Margaret Doner
Forum Replies Created
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Since nobody else seems to be around I have moved on and have gone on to Module 5. I don’t see anywhere to post module 5…but I am doing the lessons and speed writing the script. So from now on I am going to continue the lessons even if there is no where to post them. I keep getting the lessons from Hal and I didn’t want to fall so far behind, so I am just doing the lessons on my own.
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I have suddenly taken a new direction per my script…at least for the second half of it. I realized what it needed and decided to change course slightly. Also, I email William and got no reply back. I am happy to read your outline, William. If you want me to do that let me know. My email is Giddeon7@aol.com
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I’m replying to myself…but, as I am working on the outline and the script I realize it has to go in a different direction. I’ve re-titled it and am reworking the second half of the script. Where does that leave me per the class…I don’t know…but, I think its because of allowing myself to experiment with everything that I suddenly realized what wasn’t working…and needed to be changed. So, that being said…here I go in the new direction.
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Module 4 – Lesson 10
Margaret Doner – The Knowledge Keeper – SCI/FI /FANTASY
ACT 1 – A SCI-FI FANTASY which takes place through time.
FADE IN: TITLE: TARGOVISTE, ROMANIA 1462
EXT: FOREST OF THE IMPALED. DUSK
A red sky reflects fires burning in the distance. In the foreground hang 20,000 bodies impaled on tall stakes. They create a Forest of the Impaled. Wolves run around the bodies snatching up pieces of flesh discarded at the foot of the spikes.
SCREAMS sound in the distance. Vlad Dracula aka Vlad the Impaler rides onto the field, leading an army of foot soldiers. He pauses next to one of the soldiers who stands beside a captured officer
VLAD DRACULA
Put him on the highest stake, so his men can watch his agony as they die.
The soldier nods in agreement. Vlad rides away and his men follow behind him.
A brown-robed elderly man, with long white hair and beard, known as the KNOWLEDGE KEEPER, appears at the edge of the impaled bodies. He walks back and forth shaking his head, tears running down his cheeks. He turns around and walks away, then POOF, he disappears, as though he stepped through a portal to another dimension.
Scene Arc: From 1462 Romania to a man disappearing through a portal to another place/time.
Essence: The horrors of human brutality.
Conflict: The captured man and Vlad the Impaler
Subtext: The Knowledge Keeper is observing the scene, which he will then go forward in time and “magically” record in a holographic library.
Hope/Fear: Fear is the darkness of torture, hope is that the Knowledge Keeper is going to put an end to this kind of event in the future.
Version 1: Vlad the Impaler aka Vlad Dracula (this is historical fact) creates horrifying Forest of Impaled bodies, and Knowledge Keeper comes out of the forest to observe, tears run down his face, and he “magically” disappears through a portal.
Version 2: Start in Knowledge Keeper’s future environment and then have him go back in time and then return to his “lair.”
Version 3: The Knowledge Keeper intervenes when he witnesses the impalement, and barely survives a beating from soldier.
Version 4: The Knowledge Keeper draws closer to the scene and attacks Vlad Dracula from behind before disappearing.
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I am so confused now…where is Lesson 10? Nobody has posted to that yet. Did you post to Lesson 10, William? If so, where is that located? Thanks Margaret Doner
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Margaret Doner – The Knowledge Keeper – SCI/FI FANTASY
What I learned from doing this assignment is to add intrigue and schemes.
ACT 1 – A SCI-FI FANTASY which takes places through time.
Covert Agenda: In a future world, run by robots and a central computer known as GOD – Greatest Operator of Divinity – The Knowledge Keeper, plans to bring Arthur into the real world of the past, and overthrow the world of the robots making.
Secret: Arthur connects with the Knowledge Keeper and keeps it secret from the people around him.
ACT 2 –
Intrigue: The Knowledge Keeper has been planning for centuries to bring Arthur back into his world. He believes that Arthur is destined to change the course of human history. The Knowledge Keeper is revealed as Merlin the Wizard of Camelot, and Arthur his protégé, that Merlin plans to bring to power to make justice and truth reign.
Scheme: Arthur goes back in time, his robot caretaker, unbeknownst to The Knowledge Keeper or Arthur, Mathilda goes with them. Mathilda discovers the plan and appeals to GOD (Greatest Operator of Divinity) to reprogram Arthur back into the robot matrix.
ACT 3 –
Scheme: The Knowledge Keeper hooks Arthur into understanding his destiny and the real world of human emotion by instigating a plot to have him fall in love with a woman in a past world = 2024.
Covert Agenda: Arthur decides to return to his world and tell people the truth about the illusion that the robots have put them into.
ACT 4 –
Scheme: Arthur shows people that their world is a holographic illusion. Mathilda, who has been plotting against them all along, has Arthur arrested.
