Day 9 Assignments

[Julia Bucci]

Julia’s 12 Angry Men Analysis

What I learned doing this assignment: There are so many ways to show the old ways and to challenge them! I have a pretty long list here, but I’m sure it’s incomplete.

BTW, I love this play and movie, and I think it stands the test of time 100%. Great play, and such brilliant acting/directing in the film. I’ve read it/seen it before, and even taught it to students once, but I saw new things this time as I looked at it through the Old Ways/Challenge lens.

Old Ways (OW)/Challenge (C):

OW: boredom, assumption that the legal system is boring/simple ( “I almost fell asleep…open and shut case”)

Challenge: forced to listen more carefully and talk; consider that law is a breathing/complicated instrument, and the burden of proof is on the prosecution, not the defense

OW: let’s get this over with quickly

Challenge: having to stop and take time to listen to other points of view; “Who tells you have the right to sit there and play with a man’s life?”

OW: go with the crowd – if most people raise their hands, go ahead and raise your hands too (preliminary vote)

C: challenged to think for yourself by paper vote

OW: being decisive, seeing things in black and white

C: being willing to be uncertain; seeing not knowing something as a starting point – “You really think he’s innocent?” “I don’t know…we talk.” + GREAT Lee J Cobb transformational moment: “How can you be positive about anything?”

OW: unwilling to change one’s mind “You couldn’t change my mind if we talked for 100 years.”

C: forced to at least sit and talk for an hour

OW: no compassion for the kid – : a murder trial is a game (prosecutor did a great job, glad to be on a murder case rather than a robbery)

C: compassion – we should at least talk about the kid; he’s had it rough & his life is at stake

OW: stereotyping about ethnic groups (“I’d slap those tough kids down before they started trouble”)

Challenge: forced to consider this individual kid AND forced to confront their own prejudices (“How come you believe the woman? …she’s one of them, isn’t she?”); forced to confront prejudices about European immigrant juror

OW: making assumptions based on someone’s past/location (“look at his record”; “slums are breeding grounds for criminals”)

C: forced to question the assumption that past behavior predicts future guilt; confronted on narrowmindedness (“I grew up in a slum”)

OW: assuming the majority is right

C: challenged to think for themselves

OW: assuming the evidence is not questionable – that “facts” are facts and speak for themselves (Lee J Cobb: “I just want to talk about facts…you can’t refute facts”)

C: having to question facts (can you see through the windows of an el train at night?)

OW: assuming the defense attorney did his job

C: considering that lawyers can be incompetent/lazy

OW: assuming that witnesses are infallible

C: forced to consider that they are human/could be wrong (knife angle, witness wears glasses)

OW: having to be loyal to your first opinion

C: “I don’t believe I have to be loyal to one side or the other…just asking questions.”

OW: deal with problems through anger and violence (Lee J. Cobb) or dealing with all disagreements as a pissing contest

C: having to look at oneself (“You’re a sadist”) / “You’re trying to turn this into a contest”

OW: hostility to others (all the small tensions/arguments in the group)

C: working together (counting time it took for old man to get to the door; thinking about the glasses – “There are 12 people here, and 11 of us didn’t think of it”)

OW: blinded by personal wound (Lee J. Cobb’s relationship with his son; “What do you think, I’m an idiot?”)

C: forced to confront personal wound (son) and understand that the wound was getting in the way (“Not guilty.”)

[Christopher Carlson]

DAY 9: SHIFTING BELIEF SYSTEMS

Christopher Carlson’s 12 Angry Men Analysis

What I learned doing this assignment is to keep my ear tuned to characters representing the old ways, and how the writer can find different ways to challenge those ‘old ways.’

Not caring/prejudice, “Ballot great idea, maybe we can get him elected senator.” “I almost fell asleep.”

Prejudice/assumption of guilt, “Open and shut case.”
– challenge, “Defendant entitled to trial.”

Prejudice, “I’d slap those tough kids down before they start any trouble.”

