbooks. Holding on to kindness.
Setup Henry gives Goering’s daughter Edda a paint box. [Earlier?]
Payoff Act 3 – 4 She paints a picture for Pappi, which is the last thing he ever sees.
Turning Point 3 Henry’s confrontation with Goering fails, as does his efforts to reach him via his daughter. Goering’s arrogance is undiminished.
Henry PJ 21: Forced to face his failure and deny Goering communion. [Third or 4<sup>th</sup> Act?]
CAT21 Torn by the dilemma that when Goering finally asks for communion, what Henry has been working for all these months, he has to deny him. Revealing that he has finally learned tough love.
Fuller PJ 13: All is lost moment for Fuller, who takes bets on how many Nazis will hang. His racist sergeant stakes his motherlode on 11. Looks like he’s called it right. But how will Fuller pay? Realises he’s running a dreadful risk.
CAT13 Overdoes it with his betting on how many Nazis will hang. For the first time, fearful for the consequences of his recklessness.
ACT 4
Confrontation with Goering, execution of the Nazis, Resolution.
Henry PJ 22: Henry’s last-ditch go-for-broke confrontation with Goering fails. He loses his temper and fears he may have blown it.
CAT22 Fury with Goering. Reprise of his finger-curling desire to kill, swallowed down and internalised in a way that brings him close to collapse.
Goering AJ 6: Final refusal to recognise the truth about himself and accept responsibility.
CAT6 Tearful over his daughter’s painting, but devastated over realising he has been cheated by a forger.
Henry PJ 23: But Henry’s other efforts pay off. He finally gets through to some of the Nazis, who denounce Hitler and take responsibility.
CAT23 Final go-for-broke confrontation with Goering fails. Henry believes it is because he has lost his temper and pushed Goering too hard. Reveals his self-doubt.
Goering AJ 7: Goering commits suicide.
CAT7 Determined and defiant, deceiving the guards about his cyanide capsule. Giving himself his martyr’s death, rather than be hanged as a criminal.
Climax: Henry and the doctor are unable to save Goering, but with the minds concentrated by their imminent execution some Nazis finally accept responsibility and make their peace. Ten Nazis go to the gallows.
Henry PJ 24: Henry accompanies them to the scaffold – almost triggering a heart attack.
CAT24 Almost has a heart attack as he accompanies the men he has served to the scaffold. Paying a huge personal cost to have cared for them for almost a year, and now to see them die. Hugely moved by the final words of those who have responded to his ministry.
Setup The experienced hangman botches the hangings. Why?
Payoff Act 4, Fuller talked woods into botching the hangings to get revenge for the murder of his buddy at Malmedy.
Fuller PJ 14: Only ten Nazis hang, so the Sergeant loses his bet – which means he is coming for Fuller. Amps up his game on the black market.
CAT14 Hustles Russian soldiers to try to get money. Upping the risk. Getting in deeper.
Setup Fuller is reckless over taking bets on the hangings.
Payoff Act 4, Overreaches and almost gets himself killed
Fuller PJ 15: Fuller is confronted by his racist sergeant in an alley in Nuremberg. Brannigan has had Fuller’s white girlfriend beaten and plans to cut Fuller with a knife. Fuller overcomes Sgnt Brannigan and almost kills him. The memory of Henry putting his life on the line at Dachau holds Fuller back from committing murder. He goes on the run.
CAT15 Beaten up by his racist sergeant, who has attacked his white girlfriend and now wants to cut him down to size. Lifts a sidearm, just like he did in Dachau, and confronts the Sergeant. Thinks back to that scene in Dachau, sees the face of his father-figure, Henry Gerecke, telling him not to shoot. Instead, shoots the sergeant in the ear, sparing his life.
Goering AJ 8: The atrocities revealed at the trial have demoralised the Nazi resistance who melt away. Goering’s body is cremated and his effigy burnt in Nuremberg – the Nazi legend is broken.
CAT8 A straw effigy of his bloated body mocked and burned by kids in Nuremberg – the same kids Goering expected to come to his rescue.
Resolution: Henry goes home to be reunited with wife and family. Resumes prison ministry. Fuller court-martialled and jailed. Henry pulls strings to make Fuller his assistant in Menard. Fuller and Henry reconciled. Fuller learns to show mercy. Makes peace with himself. Henry dies. Fuller released to attend his memorial. Completes his story with a where-are-they-now roundup.
Fuller PJ 16: Fuller is transferred to Menard as Henry’s assistant, back at the piano. He learns to give and receive mercy, and is reconciled to Henry and himself.
CAT16 Post-war, back behind bars in Menard with Henry. Still playing the piano hot. Older and wiser, he finally learns to forgive his father and find reconciliation.
Henry PJ 25: Restored to his family, resumes his ministry, hugely popular, thanks to his compassion, humour and hot trombone. Reconciled to Fuller. [Need to develop Henry’s sense of humour.]
CAT25 Joy at being reunited with his family. Resuming a popular prison ministry at Menard. Still funny, still warm, still playing his trombone hot – and finally achieving reconciliation with Fuller.
Fuller PJ 17: To get revenge on the Nazis he tells the hangman they murdered his buddy at Malmedy. So the hangman botches the killings.
CAT17 Flashback. Vindictively gets the hangman to botch the executions, consummating his desire for revenge.
Henry PJ 26: Dies in Resolution scene – heart attack. Honoured in Menard by prisoners, including Sam Fuller.
CAT26 Heart attack at the wheel of his car.
Fuller PJ 18: Fuller completes his account to the parole board. They buy his story, would have done the same to his sergeant. They release him from jail.
CAT18 Persuades the Parole Board to buy his story that the shooting was justified. They see it his way as a racist attack and attempted mutilation. Released.
Fuller PJ 19: Attends Henry’s memorial, where he plays the organ – hot.
CAT19 Plays the organ hot at Henry’s funeral.
Fuller PJ 20: Wrap-up scene with reporter years later, explaining where are they now.
CAT20 Sardonic summing up of where everyone is all these years later. Sassy as ever.
Many thanks!
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Ron’s Reveals!
VISION: I want the success and recognition of being an in demand, A-list screenwriter who writes successful films that are financially profitable, award winning and of enduring quality.
What I learned from doing this assignment is that in outlining the script a writer should always remember that, in a script, all actions have consequences
Act 1:
Set up At their 25<sup>th</sup> wedding anniversary, the godfather professes his love to wife of 25 years. Hard to live without her. Hopes they have 25 more.
Reveal: In an attempted assassination, the godfather’s wife is killed. Godfather survives.
Setup: The son responsible for the godfather’s security is busy having sex with a waitress at the wedding party.
Reveal: Attempted assassination. Mother killed. Son blamed.
Setup: Godfather relieves son of responsibility for his security
Reveal: Son plots revenge against his father
Setup Godfather is lonely, misses his wife
Reveal: Discovers Mail order bride services on Internet
Setup: Godfather cruises Internet
Reveal: Discovers Lucia, who reminds him of his wife
Set up: Lucia has abusive boyfriend
Reveal: Lucia accidently kills him
Setup: Lucia has always dreamed of going to America
Reveal: Godfather takes her there to marry her.
ACT 2:
Setup Lucia faces rigid reception in Mob
Reveal: All except Stefano the son who plans to seduce her and recruit her to his side
Setup: Consigliere, Godfather’s right hand man, does not trust son
Reveal: Consigliere discovers Lucia is having affair, tries to warn Godfather
Setup: Son tells Lucia it would be nice they could be together always
Reveal Suggests to Lucia they kill the godfather by poisoning him
Setup: Godfather is killing Lucia with kindness
Reveal: Lucia feels guilty and reneges on killing godfather.
Act 3
Set up: Son meets with rival godfather and they plan to ambush the godfather and kill him
Reveal: Godfather has a stroke, making him highly vulnerable to getting killed
Set up: Godfather’s mother over hears grandson planning godfather’s murder
Reveal: She warns Lucia.
Setup: Lucia hides the godfather from son
Reveal: Son finds where Lucia is hiding and goes to kill her.
Set up: Son findsLucia
Reveal Son tries to kill Lucia, but she kills him
ACT 4
Setup: Godfather recovers is recovering from stroke and is in no position to head mafia
Reveal: Godfather appoints Lucia acting head of the mafia. She is the only person he trusts..
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WIM2 – Dana’s Reveals
My Vision: I intend to perfect my skills to become a successful screenwriter, scripting acclaimed and profitable films, recognized by my peers, and living an adventurous life.
What I learned during this assignment:
Determining my setups forced me reconstruct my beat sheet, holding back information from my characters and the audience to heighten the intensity of the reveals.
GENRE: Thriller
Protagonist: Ruth Griffin
Antagonist: The Custodian
Supporting Character: Camila – Drug dealer’s girl friend
Key: AJ = Antagonist Journey; PJ = Protagonist Journey; SCJ = Supporting Character Journey
ACT 1: Ruth is kidnapped
SETUP 1 – Ruth PJ: Ruth revives in the bottom of a smelting pot trapped. She explores the pot to fathom her situation, searching for a way to climb out. There isn’t one.
Ruth PJ: Above her, a full moon peeks through the remnants of a rotting ceiling. She calls to someone for help, but only hears her echo. She yells louder, and frustrated, collapses, believing she is alone.
Custodian AJ: The Custodian reveals his presence. Ruth looks up to find him standing on the platform above her. For a long moment, he stands staring at here, saying nothing.
Ruth PJ: Ruth’s defiant. Frightened, Ruth screams at her captor demanding answers. She stresses her importance as a congressman’s wife.
INCITING INCIDENT: Proof of life.
REVEAL 1 – Ruth PJ: The Custodian drops her a newspaper for a proof of life photo and instructs her to hold how to hold it under her face. He uses a camera from his overalls to take the picture. Gives her thumbs up.
Deeper Layer: Ruth realizes she’s being held for ransom.
Ruth PJ: Ruth tries to bribe her way out. He listens but rejects the offer.
Custodian AJ 2: The custodian instructs her to be silent. He points to sign painted to the inside of the pot: “Shh! Be quiet. You’re not alone.”.
Ruth PJ: Defiant, Ruth screams for help until emotionally exhausted.
SETUP 2 – Custodian AJ: He listens to the last echo fade, then holds a finger to his lips “Shh.”
Ruth PJ: She nods, agreeing, too exhausted to fight. When she glances back, he’s vanished into the mill.
Ruth PJ: She spreads the newspaper like a blanket and leans against the side of the pot. She begins to cry. Her soft cries echo from the pot through the mill.
Deeper Layer: The Custodian is warning Ruth that she’s in danger and to keep quiet.
Ruth PJ: Resting, she wakes up to hear two cars roll into the mill.
Ruth PJ: Excited at first, Ruth remembers the sign warning her to keep quiet. She hesitates.
Camila SCJ: Gang members exit the cars. Camila and her boyfriend, Bosa, climb from the cars with Bosa’s henchmen. They drag another man from the back seat, badly beaten. He’s an informer.
Camila SCJ: Camila, holding Bosa’s pet Rottweiler, is forced to watch as Bosa and his men torture the informer to learn who he’s been talking to. Camila winces at the brutality, not wanting to look.
REVEAL 2 – Ruth PJ: Ruth, listening, realizes it’s a street gang come to kill one of their own. She’s in danger. She hears the man tortured, screaming in agony. Her breathing becomes panicked.
Ruth PJ: Ruth’s breathing echoes to the Rottweiler’s ear, and the dog breaks from Camila’s grasp and charges off to find the source of the breathing.
Camila SCJ: Camila chases the dog to the platform overlooking the smelting pot and finds Ruth.
Ruth PJ: Discovered, fearing for her life, Ruth begs Camila not to expose her to the others.
Camila SCJ: When asked what she sees, Camila, having watched the informant tortured, says nothing. She rejoins Bosa the gang.
Ruth PJ: Ruth hears Bosa kill the informant, and the drug gang climb into their cars to leave.
Camila SCJ: Camila looks to the smelting pot wondering about Ruth. She puts the dog in the car, joins her boyfriend, and the cars drive out, leaving the informant’s body.
Ruth PJ: Ruth collapses, horribly distraught.
Custodian AJ: He been watching from the shadows smoking a cigar, armed with a .45 automatic, looking after Ruth. He appears above her again to emphasize quiet.
Turning Point 1: Ruth agrees, understanding the danger surrounding her.
Deeper Layer: The Custodian is keeping her alive. Why?
ACT 2: Ruth learns to survive.
SETUP 3 – Custodian AJ: The Custodian texts Ruth’s husband the proof of life photo demanding a $2M ransom. Ruth’s husband agrees to pay, he has the money, but he needs time, etc. Typical police stalling tactics.
Ruth PJ: A rattle snake, pursuing a rat, falls into the smelting pot. Ruth rolls-up the newspaper and uses her shoe to swat at the snake. When the snake strikes the newspaper, its fangs get stuck. Ruth grabs the tail and swings, slamming the snake into the side for the pit until it’s dead.
Ruth PJ: When Ruth flings the snake out of the pot, it sails past a grimy-looking derelict standing on the platform watching her. Realizing this moment is an opportunity to escape, Ruth begs him for help, first warning him about the Custodian.
Derelict SCJ: He keeps asking questions, none too concerned about the Custodian, who doesn’t seem to be present. He calls out proving they’re alone. He seemingly decides to help and locates and lowers an old ladder down to her.
Ruth PJ: Ruth is shocked when he climbs down, intending to assault her. Ruth fights him off, but he knocks her down. Injured, on the ground, she backs away until she is pinned against the pot.
Custodian AJ: He appears from nowhere and ropes the derelict around the neck. He yanks hard and pins the derelict against the inside of the pot, strangling him. He loops the rope over a high pully and heaves. Inch by inch, the derelict is lifted off his feet until his struggling stops.
Derelict SCJ: He is left hanging by the neck above the pot.
Ruth PJ: Reluctantly, Ruth thanks the Custodian for saving her. Then blames him for her being there!
Custodian AJ: He vanishes again. He drops a blanket and a bottle of water drop into the smelting pot.
Deeper Level: The Custodian must keep her alive until paid, then she can be left to die.
Ruth PJ: Ruth, curled up in the blanket, softly sings a Bible hymn. It echoes through the mill.
Custodian AJ: The Custodian hears the singing and listens and, for a moment, has second thoughts. Then he’s contacted by Ruth’s husband. He wants to renegotiate the deal. The insurance company is causing problems. But the Custodian knows it’s a lie.
REVEAL 3 – Custodian AJ: Ruth’s husband has conspired with the Custodian to kidnap and kill Ruth for the $2M insurance money.
Deeper Level: The Custodian cannot trust Ruth’s husband to honor the deal.
Ruth PJ: Nearly asleep, Ruth awakes up at the sound of another car entering the mill. She tries to hide, plastering herself against the wall of the pot, until she realizes, Camila has returned. She warns Camila about the Custodian
Camila SCJ: Camila has returned out of curiosity, but the derelict is hanging in the rafters frightens her, and she tries to flee.
Ruth PJ: Ruth begs Camila for help, convincing her to drop her cell phone for Ruth to call the police. Before Ruth can use the phone —
Custodian AJ: The Custodian kills Camila and drops her body into the smelting pot.
Ruth PJ: Ruth wraps Camila in the blanket, trying to keep her from dying. Camila succumbs to her wounds. Ruth crumbles emotionally, apologizing to Camila for killing her.
Camila SCJ: Camila is dead.
SETUP 4 – Custodian AJ: The Custodian demands Camila’s phone, which Ruth throws at him in a rage. He breaks it. Then uses his own phone to make a call. He holds it up for Ruth to hear her husband answer the call.
REVEAL 4 – Ruth PJ: Ruth realizes her husband is involved in her kidnapping when he answers the call, instantly enraged that the Custodian called him, revealing his involvement in the kidnapping. She screams at him, and he hangs ups.
Custodian AJ: The Custodian walks away. He sends a text to Ruth’s husband demanding full payment, threatening to release Ruth. The husband agrees to the $2M, but Ruth must die. Money first.
Deeper Level: Ruth knows she’s going to be killed.
MIDPOINT: Ruth’s escape plan
Custodian AJ: The Custodian climbs into his car and leaves to collect the ransom.
Ruth PJ: Hearing the Custodian leave, Ruth decides she must find a way to escape.
SETUP 5 – Ruth PJ: She finds Camila’s car keys and realizes Camila’s car is parked in the mill.
Ruth PJ: She sits Camila’s body against the side of the pot and uses her as a step stool to reach the edge. But she can’t quiet reach.
Ruth PJ: She removes her shoe and tries to hook the heel over the edge. But the heel snaps off, and she falls hard into the pot. Bruises and battered, she tries again, hooking her other shoe to lift her enough to grab the edge with her free hand. She pulls herself up and straddles the edge, but she can’t reach the platform.
Ruth PJ: She slides down the edge where she can reach the hanged derelict and climbs onto his body. She swings herself over to the platform and, landing hard, she lays there, exhausted from the effort. She notices that she broke and nail and begins to laugh until she cries.
Ruth PJ: She hears the Custodian’s car return and flees, barefoot, into the shadows of the mill.
Custodian AJ: Finds Ruth has escaped. He examines how she escaped.
Deeper Level: He supplied the means of her escape.
Custodian AJ: He drops the duffle back of ransom money on the platform, scans the mill. He knows she’s hiding somewhere. He draws his knife and backs into the shadows, searching for Ruth.
Deeper Layer: He must kill Ruth to prevent the conspiracy with her husband from being revealed.
Ruth PJ: She winds her way through the mill to Camila’s car. She sees the Custodian meld into the dark and makes her way around the mill in her bare feet.
REVEAL 5 – Ruth PJ: From the shadows, she creeps out into the moonlight to the car. Trying the door handle, the Rottweiler lunges at Ruth from behind the driver window, knocking her back. She can’t use the car.
Custodian AJ: Hearing the dog bark, the Custodian emerges and chases after Ruth.
CLIMAX: Ruth fights for her life
Ruth PJ: Ruth flees into the mill. The dog noses the door open and breaks from the car, chasing after her. Ruth runs up a ladder, the dog in pursuit. She grabs and pipe and swings, striking the dog.
SETUP 6 – The dog yelps and limps away.
Custodian AJ: The Custodian is coming up the ladder.
Ruth PJ: Ruth ducks into the shadows again, waiting with the pipe in ambush. She strikes, knocking the Custodian down. But when she swings to finish him off, he grabs the pipe and yanks it from her.
Ruth PJ: Ruth runs off. Crossing the catwalk, her bare foot digs into something sharp, and she falls, crying out.
Custodian AJ: Wounded, the Custodian climbs to his feet and gives chase.
Ruth PJ: Ruth limps to her feet, running as a fast as she can. When she realizes she cannot escape, she decides to fight or die.
Ruth PJ: Cornered on the platform above the smelting pot, Ruth fights him off, jabbing at him with a piece of sharp metal, slicing him once. He slaps her down and readies his knife.
REVEAL 6 – Custodian AJ: The Rottweiler charges from nowhere, slamming into the Custodian. He stabs at the dog, wounding it, but trips over the ransom money and falls from the platform. He lands headfirst in the smelting pot.
SETUP 7 – Ruth PJ: Ruth peers over the edge at the Custodian laying on his back.
Custodian AJ: The Custodian is dead.
Ruth PJ: Ruth has survived. She finds the Custodian’s cell phone in the bag of money and calls police.
RESOLUTION: Ruth gets her revenge
SETUP 8 – Ruth PJ: Ruth sits in the back of the ambulance, waiting to be taken to the hospital. The Rottweiler sits next to her bandaged. It’s her dog now.
REVEAL 8 – Ruth PJ: Ruth’s husband arrives feigning concern. When he joins her in the ambulance, Ruth reveals the Custodian’s cell phone containing text messages to her husband. She smiles sadistically and pets her new dog.
Deeper Level: Ruth is now in charge.
Custodian AJ: The police investigate. They retrieve the girl’s body from the smelting pot and lower the derelicts body from the rafters. But when the rescue team is ordered to retrieve the Custodian body, he’s vanished from the smelting pot.
REVEAL 7 – Custodian AJ: The Custodian has escaped.
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Lynn Vincentnathan’s Reveals!
VISION: I am determined to become a great screenwriter capable of getting my screenplays in various genres produced into movies that inspire vast audiences to mitigate climate change.
I LEARNED I already had a lot of setups & reveals from previous lessons, but some reveals needed better setups. This lesson made me try to find better setup and reveals. Many setups/reveals here are fairly minor (some included for the humor due to it being a RomCom), but I include them for my future reference in writing the script. Also are the 3rd type (the setups give us hints so that it suddenly makes sense when the reveal shows up) and I need more of the 1st and/or 2nd type (these two oppose each other, shocking us, or the setups mislead us, creating a surprise). Another thing, some of my setups are simultaneously revealed to the audience, but not to the other character.
HIGH CONCEPT: WEATHERING IT (Rom-Com) is about two college students who try to overcome family fights about global warming and get married during the worst ever Texas freeze.
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ACT 1: Ellie and Jim meet and are attracted to each other, issues regarding their uncles arise.
SETUP 1: Ellie doesn’t want rsomantic involvement; hint she despairs of eco-doom.
SETUP 2a: Ellie has some sort of relationship with Gecko.
SETUP 2b: Jim seems interested in a difficult sex conquest.
SETUP 3: The weather’s very hot for Spring, hints a global warming.
SETUP 4: Ellie doesn’t think she can set up a trip to the off-grid farm.
SETUP 5a: When a denialist raises the issue of the unusual Texas freeze several years ago (by way of denying global warming), this foreshadows the bitter freeze and power cut in the 4th Act, and the surprising argument that it is made more like because of global warming.
SETUP 6: Jim has education in alt energy and is very interested in the off-grid farm trip; Ellie is more interested in Jim because of that.
REVEAL 4: Ely hates people, is a very difficult person, had problems with last year’s off-grid farm trip, which is why Ellie thought she couldn’t convince him.
SETUP 7: Something must have happened to make Ely into a bitter recluse beyond last year’s trip.
SETUP 8: Ellie has a commitment to live with Ely and help with his projects after college.
REVEAL 6 & 8: Ellie may be interested in Jim because of her commitment to Ely and his project and thinks Jim can help.
SETUP 5b: When the same (or another) person raises the issue of the unusual Texas freeze and the host speaks of how they had to rescue 1000s of cold-stunned turtles, this foreshadows the final scene.
SETUP 1b: Gecko says that’s not why Ellie didn’t get involved with him, it’s another reason (mystery).
SETUP 9: Jim pockets a perfect blue shell.
INCITING INCIDENT (Cute-Meet): Jim and Ellie kiss, awakening her passion.