Resolution: The Knowledge Keeper frees Arthur, and offers to give others the opportunity to return to “reality” and escape the illusion of “Pleasantville.” Only Arthur chooses to return, ,and is taken back in time to Camelot, to hopefully change the destiny of humanity. Mathilda jumps back with them, and becomes the enemy of King Arthur in the past.
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Again, because I can’t add my Lesson 5 to the Forum I am adding it to Lesson 3 which (for some reason) will allow me to post. I hope these posting issues get resolved at some point soon, so we can post these things correctly.
Mod 4 – Lesson 5
My vision: To find the time to create well-written scripts that will sell and be produced.
Character actions process
1. Given the first beat where the Protagonist, Arthur, shows up what can I have him do?
a. If he is timid: He could be afraid of Mathilda the robot care taker
b. If he is bold: He could challenge Mathilda
c. If he is Deferential: he could do everything that Mathilda says
2. Given the second beat: He hears the voice of the Knowledge Keeper.
a. If he is timid: He could be afraid of the voice
b. If he is bold: He could seek it out and speak about it
c. If he is Deferential: He will do whatever the voice says, without question.
3. Arthur decides to seek out Knowledge Keeper
a. If he is timid: He won’t want to do it
b. If he is bold: He will be eager
c. If he is Deferential: He will follow the Knowledge Keepers directions
4. When Arthur meets the Knowledge Keeper, how will he act?
Angry? Afraid? Curious? Eager? Innocent?
Angry – Confronts the Knowledge Keeper about why he is called there and want to fight him
Afraid – Hide in a corner and have to be coaxed out by the Knowledge Keeper
Curious – Be a little afraid, but his curiosity and innocence draws him out of hiding
Eager – wants to know where he is and be excited about all the gadgetry in the Knowledge Keepers lair.
I think I will have him be Curious but a little afraid….question all the gadgetry and ask lots of questions. He will experiment with some of the devices and be startled by them. Perhaps its in those experiments that he gets suddenly drawn through the portal and THE KK has to go in with him and get him back out. His first venture in is a mistake but he lands in a place where amazing music or art of some type is being performed and he is deeply moved by it. He cries tears for the first time ever in his life…tears of passion.
5. At the turning point when he goes back in time through the portal, the second time, this time on purpose I am going to have The Knowledge Keeper accompany him. Again curious, afraid but eager to explore. Amazed at all the things he is seeing…childlike.
6. Next turning point is when violence enters his world for the first time…he sees the truth of the history of humanity’s destruction. He falls in love with a woman, experiences anger, passion, courage for the first time.
7. Climax: when he is captured by the robots for trying to bring information into the “pure’ world, he will then show his anger. He will actually fight them; something he would never have done prior to going back into the past and awakening his passion.
8. Resolution: Arthur is completely changed…he is a well-rounded person with all the emotions.
ANTAGONIST: MATHILDA
Mathilda is tough because she is a robot.
When she sees that Arthur is acting differently she will be watchful.
Then her watchfulness will turn to concern. I will have her follow him and see where he goes.
I think she needs to go back in time with Arthur at some point…perhaps right at beginning when Arthur goes through portal by mistake….sneakily…so the KK and Arthur don’t know. This action CHANGES HER…she begins to have emotions too. Anger grows in her which causes her to have feelings about Arthur and the KK and what they are doing. Feelings are completely new to her.
Then she will tell the other robots and GOD what is happening.
By the end she is vengeful and returns through the portal to destroy the KK and Arthur in the “old world.”
THE TRIANGLE CHARACTER: The KNOWLEDGE KEEPER
The Knowledge Keeper first appears at the first scene of the movie… It starts back in time at the Forest of the Impaled…a gruesome sight….
The KK is moved to tears by the sight. He disappears through a portal and comes back to his “lair” and “does his job,” that is, he records the information, historically, into a holographic library. As he does this, the emotion disappears.
When Arthur comes to him he must be careful not to overwhelm him….When Arthur jumps through the portal, the KK must follow after him and bring him back. This gives him the opening to tell him the truth about the world he lives in.
I think Arthur should rebuke him, but then come back because he is curious. The second time Arthur goes through the portal the KK should show him the dark history of mankind.
The KK is wiser than all the other characters. It is his role to know and understand things they do not. But, he will not be emotionless. He is definitely not a robot.
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Since I can’t add Lesson 4 to the forum….under Lesson 4…I will add it here. To my Lesson 3 .
Mod 4 – Lesson 4 Basic Plotting
The Knowledge Keeper
My Vision: I find the time to create well-written scripts that will sell and be produced.
What I learned: I just keep learning new ways to look at script writing…new techniques and ideas.
ACT I: Shows Arthur as happy in his Pleasantville world, being cared for a robot named Mathilda.