Just want this over, “Let’s get started, we’ve all got things to do.”

Prejudice, “They let those kids run wild up there.”

Just want this over, “Let’s vote. Maybe we can all get out of here.”

Assumption of guilt, after initial 11-1 Guilty vote, “Boy oh boy, there’s always one.”

Prejudice, “Listen, I’ve lived among them all my life – you can’t believe a word they say. They’re born liars.”
– challenge, “Only an ignorant man can believe that.”
– challenge, “Burden of proof is on prosecution. Defendant doesn’t need to open his mouth. That’s in the Constitution.”

Assumption that the evidence is not to be questioned, as outlined by juror #2
– challenge, “Why do you believe the woman’s story and not the boy’s – she’s one of them, isn’t she?” (using prejudice to indict prejudice)

Prejudice, “Slums are breeding grounds for criminals.”
– challenged by juror who confesses that he’s lived in a slum all his life

Assuming the defense attorney did his job
– challenged by Fonda, who notes that defense attorney let too much go by without challenging it

Assuming the witnesses were accurate
– Fonda challenges the witnesses’ supposed convincing testimony

Assuming the evidence is not questionable
– Fonda challenges assumption that the knife was ‘one of a kind’ by displaying a similar one he bought in the defendant’s neighborhood

2^nd vote 10-1 Guilty, Fonda abstaining, meaning he’d convinced one juror to vote “not guilty” (the old man next to him)

Assuming the witnesses were accurate
– Fonda challenges testimony of woman who saw the killing through el train windows
– older juror challenges testimony of old man who heard the threat, that he might be someone seeking attention; juror, “Witnesses can make mistakes.”

3^rd vote 8-4 Guilty

Juror who voted ‘guilty’ inadvertently challenged the old man’s testimony, “He was an old man. How could he be positive about anything?”

Assuming the defense attorney did his job
– Fonda challenges defense attorney’s dearth of questioning

Fonda challenges character of juror #3, “You’re a sadist,” who then uses the phrase, “I’ll kill him, I’ll kill him,” confirming Fonda’s assertion that someone can say “I’ll kill you,” but not meaning it, challenging evidence that even if the defendant did say to his father “I’ll kill you,” it doesn’t mean that he’s actually going to do so

Juror challenges those who want to make the trial “a personal thing,” makes a defense of democratic trial by jury

4^th vote 6-6

Prejudice, “A kid like that. I’m sick and tired of facts.”

Prejudice, a juror indicts other juror as a foreigner, “They’re all alike.”

Fonda challenges other juror’s memory, proving that the boy could have forgotten which movies he’s seen (his alibi on the night of)

Not looking beneath the surface
– juror challenges testimony re the knife fight

5^th vote 9-3 Acquittal

prejudice, “Look, you know how these people live, it’s born in them … that’s the way they are, by nature. Violent.”
– challenge, other jurors leave the table, turn their back on his racist diatribe
– challenge, “Now sit down and don’t open your mouth again.”
– challenge, “Prejudice always obscures the truth.”

Not looking beneath the surface
– challenge, juror challenges if woman actually saw what she said she saw

Prejudice, “Rotten kids, you work your life out.”
– challenge, a powerful silence

[Christopher Carlson]

Assignment 2

Subject line: Christopher Carlson’s Old Ways Challenge Chart

What I learned doing this assignment is sharpening my ear for arrival of the Old Ways, and brain-storming ‘challenge’ responses.