REVEAL 2 & 9: Jim finds out his pastor is Ellie’s Uncle Rudy, asks Ellie to be his shell, kisses her, asks her to pray; he considers her more than a sex conquest.
SETUP 9 continued: Ellie wonders if Jim needs some kind of protection, Jim doesn’t deny that.
REVEAL 1: Rudy mentions Ellie’s father abandonment (and father leaving mother), which seems to be at least one reason she doesn’t want involvement, doesn’t want to hurt others or be hurt, maybe also why she feels all is doomed.
REVEAL 6: It is becoming obvious that Ellie is attracted to Jim though she still denies it, but seems she has ulterior motives re him.
TURNING POINT 1 (Ellie’s Denial of Love):
SETUP 11: They talk in generalities about the future, but do not reveal their plans/obligations.
ACT 2 (overwhelming attraction): They go from “situationship” to “dating” to planning to marry.
SETUP 12a: Jim has some major obligation to Fred.
SETUP 12b: Jim says he loves the RG Valley and would like to live here after college, but– (interrupted by another call).
SETUP 13: Ely hates Fred Higson, but why?
SETUP 12b continued: Jim loves Ely’s farm, it’s his dream place.
REVEAL 13: Fred hates alt energy and environmentalism — maybe that’s why Ely hates him, but it seem there’s more.
SETUP 15: When Jim broaches the possibility of marrying, Fred is against marriage.
REVEAL 2b: Mack thought Jim was only after a sex conquest, but it doesn’t ring true to audience now, only to Ellie.
REVEAL 2a: Ellie is just a friend to Gecko (as stated in beginning), but Jim now thinks otherwise.
REVEAL 2a & 2b to each other: They clear up other man, other woman misunderstandings.
END OF ACT 2 – MIDPOINT (Break up over differences): Planning the wedding, break up over guest list.
REVEAL 8, 11, 12 played out: The break up over all their opposing plans and obligations revealed to each other, though the audience has known and worried about this incompatibility for many beats.
SETUP 16: Ely was an alcoholic and ruins weddings.
SETUP 17: Ellie expresses hatred for Fred’s business.
SETUP 18: Jim expresses disdain for environmentalism (tho he seemed to be in it earlier, maybe to please Ellie)
SETUP/REVEAL 1: Ellie may suffer a wound from father abandonment.
ACT 3: Knowing they are in love, they try to work it out.
REVEAL 1: Ellie suffers a wound from father abandonment.
SETUP 19: Luz gets some idea re Ellie saying turtles going extinct, especially male turtles.
REVEAL 19: Someone, probably Luz, is spreading a rumor about CC making men go extinct.
REVEAL 19: Someone, probably Luz, is spreading a rumor about CC making men go extinct.
REVEAL 19: It was Luz who spread the rumor about CC making men go extinct.
REVEAL 17: Ellie is trying hard not to express her hatred for Fred’s business.
REVEAL 1: Ellie’s father abandonment wound underlies her eco-despair, but makes her open now to risking marriage and fate in Houston and with denialist Fred in her life — the very type of thing she feared the most — since she’s had to “weather” her wound all her life and this has strengthened her.
SETUP 20: Jim feels more than ever he needs to change Fred. Ellie is wondering how that can happen. They both think it’s hopeless.
REVEAL 8, 11, 12 played out differently 1: RE Ellie and Jim’s opposing plans/obligations Ellie now understands and accepts Jim’s obligation and the problem with Ely and is maturing to take on a more complex role of being helpful and supportive to Jim, being his shell.
TURNING POINT 3 (break up over differences 2):
REVEAL 8, 11, 12 played out differently 2: RE Ellie and Jim’s opposing plans/obligations Jim thinks he’s harming Ellie, gutting her dreams and plans by bringing her into his constrained and controlled world, figures it’s HIS Faustian deal with Fred, not hers, so he wants to free her and backs out of getting married.
REVEAL 8, 11, 12 played out differently 3: RE Ellie and Jim’s opposing plans/obligations Ellie comes back strong saying she will make it work — both their plans/obligations and life pursuits — or die trying.
REVEAL 17: Ellie tells Fred her disdain for his business in a reasonable way and suggests it become more eco-friendly.
ACT 4 CLIMAX: A severe freeze and power cut throughout Texas makes it impossible for them to wed.
REVEAL 8 to Ely: Ellie lets Ely know she won’t be living with him after marriage, but will do what she can to help and that Jim is also on board. They’ll come frequently for long visits.
SETUP 21: Guests’ cell phones get charged up.
SETUP 21: Guests’ cell phones get charged up.
REVEAL 3 & 5: The severe freeze is due to global warming.
REVEAL 16: Ely, along with Fred, is ruining this wedding, but not due to being drunk.
REVEAL 7, 12, 13, 14, 15: Ely is not only against Fred because he’s anti-environment, but mainly because Fred stole his love, and that’s why Ely is also against marriage and was an alcoholic. And Fred is also against marriage because she left him too.
REVEAL 12: Jim owes Fred nothing and is free to pursue his own dreams.
REVEAL 8 & 12: Jim and Ellie will be able to fulfill commitments/obligations to both uncles.
RESOLUTION (reuniting in love): Ely overcomes his bitterness and forgives Fred. Both uncles bless the wedding, and the couple can now happily marry.
REVEAL 20: Cell phones interrupt the wedding after vows but before kiss with call to duty to the turtles.
REVEAL 5b: the turtles are cold-stunned and all must go out to rescue them.
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Module 4, Lesson 6 – What to Reveal and When
Subject: Rob Ingalls’ Reveals!
MY VISION:
To be a Talented writer that delivers quality fast, with the film industry seeking me out.
WIL: I had done the reveals and most setups prior to this lesson
Simon La’Rouche – Protagonist Journey (PJ)
Harris Blackwood – Antagonist Journey (AJ)
BEGINNING / OPENING ACT (Strange, interesting significant heist jobs with numerous players)
SETUP-R1: MONTAGE: Thieves steal various items: Jewelry, cars, gold bars, cryptocurrency, airplanes, yachts, etc. Cool beginnings of an Action flick. Some thieves wear black skintight clothes, gloves, mask. Others in dark cyber rooms. Others in fake uniforms – Ship Captain, Executive Pilot.
SETUP-R1: Harris – AJ 1, Instructor at academy (its ‘Grand Heist Academy’ but we won’t know for a while that it’s connected to the film’s Opening), walks daily past glass trophy case with Top Academy [Thief] trophy (we don’t know it’s a thief academy yet) with Simon’s name on it. There’s pain because he feels he should have won.
SETUP-R1: Harris – Action, Welcomes New Students to Academy. [we don’t yet know its for thieves or connection to Opening Scene]. Discusses grades, courses (General Education for 1<sup>st</sup> year: Math, History, Physics, Psychology]
Harris – AJ 1a, helps new students with challenging problems: Math, Physics, Psychology, Technical. Has eyes for female instructor (who she eyes Simon). Stares at trophy in glass case, wishful that his name was on it. Student walks by “too bad your name not on it, eh?”
Harris – Action, in fantasy thoughts, Harris breaks glass case, grabs trophy and smashes it. Then back to reality, he walks away, sad.
Simon – Action, is at Children’s Hospital doing magic tricks for cancer kids. He checks time, gotta go. Kids ask for one more trick, which he obliges. As he leaves, we notice the hospital ward is named after his brother who died when they were younger. Simon is alone when he leaves, drives off in expensive super car. Wears no ring. He’s lonely.
SETUP-R1: Simon – PJ 1, arrives at Academy. He’s the guest speaker at class graduation. He’s also the Academy’s top graduate. He is the only one to win the SPEC CHALLENGE (aka Kobayashi Maru (aka Star Trek’s Captain Kirk challenge)
Simon – Action, pops his head in a classroom, spies Harris teaching. Friendly greeting. They were classmates at academy years ago.
Simon – PJ 2, arrogantly teases Harris, rubs it in that he won, and Harris came in second. But Simon holds a deep secret. When alone, deep inside, he’s mad at himself for teasing Harris.
Harris – Action, heads off for lunch, clips Simon’s car in parking lot. Puts a dent on it.
SETUP-R1: Students finish their Senior Project, no failures. All are ready for Graduation.
REVEAL-R1: We learn they are doing final exam Senior Project in various fields for GRAND HEIST ACADEMY prior to graduation. This looks serious for an academy of thieves. We NOW learn this is an academy for thieves. We see thieves from Opening and realize they are students ready to graduate, to go out into the world as thieves.
They are seated in auditorium, ready to listen to pep talk from Simon.
Simon – Action, walks on stage. Announces to audience that if they want their wallets back, to please see him in the rear of auditorium to get it back. Students/Audience check their pockets. Gone/Missing. In the rear is an assistant with a box filled with wallets. The audience gasps, the claps.
Simon – PJ 3, gives pep talk commencement speech at graduation. He also tells them it’s time for him to retire. The audience moans.
INCITING INCIDENT: (Students challenge Simon to one last heist, to show off his skills.)
The class president, with student backing, challenges Simon to one last heist: Steal his weight in gold from city museum without getting caught and without the museum knowing, even after it has been stolen.
Simon – PJ 4 & Action, hesitates, makes excuses as to why he shouldn’t do the challenge.
Harris- AJ 2, likes the challenge and pushes Simon to accept challenge.
TURNING POINT-1
Harris – AJ 3 & Action, double dog dares Simon to accept the student’s challenge.
Simon – PJ 5, accepts challenge. He has no choice.
ACT-2 (Simon tries basic textbook approaches, nothing unique)
Simon – PJ 6a, uses school database to locate various experts in heist job. This is a cool device to match skills with crime heist.
Harris – Action, teaches younger students the basics, mid-level, and maybe senior level skills for thieves. They watch Simon, via technology, on his efforts and use it to learn and discuss.
Harris – Action, hacks into database, changes ratings on various experts so that Simon picks the WRONG assistants.
SETUP-R2: Simon – PJ 6, tries textbook approaches to steal the gold but fails. Simon appears to be a fish-out-of-water with heist challenge. He makes feeble attempts and flails/fails. Simon struggles to do simple heist and fails and we wonder why.
Students watch via cameras and other tech gear. Like watching a chess match. Lots of comments from the peanut gallery. We see Graduates and 1<sup>st</sup> year students watching same thing.
SETUP-R2: Harris – Action, pays a student to make disparaging comments in front of others.
Harris – AJ 4, is determined to block Simon from achieving challenge and to prove to school that he’s better at this than Simon, and that he (Harris) should have won trophy.
SETUP-R2: Harris – Action, for each effort Simon makes to meet challenge, Harris throws a monkey wrench into Simon’s plans.
Simon – PJ 7 & Action, Old ways don’t work. He tries jewelry heist but too many motion detectors and floor pressure plates. Large gold statue housed with less security: nobody can steal it. He tries to have a crane remove statue but too large, even with David Blain magician (or other famous magician) help (hide an elephant).
Harris – Action, smoke and mirrors don’t work. Mirror gets paint splattered and we realize the ruse.
Simon, Harris – Action, for every approach by Simon, Harris uses a counterapproach behind the scenes to deter Simon. Each time it makes Simon stronger, but in beginning we wonder why Simon sucks at heist jobs.
SETUP-R2: The entire 1st half of movie is Simon struggling to be a thief. Harris also focuses on disrupting Simon, so we wonder if that’s the reason for Simon’s blunders. But with Simon, everything has been a lie. Apparently, he is good at deceit, but we still like him. But he’s really just an average thief.
TURNING POINT-2 / MIDPOINT
Harris – AJ5, turns up the heat to defeat Simon.
Harris – Action, has his intern make claim that Simon is a fraud.
REVEAL-R2: Audience realizes Simon isn’t what they think he is. More of a fraud. He sucks at heist jobs. He’s scared, insecure, fish out of water. At school, he should have failed his final exam project for “cheating”, though Simon would say he was creative.
Harris – Action, confronts Simon to get to the truth. Simon ignores Harris.
Simon – PJ 8, determines to change and become what everyone expects of him. He’s ready to take unique challenges, is bold.
ACT-3
Simon – PJ 9, rethinks and creates new plan. He has insights into why old ways don’t work and that HE must change. New plan: Tunnel underneath and hollow out large gold statue, keeping the frame intact and no one suspects inner gold stolen.
Simon – PJ 10, begins tunnel. Goes back to academy database for tunnel experts.
Harris – AJ 6, sweats, thinks that Simon may have solved challenge.
Harris – AJ 6a, creates numerous hazards in tunnel, even trying to collapse it.
Simon PJ 10a, almost dies when tunnel collapses.
TURNING POINT-3
Harris – AJ 7, contacts local police and FBI. Gets Simon arrested for tunneling and human trafficking/drug mule, BUT NOT Gold heist. So, Simon is still in the running to win challenge.
Simon says he stumbled upon the tunnel. He didn’t build it. He has fake credentials and says he owns a catering food business (his made-up job).
Simon – Action, escapes from jail. Uses techniques from academy.
REVEAL-R3: Harris – AJ 8, hears for first time Simon stating that he shouldn’t have been top thief, that he (Simon) cheated on final project like the Star Trek Kobayashi Maru. But still Harris does not get recognition from school like he wants.
ACT-4 CLIMAX
Simon – PJ 11, completes the assignment challenge with flying colors. Simon solves the challenge despite the basic problems and the traps that Harris put forth.
Simon – Action, has melted out/hollowed out giant gold statue, leaving the outer shell that keeps statue propped up. Melted gold is more than Simon’s weight, thus fulfilling challenge.
RESOLUTION (Both Simon and Harris get what they wanted/desired/needed – Feel Good ending)
Simon – PJ 12, is STILL Top Thief but acknowledges that Harris should be considered top thief of previous graduating class.
Harris – AJ 9, gets his trophy in the glass case. Harris is given the Top Thief trophy (and Simon ‘s name removed) that he displays in academy’s main hallway. Harris has recognition that he’s always wanted.
FEEL GOOD: Both Simon and Harris get what they want and Simon has grown (inner) to be the person everyone thought he was.
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Joel Stern’s Reveals!
Module 4 Lesson 6
My vision: To write eight screenplays
that become Hollywood blockbusters and to have a speaking line in at
least one of them.What I learned from this assignment:
Placing surprising twists (with setups) in each of the four Acts.Act 1 Reveal: Protagonist Jim became an alcoholic while
fighting in WWII. This reveal takes place in the opening scene as he
reunites with his wife and son at the train station after returning
from Europe.Setup: A whiskey flask
drops from his back pocket when he bends down to hug hiswheelchair-bound son.
Reveal: Wife Jane has
cancer.Setup: She has an
occasional cough; leaves blood stain on bed sheet.Act 2 Reveal: Jim’s wartime
flashbacks begin and they’re fuzzy – he guns down four teens in a
French church and saves two wounded buddies but now it isn’t clear
to him if they were German soldiers or civilians (he won a Medal of
Honor for this).Setup: While on a hike
with his Cub Scouts, Jim hallucinates and “sees Krauts” in the
woodsjust like when he fought
in Europe. Kids are scared; parents demand he quit.Setup: Jim meets Carol
Newhouse, a local investigative newspaper reporter at a diner when
she “accidentally” drops change at the
cash register. They begin dating. Jim asks her to help him uncover
Sal’s identity.Act 3 Setup: Antagonist “Sal”, a
mobster harassing Jim with threatening phone calls to collect Jim’s
gambling debts seems to know too much about Jim and his his life
story.Setup: Jim sets up a
personal meeting with Sal but Sal fails to show up. Carol spies on
this event.Setup: For some strange
reason Jim is allowed to continue to gamble at the local casino where
he piled up big losses.Act 4: Reveal: At Jim’s hospital
bedside Carol reveals who she really is – an FBI agent
investigating Jim’s church shooting incident.Reveal: Carol tells Jim
“Sal” really was a ruthless mobster and didn’t show for the
meeting because he died twenty years ago. Sal’s threatening phone
calls were a figment of Jim’s imagination.Reveal: Jim is the one who
murdered his father and his boss when he was on a news assignment.
Jim was temporarily insane and killed them thinking they were German
officers.Reveal: Carol tells Jim
that his church shooting incident was indeed justified and the teens
he shot were in fact young German soldiers.Reveal: Jim was allowed to
gamble at the casino after receiving Sal’s threatening phone calls
because he imagined it.Story so far:
Act 1: Jim “Ace” McCarthy (25) steps off the troop train,
a WW II Medal of Honor winner finally home at war’s end. At the
platform he joins loving wife Jane (23), his high school
sweetheart) and 10-year-old son, in a wheelchair stricken with
Polio. Jim breaks down as he and Jane kiss – a rare outwardly
emotional moment for him.SETUP 1: As he bends down to hug Jim Jr., a whiskey flask falls
from his back pocket.SETUP 2: Jane has a nagging cough. Says she’s had it a while,
nothing to worry about.Inciting Incident: After spending months working low paying odd
jobs, Jim gets a high pressure job as TV Crime Reporter in Las
Vegas. His goal to “be the next Edward R. Murrow” is just
beginning.REVEAL 1: While Jane does dishes, Jim and his son eat
breakfast. Jim pours booze from a whiskey flask on his
cornflakes and hushes his son not to let mom know. Jim plays
poker with his buddies. But after another losing hand he tells
them a corny knock-knock joke and calmly leaves the table. In the
bathroom he punches a hole in the wall. Jim’s clearly a heavy
drinker.REVEAL 2: Jane’s doctor says she has cancer and has just weeks
to live. Jim’s about to be a young widower and lone parent of
his disabled son.Act 2: Jane dies. Stoic Jim takes a disciplined approach to
her death, suppressing deep sorrow in the process. Doesn’t shed
a tear at the funeral. Doesn’t even miss a day at work.SETUP 3: Jim volunteers to be a Cub Scout leader – son Jim
Jr.’s pack. He thinks getting fresh air in the countryside will
help him relax, think clearly.Turning Point 2 / Midpoint: Jane’s death, her medical bills,
Jim’s shady wartime past and pressure covering murder stories
turns him to a heavily drinking gambler. Big gambling debt
results in threatening phone calls from “Sal” a powerful
local mobster. Tells Jim he has ten days to pay or the murder
victim’s in his news reports will be family and friends.REVEAL 3: While on a hike with his Cub Scouts, Jim hallucinates
and “sees Krauts” in the woods just like when he fought in
Europe. For the first time we see Jim’s “heroic” act in a
flashback: Just after the Normandy invasion Jim and his platoon
advance through hedgerows to a old church. Locals point to the
church – Germans are inside about to blow it up. Jim and two
buddies approach…his pals are shot. Jim charges inside and guns
down four German soldiers behind the first pew. He approaches
and sees the damage – four dead kids. They weren’t Germans
after all. Or so he thinks.Act 3: Sal proposes a face-to-face meeting with Jim. Maybe
there are “other ways” for Jim to pay off his debt like
working for him.SETUP 4: Jim and his son are eating lunch at a local diner.
Carol Newhouse (25) drops a bunch of change while paying at the
register. Like a good soldier to the rescue, Jim picks up all
the coins. They strike up a conversation and set up a date. She
tells Jim she’s a reporter for the local newspaper. They begin
dating. Jim asks her for help finding “Sal” so he can expose him
and end his harassing collection phone calls. She agrees.Turning Point 3: Sal sounds completely
irrational. He changes course telling Jim he contracted a hit man to
kill him.REVEAL 4: Jim confronts his girlfriend. She’s really FBI agent
Susan Thompson. She’s investigating Jim to find out the real
story behind his WWII heroics. Is he a Medal of Honor winner or a
war criminal?Turning Point 3: Jim fails to pay his debt by the deadline. He’s
sent to cover a murder story. When he arrives he finds the
victim is his father.Act 4 Climax: Jim gets endless phone calls from Sal – every
hour on the hour – a joke followed by vicious threats. Carol
discovers Jim really didn’t commit war crimes – the boys he
shot in the French church really were Germans – young kids
the Nazi’s forced to fight late in the war. Jim is sent to another
crime scene and the victim is his boss.Resolution/Reveal At Jim’s hospital bedside Carol reveals who
she really is. She recaps his war crime – killing four teens
in a church he actually thought were German soldiers. But the
evidence shows they were indeed German soldiers – young kids –
and that he saved a village of innocent civilian from certain
death. But now he faces the murder of his father and his boss
who he hallucinated as being German officers. He also learns
that “Sal” was all in his head. He really was a mob boss
but died 20 years before. -
Subject: Monica’s Reveals!
Vision: I will continue to learn everything I can through all different media to apply what I learn to become the best screenwriter I can be. To be successful in getting my movies made and to win awards in the process.
What I learned from doing this assignment is I found it easy to put the set-ups/reveals into the outline rather than trying to add them when the first draft is finished.
What will you reveal?
The
artefact changes timelines.
That
Jay is an “alien” from the future trying to save humanity in the present
and the future.
Getting
away from the Divine has led humanity down this slippery slope.
The
artefact can only see to 2030 – this is because the future is malleable.
All
timelines happen simultaneously but will converge into one.
CERN
is disrupting the timelines with their experiments – future already
changed.
Who
set the fire that killed Conall’s family? (This is a question
throughout.)
Someone
has hacked the Elite’s bitcoin accounts and has stolen all their money.When will the set-ups and reveal show up in the story?
A. Set-up: That the artefact is being sold to Conall as a device needed to help humanity. (Beginning of Act 1)
Reveal: The artefact changes timelines. (Act 2)
B. Set-up: Conall holds a gun on Jay. (End of Act 1)
Reveal: Jay makes the gun melt. (Act 1)
C. Set-up: Jay needs ice cream so Conall takes him to a café. (Act 2)
Reveal: People worshipping their phones. (Act 2)
D. Set-up: The artefact is set up to a quantum computer. (Act 2)
Reveal: The artefact only shows the timeline to 2030. (Act 2)
E. Set-up: After set up the artefact shows many time streams. (Act 3)
Reveal: All timelines happen simultaneously. (Act 3)
F. Set-up: A hooded figures sits behind numerous computer screens. (Act 1)
Reveal: Harry is the hacker. (Act 3)
G. Set-up: Conall turned Harry down for the mission. (Act 1)
Reveal: Harry set the fire that killed Conall’s family. (Act 4)
H. Set-up: CERN steals the artefact. (Act 1)
Reveal: Conall finds his wife and kids alive – the timeline has changed. Jay did this for Conall. (Act 4)
4. Build all of those into your outline, making sure there are setups for each reveal and that you have reveals in every Act.
Title: TIME GUARDIANS
Genre: Action/Sci-Fi
Act 1: Conall makes a deal with the devil.