Inciting Incident: He hears the voice of The Knowledge Keeper whispering his name.
ACT II: Arthur locates The Knowledge Keeper and goes back in time to discover the truth about the human race and its history. Mathilda tries to stop him.
ACT III: Arthur is deeply changed by his experiences “back in time,” and decides to bring the information back into his world.
ACT IV: Arthur is stopped by the robots and captured. The robots offer everyone to be re-chipped back to the computer called GOD, or to follow Arthur back in time. No one follows him except Mathilda who is determined to discover what Arthur knows…and to stop him.
RESOLUTION: They arrive in the Middle Ages with the Knowledge Keeper who is revealed to be Merlin, the famous wizard, and Arthur will help him build Camelot: a more perfect world. Mathilda takes on the identity of Morgana, Artur and Merlin’s enemy in Camelot.
To set up the Resolution…Working backwards…I will need to insert hints at The Knowledge Keeper being Merlin and his intention is to bring Arthur back with him to make a better world in the past…free of robots.
BACK TO FRONT WITH MAJOR PLOT POINT –
In order for Arthur to become truly attached to the world of the past, and believe it has better things in it that his world needs …he will need to experience love on a level he never has before. I am going to make him meet a woman and fall in love and she dies in his arms. Also, instead of robot animals like in his world, he will experience how people love horses and dogs and cats…how they bond with animals. Merlin took Arthur into the body of animals to teach him…I will have The Knowledge Keeper put Arthur into animal’s bodies to teach him as well. All of these experiences awaken Arthur’s soul…and he comes truly alive. He is able to make choices and experience emotions in a range unavailable in his world.
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Module 4 Lesson 3 First Draft of Beat Sheet
YAY! I was able to post this myself without asking Laree to do it.
The Knowledge Keeper – Margaret Doner
My Vision: I find the time to create well-written scripts that will sell and be produced
What I learned: How to begin a Beat Sheet
Genre: Sci-Fi
Act 1
PJ 1: Arthur is shown living a normal life in a robot-controlled world. He appears content with his wife Gretchen and his children Beatrice and Benjamin. He has a good relationship with Mathilda the robot assigned to his family.
PJ 2: Arthur hears a voice and is confused about where it’s coming from.
AJ 1: Mathilda notices that Arthur hears the voice and begins to be suspicious that something out of the ordinary is happening to him.
Deeper Layer: The Knowledge Keeper is reaching out to Arthur for the first time to make an ally out of him.
ACT 2
PJ 1: Arthur goes back in time and discovers the truth about the human race and its history…and also experiences passion and creativity for the first time.
PJ 2: Arthur is forever changed by this experience.
AJ 1: Mathilda follows Arthur through the portal and discovers what is happening between the Knowledge Keeper and Arthur. She comes across witches and the power they hold in the Middle Ages.
Deeper Layer: The Knowledge Keeper is awakening the world into which he will eventually insert Arthur and create Camelot
ACT 3
PJ 1: Arthur feels love for a woman as she dies in his arms. He comes back to his present world and discovers that his wife has spilled the beans on him and Mathilda is turning against him as well.
AJ 1: Mathilda begins to feel powerful and uses the power against Arthur by telling GOD and the other robots what Arthur has done.
Deeper Layer: It sets up the animosity between Morgana and Arthur in Camelot.
ACT 4
PJ 1: Arthur is captured but the Knowledge Keeper rescues him and offers people a journey back in time. Only Arthur agrees to go back. The others want to be reprogrammed back into robot world of goodness and peace…but no passion or feeling.
AJ 1: Mathilda decides to go back as well, and hops through the portal at the last minute to the same location as Knowledge Keeper and Merlin
PJ 2: Arthur is revealed as King of Camelot and Knowledge Keeper is revealed as Merlin the wizard
AJ 2: Mathilda is revealed as Arthur’s nemesis, Morgana, the evil witch.
Deeper Layer finally revealed.
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I am unable to post anything on the forums after this LESSON 5. I have noticed that people are not posting and I suspect others are having the same problem I am. So I will continue to post my lessons on Lesson 5 until the problem is fixed. Here is my Lesson 7.
Module 3 – Lesson 7
Character Profiles Part 2
The Knowledge Keeper – Margaret Doner
My Vision: I find the time to create well-written scripts that will sell and be produced
What I learned: To deep and expand my character profiles
From Lessons 3, 4, 6: Adding Lesson 7
A. HIGH CONCEPT: In the future robots and a computer called GOD control the world and allow only goodness; tasking a hermit, known as the Knowledge Keeper to record the true history of the human race.
Actor Attractors:
CHARACTER ONE THE PROTAGONIST: Arthur Pelias
1. What about this role would attract an actor? It is a multi-level emotional range role. The character gets to go from the extreme of bland “goodness” to the other extreme of a “passionate” and deeply feeling individual.