Old Ways: Because of filmmakers’ assumption that a handicapped person wouldn’t have ‘romance and adventure in their life, they want to falsify Helen’s life by making it up
– Challenge: Teacher forbid them from doing so, but is ignored

Old Ways: Social values — society doesn’t approve of handicapped women being in a sexual relationship
– Challenge: Peter challenges this belief, as espoused by mother Kate

Old Ways: Assumptions – Kate and Teacher both critical of Peter, falsely indicting his character
– Challenge: Helen defends Peter’s character

Old Ways: Assumption — society perceives Helen as a Goddess of Perfection
– Challenge: Peter challenges society’s unrealistic and false perception of her character

Old Ways: Social Values – Helen believes that a physical relationship is something she’s not allowed to have
– Challenge: Peter challenges Helen’s own assumptions by declaring his feelings for her

Old Ways: Filters of Perception – Kate demands that Helen issue a public statement denying the published engagement
– Failure of Challenge: Helen complies, intimidated by her mother

Old Ways: Habits – Kate forcing Helen to do things against her will
– Challenge: Helen devising strategies to circumvent her mother, i.e., specifically to elope

Old Ways: Assumptions/Habits – Helen’s family in Alabama reinforcing Helen’s traditional role in the family
– Challenge: Helen expresses shock and dismay at her family’s behavior, particularly her brother-in-law’s use of a shotgun to drive off Peter

Old Ways: Social Values – racial prejudice
– Challenge: Helen decrying history of slavery and stating clearly she doesn’t accept treating Black People as 2^nd class citizens

Old Ways: Filters of Perception – Kate defends status quo to Peter, insisting that he would dethrone Helen from her deserved pedestal if he were to marry her
– Challenge: Peter challenges the very notion of Helen being on a pedestal, maintaining that’s exactly the thing she doesn’t want

Old Ways: Filters of Perception – Peter becomes the Rebelling Character and fails to uphold his pledge to Helen
– Challenge: Helen, despite painful loss in the realm of lover, affirms her experience with Peter and her right to love another, despite what others might call “handicaps”

[Julia Keefer]

What I learned from this assignment is to revisit the assumptions, habits, filters, and social values that cement my prejudices and to use a scalpel to peel off similar coatings in my characters.

What makes people change? Forced. Threatened. Terrified. Rigid thinking relates to fallacies of presumption, relevance, and ambiguity. Cognitive flexibility is challenging at any age, but particularly when life constricts with aging. However, my doctor sis says patients change the most in hospices. People are often blinded by their limitations or made grandiose by goals that they cannot accomplish. How do you unstick someone, pry them loose? Does it have to be painful? How can problems be reframed with a different perspective?

Pandemics, fires, and floods pry people out of their habits, love and fear expose assumptions that render characters vulnerable, and filters make reality tolerable for that person in their time and space, whether the filter is sunglasses or schizophrenia delusions and hallucinations.

My first two novels have characters growing up, Giving up bad habits and addictions, becoming healthy, and respecting nature by getting rid of fossil fuels when possible, so the third novel begins with habits, assumptions, and filters that must be challenged as diseases, disasters, and deaths strike, presenting the dilemma of compassion versus survival of the fittest.

Ableism can be a way that healthy people marginalize those that are sick or disabled, something Jake must confront with PD, Joan with Alzheimer’s, and Jean with ALS. Wellness can turn into a fallacious assumption when people feel that if you exercise, meditate, and eat right, you will always be healthy. But this doesn’t mean you should get drunk, smoke, and eat cheesecake.

To be successful, fitness regimens must become habits and then you must change and periodize them enough to get training effects. Addictions are bad habits. Good habits like cleanliness can be used to mask evil intentions as in the case of BB, the serial killer or polite manners that hide Ibrahim’s high concept plot to indirectly kill millions.

If the change agent is too dogmatic, the change can be superficial and not transformative, or it triggers the opposite reaction. Adolescents may go on a drinking spree to frustrate parents who keep telling them never to drink alcohol, same with smoking etc.

How do I change the audience? Make them identify with the bad habits or selfish motives of all characters, protagonists and antagonists, and then maintain this relationship through through lines to crises and climax. Entertain them, make them laugh and cry, and create enough intrigue that they don’t know what will happen next. When change is choreographed so that people think the new beliefs and behavior will bring them to the lighthouse of their lives, they can be pushed along towards a better future or led by the nose to enlightenment. At the end of people’s lives, the lighthouse can be delusional, a fantasy that fades into the fog of aging and disease.