1. NEW: Harry meets Conall at Harry’s office. Harry pitches a mission to Conall. Conall declines. Action Conall: Abrasive – he knows all about Harry. Action Harry: Business-like but his sincerity doesn’t come through. Set-up G: Conall turns Harry down for the mission.
2. Conall’s house is on fire. He is prevented from getting to the house to save his family. Action Conall: Rage as he is prevented from getting to the house – fighting people trying to restrain him. In the background Harry – Action Harry: Cruel little smile on his face. Scheming. Lays flowers. Says a prayer. Cunning in a nice way towards Conall.
3. Conall meets Harry at the graveyard where they both are visiting their respective families’ graves. Action Conall: Resigned and respectful to his family. Lays flowers and small Irish flags. Recites an Irish poem. Action Harry: Respectful to his wife’s grave.
4. Conall and Harry go to the bar where Harry shows him a picture of the ancient artefact that can help humanity. Harry invites Conall to a meeting. Action Conall: Listens to Harry’s pitch. Action Harry: Cruel as he manipulates Conall by asking, wouldn’t you like to know who set the fire that killed your family? Set-up A: The artefact is being sold to Conall as a device needed to help humanity.
5. Meeting to discuss a mission where Conall meets with Harry and Jay-the-Alien. Also, present is four other men. Action Conall: Listens to the mission details. Exhibit’s self-control as Harry details his ruthlessness. Action Harry: Unmerciful as he details Conall’s ruthlessness in several missions he’s been on. Action Jay: Patience as he eats strawberry ice cream.
6. Conall accepts the mission to steal the artefact from the museum. He is to be accompanied by Jay. Action Conall: Inquisitive as he tries to understand what the mission is really about. Action Harry: Evasive as he doesn’t want to tell Conall about timelines. But he does transfer $10 million dollars for the op. Action Jay: Leaves with Conall. Explains how the artefact can change the timeline.
7. After Conall and Jay are gone, the other Elites know Harry grieves his wife. They tell him that if the mission fails he’s out. Action Harry: Violent towards the other men by pulling a gun and shooting each of the Elites in the knee-cap. He reminds them he is the only one intelligent enough to program the artefact the way they need it to be programmed.
8. NEW: Set-up F: A hooded figures sits behind numerous computer screens.
9. Conall and Jay set off to steal the artefact. Action Conall: Intrigued – by the fact this artefact can change the timeline. Action Jay: Co-operates with Conall.
10. Conall drives to the secret base he has set up for his security firm to gather his team. Action Conall: Leader – Conall is confident the team should be in and out in 5 days. Action Jay: Calm as he explores the base.
11. Jay tells Conall the artefact is not where the Elites think it is. Jay has already stolen it and set it up. Action Jay: Calm and Manipulative – he’s already stolen the artefact. Action Conall: Dangerous as he grabs Jay.
12. Conall asks Jay what his purpose is in the mission. Action Conall: Exhibits extreme self-control as he holds a gun on Jay. Action Jay: Calm as he pushes a button on his cuff bracelet and Conall’s gun melts. Then he tells Conall they must keep the artefact out of the hands of the Elite. Set-up B: Conall holds the gun on Jay. Reveal B: Jay makes the guns melt.
(Theme: good vs evil).
13. Conall, Jay and a few team members go to where Jay has set up the artefact. Action Jay: Confident he has found a decent human to help him as he unlocks the door. Action Conall: Adventurous as he follows Jay.
Inciting Incident: NEW Inciting Incident: When Conall and Jay arrive where Jay has hidden the artefact — it is gone.
14. Conall and Jay search the cave where Jay hid the artefact. Action Conall: Mean to Jay as he doesn’t believe Jay had the artefact. Action Jay: Resigned but he can show Conall he had it.
15. Conall and Jay review the security footage. Action Conall: Optimistic as he believes Jay and recognizes one of the thieves. Believes Jay was followed. Action Jay: Anger at the people who stole the artefact. Set-up H: CERN steals the artefact.
Turning Point: Scientists from CERN stole the artefact.
Act 2:
1. Conall meets Harry to tell him the artefact has been stolen. Action Conall: Determined to not let Harry bully him. Action Harry: Rage – he beats his car with his hands.
2. Conall tells Harry scientists from CERN stole the artefact first and they’re going to steal it back. Action Conall: Authoritative because he has a plan. Action Harry: Calmer asks Conall if he needs any more money to effect his plan. Conall declines.
3. Jay tells Conall he can get them into CERN. Conall demands to know what is so important about the artefact. Action Conall: Skeptical — he tells Jay it’s going to have to be a break-in. Action Jay: Peaceful as he pushes another button on his cuff bracelet and disappears. Then re-appears. Reveal A: The artefact changes timelines.
4. The Elite are furious with Harry because CERN stole the artefact. Action Harry: Calm as he puts his gun on the table and wants to know which one of them financed CERN to steal the artefact. (He may have to kill one of them to make a point!)
5. Conall tells Jay he will buy them airplane tickets to Geneva. Action Conall: Leader plans the trip. Action Jay: Tolerant – they don’t need a plane when you have a saucer!
6. Jay lands the saucer close to the CERN facility at night. Jay takes Conall’s arm and they disappear into the CERN facility. Action Conall: Adventurous as he lets Jay do Jay. Action Jay: Helpful as he uses his technology to recover the artefact.
7. Conall and Jay re-appear inside. Conall wants to know where they go from there. (What about security cameras?) Action Conall: Awestruck cause he’s a nerd. Action Jay: Decisive – checks his bracelet to get the direction of the artefact. He put a tracker on it.
8. Jay pushes buttons on his cuff bracelet, grabs Conall and they disappear. And re-appear where the artefact is. It is hooked up to a huge quantum computer. Alarms go off. Action Conall: Soldier mode. Kills a few scientists waiting for Jay. Action Jay: Focused on disconnecting the artefact from the quantum computer. Grabs the computer also. Set-up D: The artefact is needs a quantum computer.
9. Conall grabs Jay’s arm and they disappear. Action Conall: Trust in Jay. Action Jay: Responsible for the artefact and for Conall’s safety.
10. Conall and Jay return to the secret security base. Action Conall: Leader helps Jay with the computer and artefact. Action Jay: Happy but exhausted he collapses. Conall gives Jay a bowl of strawberry ice cream.
11. Set up the artefact. Action Conall: Determined to set up the artefact and the quantum computer. Action Jay: Peaceful, resting as he directs Conall what to do. Conall meets Harry. Action Conall: Authoritative they’ve recovered the artefact and are setting it up. Action Harry: Impatient he wants to be in on the action.
12. Searches Harry for weapons then blindfolds him and takes him to the secret base. Action Conall: Guarded he doesn’t trust Harry but he is paying the bills. Action Harry: Anticipation he can hardly wait to get his hands on the artefact.
13. Conall brings Harry in while Jay is programming the artefact. Action Conall: Confident. Action Harry: Reverent. Action Jay: Cooperates but is guarded.
14. Jay shows Harry how to ask the artefact a question. Action Conall: Guarded. Action Harry: Child-like wonder. Action Jay: Indifferent.
15. Harry looks at the answer, doesn’t like it. Tries again. Same answer. Action Conall: Abrasive stops Harry before he breaks it. Action Harry: Rage he yells and screams that Conall and Jay did something to the artefact. Action Jay: Anger throws Harry across the room without laying a finger on him.
Midpoint Turning Point: The artefact keeps giving the same answer –the timeline ends in 2030. Reveal D: The artefact only shows the timeline to 2030.
16. Conall returns Harry to their meeting place. Action Conall: Cruel tells Harry he knows what he’s trying to do and he’ll stop him. Action Harry: Violent rushes Conall only to get the butt of a gun to his head.
17. Harry gathers his group. Action Harry: Authoritative Conall and Jay must die and the artefact recovered so he can program it to give them the answer he wants.
18. Conall needs time to study the artefact to try and save his family. Action Conall: Obstructive. He disguises this with trying to figure out why it keeps giving the same answer.
19. Jay knows what Conall is trying to do he offers to help him but first he needs ice cream. Action Conall: Shame because he forgot the bigger picture. Action Jay: Compassion. He tells Conall who is responsible for the fire. Set-up C: Jay needs ice cream.
20. NEW: Conall brings Jay to a café and they order ice cream. Jay watches the people playing on their phones. Reveal C: People on their phones – this is what contributes to humankind’s downfall.
21. Jay knows the Elites are coming so he re-programs the artefact. Action Conall: Leader sends everyone to Jay’s cave. Action Jay: Destructive re-programs the artefact. Then leaves with Conall.
22. Harry leads an elite mercenary team to storm the bunker but Conall and Jay are gone. The artefact remains but displays the Elites future. Action Harry: Violent shoots one of the mercs.
Act 3:
1. Conall gathers his team in Jay’s cave. Action Conall: Leader plan the assault to get the artefact back.
2. Harry sets up the artefact but it keeps giving the same answer – the timeline ends in 2030. Action Harry: Desperate to reprogram the artefact to bring his wife back.
3. As Conall and the team are going to move out another group of “assassin’s” show up. Action Conall: Leader he leads the assault on the other assassins. Action Jay: Tolerant (why do humans always settle their affairs with violence?) presses a button on his cuff bracelet and all the assassin’s guns melt.
4. Take an “assassin” hostage. Learn he’s been hired by CERN to take back the artefact. Action Conall: Cruel as he interrogates the hostage. Action Jay: Peaceful as he lays his hands on the hostage’s head and gets the answers – the Elite hired CERN to steal the artefact.
5. NEW: The Elites come to Harry’s office. They tell him all their bitcoin accounts have been hacked. Harry kills them all. Reveal F: Harry is the hacker.
6. Conall and Jay find Harry alone at his house trying to program the artefact. Action Conall: Violent. Hits Harry over the head and knocks him out. Action Jay: Concerned for the artefact. Looks it over while Conall deals with Harry.
7. Jay works on the artefact while Conall ties Harry up. Action Conall: Leader dealing with the menace. Action Harry: Fragile breaks down sobbing because he couldn’t change the timeline. Action Jay: Frantic as he works the artefact. Set-up E: The artefact is showing many time streams.
8. Jay turns to Conall and Harry. Action Jay: Anger – Harry has done something to the artefact and it is acting strangely. Action Conall: Violent – hits Harry demanding to know what he did. Action Harry: Fragile sobbing as he gets beat up because he doesn’t know the answer. Reveal E: The artefact shows all timelines happening simultaneously.
Turning Point: Huge failure / Major shift: The Timeline has been changed but will it be for the better.
Act 4:
Climax:
1. Conall works on trying to re-program the artefact. But the Earth shakes splitting the artefact into two separate artefacts. Action Conall: Surprise he’s usually pretty good at the programming stuff. Action Harry: Coward he hides when the artefact shakes. Action Jay: Intrigued – it’s not supposed to do this.
2. A new timeline has emerged. But what does this mean? Which one is the real timeline? But then what is real? Action Conall: Adventurous as he stands before one timeline and then the other. Action Jay: Cautious as he gazes from one timeline to the other. Action Harry: Gleeful because he’s taking credit for it. And he thinks he’s won.
3. Harry’s group of hired guns show up. Harry tells Conall he set the fire that killed his family. Action Conall: Leader defends the timelines with his machine gun. Action Jay: Calm afterall he has the cuff bracelet of death. Reveal G: Harry set the fire.
4. The new timeline appears to give Harry the answer he finally wants. He shows the Elites their future. He orders the execution of Conall and Jay. Action Conall: Leader he shoots Harry in the head. Action Jay: Resigned as he pushes a button and the Elite’s guns melt.
5. Jay pushes another button on the second artefact and it merges back into one. A countdown begins. Action Conall: Surprised. Demands an answer from Jay. Action Jay: Cagey. Smiles. He must end these timelines to move forward.
Resolution:
6. Conall kills the Elite. Action Conall: Bang. Bang.
7. Harry and the Elites are dead.
8. NEW Conall and Jay the artefact into Conall’s vehicle. He drives by to show Jay where he lived. The house is there in one piece. Conall screeches to a halt.
9. NEW Conall races into the house where he finds his wife and kids making dinner. Reveal H: Conall finds his wife and kids alive – the timeline has changed. Jay did this for Conall.
10. Conall accompanies Jay to the portal where a ship awaits. Action Jay: Wise: Instructs Conall and to eliminate the remaining Elite to usher in a better world. Action Conall: Friendly. Hugs Jay and says goodbye.
11. The catastrophe has been averted. Action Conall: Inquisitive. What was the catastrophe? Action Jay: Instructive. The singularity where technology takes over and devastates civilization and the Earth.
-
Joyce’s Reveals
vision: to create memorable movie scripts that actors want to perform.
WIL: The questions I have about details can wait. The structure is more important.
“Cardenio Lost”
Genre: Action / Drama
ACT 1:
PJ. 1 Colin tries to avoid sexy Laurel in the library 800’s but she kisses him.
Reveal: Laurel pretends that Colin is her lover, a ploy which embarrasses him and flatters him, too.
PJ.2. A book falls on them from a high shelf.
PJ.3. Colin fumbles with books. and Laurel leaves with Champion who will help her pass the finals.
AJ. 4. Delaney appears after she witnesses the kiss and the book.
PJ. 5. Colin pulls several books from the shelves with Delaney dogging him.
PJ. 6 Colin tricks Delaney into an elevator, but he exits seconds before the doors close.
P. J. 7 Before class begins Fellow graduate students antagonize him.
Triangle: 8. Professor announces his forthcoming publication and hints that his manuscript will anger the current Shakespearean legacy advocates with the real truth about the authorship of Shakespeare’s plays.
Deeper Layer: Colin is against the argument the professor wants published., but he needs an assistant position the professor has open.
AJ. 9 Delaney feels the class should promote professor’s research.
PJ. 10 After a hot discussion about Champion’s proposed thesis concerning questions in Shakespeare’s plays, such as in Macbeth and Hamlet, Colin is attacked by Champion and overtly socks him.
PJ.11. Colin explains how Hamlet’s soliloquy is like a debate topic, such as “resolved a decline in global reliance on the dollar would help international economies” and did not mean what Champion proposes.
Triangle: When the class is over. Professor calls Colin into his office and offers him an associate position.
Reveal.
PJ. 12 Colin reads notes professor for the forthcoming manuscript and opposes the radical ideas in the publication.
PJ. 13 Colin asks for more time to decide and insure Colin’s PHD.
AJ. 14. Delaney overhears them and follows the professor to the library rare book section to confront him about his decision to give Colin an associate position.
AJ. 15 On the rare books floor Delaney argues with professor because he refuses to change his decision,
Triangle: Professor demands she must leave him alone to work on additional pages of his book.
AJ. 16 The only two there she steals his manuscript and stays in the next section away from professor,
AJ 17. She opens the manuscript, but it is blank.
TP. 18. As the air control that preserves the rare volumes hisses, the professor becomes unconscious.
PJ. 19. Colin goes to find the professor and discovers him and an incoherent Delaney.
PJ. 20 Colin drags her out from there, calls for help, and goes back for the professor.
INCITING INCIDENT:
21. The police suspect that Colin tampered with the air controls.
AJ. 22. Delaney witnesses that the manuscript is missing and that Colin may know where it is.
Triangle: 23. The professor is seriously impaired and can’t explain about the manuscript.
Deeper Level:
24. Police treat the affair as an accident with a faulty air control.
PJ. 25. Colin becomes the associate and finals will replace dissertations.
PJ. 26. Colin loses when the majority decides to investigate but none of them wants to give up finals to play detective, so they draw straws.
PJ. 27. The investigation will end his graduate studies.
Setup.
AJ. 28. Delaney fakes the next shorter straw to go with Colin after the manuscript, a real sacrifice since she dislikes him and what he believes.
Deeper Layer.
Reveal.
AJ. 29. She desperately wants the manuscript and has to pretend she is helping Colin, even though it will cause an uproar among Shakespeare’s followers, the tourism, and his legacy, she has to get the manuscript first.
PJ. 30. Colin ekes out information, from the ailing Professor to set up a way that they can get a clue.
Turning Point
PJ. 31. Colin rigs a contraption for the professor to signal “yes” or “no”.
PJ. 32. Colin chases a suspicious man but loses him.
Setup
AJ. 33. Delaney bumps into Colin and offers her help with the professor.
PJ. Colin questions if she saw the intruder.
Triangle. 34. Although the professor can’t write or speak, he can move his fingers.
PJ. 35. Colin accepts Delaney’s help, and they collect acrostics and other symbols for Professor’s clues to his attacker and his manuscript.
Deeper Level.
Setup.
Triangle. A 36. Answers can be found in an unpublished play “Cardenio”, which treasure seekers search for in Europe.
TURNING POINT. The grant money professor had will be used to find what they can about Cardenio in Europe.
ACT 2:
Inciting incident. 34. Colin and Delaney are stopped at the airport and lose their passports to authorities.
Deeper Level: They will not be able to return through legal immigration ports.
AJ: 37. Delaney pulls strings, with family ties and they sail to Europe on a barge.
They receive a warning that they will be apprehended at the dock.
Setup.
DJ and AJ. 36. They jump overboard.
AJ. 38. Holds on to one suitcase and loses a second one.
Reveal.
AJ. On shore she has lost her glasses and her hair is loosened, not like the dowdy student she portrayed but an attractive woman.
PJ. 39. Colin shares his shirts with her. and admits he cares more about Delaney than the Shakespeare legacy.
PJ.40. Setup. In Europe Colin sharpens his wits for they are being followed.
AJ. 41. Delaney pretends to care for Colin, and she kisses him, but she becomes aware of his good qualities.
Turning point
AJ. 42. Delaney promises to help find the manuscript, but after that she wants an equal playing field.
Reveal.
AJ. 43. Delaney meets Bragg secretly.
AJ. 44. Bragg is a more dangerous antagonist than she is and threatens to kill Colin.
AJ. 45. Delaney agrees to get him the manuscript to save Colin.
AJ. 46. Setup. Delaney sabotages their secrecy.
PJ. 47. After Colin finds a family who have information passed down about “Cardenio” and three other plays never printed in a folio, he shares with Delaney.
DEEPER LEVEL REVEAL:
AJ. 48. Delaney confesses she isn’t a struggling graduate student, but from an aristocratic background.
Turning Point
PJ: 49.:Colin figures out clues to the manuscript sent to professor’s contact in Europe.
AJ. 50. Delaney steals it and tells Colin she knows what the professor has discovered.
Act 3:
Deeper Reveal
PJ. 48. Colin learns that In Delaney’s family tree are aristocrats and noblemen as ancestors who may be the real authors of Shakespeare’s works, but she may die for it.
AJ. 49. Delaney hides the manuscript,.
#2 AJ. 50; The real antagonist, the attacker, kidnaps Delaney.
AJ. 51. Delaney promises to share Cardenio with him.
PJ. 51. In the lowlands of the Alps, Colin picks up Delaney’s trail.
AJ. 52. Delaney tricks the attacker and leaves clues for Colin to reach her.
Turning point :
PJ. 53. Colin fights Bragg and rescues Delaney.
AJ. 54. Bragg tracks them and confronts Delaney on a train.
PJ. 55. Colin fights Bragg to save Delaney and the manuscript.
AJ. 56. Bragg pulls a gun on Colin.
AJ. 57 Delaney tears open the manuscript and throws it into the wind, as the train goes over a trestle.
AJ. 58 Bragg attempts to recover it and dies.
Act 4:
Reveal
AJ. 59. Delaney reveals she is related to Macbeth, and Duncan, Southhampton, de Vere, the Nevilles and several monarchs from William the Conqueror to the present day Spencers. And the seventeen century ancestors may be the real author.
PJ. 60. Convinces Delaney that it just doesn’t matter who wrote the plays and poems.
PJ. 61. Colin and Delaney sneak back into the country.
Resolution
P.J. 62. Colin fails in his journey, but he helps the professor communicate to reconstruct the manuscript.
Climax
AJ. and PJ. 63. Delaney hires Laurel to care for professor so that she and Colin can return to Italy to find proof of the other three plays which were performed but never published.
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Renee’s Reveals
My Vision: I will work hard to become a well-respected writer who gets my movies produced and has enough work to keep me busy and keep the lights on.
What I learned from doing this assignment is how to look at the reveals and work backwards to properly set them up to keep the audience engaged.
Act 1: A girl goes missing in the woods.
1. Ext. Forest – Night
Opening: a father checks on his kids in their tent.
2. Int. Club – Night
Claire partying, taking shots, doing lines.
Setup 1 – Claire’s phone blows up with calls and texts from her sister.
3. Ext. Forest – Night
A creature rips through the tent and snatches the young girl.
4. Int. Claire’s Home – Day
PJ 1 – Hungover, Claire gets a call about a missing girl. She lies about being sick and unable to go. Her patrol officer reminds her that she doesn’t have a choice.
5. Ext. Base Camp Tent – Day
AJ 1 – Marc talks with the parents of the missing girl. He tells them that the mission is most likely going to be a locate and recover rather than a search and rescue, but that he will do everything he can to try and bring their daughter back alive.
6. Int. Base Camp Tent – Day
AJ 2 – Marc pulls his three men into the tent to go over his plans to capture the creature alive.
Setup 5.a – Marc has a detailed plan to bring the creature back alive at all costs.
7. Ext. Claire’s House – Day
She packs her Bronco with her search and rescue gear. An old neighbor warns her there is something in the woods. She has second thoughts about going up, but her neighbor gives her an old hunting knife of his.
Setup 2.a – The old neighbor knows that there is something otherworldly in the woods.
8. Ext. Base Camp – Day
Inciting Incident: Claire sees her sister and brother-in-law. She finds out the missing girl is her niece. She doesn’t tell her sister the real reason she is up there (community service). Her brother-in-law calls her out for smelling like booze and asks her where the flask is.
Payoff 1 – Claire gets to the site and sees her sister and realizes the missing girl is her niece.
PJ 2 – She yells at her sister about putting her niece in danger.
Surface Layer: Claire must find her missing niece before it’s too late.
Deeper Layer – the missing girl is actually her daughter.
9. Int. Base Camp Tent – Day
AJ 2 – Marc directs the search and rescue team of the mission. The volunteers leave the tent. He pulls his men aside again and reiterates the importance of bringing the creature back alive and goes over the plan again.
Setup 2.b/3.a – Marc is insistent that they bring the creature back alive.
Setup 5.b – Marc is relentless about the mission.
Deeper Layer: he wants revenge on the creature that killed his brother.
10. Ext. Base Camp Tent – Day
PJ 3 – Claire steps out of the tent and sees her former best friend, Lexi. She tentatively approaches her. She lies to Lexi about why she hasn’t been in contact with her for years. Lexi knows she’s lying but is willing to forgive Claire.