2. What makes the character one of the most interesting? Not only is the emotional range vast, but also the actual worlds the character inhabits. This character will go from the future to the most savage past to uncover the historical truth of the human race.
3. Interesting actions? The interesting actions include participating in battle scenes, falling in love with a woman who dies in his arms, being the apprentice of the Knowledge Keeper, awakening his village to the truth
4. How can you introduce this role in a way that could sell it to an actor? That’s a tough one….still a little stumped on that. I feel that the opening of the script is good, it opens with a bang, but the opening scenes of Arthur are in the “pleasantville” world and aren’t powerful. I’m still wrestling with that and haven’t come up with the answer.
5. What could be this character’s emotional range? Said earlier.
6. What subtext can the actor play? I think the subtext will be in the fact that Arthur is hiding the truth of his knowledge from the robots who control his world and also from the computer “GOD.”
7. What’s the most interesting relationships the character can have? With the Knowledge Keeper and with the woman who he falls in love with in the past. Although I am working on developing a interesting and conflicted relationship between him and Mathilda, the robot who is in charge of keeping him and his family safe and “in line.”
8. How will this character’s unique voice be presented? The voice will change as he evolves…from bland to passionate. Soft spoken to loud.
9. What could make this character special and unique? His passion and inability to “fit in” to society. Also I think I am going to have him injured and scarred in the past life, which he will bring into the future life….(present life for him). This scar will be different because everyone else is perfect…and will be why he is “found out.”
CHARACTER SUBTEXT:
Character 1 Name: Arthur Pelias
Subtext Identity: Only shows happiness and goodness, but isn’t really happy.
Subtext Trait: Secretive, sneaky
Subtext Logline: Arthur must be well-behaved at all times, but secretly wants to express passionate emotions.
Possible areas of Subtext:
Act I: Arthur looks outside the borders of his world and hears voices calling him to explore.
Act 2: Arthur answers the call of the Knowledge Keeper and discovers a world of violence.
Act 3: Arthur falls in love with a woman other than his wife and experiences love and loss.
Act 4: Arthur chooses to return to Earth in a previous time when the world was filled with passion and emotional extremes.
CHARACTER INTRIGUE: Hidden agendas: Conspiracies, secrets, deception, unspoken wound, secret identity.
Arthur has all of these hidden agendas. Conspiracy with The Knowledge Keeper to bring passion back to his world. Secrets and deception as he pretends that he is still “normal.” His unspoken wound is the love he feels for the woman in the past, who dies in his arms. His secret identity becomes revealed at the end he is shown to be King Arthur of Camelot.
FLAW: He sabotages himself by Overdoing things and Poor decision-making.
VALUES: Family, duty, loyalty
CHARCTER DILEMMA: Stay in the “matrix” of the robot-controlled Pleasantville and shut down all his feelings and emotions or breaking out of the mold and awakening himself and others.
CHARACTER TWO: THE KNOWLEDGE KEEPER- THE TRIANGLE CHARACTER
1. What about this role would attract an actor? I believe that the Merlin-like or Dumbledore-like role of the wisdom keeper who awakens a member of the future-world in hope to reignite passion back into the world is deep and rich enough to attract an older actor.
2. What makes the character one of the most interesting? The character is the only one who remembers the true history of the human race. He records the history holographically, and opens portals back in time.
3. Interesting actions? Opening portals back into time, and time-travelling.
4. How can you introduce this role in a way that could sell it to an actor? The opening scene takes place in Vlad Dracula’s (Vlad Tepes aka Dracula) (a real historical character BTW) Forest of the Impaled. The Knowledge Keeper is recording the horrors of that experience and emerges through a portal from that scene into his “laboratory-like cave.”
5. What could be this character’s emotional range? Although the character is a hermit; we see that he longs for emotional connection with another person and enlists Arthur to be his protégé.
6. What subtext can the actor play? The Knowledge Keeper knows “all,” and so knows secrets that others do not. In the end I am playing with the idea that he is indeed, Merlin, and he and Arthur travel back to create Camelot. A utopia on Earth during the Middle Ages…no robots.
7. What’s the most interesting relationships the character can have? With both Arthur and the robots. After all the robots have almost enslaved him as well; making him hold all the historical records but keeping them away from other humans.
8. How will this character’s unique voice be presented? I think I will write him speaking as though he were Merlin from Camelot. Not “modern” English, but an old-fashioned edge.
9. What could make this character special and unique? His hidden fear: Although he seems “all-powerful” I think he needs a fear…the God-like computer cube also “knows all,” and is his rival. He must trick the cube in order to accomplish his goal. In otherwards, trick God, to accomplish his aim. His is afraid of the robot-computer power in that cube.