As I did research on the homeless and successful multicultural high rise livers on the Upper East Side of Manhattan as well as the village culture of New Paltz over a 15 year period, I became aware of the social values of a culture. All three cultures were upended by the pandemic but incremental changes were made before then. The conformity of the social group has a different rate of change than the individual but helps embed personal drama in high concept premises and a wider world. This may increase the budget so when adapting novels to the screen, I am ready to kill my darlings, delete and change, and cut characters and locations because people can always read my novels.

[Heather Hood]

Assignment 1

12 Angry Men

What I learned doing this assignment is, human opinion can be very strong and swayed by a good argument.

· Assumption of guilt

“The defense didn’t say anything” so obviously even they thought he was guilty. If your lawyer thinks you’re guilty the best thing to do is to stay quiet.

· Just want this over

Everyone had something else they wanted to do. See a baseball game, not be in a hot room sweating over a kid who came from a bad neighborhood.

· Not caring

No one cared about a kid from the wrong side of the tracks.

· Prejudice

Kids like this are a product of their environment. They are violent. They kill and rob all the time. They are all guilty, no matter what chances they are given.

· Not looking beneath the surface.

No one saw the small details until they were pointed out: the man’s limp-how could he get to the door in 15 seconds? The marks of the woman’s glasses: how could she identify the boy across the tracks?

· Assuming the evidence is not questionable

The knife: there could only be one knife. It was rare and valuable when it was a cheap knock off. How one uses a switch blade. It needs to be stabbed upward, not downward.

· Assuming the witnesses were accurate

The testimony of the woman and the old man were more enthusiastic than accurate.

· Assuming the Defense Attorney did his job

He didn’t do anything at all.

· Assuming the case is completely logical

By the time they finished, it was established the case was full of holes.

Assignment 2

What I learned doing this assignment is: I had a hard time pinpointing Andrew’s old ways. It occurred to me I hadn’t made his change big enough. I had to make him more ‘unlikeable’ to show up his old ways of thinking, which highlight his days of scrabbling to survive in his youth.

That’s a real fine balance when those first 20 pages make or break someone wanting to read your script or toss it on the slush pile. I have so much rewriting to do.

Andrew’s Old Ways Challenge Chart

Old Ways

· You win the fight any way you can

Challenge:

To learn the meaning of honor.

· People don’t treat you fairly

Challenge:

To treat others kindly no matter how they treat you.

· You are worthless, just a tool to be used

Challenge:

To see he has value and so does his life.

· What you feel doesn’t matter

Challenge:

He is entitled to his feelings but must control them.

· Life is something to be endured, not enjoyed

Challenge:

Life is a precious gift, not something to be wasted.

· Things only change if you work hard

Challenge:

Things can change if you open your heart to others.

[Julia Bucci]

Julia’s Old Ways Challenge Chart

What I learned: 1) THE TERMINATOR built in old ways/challenges really well for Sarah Connor. 2) I need an Oppression!! Still looking for one as I brainstorm Old Ways/Challenges. I feel like it’s hovering on the horizon, but I don’t see it yet.

OW: (Maud) snob about writing/writers and older people

C: some of the seniors write better stories than her clients (or her??)

OW: (Maud) angry at birth mother

C: having to listen to birth mother’s story with neutral teacher empathy – having to deal with what is left when her anger starts to dissolve

OW: (Maud) pitch student’s story as her own (client’s own?) to help herself

C: remorse – to do the right thing now = undermining her own career

OW: (Maud) romantic relationships with men

C: new romantic feelings for Ray

OW: (Ruth) social distance – thinks she doesn’t deserve love

C: her old (old) boyfriend Mike wants to be together now

OW: (Ruth) turn her back on her past – giving birth to Maud, placing her for adoption

C: how to deal with Ruth — in her face, possibly knows who she is, is pulling story out of her in the class