11. Ext. Mountain Trail – Day
The search and rescue team spreads out in pairs. They call out to Maddie as the walk up the trail toward the family’s campsite. Lexi and Claire talk about the past. The find the first traces of the creature. They think it is a grizzly bear.
Setup 4.a – Claire opens up about her past and why she started drinking.
12. Ext. Family Camp Site – Day
The team reaches the camp site. The tent Maddie was in has large claw marks down the side. Claire approaches Adam and asks him if he thinks her daughter is alive. He tells her there is always hope. They discover which way the creature went.
Setup 2.c – the tracks are huge! There’s no way it can be a grizzly bear.
13. Ext. Forest – Day
Claire is starting to have withdraws. She separates from Lexi and pulls out her flask. She takes a long drink. Adam comes up on her and warns her to stay with her partner.
14. Ext. Forest – Day
Scott and Paul are going over the plan. Adam is starting to have his doubts about what they are going, but stays the course because he is loyal to Marc.
Setup 3.b – Scott, Paul, and Adam seem to be working on a different agenda.
15. Ext. Forest – Day
Turning Point 1: Paul wanders from the path and is taken by the creature. The rest of the team search the area for him.
PJ 4 – Claire is scared and wants to go back, she doesn’t think she can handle it if she finds her daughters mangled corpse.
Act 2: More volunteers get taken by the creature while they are searching for the girl.
16. Int. Base Camp Tent – Day
AJ 3 – Marc hears from Scott that Paul has gone missing. He goes on a tirade, destroying everything in the tent. He pulls out the map and radios Adam, telling him he better not fail the mission, like he did in Iraq. He tells him that they are not to come back down until they have found the creature.
17. Ext. Base Camp – Day
AJ 4 – Marc approaches Maddie’s parents and tells them that one of the volunteers has gone missing, but assures them that the rest of the group will continue to search for their daughter and won’t come back until they find her.
Deeper Layer: he will bring the creature back alive even if it means the girl must die.
18. Ext. Camp Site – Night
Adam informs the rest of the group that they will need to make camp for the night. There are lots of protests, but eventually they make camp.
19. Ext. Forest – Night
Claire slips out of the camp site to drink. Lexi finds her and brings her back to the camp.
20. Ext. Camp Site – Night
Claire sits alone, away from the fire and the rest of the group. Adam comes over and sits down with her. The sit in silence for a while, then Adam starts asking her questions. She starts to give him some truths and some lies.
PJ 6 – Claire opens up about her past and giving up a daughter for adoption.
Setup 4.b – she reveals she gave up her daughter.
21. Int. Tent – Night
Claire lies down and tries to go to sleep, but she tosses and turns because she is worried about her daughter and racked with guilt.
22. Ext. Camp Site – Night
Adam sits next to the fire, keeping an eye on things. Scott and another volunteer patrol the surrounding area. One of them screams. Adam is on high alert. Claire and the rest of the group emerge from their tents. Scott stumbles into the campsite, bloodied, babbling on about a creature taking Jacob. Adam directs the rescuers to pair up and search the perimeter of the camp site to find Jacob.
23. Ext. Forest – Night
Two team members are calling out for Jacob. The come across is mangled body. They turn back toward the camp site. The creature grabs one and drags him screaming in to the woods.
24. Ext. Camp Site – Night
Scott is in horrific pain. Claire comes over and gives her flask to him. He takes a long drink and hands it back. There are more screams in the woods. Only one of the volunteers returns to the camp.
25. Ext. Camp Site – Night
The team wants to go back down the mountain. Claire is torn between staying and going. She convinces them that the best way to get out alive is to continue forward together.
PJ 5 – After more rescuers go missing, Claire must convince the remaining to continue on.
Setup 4.c – she gets the rest of the group to stay bringing up what would they do if it was their kid.
26. Int. Tent – Night
Claire is patching Scott up. He is delirious. He lets slip that they are bringing the creature back alive. This doesn’t sit well with Claire.
PJ 7 – When one of the antagonists men gets seriously injured, she still helps him.
Reveal 2 – it’s not a grizzly bear.
Reveal 3 – Marc wants the creature taken alive
27. Ext. Camp Site – Night
Claire confronts Adam. He admits that was the plan when they started out, but now he wants to help her find her daughter.
Turning Point 2: It’s revealed that they are to take the creature alive, even if it means letting the missing girl die.
Act 3: Claire goes on by herself.
28. Ext. Camp Site – Day
While Adam is attending Scott and developing a plan to get him down the hill, Claire packs up her stuff and sneaks out of camp, telling Lexi she has to go.
PJ 8 – Claire doesn’t trust Adam has her best interests at heart and decides to go out on her own.
Setup 4.d – Claire pleads with Lexi to let her go and not say anything.
29. Ext. Camp Site – Later
Adam is getting things packed. Scott is lying on a stretcher. Adam asks if anyone has seen Claire. No one has. He tells Lexi and the other two remaining volunteers to get Scott down the mountain. He’s going after Claire.
30. Ext. Base Camp – Day
Marc sees volunteers dragging Scott down the hill on a stretcher. The parents are hysterical. Marc becomes angry and orders them to take Scott into the tent rather then calling in the medics.
AJ 5 – When the injured man makes it back to camp with Lexi, he decides he will have to capture the creature on his own.31. Int. Base Camp Tent – Day
Marc berates Scott and demands he tell him where they were headed. He tries to make contact with Adam. When he can’t reach him he makes plans to go back up the mountain himself.
Setup 5.c – Marc will go after the creature himself.
32. Ext. Base Camp – Day
The girls parents approach him demanding answers. He tells them their daughter is probably dead, making it easier to bring the creature back alive.
33. Ext. Camp Site – Day
Adam takes inventory and heads into the forest after Claire.
34. Ext. Forest – Day
Claire stumbles into an opening. She spots a cave. She scopes it out for any movement.
35. Ext. Camp Site – Day
Marc reaches the campsite and figures out which way Claire went. He disappears into the trees.
36. Int. Cave – Day
Claire cautiously enters the cave and looks around. She sees a mass huddled in the corner. It’s her daughter. A large shadow covers the cave entrance. Claire hides. The creature comes in, dragging Adam behind him. It tosses him into the corner with her daughter.
Turning Point 3: Claire finds her daughter, hurt and scared in the creature’s cave. Before she can rescue her Mark shows up.
37. Int. Cave – Day
Claire watches as the creature leaves the cave.
38. Ext. Cave – Day
Marc has found the cave. He watches as the creature leaves the cave. He creeps up to the cave entrance.
39. Int. Cave – Day
She runs to her daughter to see if she’s alive. She stirs. Claire checks on Adam. He’s also alive but bleeding badly.
40. Ext. Cave – Day
Marc enters the cave.
41. Int. Cave – Day
Claire is kneeling next to her daughter, trying to wake her up. She hears Marc. She turns. He is pointing a gun at her. She looks around for a weapon of some kind.
PJ 9 – Claire stands in the way of Mark getting to the creature.
AJ 6 – he threatens to kill them both.
Major Reveal 4: Claire reveals the girl is her daughter.
Major Reveal 5: Mark reveals the creature killed his brother.
Act 4: Claire must kill the creature and Mark to save her daughter.
42. Int. Cave – Day
PJ 10 – Claire sees a way out, but can’t do anything when Marc has a gun on her. She gets him talking to try and distract him. Marc doesn’t notice Adam is awake, but Claire does. Adam gets up and lunges at Marc, who swings the gun toward Adam and fires. Adam falls to the ground, knocking Marc down with him. The gun flies out of his hands. Claire picks it up and points it at Marc. Marc gets up and rushes at Claire. She fires the gun, hitting him in the chest. He falls to the ground and dies. Claire drops the gun and runs to Adam. He is hit, but will survive. Claire is going to go outside to find something for Adam to use. She takes the gun with her.
Climax: Claire fights Mark and kills him.
43. Ext. Cave – Day
Claire steps outside and sighs in relief. A large shadow falls across her. The creature has returned. Claire must now fight the creature. She tries to aim the gun but it knocks her down, the gun flies. She scrambles back. She hits the side of the mountain and climbs up. The creature follows her.
44. Ext. Hill – Day
Claire scrambles up the hill. The creature close on her heels. She reaches the top.
45. Ext. Cliff – Day
Claire scrambles onto the cliff top and finds a large branch. She picks it up and moves to the edge of the cliff. The creature lumbers onto the cliff and advances. Claire swings the branch and connects. Making the creature mad. It charges her. She side steps at the last minute and swings the branch, forcing the creature over the edge.
46. Int. Cave – Day
Claire runs into the cave and finds Adam holding her daughter in his lap. She kneels down and takes her in her arms. Her daughter is bruised and bloodied, but alright. Marc has a broken leg. Claire helps him wrap it and finds a branch to help him walk. The three limp out of the cave.
47. Ext. Base Camp – Night
Claire, Maddie, and Adam emerge from the woods. Maddie’s parents run and embrace their daughter. Claire stands back from her sister, unsure if she is wanted. Her sister gets up and gives her a big hug and thanks her. She then introduces Claire to Maddie as her mom.
Resolution: Claire and her daughter make it down the mountain. Mark’s body is brought down from the mountain.
PJ 11 – she reconciles with her sister.
48. Int. Claire’s Home – Night
Claire, her daughter, sister, and brother-in-law and Adam gather around the table. The eat and laugh. The TV is on in the background. A breaking news story comes on about how Bigfoot was found.
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Karen Crider’s Reveals/ 4/6
My vison is to be a stronger writer.
What I learned: When we focus on items in a screenplay, they are relevant and carry not only the vision, but the subtext, the motivation, the credibility, etc. needed to lend a screenplay valid.Thanks.
PJ- Protag’s journey
AJ- Antagonist’s journey
Genre: Adventure, Drama/Animation
Mortimer’s traits are: diseased, treacherous, malignant, out of control.
Subtext Logline: A diseased, serial killer who maims or kills everything within his power without recourse, conscience or regret.
Character Intrigue: A mad killer out of control. Rabid, diseased. One that kills humans.
Flaw: Disease is his flaw. It has taken his reason or anything that was ever in his control.
Values: When one is mad, values have already died a terrible death.
Character Dilemma: None he is aware of, other than to kill as many creatures as he can. before the disease kills him. Either way he’s doomed.
Actor attractors: Mortimer is a snake in the grass, one that whispers in a sinister way. One that does not need to be provoked to attack. He is a pathogenic macro-organism on four legs spreading rabies and death. He is Jaws, a land shark with fangs. One foaming at the mouth; an evil wolf with a blind eye, a missing ear and a scar. Shadow, (protag) a hyena cub also believes he has the blood of his sister, Surus, on his hide and heart. The wolf remains a formidable enemy to Shadow.
Fade In
EXT. JUNGLE – DAY
The film opens with panning a herd of African zebras browsing, unaware a lion and his mate crouch in the underbrush for a surprise attack.
Grunting wildebeests hunker near a dwindling slough of water. In the distance, a cackle of hyenas nervously pace back and forth as hunger drives their motivation toward their next kill.
Antagonist: Mortimer, a huge African wolf, scarred and alone, has hunted for three days and three nights and not taken any prey within that time
An outburst startles a flock of birds in a tree as they are flushed from their roosts. A mortal battle explodes beneath their branches.
Setup: AJ. –MORTIMER, an afflicted one-eared, half blind, African wolf, (the criminal) is attacked by a mad dog. Even in his weakened state, Mortimer manages to kill the dog, but refuses to chew on its toxic, disease-riddled carcass.
Reveal: The results are revealed in every attack, every reveal. But his nature is evident that even before he contracts the disease, he’s already diseased in everything he does. The setup is in the intro and follows through the entire screenplay. These setups belong as close to the reveal as possible to keep the set up in mind, and reveal to emphasize it.
EXT. DEN – DAY
PJ- A day later, Mortimer scours the brush for game, famished, and half sick. He hears the mewling of
young cubs. He spies IVY, a hyena mother, as she leaves to hunt; then, invades her den.
INT. DEN – DAY
Action: Mortimer’s paws tunnel slowly into the den’s opening. He pants, then stops digging momentarily, trying to catch his breath. The mewling from the cubs has ceased, and he strains his ears, listening.
Action: Mortimer slings dirt and debris on top of a growing pile. The pads of his feet bleed from the sharp stones. His tongue drips saliva, as he stretches his front paw into the den as deep as he can reach.
SETUP: PJ– The youngest hyena, SHADOW, (the underdog) howls when Mortimer grapples him, half-dragging Shadow across the gritty floor of his den—then loses him, grabs him again, as Shadow howls and screams.
Setup: Shadow rolls away from Mortimer’s grasp. Mortimer groans, as he repeatedly feels for the cub, but collects his sister, SURUS, (the victim) instead. Shadow trembles, curls into a ball. The continual failures at everything he attempts, his terror of Mortimer, the hatred of the wolf is all that plagues him to continue his pursuing of his arch enemy. The setups appear everywhere, internal and external results as well.
Reveal: This intro sets up the trauma that marks Shadow’s withdrawal from society. His willingness to avoid conflict. His lack of confidence, his fear of the predator, Mortimer. This reveal show up at the beginning and carries through the movie, bringing back the initial encounter with Mortimer.
Shadow doesn’t know SILLA, (the competitor), the clan’s matriarch, has attacked Mortimer and intercepted Surus, (the victim) during the fray. She puts the chase on Mortimer and has taken Surus as her own cub.
Setup: Ivy returns. She searches high and low, calling for Surus. (Emotional moment.) In despair, she moves her remaining cubs to the communal den, where, as time goes on, Hilly, Silla’s offspring, bullies her and her cubs almost daily.
Reveal: In the second act Ivy tells Surus she is her daughter,after she recognizes her scent is the same as her other cubs, and then notices the heart shaped spot on her right shoulder.
Setup: Inciting Incident – PJ-Shadow (underdog/victim-) is ousted from the clan in retribution of him standing up to Silla’s offspring, HILLY, (saboteur) who at the time, is attacking Shadow’s mom. He circles the perimeter and tries to sneak back in, but Silla’s guards beat him to an inch of his life.
REVEAL: Abandonment justifies his fear, isolation, lack of social skills and confidence issues that plague him throughout the script.
SET UP: PJ- Turning Point: Shadow re-digs the den of his birth outside the communal dens. He survives as a dejected, grub eater.
Reveal: Shadow shows he is traumatized even in his attempts to survive. He digs a hole and hunkers down. He avoids hunting, something he has let others in the clan do. He survives on grubs. The most despicable thing any creature can survive on. This inclusion gives a side of his nature that once again weaves back to Mortimer and the attack.This lack of confidence finds itself repeated throughout the entire script.
Setup: He howls to the heavens his will to survive, to get even with Hilly, (the saboteur) and to kill Mortimer. He dreams about succeeding and wakes up so excited he cannot go back to sleep. (Emotional moment)
Reveal: His goal reminds me of Scarlet, in Gone with the Wind, when she states emphatically: “ I shall never be hungry again.” Shadow does the same thing. He howls his plans to the heavens, and backs them up in the last act when he kills Mortimer, but then suffers even more, because Mortimer has killed his mother. The setups are scattered throughout the acts where Shadow had the chance of killing Mortimer, but because of his fears, his mother dies.
Silly demands that Surus, (whose name has been changed,) keeps the lower- class hyenas in subjection.
Surus goes after Ivy. Ivy recognizes her scent and notices the star shaped spot on her shoulder. She tries to tell her, she is her mom.
Surus is insulted. She slices her mom’s nose and leaves her bruised and sad. Ivy grieves over the loss of her cub. (emotional moments.)
.ACT 2:
Setup: PJ- The clan howler announces the opening of the Olympic Hyena Howling contest where the winner wins the award of entering a large clan for safety/protection
Reveal: the competition is a metaphor for the competition he struggles with each day of his life. I am a comedy writer. In this script, I hope to enlarge on that. But life and death subjects seldom elicit humor. This reveal shows how lacking Shadow is. He cannot carry a tune. He is a hyena who is dejected, rejected and subjected to the cruelties that life slings at us all. But to lose a competition to your brother, has to be the biggest let down of all, which goes back to Shadow having no confidence.
Shadow’s determined to win, but he gets beat for practicing. He’s tone deaf.. Others attack him to put him out of his misery.
Twist–PJ-Shadow follows the clan as they go on a hunt. Silla leads the hunt with Hilly, but Shadow does a double take when he sees another dominant hyena who looks just like his mom. How can this be? She seems a stronger leader than Hilly, but younger. Who is she? (Surus) He circles around and examines her through a bush. She cantors like Ivy.
AJ- Time passes, Hilly, Silla’s offspring, becomes jealous of Surus. Hilly spills the beans about her being a cub that Silla has stolen. Silly denies it. (subtext)
Hilly tells Surus who she really is, which backs up what Ivy has told her. Surus faces Hilly and she admits it’s true. She is not Surus’ mom.
Setup: Turning Point: Surus connects with Ivy and they track down/ connect with Brimsley. They look for Shadow, to make a plan about leaving their given clans.
Reveal: the beginning of the family bonding. The bonding that leads to a new clan. One where they have complete freedom to run their lives as they seem fit. Act four culminates in this action.
They find Shadow attending the competition. He loses. His brother, Brimsley, howls a Pavarotti Aria and wins. He shuns Shadow. Shadow leaves downcast, lost in his misery.
Setup: Some hyenas call him names and make fun of his appearance as most hyenas are groomed and preened for the event. Shadow backs off to avoid confrontation.
Reveal: Shadow is still plagued with this lack of confidence stemming from his past. This occurred back in Act one, but still holds Shadow at bay.
When the competition takes place, Shadow is jeered and he loses. He slinks away and lives up to his nickname–coward. His brother, Brimsley, howls a Pavarotti Aria and wins. Surus and Ivy, fill in Brimsley who Surus is. They catch up with Shadow and make amends.
Shadow works on improving himself to be more like Brimsley. -Bathes more, practices howling, polishes hunting skills, fails in another hunt, but also fails to be himself.
ACT THREE:
PJ-Shadow follows the scent trail of his old clan to a Maasai village where hyena’s serve as undertakers to the dead. He blends inside shadows and foliage and manages to steal a human thigh bone.
AJ- Mortimer shows up and goes on a killing spree. Mortimer kills a young Maasai mother with her new infant outside the village.
Setup: PJ-Shadow recognizes the face of his sister’s killer—the missing ear, the cavernous eye, the scar. Shadow flashes back to being a cub again. He freezes.
Reveal: He’s still haunted by his wound. Can he ever overcome the trauma his arch enemy has inflicted on him. Is there any end to the terror? Or is it common sense that keeps him from attacking of this monster? The initial inflictiion begins in Act one and continues until he kills Mortimer in the last act.
Shadow weeps over his own ineptness/ (Emotional moment.) He mourns their loss. He’s a failure. Their deaths prove it.
He follows the Maasai warriors as they hunt Mortimer. He is waiting for them. Mortimer kills two warriors as he escapes into the night. Shadow hides.
PJ- Shadow staggers, shaken to the core, (emotional moment) but he follows his old clan back to their den, disappointed in his actions. When he views Mortimer carnage, he is convinced he can never survive if he tries to attack Mortimer.
ACT FOUR:
PJ–Shadow trots over a path, heavy with hyena scent where ahead on the trail, Silla drags a zebra into the brush.
A feeding frenzy, loud with cackles and growls, result in dinner ending in minutes. Silla and Hilly exit the corpse.
AJ- A free- for-all takes place, as the remaining hyena’s battle for scraps. Vultures add to the mayhem.
Setup: PJ-–Shadow hears his mom howling and recognizes her frenzied pleas for help. He scrambles onto a side trail up the hill and searches for his mom.
Reveal: Shadow faces Mortimer not out of fear for his savagery, but out of love for his mom.
AJ-–Mortimer, (the criminal) has Ivy by her hindquarters. She is alone fighting the rabid wolf.
PJ—Shadow, forgets his fear and attacks. Mortimer drops her as Shadow goes for the wolf’s throat. He hangs on.
The attack is so loud, a lion startles in the early morning dusk. Zebras rise to their feet and scatter.
Setup: PJ- –Shadow kills Mortimer. Surus, and Brimsley show up after the battle. Mortimer has killed Ivy. The news spreads near and far about the great predator, Shadow—the so -called coward, that has killed the savage beast, Mortimer.
Reveal: The high point of the movie. Shadow endures, but at a great cost. He has lost his mom.
PJ- Together, they mourn the death of their mother. Shadow hobbles with his sibling’s protection to their early den but he’s ecstatic over finding his sister. They bond and become family. (bonding)
Setup: PJ— A few days later, Shadow’s family wait for him inside the clan’s perimeters, while Shadow taunts Silla. She backs off, hesitant over the rumors of Shadow’s prowess. Silla’s guards attack Shadow.
Reveal: Shadow has found himself. He has overcome his greatest arch enemy. He is self- actualized, capable of surviving, and now he also belongs. He takes out his bullies and never looks back.
PJ- Shadow counter attacks and leaves them in the dust. He calls Silla a coward. No one contests him from his old clan ever again.
AJ- From a distance, Silla mourns, as Surus joins her new clan. She has lost Surus forever.
– Brimsley and Surus, leave with Shadow. They form a new clan.
RESOLUTION:
Surus, the new matriarch, takes the lead as they trot away from the only home they have ever known.
Deeper reveal: Not one family member looks back, not even Surus. Shadow finally has roots. He belongs, and no one ever doubts his courage or ability to survive alone ever again…
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My genre is: Adventure, drama, animation.
CONVENTIONS OF DRAMA PURPOSE:
To explore stories with emotional and interpersonal high stakes for their characters.
CHARACTER-DRIVEN JOURNEY: We always need to care about the characters in a Drama, and their internal journey drives the film’s events and progression.
HIGH STAKES COME FROM WITHIN: Whether the story’s events are relatively mundane or intense, the struggles, obstacles, and stakes come from within the characters more than external pressures.
EMOTIONALLY RESONATES: Drama audiences want to feel and be moved by the characters’ emotions and how they experience the events.
CHALLENGING, EMOTIONALLY-CHARGED SITUATIONS: Characters get challenged to their core by the emotional situations and struggles that they run into. REAL-LIFE SITUATIONS: Drama stories are grounded in reality.
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MODULE FOUR LESSON SIX
FRAN’S REVEALS
WHAT I LEARNED: Again, this is only to help you become more deeply acquainted with who your characters are, what their motivations are, what their stories are. This week my brain is on fire. It’s starting to mesh everything together and especially with the script I’ve been having trouble with writing.