CHARACTER SUBTEXT:
Character 2 Name: The Knowledge Keeper
Subtext Identity: Appears to be happy as a loner, but longs to join his life with another for a purposeful mission.
Subtext Trait: Secretive, Vulnerable
Subtext Logline: The Knowledge Keeper must pretend to be completely independent and without emotion when he wants to express love and concern.
Possible areas of Subtext:
Act 1: The Knowledge Keeper is deeply impacted by the violence he witnesses in Vlad’s Forest of the Impaled.
Act 2: The Knowledge Keeper calls Arthur to him and send him back in time. He has a secret plan, in the end he wants to join forces with Arthur to set up a utopia called Camelot.
Act 3: The Knowledge Keeper knows he is endangering Arthur, but he realizes the only way to free them is to get caught.
Act 4: The Knowledge Keeper hatches a plan to separate Arthur from his world permanently and take him back in time to start a new world on the Earth. One that allows passion but also fairness.
CHARACTER INTRIGUE:
Hidden Agendas: Conspiracies, secrets, deception, unspoken wound, secret identity.
The Knowledge Keeper also has all of these hidden agendas. He conspires with Arthur to create a new world on Earth. He keeps secrets from both the robots, the Computer God, and even Arthur. His unspoken wound is that he is lonely. His secret identity is that he is the wizard known as Merlin.
FLAW: Doesn’t fully understand what he is up against. Pins all his hopes on one man: Arthur.
VALUES: Justice, Duty, Intelligence
INTERNAL DILEMMA: Being a loner and staying safe versus breaking out of his safety to give humanity another option…the option of true feelings and emotion.
CHARACTER THREE: MATHILDA THE ROBOT NANNY: ANTAGONIST
1. What in this role would attract and actor? It will be a challenge to play this character as both “flat” and robot-like, but also with an undertone of humanity.
2. What makes this character one of the most interesting?
This character undergoes the most intense transformation. Going from dead pan to angry at Arthur when she sets out to capture him, to emotional at the end when humanity begins to present.
3. Interesting Action: I think the interesting action will be in the subtext emotional states.
4. How could you sell this role to an actor? That’s an interesting question. I think the thing that would sell this role is the emotional range in the end. This character goes from being a “nanny” to a “fighter” to a being who feels genuine emotion.
5. What could be this character’s emotional range? Just stated that.
6. What subtext could actor play? Show slight bursts of humanity through robot exterior.
7. What’s the most interesting relationship the character can have? Not sure yet, but I think it will be between Mathilda and Arthur.
8. Unique voice? Not sure yet…but I suspect it will be going from robot blandness to emotional anger.
9. What could make this character unique? I think although the character turns from helper to antagonist the fact that the character joins Arthur in the end gives the character something unique.
CHARACTER SUBTEXT:
Subtext Identity: Serves the computer GOD, has no mind of her own, but underneath is becoming self-aware and having emotion.
Subtext Trait: Secretive
Subtext Logline: Mathilda must pretend to be a typical robot yet she actually is becoming self-aware and developing emotion.
Possible areas of Subtext:
Act 1: Mathilda notices that Arthur is making some “mistakes” of behavior.
Act 2: Mathilda follows Arthur as he journeys to the Knowledge Keeper.
Act 3: Mathilda begins a revolution by exposing Arthur.
Act 4: Mathilda chooses to go back in time and become human with emotions.
CHAR Role: Antagonist
Hidden Agendas: Secrets, competition.
Mathilda is a robot who is designed to watch over Arthur Pelias’ family and keep them in line. She goes against Arthur and The Knowledge Keeper all the time and spies on Arthur when she begins to wonder if he is up to something. She mobilizes the army of robots against them and eventually has Arthur captured.
In the end however, a bit of humanity will awaken in this character….I am toying with the idea that Mathilda will be the only one who chooses to join Arthur and go through the portal and become fully human. That is the secret, that Mathilda begins to long for something more than to be a programmed robot.
FLAW: Can’t behave like a proper robot in the Pleasantville world
VALUES: Duty
INTERNAL DILEMMA: Being a robot versus being a human with emotions.
1.ROLE IN STORY
Arthur Pelias: Protagonist: This is a man who is micro-chipped into a perfect world where bland pleasantness is the only expression allowed. He longs to feel emotion, and this longing opens him to the whispers of the Knowledge Keeper, who entices him to explore the past and come to a greater understanding of the true history of the human race.
Mathilda: Antagonist: This is a robot who follows the dictates of the Central Computer System known as GOD. GREATEST OPERATOR OF DIVINITY. (GREATEST OPERATOR OF DECEPTION). This robot is assigned to Arthur’s family and overseas their life; making sure that everything follows the mandates she is programmed to follow. In order to make her interesting I am giving her some emotional foibles…which end up in the longing to be human.
The Knowledge Keeper: The Triangle Character. The Knowledge Keeper is an ancient wizard known as Merlin whose job is to keep the true history of humanity recorded and away from Arthur’s world. The Knowledge Keeper longs to have human contact and entices Arthur to join him and become his protégé.
2. AGE RANGE AND DESCRIPTION
Arthur Pelias: In his thirties. Good looking in a mild-mannered way. The only thing that stands out about him are his eyes. Compared to everyone else, Arthur’s eyes are “alive.”
Mathilda: A female robot who looks like “nanny.” She is middle-aged and dresses like all the robots dress who are in this role: Dark shirt and pants with a light pink apron. Hair pulled back in a bun. (Robots are told apart by their dress, and faces. All robots have the same look for their specific tasks)
The Knowledge Keeper: A wizard. Old man. Long hair and beard. Wears the robes of a medieval monk which contrasts with his scientifically advanced holograms and portals.
3. CORE TRAITS:
Arthur Pelias: Brave, Intelligent, Adventurous, Passionate
Mathilda: Programmed to be: Kind, Unemotional, Soft-spoken, Caring. After Arthur Challenges GOD she becomes: Cold, Unfeeling, Ruthless
The Knowledge Keeper: Wise, Proud, Brave, Sneaky
4. MOTIVATION WANT/NEED:
Arthur Pelias: Want: To be free to express himself and his emotions. Need: To free himself from the computer known as GOD.
Mathilda: Want: To keep Arthur in line and his family organized and happy. Need: To please GOD.
The Knowledge Keeper: Want: To make a world where people can be free to express themselves. Need: To awaken Arthur so that he will help him accomplish this.
5. WOUND. WHAT THEY CAN’T FACE:
Arthur Pelias: That he wants to leave his world behind and abandon his family to find another world where he can be free.
Mathilda: That she has emotions and wants to be free of GOD.
The Knowledge Keeper: That he has been captured by the robots and GOD and that he really isn’t a free man at all. He is doing their bidding.
6. LIKABILITY, RELATABILITY, EMPATHY:
Likability: Arthur is kind and caretaking toward his daughter. He wants to do the right thing to make sure she fits into society.
Relatability: Arthur struggles to find meaning in his life and discover a purpose to his life.
Empathy: Arthur longs to have passion and true love in his life. When Arthur falls in love with a woman in the past, and she dies in his arms, we can feel his pain.
Likability: Mathilda is caretaking and kind to Arthur’s family.
Relatability: Mathilda wants life to be orderly, safe, and peaceful
Empathy: Mathilda has secret longing at the end of the script. The longing that awakens in her is to be human, not robot.
Likability: The Knowledge Keeper cares for the human race and wants to make a better place on the Earth.
Relatability: The Knowledge Keeper doesn’t want to be alone anymore, and seeks to establish a relationship with another person. In this case, Arthur.
Empathy: The Knowledge Keeper lives alone, cut-off from the rest of the human race. We have empathy for his situation as we have felt cut-off or alone at times.
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I can’t reply to the Lesson 6 Thread. So I am adding my Lesson 6 to my Lesson 5 answers and posting it here until a NEW THREAD opens up for Lesson 6 and it allows us to POST. This has happened before, and I am confused as to why it is happening, but so be it. Here are my Lesson 6 answers.
MOD 3 – Lesson 6 Character Profiles Part 1
My Vision: I find the time to create well-written scripts that will sell and be produced
Margaret Doner: The Knowledge Keeper
A. HIGH CONCEPT: In the future robots and a computer called GOD control the world and allow only goodness; tasking a hermit, known as the Knowledge Keeper to record the true history of the human race.
Actor Attractors:
CHARACTER ONE THE PROTAGONIST: Arthur Pelias
1. What about this role would attract an actor? It is a multi-level emotional range role. The character gets to go from the extreme of bland “goodness” to the other extreme of a “passionate” and deeply feeling individual.
2. What makes the character one of the most interesting? Not only is the emotional range vast, but also the actual worlds the character inhabits. This character will go from the future to the most savage past to uncover the historical truth of the human race.
3. Interesting actions? The interesting actions include participating in battle scenes, falling in love with a woman who dies in his arms, being the apprentice of the Knowledge Keeper, awakening his village to the truth
4. How can you introduce this role in a way that could sell it to an actor? That’s a tough one….still a little stumped on that. I feel that the opening of the script is good, it opens with a bang, but the opening scenes of Arthur are in the “pleasantville” world and aren’t powerful. I’m still wrestling with that and haven’t come up with the answer.
5. What could be this character’s emotional range? Said earlier.
6. What subtext can the actor play?I think the subtext will be in the fact that Arthur is hiding the truth of his knowledge from the robots who control his world and also from the computer “GOD.”