MY VISION: I want to write great movies. Movies that are magical, movies that move people and tell the truth. I want to write movies that stars will want to be in.
ACT I
Meredith buys the diary despite Jerome’s objections. She wants to be obstinate, independent, in charge/control of her work. Not a “yes man” or underling to Jerome. She wants to be treated like an equal partner.
Jerome is a cad. When we see him with his paramour, a very young, younger than his daughter paramour we realize he’s going through a midlife crisis and he’s also bothered by what’s going on behind the scenes at work—big financial problems both professionally and personally.
ACT II
Meredith calls her agent to talk about the story she’s discovered and wants to try to turn it into a script. She’s really looking for validation from her agent, looking for a new work assignment, a new partnership. A way to get out of her failing marriage and partnership with Jerome.
Jerome threatens Meredith’s job partnership. He’s already hired a new writer to take her place. He’ jealous of her and he has the need to hide his own failings from her.
Meredith tells Jerome he’s too late. She quits. She doesn’t let him know she’s already looking for a new partnership. A new job.
ACT III
Meredith’s daughter is a grown woman. She is older than the starlet. She knows about her father’s affairs. She tells her mother when they have their heart-to-heart talk.
New job for Meredith. She learns she is going to be working with an old flame when the meeting they’ve set up, it is finally revealed to her.
Jerome tries to win Meredith back. He’s jealous of her success and of the old flame, who was an old nemesis of his years ago. When Meredith is finally eyeing the freedom she craved and the success she has always wanted in her writing and in a working partnership.
Meredith wins an Oscar. She gets great reviews, kudos. She is now more confident, knows she can do the job. She gets the offer to work with her old flame again. And then, she learns one of the stars of their movie wants her to write him a script and is willing to hire her. He asks her out on a date.
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Amy’s Reveals!
Vision: I want to become known as an expert in the family-friendly genre and make a full-time living as a screenwriter.
What I learned from doing this assignment is I found the setups and reveals that were already in my outline.
Title: Unroyally in Love
Act 1: Stephanie learns of a glitch in her schedule and declares that she’s not going to attend the masquerade ball, once of the biggest royal events of the year, until her mother the queen sets her straight.
SETUP 1: Stephanie dances with a handsome stranger at the masquerade ball.
Stephanie PJ 1: Stephanie attends the royal masquerade ball and runs into Jack disguised by a mask. When he acts like he doesn’t know who she is, she is insulted and demands to know who he is and how he got into the ball, until he reveals himself. Then she gets angry and the two spar verbally.
Jack AJ 1: Jack attends the royal masquerade ball in disguise and pretends like he doesn’t know who Stephanie is. He tried to woo her at the same time. He reveals himself and then argues with her.
REVEAL 1: The stranger is Prince Jack from the country next door who Stephanie hates.
SETUP 3: Stephanie makes it known that she wants nothing to do with Jack.
SETUP 2: A historian visits the castle and informs Stephanie and her mother that he’s looking into the royal line.
Historian visits the castle to talk to Stephanie, Ava and Willis. He lets them know he’s doing some research into the royal line. Ava throws him out. Then Stephanie throws herself on the nearest couch and sobs.
REVEAL 2: Stephanie’s family is not royal.
Inciting Incident: Historian informs the family that they are not royals. Says he will keep his mouth shut for now, but tells them they must decide how they are going to proceed.
Stephanie PJ 2: Stephanie visits her father’s grave wearing a tiara to talk to him about what’s just happened and vows that she will do what he would have done in this situation.
Historian visits Jack and informs him that Stephanie’s family is not really royal.
Jack PJ 2: He finds out about Stephanie’s predicament and approaches her about helping her, even though he knows she hates him.
Historian leaks the news to the press.
Turning Point 1: The news gets out that Stephanie’s family is not really royal. The country is in chaos. Stephanie must accept help from Prince Jack who she hates from the country next door.
The politicians in the country demand that Stephanie’s family vacate the castle.
Historian identifies the rightful princess, but no one has any idea where she is. The press and all the politicians vow to find her.
REVEAL 3: Stephanie is going to have to rely on Jack for help now that she is not a royal.
Stephanie: PJ 3: Stephanie gets booted out of the castle and accepts Jack’s offer to live in his castle until she can get back on her feet.
Jack AJ 3: Gets Stephanie to agree to let him help her. His father, the king of their country, doesn’t want him to get involved. He decides to try to make Stephanie fall in love with him just to see if he can.
Act 2: Stephanie tries to learn how to be a commoner by doing common things like going shopping.
SETUP 1: Stephanie goes along with Jack’s attempts to help he become a commoner.
SETUP 2: Jack seems to dislike Stephanie as much as she dislikes him.
SETUP 3: Stephanie is clearly selfish and self-centered in her attempts to become a commoner.
Stephanie PJ 4: Stephanie lets Jack take her shopping like commoners do. Completely out of her element, Stephanie starts ordering everyone in the store around. She and Jack have to leave in shame.
Deeper layer: Stephanie has no intention of accepting the fact that she’s not a royal.
Jack AJ 4: Jack, who is really comfortable with commoners, sets out to help Stephanie become a commoner while letting her stay at his castle.
Stephanie PJ 5: Stephanie goes with Jack to a local park to interact with commoners. It turns into a media circus and they have to run. She starts to fall prey to Jack’s charms. Stephanie doesn’t want to shake hands with anyone or get too close to them. She treats them like they are below her.
Jack AJ 5: Jack takes Stephanie to a local park to interact with commoners. He is making her laugh and have a good time despite her best efforts to resist his charms.
REVEAL 1: Stephanie never had any intentions of accepting that she wasn’t a royal.
Turning Point 2 / Midpoint: After Stephanie is properly exposed to the public, news reporters peg her as a horrible person
Stephanie PJ 6: Stephanie hides out at Jack’s castle.
REVEAL 2: Jack has actually fallen for Stephanie.
Jack AJ 6: Jack realizes he actually has feelings for Stephanie and accidently lets it slip out. Jack’s father forbids him from helping Stephanie anymore (although he allows her to continue staying at the castle. He helps Stephanie in secret because being seen with her in public is now a PR nightmare for his own country.
REVEAL 3: Stephanie actually cares about the people in her country, i.e., the kids in the orphanage, the single father working two jobs.
Stephanie PJ 6a: Stephanie sneaks out of the castle one night in a disguise and walks through town. She sees homeless people on the street. She talks to a father who is getting off work from his second job to support his family. She walks by an orphanage and sees all of the children through a window. She talks to a homeless woman and realizes that she is one everyone has been looking for, the rightful princess, but she keeps it to herself.
Deeper layer: Jack’s is deliberately going against his father (who he has a dysfunctional relationship with) to help Stephanie.
Act 3: Stephanie’s eyes are opened to all the suffering in her kingdom and she decides to use her fame to help people. She sets out to help an orphanage.
SETUP 1: Stephanie sets out to help the orphanage.
SETUP 3: Stephanie seems to have changed for the better
Stephanie PJ 7: Stephanie contacts the orphanage and invites the press along to bring awareness to the plight of the children and to volunteer her services.
SETUP 2: Jack pursues Stephanie with a fancy dinner and a private symphony concert.
Jack AJ 7: Jack sets out to win Stephanie over for real. He has a beautiful dress sent to her room and has a fancy dinner set up for them. He hires an entire symphony to entertain them.
REVEAL 3: Stephanie is still who she always was.
Turning Point 3: Stephanie gets caught up in all the attention. It becomes painfully obvious to everyone that she was not doing “good” for the right reasons. She’s rejected by everyone, including Jack.
REVEAL 1: Stephanie realizes her true motive was to bring attention to herself, not the orphanage.
Stephanie PJ 8: Stephanie starts spending more and more time talking to the press and her adoring fans than helping the orphanage. Everyone realizes this and turns on her.
REVEAL 2: Jack rejects Stephanie when he realizes she was helping the orphanage for the wrong reason.
Jack AJ 8: Jack rejects Stephanie after he realizes she was only helping the orphanage to make a good name for herself.
Deeper layer: After the public and Jack’s rejection, Stephanie comes face to face with her true self and must decide if she is going to go on being who she always was or change.
Act 4 Climax: Stephanie swallows her pride and helps the homeless woman who is the real princess.
SETUP 1: Stephanie seeks out the homeless woman who is really the princess.
Stephanie PJ 9: Stephanie seeks out the homeless woman, has her people give her a makeover and a whole new wardrobe and educated her on how to be a royal.
REVEAL 1: Stephanie presents the homeless woman to the country in a passionate speech.
SETUP 3: Jack sees Stephanie’s speech on TV in which she speaks to him indirectly.
Stephanie PJ 10: Stephanie gives an impassioned speech to her country as her final act as princess and gives over her title to the homeless woman
SETUP 2: Jack stands up to his father.
Jack AJ 9: Jack stands up to his father and decides to go after Stephanie.
Deeper layer: Jack has learned how to stand on his own two feet.
Deeper layer: Stephanie is now a selfless and caring person.
Resolution: Stephanie gets Jack back. She gets a cushy job.
Stephanie PJ 11: The rightful princess appoints Stephanie an ambassador for her country.
REVEAL 2: Jack mends fences with his father and becomes king.
REVEAL 3: Jack goes after Stephanie and proposes to her. She accepts.
Jack AJ 10: Jack is reunited with Stephanie and makes amends with his father. His father steps down so Jack can be king.
Stephanie PJ 12: Stephanie accepts Jack’s proposal.
Jack AJ 11: Jack proposes to Stephanie.
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David’s Reveals!
My vision is to increase my skills to become an A list writer
What I learned from this assignment is the importance of hiding key information, then springing it forth at the best time with the proper setup.
ACT 1.
Start with yachts, then reveal that Chas lives in a dinky boat. Start right on page 1
Keith, after leaving violent voicemails, is a pudgy guy in a shitty boiler room operation- and he’s about to get fired
That Chas spent 8 years in college and still doesn’t know what to do. Shows up when he’s interviewing for jobs. Setups? All kinds of books littered on the floor of his boat. When he plays Warcraft, has difficult time selecting occupation; chooses healer, which will play into the story later.
Hides his debt situation from his parents and friends. Tells Trey, his Little Brother, his troubles in the park. We know that he lied to his dad before, telling him he’s interviewing for a bank job (it’s a sperm bank). Tells RJ that he likes living on a boat.
Keith is losing his house to the IRS. The IRS guy comes over while Keith throws Ninja stars in the backyard. This sets Keith on the course to find Chas, who he believes has money. Setup? He mentions to Patrick, the student loan director, that the IRS is after his mom. Takes picture of Chas’s info after he’s fired.1
Reveal that Chas interviews at sperm bank instead of real bank. Setup by Chas telling dad he as interview at a bank, then see a professional setting that we think is a real bank.
ACT 2
Reveal: Keith is gonna get pulled over at ‘fruit check’ border.
Setup: Gets fruit basket after being fired from work. Then sees oranges bursting out of the plastic after being flashes by girls.
Reveal: Chas driving a sports car after we see him taking the bus.
Setup: His friend RJ lets Chas borrow his apartment while he’s away.
Reveal: The blonde Keith’s ogling is a guy
Setup: Keith loves women, then sees the blonde taking a piss. He already hates California, so this adds to his hatred.
Reveal: A photo of an 18 year old girl on RJ’s fridge
Setup: The girl he’s visiting in Costa Rica- we know she’s younger
Reveal: Freshman tied up to his bunk bed in frat house
Setup: Keith got fired for being too aggressive
Reveal: Magazine with RJ’s name on it under couch
Setup: Cleaning up quickly, Chas threw it under the couch
ACT 3
Reveal: Christie takes Chas to a kid’s hospital
Setup: Christie says she’s taking him somewheer special, mentions the girl on RJ’s fridge
Reveal: Keith has rough sex with Heidi
Setup: She’s turned on by him when he demands Chas’ file. Then he texts someone when he’s drunk and lonely.
Reveal: Keith accosts the bum look alike, thinking it’s Chas
Setup: We see the bum look alike earlier
Reveal: The cat’s bowl is full, i.e. Keith feed the cat
Setup: Arnie, the landlord, locks the cat in the boat and only Keith has been inside
ACT 4
Reveal: Dicker shows up on the yacht
Setup: Sees invitation for party, parents discuss stalker in the firm
Reveal: Keith calls number- Chas’ dad
Setup: We know Chas lies to dad
Reveal: Keith lives in Chas’ boat with Heidi
Setup: Keith offered it before, had a boat in Idaho, feeds cat, has sex with Heidi
Reveal: Prom party for Christie
Setup: Christie mentions never had prom, Keith says she asked about Chas
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Marcus’ Reveals
My Vision: I have well-founded confidence that what I write is excellent and will be acknowledged as excellent by everyone who reads it.
This assignment taught that there are many ways to do reveals and many places to put them. And the more the better. They engage the audience and enrich the story.
Movie Title: “Beyond the Faded Trail”
ACT 1: A burgeoning western town, rapidly growing. Jake Barnet has a business as a building contractor. He spends money as quickly as he gets it and is in debt. Nevertheless, he tries very hard to be successful at his business.
Barnet wakes up in the morning with Charlotte and they speak like a married couple. Then she has to go to work and collects money from Barnet, revealing she’s a prostitute. Barnet thinks he’s in love with her. He’s been paying to “play house” with her. She tells him she might consider leaving prostitution for a man of real means, but with his happy-go-lucky attitude, she doesn’t think he’s a safe bet.
Barnet then tries to buy her contract from the saloon/brothel owner, Alf. When Alf rejects his offer, Jake insists. Alf pulls out a gun. Jake backs down.
Tries to find new business for his builders. Brings some prospective clients to see his latest building under construction.
Whitaker under his new identity, Isaac Castle, came to town and his skills as a carpenter got him the job of Barnet’s foreman. Castle hires all experienced gunmen to work for him as carpenters. Sheriff Edmund hangs wanted posters all over town. Castle argues that hanging so many posters is stupid. The poster of Lucien Rickey especially infuriates him. Edmund ignores him. Castle takes a swing at him landing himself in jail overnight.
Rickey has put together a gang to rob railroad payroll shipments. Rickey is smart about how he leads his gang and they are very successful. They catch a stage coach in a desolate area of road and quickly capture it. Rickey insists on executing the rail employees defending it. Some of his men think it overly harsh, but quickly forgive when they get the chest full of money. Rickey claims he’s not in it for the money. He hates the railroad.
INCITING INCIDENT: A fire of unknown origin destroys Barnet’s building supplies (lumber) as well as damaging the building under construction. (It is Whitaker who burned his boss’ lumber and the building under construction, but audience doesn’t know this yet.)
TURNING POINT 1: The customer is angry with Barnet, who has no further source of wood. He threatens to go to Barnet’s competitor, and demands his money back. Barnet promises restitution. The men, having no work and hence, no pay, walk off the job.
Barnet decides to skip town. There’s nothing for him here. But first he gets Castle out of jail.
Whitaker tries to convince Barnet to pay the men for just a few more days – he knows of a source of lumber: an abandoned town. Barnet, short on money is reluctant to sink his last few dollars into a failed business. Whitaker tells him he used to live in the town and is aware of some hidden money there that he has wanted to retrieve. But the trail there is unsafe and he could never traverse it alone.
Whitaker tries to talk Barnet into sending him there with the men while Barnet stays in town and does damage control. Barnet can’t look Charlotte in the eye and feels bad about his customer, so decides he must go.
Rickey rides with Adelaide, who sees him as a real man and Whitaker as an indecisive coward. Rickey discusses his plans to revive the town with her. She thinks he’s dreaming – the town will never come back without a water supply. Rickey sees that Adelaide is right about the water diversion.
ACT 2: The journey to the ghost town. It is a two-day trip.
First evening, the men get drunk and start shooting at bottles. The intellectual Castle is reluctant to engage in this but is cajoled by the men. He can’t hit a single target. Barnet seems bothered by the gunfire and asks them to stop shooting. They tease him. They think he’s probably an even worse shot than Castle. Finally, Barnet leaps onto his horse, does riding tricks, and as he passes by the bottles, shoots his pistol and hits all of them. He jumps off his horse onto the main guy making fun of him, tackles the guy, and holds a knife to his throat. Barnet thus gains the respect (and fear) of his men by showing his hidden skills – and temper. Castle has to pull him off. Barnet reveals his fear of combat left over from the war, where he was a cavalry officer. He goes into his tent and breaks down.
They arrive in town the next evening to find a fully stocked saloon. This raises Barnet’s suspicions. He notices that Castle has disappeared. Barnet wants the money and thinks Castle is going to grab it and run. He goes looking for Castle.
Rickey brings his gang to the weir that diverted water away from his town, intending to blow it up and correct the direction of water flow. His gang is unhappy that there’s no money in it. He pulls his gun on them and threatens. None of them is any good with explosives, and they fail to destroy the weir. Rickey vows to try again, but his men are unhappy about it. They ride for “town”.
TURNING POINT 2: First night in Justice, Barnet puts together that it might have been Castle who burned the lumber, despite being in jail during the fire. Barnet is angry but avoids direct confrontation with Castle when he finds him. Castle reveals that he was once mayor of this town. They talk about why Castle didn’t run for mayor of their town. He shows Barnet where the bulk of the gang’s loot is hidden – a location he knows but that Rickey thought was secret.
This amount of money is life changing. Barnet is puzzled as to how Castle would know where this stash is. He becomes suspicious.
At dawn, they spot Rickey’s gang on its way into town, sooner than Whitaker had expected.
ACT 3: Rickey’s men roll into town and Barnet’s men hide. Rickey’s men go to the building where the loot is stored and discover it missing. They accuse Rickey of stealing from them.
TURNING POINT 3: Whitaker confronts Rickey, shoots at him but accidently hits Adelaide, wounding her badly. Rickey reveals that Isaac Castle is really the outlaw Holland Whitaker. Rickey shoots Whitaker. A gunfight with Rickey’s gang ensues. Barnet must decide whether to run and hide or try to overcome his fear of battle and lead his men.
ACT 4: The big gunfight.
CLIMAX: Barnet sees Castle/Whitaker gunned down in the street. His men start an erratic disorganized gunfight. He must take action or flee. Barnet does not want to fight. But he overcomes his fears. He takes a few men and sneaks around the back of the saloon flanking Rickey and his men.
CHANGES REALITY: Barnet and his men feel like Whitaker has tricked them. But Barnet realizes that Whitaker has been preparing them for this fight all along, even himself. The payoff for the men will be the reward money for Rickey, which Barnet will give to the men as a bonus and the lumber for Barnet who now realizes what his business could mean for him.
Rickey guns down Whitaker and tries to help Adelaide. Adelaide crawls to Whitaker, rejecting Rickey and seeing him for what he is, a selfish, power-hungry crook. Rickey runs into a building with his men.
Barnet chases Rickey up an alley and they have a fight which Barnet wins using all his skills. He captures Rickey and hangs him.
RESOLUTION: Return to town where they get to work.
Jake settles into his
business as a contractor. Charlotte now sees him as serious. But he realizes
that she will never leave Alf’s employ. He realizes that what attracted him to
her was her unavailability – he would never have had to take responsibility for
a relationship. -
Dave Holloway’s Reveals
My vision: I would like to be a successful writer in Hollywood, with a number of successful movies to my credit that put forward a core belief about environmental, political, or personal values.
What I learned doing this assignment is that doing set-ups and reveals really does increase the interest of a script and makes it seem more realistic by having an action lead to another action later on.
Act One
Set-up: In the opening scene, Nigel is seen as passionate and articulate while arguing a case in court, but seems like a civilized man who would be unlikely to be overwhelmeupd by his passion.
Reveal: Later in Act One, he calls the military state and responds to its employee’s attempts to stonewall him by shouting that he wants to get “you Nazi bastards” to release her.
Act Two
Set-up: A crew-cut man stealthily takes Nigel’s suitcase from near the baggage compartment of a bus Nigel will be on and keeps it with him as he boards the bus. He later appears to do something to the suitcase’s contents.
Reveal: Later, when they’ve travelled to the state of El Dorado, authorities there tell them a tracking device was in Nigel’s shoe, and it is from the military state.
Set-up: Nigel tells Roger about an incident when he was 14 in which another boy punched him in the face and he ran away. He gives the impression of being very uncomfortable with violence.
Reveal: When they get embroiled in a gun battle in the Native-American state, Nigel is shot through the fore-arm, though he doesn’t feel it at the time. He later discovers it, and shows that being shot hasn’t unnerved him. He also turns down Roger’s suggestion that they get medical care for his wound.
Set-up: On the plane flight to North America, Roger reveals himself to be jocular and apparently lacking much empathy for others.
Reveal: Later, when he sees the body of a young Navajo man they’d befriended, dead on the battlefield, he becomes quite emotional, shedding a tear and praising him to the other two Navajo men they’d met.
Set-up: June, the prison security guard, speaks to Livia and shows little consideration for the prisoners who will soon be executed.
Reveal: Later, she is sympathetic to Livia, helps her escape from the prison and accompanies them as they escape Shiloh.
Set-up: In the first act, Nigel shows his lawyer skills and appears to be a very law-abiding man.
Reveal: In the fouorth act, he stops a car on the road and threatens the driver with a gun to he, Roger and Amelia can drive it to the capital.
Act Four
Set-up: Nigel had expressed his discomfort with violence in Act Two.
Reveal: Nigel goads the prison warden into walking along an elevated passageway and then into fighting him. He then wins the fight by throwing the warden over the railing of the passageway to his death.
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Module 4 – Lesson 6 – What Do You Reveal and When
Lisa Long’s Reveal!
My Vision: I will do whatever it takes to be comfortable saying that I am a writer by creating impactful stories with amazing characters in order to sell my scripts.
What I learned from this assignment is to incorporate setups and reveals early in the process to keep the storyline on track and add interest.
Title: Chesapeake Girl
Genre: Drama
ACT 1:
Setup: Molly puts on a brave face to everyone and pretends she’s strong
Reveal: When Molly goes into her bedroom at night she falls apart because April abandoned her
Setup: Ed is a curmudgeon – acts like a grumpy old man to everyone
Reveal: When Ed goes into his bedroom at night he falls apart because he still misses April
ACT 2:
Setup: Molly tells Mars that Ed said she could go to NYC for the audition
Reveal: When Ed’s calls blow up Molly’s phone in route, Mars confronts Molly and finds out that she lied. He wants to turn around, but Molly convinces him that it’s too late
ACT 3:
Setup: April and Ed meet at the performance and the hurt is palpable between them
Reveal: Audience finds out that April left Ed for a choreographer
Setup: April hints at the mistakes she’s made over the years
Reveal: April wants to return to the Bay
ACT 4:
Setup: April returns to the Bay
Reveal: She never stopped loving Ed
Setup: Ed is slowing down and can’t sustain the pace he is used to around the restaurant. April pitches in
Reveal: Ed is very ill and dying
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Bice-Stephens Reveals
2022 is my year to break through!