7. What’s the most interesting relationships the character can have? With the Knowledge Keeper and with the woman who he falls in love with in the past. Although I am working on developing a interesting and conflicted relationship between him and Mathilda, the robot who is in charge of keeping him and his family safe and “in line.”
8. How will this character’s unique voice be presented? The voice will change as he evolves…from bland to passionate. Soft spoken to loud.
9. What could make this character special and unique? His passion and inability to “fit in” to society. Also I think I am going to have him injured and scarred in the past life, which he will bring into the future life….(present life for him). This scar will be different because everyone else is perfect…and will be why he is “found out.”
CHARACTER TWO: THE KNOWLEDGE KEEPER- THE TRIANGLE CHARACTER
1. What about this role would attract an actor? I believe that the Merlin-like or Dumbledore-like role of the wisdom keeper who awakens a member of the future-world in hope to reignite passion back into the world is deep and rich enough to attract an older actor.
2. What makes the character one of the most interesting? The character is the only one who remembers the true history of the human race. He records the history holographically, and opens portals back in time.
3. Interesting actions? Opening portals back into time, and time-travelling.
4. How can you introduce this role in a way that could sell it to an actor? The opening scene takes place in Vlad Dracula’s (Vlad Tepes aka Dracula) (a real historical character BTW) Forest of the Impaled. The Knowledge Keeper is recording the horrors of that experience and emerges through a portal from that scene into his “laboratory-like cave.”
5. What could be this character’s emotional range? Although the character is a hermit; we see that he longs for emotional connection with another person and enlists Arthur to be his protégé.
6. What subtext can the actor play? The Knowledge Keeper knows “all,” and so knows secrets that others do not. In the end I am playing with the idea that he is indeed, Merlin, and he and Arthur travel back to create Camelot. A utopia on Earth during the Middle Ages…no robots.
7. What’s the most interesting relationships the character can have? With both Arthur and the robots. After all the robots have almost enslaved him as well; making him hold all the historical records but keeping them away from other humans.
8. How will this character’s unique voice be presented? I think I will write him speaking as though he were Merlin from Camelot. Not “modern” English, but an old-fashioned edge.
9. What could make this character special and unique? His hidden fear: Although he seems “all-powerful” I think he needs a fear…the God-like computer cube also “knows all,” and is his rival. He must trick the cube in order to accomplish his goal. In otherwards, trick God, to accomplish his aim. His is afraid of the robot-computer power in that cube.
CHARACTER THREE: MATHILDA THE ROBOT NANNY: ANTAGONIST
1. What in this role would attract and actor? It will be a challenge to play this character as both “flat” and robot-like, but also with an undertone of humanity.
2. What makes this character one of the most interesting?
This character undergoes the most intense transformation. Going from dead pan to angry at Arthur when she sets out to capture him, to emotional at the end when humanity begins to present.
3. Interesting Action: I think the interesting action will be in the subtext emotional states.
4. How could you sell this role to an actor? That’s an interesting question. I think the thing that would sell this role is the emotional range in the end. This character goes from being a “nanny” to a “fighter” to a being who feels genuine emotion.
5. What could be this character’s emotional range? Just stated that.
6. What subtext could actor play? Show slight bursts of humanity through robot exterior.
7. What’s the most interesting relationship the character can have? Not sure yet, but I think it will be between Mathilda and Arthur.
8. Unique voice? Not sure yet…but I suspect it will be going from robot blandness to emotional anger.
9. What could make this character unique? I think although the character turns from helper to antagonist the fact that the character joins Arthur in the end gives the character something unique.
PART 2 OF LESSON 6:
1.ROLE IN STORY
Arthur Pelias: Protagonist: This is a man who is micro-chipped into a perfect world where bland pleasantness is the only expression allowed. He longs to feel emotion, and this longing opens him to the whispers of the Knowledge Keeper, who entices him to explore the past and come to a greater understanding of the true history of the human race.
Mathilda: Antagonist: This is a robot who follows the dictates of the Central Computer System known as GOD. GREATEST OPERATOR OF DIVINITY. (GREATEST OPERATOR OF DECEPTION). This robot is assigned to Arthur’s family and overseas their life; making sure that everything follows the mandates she is programmed to follow. In order to make her interesting I am giving her some emotional foibles…which end up in the longing to be human.
The Knowledge Keeper: The Triangle Character. The Knowledge Keeper is an ancient wizard known as Merlin whose job is to keep the true history of humanity recorded and away from Arthur’s world. The Knowledge Keeper longs to have human contact and entices Arthur to join him and become his protégé.
2. AGE RANGE AND DESCRIPTION
Arthur Pelias: In his thirties. Good looking in a mild-mannered way. The only thing that stands out about him are his eyes. Compared to everyone else, Arthur’s eyes are “alive.”