What I learned: another very valuable piece of the puzzle has fallen into place!
Baby Dearest Outline
Log line-How do you let go of something you’ve never had?
Concept-A psychotic young woman kidnaps her way to motherhood to manipulate the ex who rejected her.
Surface Layer-Brandy and Alex are desperate to have their own families—Brandy because she lost hers and Alex because he never believed he had a real one.
Deeper Layer-Brandy and Alex are total opposites with the same goal.
Opening-Brandy wants a husband and baby. She is angry to the point of madness–takes a knife and slashes smiles off the pictures of couples she taped on her walls. Writes madly all night. When morning comes, there are wads of paper covering the floor and the walls are a wreck. She goes out trolling for a partner and runs into Alex.
Beginning-Alex crosses paths with Brandy, a person he never knew in high school. He’s busy studying for law school. She acts like they were great friends, flirts with him, gives him her number, and wants him to call her. He brushes her off, gets right back to the books.
Beginning-Brandy is very excited to see a former upperclassman, Alex, whom everyone idolized and she had a massive crush on. The timing is perfect—she’s looking for a guy to reel in. Suddenly she has a cheerful, bubbly personality and she uses it to entice Alex. She hides the book she’s getting ready to check out about how to get your GED, says she’s in college like Alex.
New Plan-The stalking begins. Brandy isn’t going to let Alex out of her latches. It’s on! She cuts his pictures out of her well-bookmarked yearbook (every page he was on), and while putting the book away she finds news clippings from her mother’s death. Her father murdered her mother to get the insurance money and Brandy found her body when she was 14. Her mother is buried in Detroit, but Brandy acts like she’s still alive. Brandy’s father remains in prison for life without parole, but Brandy acts like he’s dead. At least Brandy got the huge insurance payout because she’s an only child, though she mentions having a brother and sister when it’s convenient.
Inciting Incident- Alex breaks up with his long-time girlfriend, Angela. He goes out just trying to have a good time, gets drunk and ends up spending a night with Brandy. He passed out and doesn’t even remember having sex, but does remember Brandy saying she can’t get pregnant (and he believed her).
Inciting Incident-Brandy can’t believe she actually has the most popular guy in school in her bed! What a catch!
Inciting Incident-Brandy takes pictures of Alex while he’s sleeping nude. She’s going to savor every minute of this moment. Her manipulative mind knows photos may come in handy if she needs leverage. She also goes through his wallet, getting all of the information she can.
Turning Point 1- Alex finds out that Angela is pregnant. They get back together and he blocks all contact with Brandy—he thinks.
Turning Point 1-Brandy is furious when Alex blocks her and she can’t reach him. She can’t cope with it and has a major fit. She starts following them on social media, using fake names.
Turning Point 1-Brandy refuses to let Alex ditch her for another woman, at any cost. She starts plotting revenge and a plan to hook him.
Act 2- Alex starts building a great life with Angela. They plan their wedding. He’s so happy he’s going to have a “real” family like he always wanted.
Act 2-Brandy is going to get even with Alex for dumping her. She just lost her chance to get a new family to replace the one she lost.
Act 2-New Plan-Brandy connives a way to replace Alex’s girlfriend. Otherwise, she may need to get rid of her completely.
Turning Point 2/Midpoint- Alex learns Brandy just had a baby boy and told his BFF he’s the only possible father. When Angela accidently discovers this, she takes their new baby girl, Sophia, and goes back to her parents.
Turning Point 2/Midpoint-Brandy has been wearing progressively larger pregnancy pillows all winter to match Angela’s growth month-by-month, as stalked on social media. To fulfill her fantasy, Brandy kidnaps a baby in the spring, right after Alex’s baby daughter is born.
Turning Point 2/Midpoint-The kidnapped infant is a girl, so Brandy disguises her as a boy. She lightens the baby’s hair with bleach to match Alex’s baby pictures so he will believe the baby is his. Brandy displays no conscience as she reads news headlines about the kidnapping and reward. She is delighted when her old, very Catholic neighbor lady dubs the little one “Baby Dearest” and gives him (her) a beautiful pastel blue rosary to hang in the nursery. Brandy calls the little one Baby Dearest from then on.
Act 3-Alex starts to visit his son at Brandy’s, like a dutiful father should. The baby doesn’t look a thing like him, and his heart’s not in it. Brandy keeps trying unsuccessfully to seduce him. Alex passes out twice when he visits Brandy’s apartment, but he doesn’t know why. His once happy life has turned to shit.
Act 3-Brandy tries desperately to manipulate Alex into being with her and the baby. He wants only the loves of his life, Angela and Sophia. This greatly infuriates Brandy. She wants Alex to forget about them. Brandy drugs Alex and increases the dose. If she can’t have him, she’s not going to let anyone else have him either. She files for child support through DSHS to pin Alex, and she is already getting child support for two children, Macy and Mason.
Act 3-Rethink everything-Brandy is totally, batshit, certifiably crazy. There’s no way to predict what she will do next. Her motus operandum is “Til death us do part”-on steroids!
New Plan-Brandy increases her drug supply and studies up on how to raise drug levels from sedation to lethal overdose without getting caught. Brandy is going to do whatever it takes so that pesky girlfriend, Angela, doesn’t keep Alex any longer.
Turning Point 3-Baby Dearest gets very sick, poisoned from his (her) skin absorbing the hypochlorite in bleach that Brandy has been using to lighten the baby’s hair. Alex goes with Brandy to take the baby to the ER and is very surprised when Brandy struggles to remember where he was born. She also stumbles when the nurse asks his birth date and weight.
Turning Point 3-Brandy realizes she’s about to get arrested for kidnapping. She says she needs to catch a cigarette break outside and quickly dumps Alex and their baby at the ER. When the diaper comes off, the medical team soon surmise Jack is actually the kidnapped infant girl everyone’s been looking for.
Turning Point-Brandy has to disappear fast. She rushes to her apartment to grab a few things, including little Mason jars from the cradles in the closet. They are revealed to contain the embryos of twins she lost, which she’s been mothering with love.
Act 4/Climax-The authorities soon locate Alex. He is arrested for kidnapping, attempted murder from poisoning the baby, and breaking into Brandy’s apartment to confront her.
Act 4/Climax-Brandy acts totally sane and innocent and lies her way out of everything. She makes Alex take the whole fall so the police haul him away.
Act 4-Climax- Brandy destroys evidence of any crime, including the saved kidnapping headlines which she burns in the sink. She remembers to grab her mother’s obituary on the way out.
Resolution-Alex sits helplessly in jail. An unknown lady lawyer comes to help him. It’s his biological mother.
She reveals she was forced to give him up when she was a young clerk and became pregnant by a powerful judge, Alex’s biological and adoptive father. Both of his adoptive parents are deceased, so it’s finally safe for her to come forward.
Resolution-Brandy gets on a plane, heads to Detroit to see her mother. She does not acknowledge her death and can’t wait for her to meet Mason and Macy.
Brandy starts flirting with the guy seated next to her. She has met her next victim.
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Alan’s Reveals
My Vision:
I do whatever it takes for me to be a true wordsmith that spins wildly original and entertaining screenplays that are passionately sought out by top industry professionals who turn them into critically and publicly acclaimed major motion pictures distributed by the top studios in Hollywood, all while writing from wherever I may be leisurely traveling the world at the moment.
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What I learned: Caught a couple pay offs without a proper set up! The outline has improved! Yet another important pass.
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Title: Ninja Burgers
Genre: Action/Comedy
Concept: A down on his luck, nineteen-year-old fast food employee finds a high tech bracelet that turns him into the world’s deadliest super soldier.
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WORKING OUTLINE
Main Conflict: Tiberius has a high tech bracelet fused to his wrist that makes him a super soldier, the bad guys who stole it want it back and will kill him and anyone else who gets in their way to get it.
Key:
PJ = Protagonist Journey
AJ = Antagonist Journey
Before Story Starts:
AJ 1: Crypto is a brilliant engineer who designs weapons systems for various governments.
AJ 2: He is approached by EWD Consolidated Technologies (the secretly evil organization recruiting great minds in their bid to eventually take over the world) and quickly rises through the ranks to become senior management and in charge of the tech acquisitions branch.
AJ 3: He finds out what his real job is (to acquire the technology necessary to raise an army of super soldiers/AI bots to eventually take over the country and then the world) and realizes he is trapped and must project strength and ruthlessness or face death.
Genre: Action/Comedy
Act 1 – Tiberius Finds Something Shiny in the Trash – [The Orphan]
Opening:
PJ 1: Tiberius Truman (19) is late for work.
Set Up 1: Quickly drops off his sick father’s (Harry Truman) lunch and meds with a promise to bring him dinner and find a way to get his needed med refills that they can’t afford.
He rushes out the door to his bike. Takes off.
ACTION SET PIECE:
Set Up 2: We see him riding his bike to work…poorly. He can’t do jumps, falls off the bike, is chased by dogs and is hit by a bus.
Once at work: he’s bullied by his boss, displays a lack of confidence at every turn, and shows that he’s a weak “yes, man” to all those around him. He’s depressed, but has a good heart.
He takes out the trash to the dumpster and is kind to a homeless man that lives behind the restaurant. Gives him some food. Homeless guy asks him why he doesn’t stand up for himself. ‘It’s just easier to go along. I don’t want any trouble.’
We meet his best friend Hannibal Byrd. He wants to be YouTube/PodCast famous and needs Tiberius to be his camera and sound guy. Tiberius goes along but his heart isn’t in it.
AJ 4: An evil henchman visits the restaurant. This is Shadow. He orders and sits in a booth to eat. Sets a case on his tray. Plays with his phone, chuckling at Tic Tocs as he eats.
Tiberius is bullied by a member of the group saying maybe they should cut him out of the You Tube group. He never comes up with any ideas, is always a downer etc. Hannibal defends him.
Set Up 3: Tiberius is bullied into mentioning to his best friend that his life goal is to either open his own fast food restaurant or to be a ninja. This gets him a load of shit from the others. Hannibal reminds him that he will never be a ninja and that it would be cultural appropriation anyway. They check that with another employee, Gary Huang but Gary doesn’t give a shit and isn’t bothered by him wanting to be a ninja. Tiberius takes this as justification for his dream and then Hannibal reminds him that Gary is Chinese not Japanese so why would it bother him.
Shadow finishes his meal. Sips his huge drink. Laughs at Tic Tocs. Tiberius offers to take his tray with the trash on it. Henchman nods and waves him off. He forgets that the case containing the bracelet is on the tray. Tiberius tosses the trash as his boss yells at him to do the freezer floor. Shadow leaves the restaurant, still locked in on his phone.
AJ 5: With his job/life on the line, Crypto’s henchman Shadow loses the high tech super soldier bracelet he promised to the EWD Consolidated Technologies executive board.
Deeper Layer: the evil henchman Shadow is the man Tiberius will ultimately kill in the final confrontation. Shadow will be wearing a bracelet as a High Tower Surprise for Tiberius and he will have to overcome that.
Inciting Incident:
It’s later, Tiberius on his hands and knees in the freezer, scraping ice off the floor, freezing, but he says nothing about it. Boss pokes his head in, orders him to take out the trash and go home. No overtime!
Tiberius gathers the trash in the kitchen and subtly pockets several burgers and a couple apple pies, then heads out with the trash saying goodnight.
PJ 2: As he tosses the trash bag into the dumpster, the bag tears and all of its contents spill out to the ground. Old homeless guy offers to help clean up. Tiberius spies amongst the refuse a small case. He finds an awesome looking metallic bracelet inside. He and the homeless guy discuss how much he could get for it? Should he take it into the lost and found? This could pay for his dad’s meds if he gets enough for it. They decide they should try to sell it. Tiberius offers it to the homeless guy but he refuses it.
Set Up 5: Tiberius slips the bracelet on and it painfully fuses to his wrist. This freaks both of them out.
Deeper Layer: The bracelet is a piece of future high tech that turns him into a super soldier.
Deeper Layer Hint: ACTION SET PIECE:
Pay Off 2: On the bike ride home mysterious abilities show up. He can make the jump he missed on the way to work. He avoids the bus with some true BMX style riding. He does a bunny hop over a car that almost hits him. And he flat out outruns a dog chasing him.
When he gets home he’s both shocked and completely gassed. Although he has new skills, he’s still woefully out of shape. He pukes on his front lawn.
He goes in to give his dad the dinner of stolen burgers and apple pies and says he may have a way to get some money for his meds. Not to worry. Dad says mom would have been proud of him, maybe?
AJ ?:
Set Up 4: We see Crypto giving Shadow hell for losing the bracelet, maybe he’s at home in his study chewing out a hologram of Shadow. Busts up his office, tries to hit the hologram with a fireplace poker etc. Then has to assure his wife Clarissa that all is okay. Deeper Layer : We see Crypto has a loving wife that he cares deeply for and that his job is killing him. He takes pills and glances at a photo of a tropical island with a hammock stretched between two palm trees.
Turning Point:
Set Up 7: (this is where we need Hannibal to demonstrate something powerful he can do that makes Tiberius want to use him to help in the climax.) Tiberius meets up with Hannibal to do a YouTube video. Again, Tiberius goes along with his friends wild plans of stardom (we need to prove to the group that you’re into this! You want to be rich and famous, don’t you? Hannibal has the camera on Tiberius) so he doesn’t hurt his feelings or discourage him. “Do you have to go to college to open a business?”
PJ 6: ACTION SET PIECE:
Pay Off 5: From out of nowhere black SUVs pull up, men in black jump out, throw a hood over Tiberius’ head, zip tie his hands, inject him with something that knocks him out after he busts the first set of ties, (it’s a vicious struggle) but eventually they subdue Tiberius and toss him into the truck, snatch Hannibal’s phone (he was filming everything) etc away. The trucks pull away leaving Hannibal stunned.
Deeper Layer Hint: Untrained Tiberius was tough to subdue!
They pull off his hood. Tiberius finds himself in a cement room with one iron, vault-like door and no windows. Cameras in all four corners protected behind small iron cages. He is iron shackled to a thick steel chair that is bolted to the floor at the arms, wrists, neck, waist, thighs, calves, and ankles. He has an IV in his arm. Seems a bit woozy but fully conscious.
Addison Grant watches a video of the abduction and shakes her head. “Why didn’t you trank him from a distance?” “He’s just a doughy kid. We didn’t think…” “No, you didn’t, did you? The SUV body work is coming out of your paycheck.” Addison is in charge. Boss Bitch. She goes in and talks to Tiberius. She explains what he has on his wrist and makes him an offer he can’t refuse, join their experimental team of human test subjects, or they can amputate his arm and take the bracelet.
Set Up 6: Tiberius asks about who will take care of his father. “Jesus will he even notice you’re gone?” “Yes. He needs his meds, too.” Addison rolls her eyes. “Establish a cover for him. Get a detail to cover the father.”
Deeper Layer Reveal: Addison Grant shows up and makes the offer to Tiberius to join the test subject group or lose his arm.
Deeper Layer: Addison Grant wants out of her terrible life and will do anything to achieve this dream. She will provide the future tech bracelet to the bad guys in order for a huge payment and a new identity.
Deeper Layer Hint: Addison is incredibly unhappy that Tiberius has the bracelet. Not excited at all that he managed to retrieve the missing item.
Act II – Tiberius: The Fish Out of Water – [The Wanderer]
New Plan:
PJ 7: Tiberius decides to become a human test subject and keep his arm. The plan is to find out what is really going on with this bracelet, and survive the experiments.
Plan in Action:
PJ 8: Set Up: Tiberius is a true fish out of water amongst the perfect human specimens who have volunteered to become super soldiers. He meets the other trainees… Set Up: Patton, MacArthur, Eisenhower, and Washington. Pay Off: He is given the name Custer.
He is unable to keep up…the old ways on display again. All kinds of super soldier training set pieces here. But he gets better.
Set Up: Washington sets her romantic eye on Tiberius during training.
Set Up: Tiberius fails a horrifyingly scary training exercise…his fears get the best of him. (Payed off later when he must overcome the same type of situation in the climax.)
Pay Off 6: Father detail arrival scene. Maybe a men in black detail? That could be funny. “Who’s going to clean the house? Am I supposed to live in a pig stye you heartless assholes? Shots of MIB washing dishes, vacuuming, scrubbing toilets.
Pay Off: Tiberius succeeds at a task much to the horror of Addison and the cheers of his cohorts. He’s got skills!
Pay Off: and Set Up: Tiberius hooks up with Super Soldier test subject Washington.
Shadow sneaks into the training facility.
Deeper Layer Hint: Set Up: Shadow knows the code to enter the facility. Addison sends the group into the location that gets them all killed.
Deeper Layer: Pay Off: Tiberius only misses out on getting killed because he was zonked out after sex with Washington.
AJ 6: (Not Scene) After finding the bracelet he agrees to bring “Good Guy Leader” into the group, to disappear him to Japan so he can retire comfortably if she will wipe out the group of test subjects and bring him the prototype bracelets.
Midpoint Turning Point:
PJ 9: Set Up: The entire team is wiped out by Crypto’s henchmen in a massive explosion. Tiberius is able to escape thanks to some new skills but just barely.
Deeper Layer: Addison, after making a new deal with Crypto facilitates Shadow’s infiltration and sabotage of the test subjects.
Act III – Tiberius Grows a Pair – [The Warrior]
Rethink Everything:
PJ 10: After the shock of losing the team he had begun to bond with, Tiberius realizes the old ways won’t work anymore. The leader of the ‘good guys’ meets up with him. Pay Off: Tiberius vows to avenge his class of fallen super soldiers and wipe out Crypto and his organization..
Deeper Layer: Tiberius doesn’t know Addison is working for the bad guys…neither does the audience.
Deeper Layer Hint: Addison discourages Tiberius from going on his mission of revenge.
New Plan:
PJ 11: Pay Off for Hannibal from Act I: Tiberius goes to his best friend Hannibal for help. He should use his closest friend in some way to help him. This needs to be set up in Act I.
Together they come up with a plan to infiltrate and destroy Crypto’s evil headquarters.
Build in stealth type set pieces here. Pay Off: Also, make him have to perform some task that was a major challenge/failure for him during the training process.
Turning Point:
PJ 12 – AJ 7: Huge failure / Major shift: Tiberius is captured and set for execution. Along with his best friend, maybe? Crypto will have his super soldier bracelet and be able to create his army.
Deeper Layer Reveal: And… the ‘good guy’ leader Addison stands at Crypto’s side (Pay Off) and was behind the death of the entire team! Tiberius just survived by dumb luck. It turns out that ‘good guy’ Addison was the supplier of the tech (Pay Off) to the henchman Shadow who then lost the bracelet at the fast food restaurant!
Act IV – Tiberius Burns Down the House – [The Martyr]
Climax/Ultimate expression of the conflict:
PJ 13: Tiberius embraces the new way. He finds a way to defeat Crypto’s henchman Shadow and save his buddy. He kills ‘good guy’, recovers the prototypes Pay Off: (one by hacking off Shadow’s hand) (Shadow will be wearing a bracelet as a High Tower Surprise for Tiberius and he will have to overcome that.)
and…
PJ 14 – AJ 8: Crypto asks Tiberius to give something sentimental to his wife as he awaits death. He doesn’t want to be saved, just to make sure his wife will be taken care of. Tiberius spares him and together they fake his death so he can get out of his miserable life.
AJ 9: …sends Crypto to an apparent fiery death in front of the Executive Board and then destroys the evil lair in the process.
Resolution:
PJ 15: Tiberius, new ways on display, turns down a chance to be a permanent super soldier, opens his own fast food restaurant and calls it: Ninja Burgers Pay Off: (even though his best friend keeps reminding him that he never was or can be a ninja.)
AJ 10: Crypto and his wife open a bar on a tropical island (Pay Off:). Receives a postcard (or modern equivalent) from Tiberius warning he’ll be keeping an eye on him.
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We see Lorenzo’s dark side and DONT see Landlord’s dark side at first; so we don’t know who to believe, just like Emily.
Question 4: Where in the story do those setups belong?
Early on; first few scenes.
Question 1: What will you reveal?
Lorenzo isn’t just a pizza maker, he’s got a passion for fine Italian cooking and is really good at it.
Question 2: When will the reveal show up in the story?
When he has to take care of Emily, and after she has been neglecting her own dietary needs.
Question 3: What setups need to be in place to have this reveal work?
The outside image of the pizza shop from the get-go says NOTHING about fine italian cuisine. It totally caters to a “hangout for shifty teenagers” vibe.
Also, Lorenzo is so busy making the business work, he never has any time to cultivate that side of him anyway.
Question 4: Where in the story do those setups belong?
Early on; all throughout 1st act.
Question 1: What will you reveal?
Emily’s older sister is a hot-shot lawyer who could have saved her a lot of grief if she’d gone to her for business advice early on, but Emily didn’t do this because she was too proud and always felt upstaged by her “professional” sister. Ironically, her sister always felt upstaged by her artsy-glamourous broadway-bound sister.
Question 2: When will the reveal show up in the story?
Late in 2nd act, because Emily finally goes to her out of motivation to help Lorenzo, moreso than helping herself.
Question 3: What setups need to be in place to have each reveal work?
Emily has to be so house-proud from the beginning that she doens’t ask for help. The audience is also led to believe she really doesn’t HAVE anyone like that in her life that she can go to help for.
Question 4: Where in the story do those setups belong?
Every time a difficult business decision must be made: we question Emily’s quick decision making: looks like false confidence and we cringe that she’s making a bad mistake. Finally she gets humbled and seeks wise counsel.
Question 1: What will you reveal?
Lorenzo comes from a fairly well-to-do family in Italy, but he feels kinda ashamed as if he “abandoned” them when he opened a pizza shop in America: the family was always very adamant about keeping their money in the motherland.
Question 2: When will the reveal show up in the story?
Only after Lorenzo is “defeated” and gives up the shop and returns to the motherland.
Question 3: What setups need to be in place to have this reveal work?
His food and cooking technique is better than all the other pizza shops, but he doesn’t talk about where he got all that skill from. He even shirks it when Emily asks him where he learned to cook.
Question 4: Where in the story do those setups belong?
All through the first act.
Question 1: What will you reveal?
The secret of the 3rd floor, and why the landlord doesn’t do anything with it. (still don’t know what it is, but when we learn that Emily and Lorenzo turn that space into their home, we will be very happy for them)
Question 2: When will the reveal show up in the story?
When Emily goes sleuthing to find out more about the landlord.
Question 3: What setups need to be in place to have each reveal work?
Landlord just matter of factly says “its off limits” when Emily signs the lease.
Question 4: Where in the story do those setups belong?
Again; in the 1st act, right off the bat.
Question 1: What will you reveal?
Uncle puts a clause in the will that IF Lorenzo chose to marry the American, over the relatives wishes for him to stay in Italy, then he gets a ton of money to invest into his restaurant; a clause which largely goes against his family’s traditional attitude.
Question 2: When will the reveal show up in the story?
It will show up in the end, only AFTER Lorenzo and Emily have decided to live in Italy, and also AFTER Emily feels like they are not meant to stay in Italy, and instead return to America to continue to fight the battle for their livelihoods.
Question 3: What setups need to be in place to have this reveal work?
-Lorenzo torn between pleasing family, or pleasing himself.
– Show the tension in the family between “keeping it all on home turf” vs. “Expanding the borders of influence.
– Showing the two main reasons for Lorenzo staying in Italy: It gives Emily that “cinderella” feeling, and “the pizza shop wont make enough money in America to do what he really wants to do with his life”.
Question 4: Where in the story do those setups belong?
Emily and Lorenzo’s entire existence in America in the first 3 acts, affirm the truths that make the Uncle realize what Lorenzo and Emily need. But that’s of course only if Lorenzo chooses his true calling: opening his own restaurant, and getting the girl, even if it goes against what the other family members want.
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Paul Dees’ Reveals
My Vision: I am a writer/director/producer that writes and makes films of all kinds, and I am recognized by the industry as both a highly successful filmmaker and as a person that’s easy to work with.
What I learned from doing this assignment is how to setup a pattern of set and reveal to articulate the beats of a screenplay.
Act 1:
Setup: Special Agent Rick O’Brien is in charge of a hostage situation. The hostage is killed, and the kidnapper escapes.
Reveal: Six months later, Rick is on an extended leave of absence and a shell of a man, trying to keep himself together.
Setup: A woman plants a bomb in a building and leaves. It goes off just as she walks outside. Her face shimmers, and a mask falls to the ground. The woman, whose face looks different from the mask she was wearing, runs off in terror.
Reveal: Rick is contacted by his boss and tells him his expertise is needed at a crime scene. He reluctantly agrees and investigates the scene with Special Agent Sean Gray. There, Sean finds the mask the woman left behind.
Setup: A second terrorist attack occurs at an office building in a different part of town. This time a 60 year-old man plants the bomb. He emerges just as the woman did, and his face shimmers and a mask falls to the ground.
Reveal: Rick’s boss reactivates him, as they’re now dealing with a serial terrorist.
Act 2:
Setup: Back at the Field Office, Sean analyzes the mask they found at the first crime scene, and discovers it controls the mind of the subject who puts it on. He demonstrates, and it takes two agents to remove it from his face.
Reveal: Rick looks through the FBI database and finds a possible suspect named Jonathan Rogers with a background in demolition and biomedical technology, that was convicted of blowing up buildings for people wanting to collect the insurance on them, and recently paroled.
Setup: Rick and Sean visit Jonathan but can’t prove he has anything to do with the current bombings.
Reveal: Rick and Sean travel to the second crime scene, and they notice the residue from the bomb is exactly the same as the residue from the bombs Jonathan Rogers used.
Setup: Rick and Sean search the Post Office database to see if Jonathan delivered any packages on the days the bombings occurred.
Reveal: The Post Office shows a package sent by Jonathan arrived at a woman’s house the day of the first bombing, and to a man’s house the day of the second bombing.
Setup: Rick and Sean visit the homes of both people that received a package from Jonathan, and they’re the ones who planted the bombs against their will.
Reveal: Rick and Sean search Jonathan’s house and find explosive materials. Jonathan pulls out a gun and points it at Sean. Rick fires in retaliation just in time, killing Jonathan and saving Sean.
Act 3:
Setup: Rick invites Sean to have dinner with his family.
Reveal: Sean and Rick’s family bond, and he shares how his family was killed in 9/11, which inspired him to be an FBI agent.
Setup: Three weeks later, another building in town is bombed in the same manner as the other two. This time, an 18 year-old girl is the innocent perpetrator.
Reveal: At the field office, Rick and Sean open a package addressed to them. It contains a flash drive with a video from someone with a disguised voice who says they clearly caught the wrong guy, since Jonathan’s dead, and there’s been another bombing. The bomber then says he doctored the Post Office records and planted the explosive materials they found in Jonathan’s apartment, to set him up and to prove how inept the FBI really is. He then tells them they’ll have to do better than that to catch him, and that there will be a whole new wave of attacks coming.
Setup: Rick and Sean brief all of the heads of local law enforcement about the new threat, in hopes of finding the bomber before the next attacks.
Reveal: Five more building are bombed, each one involving an innocent perpetrator who is released from their task once their mask falls off their faces. The city is in chaos.
Setup: Rick and Sean are devastated, and Rick turns in his badge.
Reveal: Rick finally opens up to his wife about the night the hostage he was trying to protect was killed, and how it destroyed his confidence, and how he felt he was getting a second chance by being assigned to find the bomber, but that he bungled that too. His wife tells him he’s got to see it through, or he’ll never be at peace.
Setup: Rick asks his boss for his badge back.
Reveal: His boss tells him didn’t process the paperwork for his resignation and gives him his badge.
Act 4:
Setup: Rick starts to suspect that the bomber may be one of their own, and he starts running background and fingerprint checks on all of the agents in the office, unbeknownst to them.
Reveal: Rick pulls Sean aside at the office, and tells him when he looked up his name on the FBI database, it pulled up a 56 year-old special agent named Robert Daivs stationed in Los Angeles. Furthermore, he got Sean’s fingerprints off of the coffee mug he drank from the day before, and pulled up one Lester Thomas, a felon with a long history of computer fraud, that was granted parole two years ago. Additionally, it showed he served in the military and worked in demolition, and then earned a degree in biomedical engineering before he went to prison. Sean tells Rick he blames the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security for failing the death of his parents on 9/11. So he stole agent Davis’s identity to cover his tracks, and then he decided to give the FBI some more hands-on practice at stopping terrorist attacks, as opposed to them just going through the motions with some pre-planned exercise. He goes on to say that even though people have died from his scenarios, many more people will be saved once the FBI is able to spot and prevent them from happening. Rick tries to arrest Sean, they fight, and Sean gains the upper hand. He tells Rick normally he’d just kill him, but since he saved his life earlier in the case, he’ll let him live. His wife though won’t be so fortunate.
Setup: Sean knocks Rick out and activates all of the masks and timers on the bombs he sent his new group of helpers.
Reveal: Sean stops off at Rick’s house, carrying a package. He puts it on the doorstep, and then rings the doorbell. Rick’s wife comes to the door, and she and Sean talk for a moment. Sean points out the package on the doorstep, and she takes it inside. Sean drives away. Rick’s wife opens the package and pulls out a mask. A light shines in her eyes, and an audible voice tells her to put it on. She complies, and her face changes so that she looks like someone else. The voice then instructs her to pull a bomb out of the package and to head to a downtown, where she’ll receive further instructions. Rick’s wife puts the bomb in her purse, the timer activates, and she drives away. Sean’s other helpers all get in their cars with bombs in tow, their timers counting down.
Setup: Rick puts all agents on the lookout for Sean, as he jumps in his car and drives off.
Reveal: Rick pulls up to his house and runs inside. His wife is nowhere to be found.
Setup: Sean is spotted by a pair of agents, and they call Rick, who runs to his car and joins in the chase. Meanwhile, Rick’s wife gets to the building her mask has instructed her to go to, and she goes inside. Sean is run off the road, by the other agents in front of a mall. He gets out of his car and a gunfight ensues, and Sean ends up shooting both agents, and runs in to the mall.
Reveal: Rick pulls up and checks on the agents, who are both wounded, but alive. They tell Rick where Sean ran off to, and Rick runs into the mall. He finds Sean and pursues him on foot. Rick’s wife takes an elevator to the 25<sup>th</sup> floor.
Setup: Sean makes his way to the roof of the mall, with Rick close behind. Rick’s wife plants the bomb in a utility closet. The timer has only five minutes left before it goes off. The voice coming from her mask tells her to remain of the 25<sup>th</sup> floor. She stands in the hallway and looks at her phone. Sean’s other helpers he’s sent his packages to plant their bombs as well, the timers on each of them have just minutes left.
Reveal: Rick and Sean fight and Rick overpowers him. Sean pulls out his phone and then throws it over the side of the building. Rick knocks Sean unconscious and goes over to the edge. The phone is on a walkway about eight feet down. Rick drops down to the walkway and picks it up. But just as he goes to open up the app to stop the timers on the bombs, Sean grabs his wrist, and they struggle. There’s only 20 seconds left on each bomb’s timer. Rick gets the upper hand, throws Sean off the walkway, and he plunges to his death. There’s five seconds left on the timer.
Rick opens the app that will stop the bombs’ timers, and they all stop with one second left. The masks on each of Sean’s helpers including Rick’s wife, start shimmering and fall off, revealing their true identities, and they all stand where they’re at, without any recollection of what happened. The nightmare is over, and the country is safe once more. Rick is awarded the Presidential Freedom medal by the President of the United States and is promoted to field office supervisor.
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Nancy’s Reveals.
It seems I have several repetitive beats in the outline now, although that is because I am still working on the order of certain things. It will all iron out as I move along.
Act 1: Freya’s search for her life’s purpose sends her fleeing home to an uninhabited island.
Surface Layer: Freya is troubled by her platonic marriage.
Set-up: At her holiday christmas party, Freya corners her boss in the bathroom, seduces him.
Reveal: Freya is in a “platonic” marriage.
Deeper Layer: Freya escapes to give herself time to think… What’s her purpose? Is her husband her soulmate?
Freya PJ1: Still reeling from a miscarriage and her failure to commit to her husband/marriage, Freya fights with her husband at a holiday christmas party for work. Falls back to the old pattern of work to fill her void.
Action Now: corners her boss at office party, then uses sex to manipulate
Action Future: Threatens to reveal encounter w/boss to get a meaningful story
** Freya is interviewed for a story about the death of her media mogul boss. Story reference’s his island and the sordid history of “murder”.
Establish she is a city girl, glued to her phone, uncomfortable with quiet.
Action Now: shuts down when confronted by husband, sobs, opens computer, writes madly
Action Future: ?
Set-up: In the middle of an argument with her husband, Freya has flashbacks of an unhappy childhood, she doesn’t want a family.
** Freya reveals (in therapy) that she is relieved that she is no longer pregnant
Reveal: Freya is not unhappy about the miscarriage, she wasn’t ready – unsure the baby belongs to her husband.
Action Now: She walls up, speaks without emotion, curls into a ball on therapist’s couch
Inciting Incident: Husband gives her an ultimatum, commit to relationship or he’ll leave her.
Action Now: She tries to change his mind with sex, but he denies her
** Freya PJ2: Freya is passed over for a big assignment
Action Now: She threatens to reveal her boss’s indiscretions
Freya PJ3: Freya meets boss to pitch for a more fulfilling story, but is refused.
** Townspeople discuss the future of the island now that media mogul boss owner is dead. Express hopes that tourism will resume
Noah AJ1: While in town, Noah sees a picture of Freya (when interviewed), she’s wearing the one of a kind amulet that once belonged to Lisbeth. He also overhears “treasure hunters” discussing the presence of fortune hidden on the island he is protecting.
Set-up: Noah overhears two men at the village bar discussing a raid on the island
<b style=”font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit;”>Reveal: Media mogul has buried millions of dollars on property – (the men aren’t treasure hunters, they are investigators for IRS).
Action Now: Noah Slinks around the bar/village, stays in shadows, face down
Action Now: He knocks over a treasure hunter’s drink, all over map of grounds
(Noah AJ2: Noah sends an old travel brochure to Freya’s address.)
Deeper Layer: Noah recognizes Freya as the reincarnation of his past love, Lisbeth and hopes to draw her to the island to be sure.
Freya PJ4: Freya gets an opportunity to write a series of travel articles/blogs about an uninhabited island (once a famous tourism site until the death of Lisbeth, 30 years prior but Freya does not know this yet.)
** Establish Freya is a city slicker with zero skills for living alone on deserted island
** Establish Freya/husbands relationship based on friendship, now hanging on thread
Freya PJ5: Freya tells her husband she’s leaving for a career opportunity. Her husband gives her one week to return, or he leaves. “If you want to be taken seriously as a writer, you need to start acting like someone people can take seriously.”
Action Now: once again tries to use sex as a salve, he stops her
Hints: Freya has dreams of drowning and we believe this is due to a childhood fear of water… but in fact, they are dreams of how she died in her past life.
Turning Point 1: As she’s ferried to island, Freya learns about the legend of the island, she has an unexplainable drive to solve their mystery.
Action Now: She clings to the side of the boat as they ride (fear). Selfies, takes tons of pictures, struggles to keep calm exterior composure
** There is no indication that a caretaker lives on the island.
** Noah watches her disembark from the shadows.
<b style=”font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit;”>Action Now: Freya ask ridiculous questions, like daily housekeeping, turns her nose up at the rustic conditions. Scrambles around the island to find bars on her phone. When it’s at the edge of the water, she nearly has a panic attack.
Action Later: She overcomes her fear with deep breaths when she has to go back on the water to escape the island
Set-up: On the ferry from the mainland to island, villager recounts the covered up cold case of Lisbeth’s death.
Reveal: Media Mogul is the owner of the island and has been preventing visitors for the last 30 years.
Act 2: Freya dives into her assignment, but digs deeper into exploring the cold case. Through Noah, Freya reviews her errors of the past/in dreams? through hypnosis?
** Freya struggles with having spotty internet, living so close to water, no water pressure in the cottage, etc.
** Freya falls into depression, questions her abilities to write, stay on island
** Freya fights with husband from stress and his “I told you so attitude”
** Noah wears “caretaker” clothing
** The dreams Freya has about her past are so life like, audience questions whether they are dreams or Freya’s reality
<b style=”font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit;”>Action Now: After the dreams, she curls up in a ball, afraid
Noah AJ3: Noah spies/stalks Freya. Tries to scare her off the island before she learns the truth > who she is and the truth about the murder
Freya PJ6: As Freya stumbles about adjusting to being alone/non-city life, a series of events (created by Noah) occur and she begins to question her reality.
Action Now: She freaks out with her editor and therapist on the phone, acts far from someone who can be taken seriously.
Set-up: In an intense therapy session, Freya and the therapist discuss that her dreams are manifestations of Freya’s fears.
Deeper Layer: Freya has nightly dreams that continue to build clues to the truth > she is the reincarnation of Lisbeth.
** possible beat here in flashback of the home, lived in and in its heyday
** Noah keeps protective watch over something that is buried beneath the house
Freya PJ7: Freya discovers the deserted home that once belonged to Lisbeth and Lars. She breaks in. turns her nose up at the dust.
Noah AJ 4: Noah stalks Freya as she explores the house.
HInts: When Noah is alone, and we see the world from his perspective, his surroundings are what they once were (30 years ago), but Freya sees them as they are now – dusty, unkempt with furniture covered in sheets.
Turning Point 2 / Midpoint: Freya learns the truth about Lisbeth’s death, she uncovers the stories Noah has been collecting. Noah confronts Freya in the house, lies to her about who he is.
Action Now: Instead of being afraid, Freya asks a zillion questions – do you live here? How do you get here? Are you a ghost? To which he replies, do I look like a ghost to you?
Set-up: Freya ransacks the house for clues, she finds a hidden tunnel under the house. Noah sneaks up behind her.
Reveal: Noah is protecting the land/house from treasure hunters.
Set-up: Noah describes/shares details of the night of Lisbeth’s death, elements that match the dreams Freya has been having.
Reveal: Freya was Lisbeth in an earlier life – audience knows but she does not.
Noah AJ 5: Noah tells her to leave the island – for her safety.
Action Now: Until now, he’d been afraid to get too close… he approaches her, reaches for the amulet she wears around her neck.
** snippets of weather reports in the background days before Freya arrives on island
<b style=”font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit;”>Set-up: ?? Flashback of her reckless college life with men, where her friend (current husband) always comes to her rescue.
Reveal: Freya was abandoned as a baby, found in the dumpster, does not feel worthy of love – her wound – and therefore she keeps searching for her soulmate & soul purpose.
Act 3: Freya digs in. But a deadly storm is headed their way and she can’t leave. Through Noah, Freya reviews her errors of the present/what she is not seeing,
Action Now: Packs bags, frantically tries to get someone on the phone.
Freya PJ8: Freya begins piecing together why Lisbeth was murdered and by who.
Set-up: Noah describes/shares details of the night of Lisbeth’s death, elements that match the dreams Freya has been having.
Reveal: Freya was Lisbeth in an earlier life – audience knows but she does not.
Discovery: As Freya gains his trust, he shares the details of Lisbeth’s death. These details match what Freya has been dreaming. Freya shares her dreams with Noah, they match what she has learned about Lisbeth’s death. – the face of her killer has not yet been revealed.
Set-up: Lisbeth’s amulet washed away the night she died, years later it washes to shore, found by a family who sells it at a NYC flea market. Freya is inexplicably drawn to it, and has worn it ever since.
Reveal: Freya is wearing the amulet that belonged to Lisbeth. Noah sees it and confirms his beliefs.
** to rid dreams, Freya undergoes past-life regression therapy
Freya PJ 9: Befriends Noah, uses him for info. There is an unexplainable soul connection between them.
** Freya pitches the new story to her boss, indicating this investigative piece will make her career. She emails notes to boss.
** Husband gives final ultimatum to Freya to return home in 2 days
Noah AJ7: Forces Freya to delete her notes, he doesn’t want her to complete the story because then he would leave her >> she is his love from the past.
** a previous beat where Freya attempts to get closer to water, tinker with a defunct boat left on land
Freya has another dream, this time the face of her killer is revealed, it’s Noah.
Reveal: Freya’s dreams aren’t dreams, they are memories from the past – where Lisbeth drowns.
Freya PJ10: Afraid for her life, Freya tries to escape. She’s hit from behind.
Turning Point 3: Freya wakes up tied to her bed as the waters rise from the impending storm outside her door. Her story, and semblance of a shot of a story that could launch her career, is shattered.
Set-up: Noah traps Freya, ties her to bed.
Set-up: Noah recounts the night of Lisbeth’s with such precision, Freya knows he was there.
Reveal: Lisbeth’s husband put a hit out on her, went sideways. Freya’s boss is Lisbeth’s husband.
Action Now: Freya walls up, can’t speak. “My followers will wonder why I haven’t posted yet.”
<b style=”font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit;”>Deeper Layer: Because he is a soul, Noah knows Freya is the reincarnation of Lisbeth… but it is unclear how much she remembers. He tries to deter her from looking within and remembering the truth… in case her memory will implicate him.
** internet is out, landlines are out, no electricity – Freya can’t reach husband to ask him to wait
Act 4: A deadly storm is approaching the island, no one is able to come rescue Freya. She has to use a different tact, convincing Noah to help her escape. Freya sees herself lonely, without husband in the future
Action Now: Freya uses her sexuality to manipulate Noah, he won’t let her touch him. “No.”
Freya PJ 11: Freya convinces Noah that Lisbeth loved him, and so does she. Attempts to win him over. Uses investigative skills to learn more about the real story of why Lisbeth was killed.
Reveal/discovery: (Lisbeth’s husband hired killers, and framed Noah/Caretaker for the murder so that he could claim ownership to the family fortune and money buried in the basement of the family home).
Reveal: Lisbeth’s husband put a hit out on her, went sideways. Freya’s boss is Lisbeth’s husband.
Set-up: Freya uses her sexuality to convince Noah to leave the island. They have an inexplicable connection when they kiss.
Reveal: Freya realizes who Noah is, and now she will manipulate him to save her life. Noah was Lisbeth’s killer.
4th Act Climax: Lisbeth & Noah set out for the mainland together. Noah realizes Freya knows the truth about the murders. He confesses and she captures it all on recording/phone call to ?boss?authorities
Noah tries to kill her but they both go overboard.
Set-up: They head to the mainland together, Freya convinces Noah that she is Lisbeth and that she forgives him for her accidental death. When he discovers she still plans to turn in her story, they wrestle and she goes overboard.
Reveal: Freya’s plan is to reveal the truth about Lisbeth and lead the authorities to the buried money.
Set-up: Freya finds her will to survive, wakes up in hospital. No sign of Noah.
Reveal: Freya sees Noah’s picture in an old obituary, 30 years earlier. He was a spirit all along.
Set-up: (when she sees a picture of Lisbeth’s husband from 30 years ago, she recognizes him as her boss, the son of the media mogul.
Reveal: She releases her story that will incriminate the media mogul and his son for money laundering and tax fraud. She’s found her purpose and now puts her career aside to live a happy life with her existing husband.
Noah AJ8: As a spirit, Noah crosses over fulfilling his purpose to help Freya find the will to live.
Resolution: Freya returns to her home as a changed woman. She has the will to live, and fights to be with her husband, takes focus off her career.
She fights to get her husband back. Discovers Noah was never alive in the first place. Montage of scenes where it is obvious Noah was a spirit all along.
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I am sorry I am so behind. My family had a crises over the holidays, which left me too upset to make progress. Things are much better now, so I am hoping to make progress.
Deeper Layer
(Patty Ruland’s) Deeper Layer!
My vision: To get better and better so I attain representation and earn a good living in this business.
What I learned from doing this assignment is if I follow the directions and go through the process, astonishing breakthroughs are possible.
Assignment:
Surface Layer: Jessie, the dutiful protege and daughter of renowned naturalists and explorers. helps her parents prepare to venture into the Amazon rainforest in order to document sightings of the elusive pink river dolphin.Deeper Layer: She resents the favored status her older brother has, to the point he’ll be dubbed as expedition director, so she goes behind everyone’s back to go solo into the deep rainforest to study the ways of an indigenous tribe, gaining her a secret best friend.Major Reveal: She reveals she’s build her own raft/canoe and will conduct her own parallel expeditionInfluences Surface Story: Her father agrees, but it means they will occupy different vessels, which are separated by a terrible storm, subjecting her to the evil ways of a poacher who takes her hostage.Hints: She amazes her parents with her ability to build her own raft/canoe/shelter, all in one, and her knowledge of the lay of the land.Changes Reality: She wants to beat both her parents and the poacher to be the first to sight and document (draw or photograph) the river dolphin.
3. Add the rest of the structure to the characters to the script. Try to get to the point as we’ve done in the Iron Man example above.
Beginning: The parents and the brother are abuzz preparing and loading their boat, only to find that Jessie is piloting her own vessel.Inciting Incident: A storm hits, sending the boat down the river and out of sight and out of reach. Jessie sets out to find them and is joined by her friend.Turning Point 1: They find out a poacher, the parents’ rival, is on the trail of them all. They hatch a plan to double-cross the poacher.Act 2:Turning Point 2 / Midpoint: They let the poacher take them hostage; he chops up their raft for firewood. He ties them to posts on the deck of his boat. Act 3:Turning Point 3: They travel a long way, and still no sign of her friend’s tribe, in dangerous waters. The poacher demands they give him the map to the fabled home of the river dolphin, or he’ll throw them to the caymans and snakes. All is lost.Act 4 Climax: The tribe ambushes the poacher’s vessel and shoots poison darts and kill the crew. They take the poacher hostage at their village to exact retribution. The authorities arrive.Resolution: The parents show up, with reports they, including the brother, were the first to spot the pink river dolphin. Jessie is genuinely happy for them and happier for herself for having masterminded the capture of the notorious, ruthless poacher.
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Erin Ziccarelli’s Reveals!
Vision: I am going to create profound scripts that leave audiences remembering my movies and leave me excited to keep writing and moving up in the industry.
What I learned from doing this assignment is: in addition to the two parts of a reveal (setup and reveal), there are ways to show the reveal – either shock the audience, surprise the audience, or gradually give hints so that the reveal makes sense. Incorporating a blend of these into my outline and scenes will make it more dramatic and engage/connect with the audience.
Pull out the current version of your outline and the answers from the lessons listed here.
Module 2:
Lesson 4: What’s beneath the
surface?
Lesson 5: 4-Act Structure –
Turning PointsModule 3:
Lesson 3: Characters for
Subtext
Lesson 4: Character Intrigue
Lesson 6: Character ProfilesUsing that info, make a list of your answers to these four questions:
Question 1: What will you
reveal?
Question 2: When will the
reveal show up in the story?
Question 3: What setups need
to be in place to have each reveal work?
Question 4: Where in the story
do those setups belong?Act I
Setup: Poker game amongst the Donovan
family. Alex’s relationship with Kitty. Operation Dunbar goes wrong, and
Alex gives himself up.
Reveal: Alex is in prison 20 years
later. He receives some news of his inheritance.
Setup: Alex speaks badly of
Nathanial Caden. Insults Roger. Has lost hope.
Reveal: Scarlett Brennan is his daughter.
He will claim his inheritance because she is “family.” She’s his first step
in leaving the past behind.
Setup: Alex in rehab. It takes him
almost a year to get out, but he’s finally clean and ready to move on.
Reveal: Back at the prison, Alex is
preparing to leave. He has an altercation with the North End family members.
They know what he did to Ted. If he returns, they will kill him.
Setup: Alex wants desperately to get
his hands on the money. Roger wants nothing more than to know why the
money was not left directly to Scarlett.
Reveal: Alex will not see the money until
he approves the conservatorship. He will not tell Roger anything about his
“ties” to Scarlett, leaving Roger to open an informal investigation. Roger
won’t stop until he learns the truth.Act II
Setup: Alex, Jack, and Sean prepare
to launch their business. Alex visits the DMV.
Reveal: Scarlett has no idea about
the conservatorship. She does not know Alex when she sees him.
Setup: Scarlett’s life – her lack of
ambition and her struggles to feel safe and secure. She is everything Alex
once was.
Reveal: Scarlett is a good card
player and even better counterfeiter. She and Joe have finally earned
Richard’s trust – enough to put them in charge of this next operation.
Setup: Alex forges Scarlett’s signature.
Roger continues his investigation, with little success. He is forced to confront
some of his fears about coming home.
Reveal: Liquidation begins.
Setup: Alex sees his old friends.
They want him back. His uncle is sick.
Reveal: Alex’s uncle dies, naming
him “heir” to the family business. He rejects Patrick’s offer. Not wanting
to go back. This turns the family against him.Act III
Setup: Alex moving forward with the
business, Roger gives him a small fraction of the money, and the business
starts to work.
Reveal: Saoirse is working to
destroy Alex’s self-made success. She orders his business burned to the
ground.
Setup: The forensic scientists collect
DNA from the crime scene. Call Scarlett in.
Reveal: Scarlett finds the truth
out. She’s furious. Rejects Alex and everything he stood for. Roger tries
to help her.
Setup: Alex’s business and personal
life are both falling apart. He has only one buyer left. Scarlett rejects
his ill-fated attempt to apologize. He resorts back to the old ways.
Reveal: Alex goes back to the South
End. Reconnects with his old friends. He’s ready to rejoin them in their quest
for control of the black market.Act IV
Setup: Alex is nearly killed by the
Cadens and Brennans. He flees and buys the cocaine.
Reveal: Alex is going to live up to
his promise. Once again, he can’t abandon the Donovans.
Setup: Roger returns to the North
End. Knows exactly where to look for Alex.
Reveal: Roger is from the North End.
They brought him back because they thought he could help Alex. Alex is
shocked that someone from the “other side” would help him.
Setup: Alex returns to the South
End. Talks to Saoirse. Sits down to a final poker game with Richard.
Reveal: Alex rejects his old life.
Walks out of the room without harming anyone. Richard takes his own life,
symbolizing the death of the old family feud and a potential for peace
between the two families.Build all of those into your outline, making sure there are setups for each reveal and that you have reveals in every Act.
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Jamie’s Reveals
This lesson kicked in the need to layer and in this fashion. In other words, I’m getting it, little by little. Over a week ago I was really behind, almost 11 classes. Accident, new car and that’s just a wee bit of BUT I am catching up. For this class I started doing the reveals, integrity etc. but only made it to the 3 Act. So I’m sending it in as-is and move forward in order to keep up with class. Besides, it’s only the first draft!! Right now I know that a lot is going to change, finally get that too.
ACT 1
TIME LASPE – 1969 – 1980’s Photos of Lindsey and Sadie over the years. We see the closeness of the two sisters, Sadie and Lindsey’s relationship. Marriages, births, multiple photos at Laguna Beach hanging out and with the girls (toddlers).
Lindsey’s divorce (him cheating on her) then Sadie’s divorce (her husband overdoses on heroin) they move in together, party time, day jobs Lindsey working downtown L.A. garment industry, Sadie a hairstylist, they get a second job (week-end nights- trying to make ends meet, go-go dancers at a strip club), Sadie starts drinking, staying drunk then, pot and valiums. Sadie moves out, a wealthy man by her side. Gracie, (Lindsey’s daughter) and Brooke (Sadie’s daughter) same age, crying as Sadie drives off. Lindsey gives her the finger.
OPENING
INT. – COURT – DAY
The JUDGE and SOCIAL WORKER talk with BROOKE (11) asking questions. They return to the main court room; Brooke sits at table with lawyer and Social Worker. LINDSEY (30’S) and CHRIS (40) stand when they walk back in. Lindsey is granted custodial rights for Brooke. When the gavel slams down…
INT-ARIZONA BEDROOM – DAY
PRESENT DAY
INTRIGUE – BOX OF JOURNALS. COVERT – GRACIE STASHES A COUPLE OF JOURNALS.
EMOTIONAL DILEMMA – SET UP
Lindsey sits thinking, staring out in space when daughter, GRACIE (50) DROPS the box startling her, she jumps. Lindsey is despondent, a room filled with boxes and papers, clothes, nick-nacks, boxes with people’s names on them.
She is going through a box of her mothers who has passed away. Gracie quickly puts the box into the sunroom. Later Lindsey discovers one journal that upsets her, labeled “Personal”.
Lindsey is quiet and overwhelmed. Gracie helping, as is her significant other, Dylan as he brings in mail.
INTRIGUE – LINDSEY LIES. SHOWS WHO’S IN CONTROL. SET UP – FAMILY AND LINDSEY’S SECRETS
Lindsey tries to avoid any conversation, even when the phone rings, it’s SADIE, her older sister, and doesn’t want to take it.
She makes decisions as to who gets what, hands it off to Gracie who puts it in the proper box. Lindsey snaps redirecting her to place it where she said to. Gracie brings up the will, busting her with questions and replaces the item.
Gracie takes two of her grandmother’s journals, quickly stashing them.
Younger sister, Emma pops in with a bunch of clothes and a silver fox coat, asks if she can have it. It’s a given, Emma wants it to sell, it would never fit her. They talk a moment. Gracie chimes in. Everyone is edgy.
B.G. is a computer and desk filled with papers. The computer has several screens open, two have written words, another screen is on pause from Studio Binder, we can’t make out anything.
Lindsey gets up off the floor, puts on her back brace that hangs on her chair.
Lindsey briefly looks down in a box of papers, takes out a bunch of old writings and stories of hers. Calmly, walks over and turns off the computer, then sits. Gracie, snippy, asks if they’re done in an almost reprimanding way. Words exchanged.
DAYS PASS – everything almost gone.
EXT. ARIZONA HOME – DAY
Emma packs her SUV. Asks for one of their mother’s diamond rings. No, it’s for Sadie. Emma puts the ring in her wallet, drives away.
INT. ARIZONA BEDROOM – NIGHT
SET UP – BACK STORY OF BROOKE
KITCHEN – Gracie is cooking, something she rarely does.
Lindsey is exhausted, pissed and grieving, and falls asleep.
PAY OFF – BROOKE CALLS SADIE “MOM”. How will Brooke and Lindsey deal with Brooke calling her aunt “mom” in front of her mother, Sadie?
This will LATER play havoc with Lindsey and Sadie.
Lindsey wakes abruptly as Brooke’s suitcase drops and she leans in calling Lindsey “mom” to wake her up. A big surprise for Lindsey.
Gracie knew she was coming, the reason she was cooking. Lindsey puts on both braces, one for her arm, the other a back brace.
KITCHEN
Conversation at the kitchen table.
BEDROOM
Gracie and Brooke plan the trip to Oregon secretly. They chit-chat as they look through photos of Sadie and Lindsey. Gracie is brought up to date on Sadie’s botched colon cancer surgery.
Gracie shows her the two journals, packs them. They continue talking then show Lindsey the tickets for the next day as they laugh the night away.
EXT. ARIZONA HOME – DAY
Gracie and Brooke are picked up by Lyft.
INT. CAR – DAY
Gracie and Brooke have a heavy conversation about what’s going on with her aunt Sadie and the toll of caring for her mother.
EXT. OREGON HOME – DAY
SURPRISE FOR SADIE. EXCITEMENT & BONDING BETWEEN GRACIE AND SADIE.
Sadie is very surprised to see her niece. Sadie dismisses Brooke who leaves and goes to her home.
INT. OREGON HOME – DAY
Sadie waits on Gracie who wants to make her feel at home.
EXT. OREGON HOME – DAY
SET UP – SADIE IS WASTED AND TESTING GRACIE
Sadie backs into garage door. She asks Gracie to make a run to the pharmacy for her. Calls Brooke to update while driving to pharmacy.
INT. OREGON HOME – DAY
Sadie takes out her stash of pills and pot as she stares into the mirror on the kitchen island.
INT. PHARMACY – DAY
GRACIE PANICS – Gracie can’t get one of the prescriptions. Too early- it’s a narcotic.
INT. OREGON HOME – DAY
Gracie explains to Sadie and calms her down.
INT OREGON HOME – NIGHT
SET UP – SHOWS SADIE’S FEAR.
Power outage. Sadie wakes Gracie and must go and spend the night with Brooke.
INT. CAR – NIGHT
It’s pouring rain and fog. Sadie’s pills drop all over the front seat and floor. Pull into Brooke’s home. This is an emotional dilemma for Gracie. What if she gets pulled over?
INT. BROOKE’S HOME – NEXT DAY – EARLY MORNING
SUBTEXT – Shows Sadie’s vanity and routine.
Brooke has breakfast ready. Sadie doesn’t want to eat and wants to go home to put on her make-up. Sadie wants to drive home, Gracie refuses to let her. Brooke will meet her there later.
INT. OREGON HOME – DAY
SET UP – BROOKE WANTS LINDSEY’S HELP – TAKING CARE OF SADIE – GIVING BROOKE A BREAK. Shows differences between Brooke and Sadie.
Brooke arrives, Sadie sleeps, Brooke goes to the office she uses for work. Gracie wants Brooke to spend the day with her, but she has zoom meetings with her work. Later…
Sadie’s BOUDOIR ROOM – LATER
Sadie isn’t drinking. SET UP a promise she made with her mother stated in a journal.
SECRETS – Sadie had an abortion. Who is the love of Sadie’s life? Sadie and Lindsey worked in a strip bar.
Gracie and Brooke have cocktails. Meanwhile, Sadie is still asleep. More information is exchanged about the family, Brooke lets Gracie know that Sadie is on palliative care which shocks her.
THIS IS A SECRET BETWEEN SADIE AND BROOKE.
Gracie gets one of the journals that she brought for Brooke. Some serious information is exchanged and talked about, things only their grandmother knew. Brooke is exhausted and torn.
SET UP – Gracie shares information with Brooke, stuff Lindsey has found about Colorectal Cancer. She’s even talked with lawyers.
EXT. ARIZONA HOME – DAY
BACKYARD
Lindsey is still grieving over Gram and Sadie’s health.
Gracie arrives back home. Lindsey is very surprised; she arrives via Lyft. Gracie is happy to be home. Gracie returns the journals she secretly took. GRACIE WITHHOLDS INFORMATION.
INT. ARIZONA BEDROOM
New plan. Lindsey is going to go spend time with Sadie. Lindsey makes new plans about who gets what.
A SURPRISE FOR GRACIE – There are items that she gave to other people than what is in her will.
GRACIE – it’s a MORAL ISSUE.
Lindsey decides to mail what Sarah listed in the will instead of driving to California because of COVID BUT wants to go be with her sister. There are items missing, like some of her jewelry and artwork etc. SET UP – Who took the diamond ring and the story behind it?
INT. PLANE – DAY
SET UP – A magazine that deals with colon cancer.
Lindsey is reading a magazine, Beyond Blue.
EXT. MEDFORD AIRPORT – DAY
Mike picks up Lindsey and drops her off at Sadie’s home.
INT. MIKE’S TRUCK – DAY
Mike, an older friend of Sarah’s and Sadie. Lindsey probes to find out how Sadie is and his view on dying with dignity since Oregon’s laws allow it. Mike is all for it for personal reasons.
COVERT – LINDSEY IS FISHING TO GET HIS OPINION OF SADIE.
INT. OREGON HOME – DAY
Sadie and Lindsey embraced each other and sobbing. Mike brings in luggage and drives off.
INT. BEDROOM – DAY
Sadie is trying to impress Lindsey while she lets Lindsey know how hard it was for her to do it all -empathy.
Sadie has made her room perfect as well as having gifts waiting for her. Sadie babies her, demanding that she climb into bed and rest, first. She implores her to take a pill and a hit of her pot, which she does.
SET UP SADIE USES THIS TIME TO GO THROUGH HER PILLS.
Sadie peeks in on Lindsey as she sleeps through two days. Brooke laughs with Sadie watching her sleep but then Brooke gets a bit worried. Lindsey wakes as she dashes to the bathroom. comes out laughing as Brooke and Sadie wait for her entry in the kitchen. This is the third day.
INT. KITCHEN – DAY
Sadie acts differently with her pod.
Lindsey doesn’t remember changing into her pajamas. Sadie has made a ton of food. She has also invited several of her “pod” over for dinner. Lindsey dresses, goes through her prescriptions and counts.
DINNER PARTY
Lindsey sees Sadie in a different light. IS SHE REALLY THAT SICK?
Lindsey learns who is who and their relationship with Sadie. Sadie gets waisted, leaving Sadie to be the “hostess” and clean up. Sadie has passed out, wakes up a day later. Lindsey is a little pissed off.
NOTE – GO OVER VENUES WHERE SADIE AND LINDSEY MIGHT GO OR DO OVER A FEW DAYS TOGETHER. Like, goes to restaurant but Sadie doesn’t eat.
PAY OFF – LINDSEY QUESTIONS SADIE’S HEALTH.
Over the next few days, Sadie begins to take more and more drugs as the two lay around, watching movies and Sadie showing Lindsey who gets what when she passes away until Sadie walks in with the CRC magazine, BEYOND BLUE (all about Colon Cancer) and Lindsey’s list of lawyers. An argument heats up and each slips away to their rooms.
INCITING INCIDENT
INT. BEDROOM – NIGHT
SCHEME – Sadie gets into ambulance just to get more pills and a way to be accepted in hospice.
MORAL ISSUE FOR LINDSEY – DISTRESS AND BETRAYAL – LINDSEY IS BEING USED
Lindsey’s shoulder breaks. Lindsey cries out but Sadie is wasted and passed out. Reluctant to ask for help she suffers through the night until Sadie comes out. Lindsey explains that she is calling for an ambulance. Sadie goes to her room and gets back into her pajamas, messes up her hair, removes make-up.
INT. AMBULANCE – DAY
SURPRISE – Sadie goes with her.
INT. HOSPITAL – DAY
WOUND for Brooke, her mother is playing games with both Brooke and Lindsey that bring up old feelings with her mom.
Both are in separate rooms. Lindsey hears Sadie talk to the doctor.
Brooke picks them up. – Brooke is horrified, upset and embarrassed.
INT. OREGON HOME – DAY
Brooke is speechless but helps Lindsey pack. Sadie enters with magazine and lawyer list in hand and throws them at Lindsey.
EMOTIONAL DILEMMA, WOUNDS AND HURT FEELSING EXCHANGED.
Harsh words are exchanged bringing tears to Lindsey’s eyes. As though they will never speak again. Brooke offers to take Lindsey to the airport, but a man comes and picks her up from Lyft. Brooke feels hurt but Lindsey doesn’t want to put Brooke in that position and whispers in her ear.
TURNING POINT
INT. ARIZONA BEDROOM – DAY
Lindsey has had her surgery and searches through the journals hoping to find words of wisdom left by her mother.
Lindsey is in bed with her new arm brace, unable to use the computer but tries to write notes as she goes through a journal. She makes a list. Her lifelong friend Lauren calls. Lindsey breaks down. Lindsey reminds her of some of her mother’s quotes hoping to make her laugh, like; This too shall pass!
DAYS PASS – Lindsey takes off brace and begins to do her physical therapy. Each day she gets better. Her list gets longer. Soon she is on the computer.
INT. OREGON HOME – DAY
New information. Surprise. Brooke upset, words exchanged then leaves, Sadie announces her plan to die.
Palliative nurse shows up unexpectedly. Sadie is too well dressed. Informed that a doctor is willing to do correctional surgery. Sadie declines, shares all her reasons. Later throws literature away, then burns it. Sadie tells Brooke that all she wants is her drugs and to die.
ACT 2
INT. – ARIZONA BEDROOM – DAY
Lindsey looking in journals. *NOTE – something about Sadie and Lindsey.
Lindsey, wanting to make amends starts to call Sadie but takes a nap.
LINDSEY HAS A DREAM – Gracie and Brooke are in the pool, Brook surfaces where Lindsey sits. They are 17 years old. Brooke asks a serious question to Lindsey. Would you love me no matter what? Even if I was an axe murderer? Lindsey responds with great affection, like a mother.
PHONE RINGS – IT’S BROOKE. She wakes Lindsey up. Brooke rants, Lindsey gets upset over Sadie’s decision.
LINDSEY IS PROTECTIVE OF BROOKE.
Lindsey makes a call to Sadie, talks about her decision to die. Brooke is going to support her mother’s decision. * Part of the reason is because she feels abandoned again and pissed with a so-what attitude.
*NOTE – NEED A SCENE WITH GRACIE AND DYLAN WITH LINDSEY. Maybe shopping, what are they doing for Christmas, looking at photos of olden days of Christmas. Gets out Christmas boxes. Debate on having Christmas or not? Christmas ornaments and bring laughter in. Gracie cleaning flowers and making arrangements, fixing her website.
Lindsey returns to the journals with the hope she will find words of wisdom her mother might have shared with her daughters.
Lindsey is trying to manipulate Sadie to change her mind. Lindsey is deeply afraid of losing her sister and being the next matriarch, something she doesn’t want.
MIDPOINT TURNING POINT
Discoveries of manipulation and deceit by Sadie, particularly regarding her drug-seeking behavior push Lindsey to her limits, forcing her to bluntly oppose Sadie’s selfish and drastic choices
(* note come back and find location and scene)
Lindsey is holding on to old scars. 1. When Sadie and Lindsey were growing up their mother gave more attention to Sadie. Lindsey left feeling neglected and abandoned. 2. When their father and mother divorced, her father wanted nothing to do with Lindsey.
ACT 3
INT. OREGON HOME – DAY
Sadie plans a Christmas gathering and pays the way for the family. Her plan works.
EXT. OREGON HOME – DAY
The deck is full of garland, lights and Christmas. Sadie’s helpers are working away.
The entire house is decorated with Christmas to the max.
BEDROOM
Sadie goes through her closet wondering what to wear. Lots of bling and glitz. She brings out a basket full of gifts, perfectly wrapped even with holly in the bows.
Lindsey makes her entrance. Lindsey hesitates but she arrives days before the party. Lindsey brings one of the journals with her. She enters the house, plops her handbag and Mike brings in her luggage.
Lindsey goes to Sadie’s room. Much to her surprise. They go into kitchen and begin talking. Gracie stays home. She has an event.
NEXT DAY
Emma arrives in Oregon, much to Lindsey’s surprise. Sadie failed to share that Emma was coming.
Emma and Lindsey have a deep conversation. Lindsey shares some information.
Sadie proves to the family she is in control of her life and knows what she is doing.
Everyone believes this is when she will end her life, except Lindsey.
The group “pod” gathers in the living room.
Lindsey shares the journal and diary with the family, their mother’s last wishes for all. A heart-wrenching moment.
Sadie wants to be remembered for being the matriarch, her one last opportunity, Christmas.
Lindsey lets everyone know she will not be the matriarch. She reads their mother’s words, hoping that Sarah’s words will change Sadie’s mind, but it backfires, calling bullshit.
Lindsey voices her opinion, then out of the blue guesses that her day to die would be on her birthday, come spring. Sadie gets pissed knowing that is her plan and leaves the room.
Sadie comes back swinging. She’s going to have the last words.
Sadie starts in, taking heavier doses, trying to be funny, as she hands out the gifts. There is a note on each gift, “DO NOT OPEN UNTIL JANUARY 15th”, their mother’s birthday.
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