Mathilda: A female robot who looks like “nanny.” She is middle-aged and dresses like all the robots dress who are in this role: Dark shirt and pants with a light pink apron. Hair pulled back in a bun. (Robots are told apart by their dress, and faces. All robots have the same look for their specific tasks)
The Knowledge Keeper: A wizard. Old man. Long hair and beard. Wears the robes of a medieval monk which contrasts with his scientifically advanced holograms and portals.
3. CORE TRAITS:
Arthur Pelias: Brave, Intelligent, Adventurous, Passionate
Mathilda: Programmed to be: Kind, Unemotional, Soft-spoken, Caring. After Arthur Challenges GOD she becomes: Cold, Unfeeling, Ruthless
The Knowledge Keeper: Wise, Proud, Brave, Sneaky
4. MOTIVATION WANT/NEED:
Arthur Pelias: Want: To be free to express himself and his emotions. Need: To free himself from the computer known as GOD.
Mathilda: Want: To keep Arthur in line and his family organized and happy. Need: To please GOD.
The Knowledge Keeper: Want: To make a world where people can be free to express themselves. Need: To awaken Arthur so that he will help him accomplish this.
5. WOUND. WHAT THEY CAN’T FACE:
Arthur Pelias: That he wants to leave his world behind and abandon his family to find another world where he can be free.
Mathilda: That she has emotions and wants to be free of GOD.
The Knowledge Keeper: That he has been captured by the robots and GOD and that he really isn’t a free man at all. He is doing their bidding.
6. LIKABILITY, RELATABILITY, EMPATHY:
Likability: Arthur is kind and caretaking toward his daughter. He wants to do the right thing to make sure she fits into society.
Relatability: Arthur struggles to find meaning in his life and discover a purpose to his life.
Empathy: Arthur longs to have passion and true love in his life. When Arthur falls in love with a woman in the past, and she dies in his arms, we can feel his pain.
Likability: Mathilda is caretaking and kind to Arthur’s family.
Relatability: Mathilda wants life to be orderly, safe, and peaceful
Empathy: Mathilda has secret longing at the end of the script. The longing that awakens in her is to be human, not robot.
Likability: The Knowledge Keeper cares for the human race and wants to make a better place on the Earth.
Relatability: The Knowledge Keeper doesn’t want to be alone anymore, and seeks to establish a relationship with another person. In this case, Arthur.
Empathy: The Knowledge Keeper lives alone, cut-off from the rest of the human race. We have empathy for his situation as we have felt cut-off or alone at times.
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Mod 3 Lesson 5 – Audience Connection to Characters
Margaret Doner
My Vision: I find the time to create well-written scripts that will sell and be produced
What I learned: I am learning so much about my characters with these exercises! Love that my characters surprise me!
The Knowledge Keeper – TITLE OF SCRIPT
Brainstorm one or more ways you can present your Protagonist through each of these:
Likability: Arthur is kind and caretaking toward his daughter. He wants to do the right thing to make sure she fits into society.
Relatability: Arthur struggles to find meaning in his life and discover a purpose to his life.
Empathy: Arthur longs to have passion and true love in his life. When Arthur falls in love with a woman in the past, and she dies in his arms, we can feel his pain.
Brainstorm one or more ways you can present your Antagonist through each of these:
Likability: Mathilda is caretaking and kind to Arthur’s family.
Relatability: Mathilda wants life to be orderly, safe, and peaceful
Empathy: Mathilda has secret longing at the end of the script. The longing that awakens in her is to be human, not robot.
Brainstorm one or more ways you can present your Triangle Character through each of these:
Likability: The Knowledge Keeper cares for the human race and wants to make a better place on the Earth.
Relatability: The Knowledge Keeper doesn’t want to be alone anymore, and seeks to establish a relationship with another person. In this case, Arthur.
Empathy: The Knowledge Keeper lives alone, cut-off from the rest of the human race. We have empathy for his situation as we have felt cut-off or alone at times.
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Mod 3: Lesson 4 Character Intrigue
Margaret Donner
My Vision: I find the time to create well-written scripts that will sell and be produced
What I learned: I am learning so much about my characters with these exercises! Love that my characters surprise me!
The Knowledge Keeper – TITLE OF SCRIPT
Character Name: Arthur Pelias
Role: Protagonist
Hidden agendas: Conspiracies, secrets, deception, unspoken wound, secret identity.
Arthur has all of these hidden agendas. Conspiracy with The Knowledge Keeper to bring passion back to his world. Secrets and deception as he pretends that he is still “normal.” His unspoken wound is the love he feels for the woman in the past, who dies in his arms. His secret identity becomes revealed at the end as he is shown to be King Arthur of Camelot.
Character Name: The Knowledge Keeper
Role: Triangle Character
Hidden Agendas: Conspiracies, secrets, deception, unspoken wound, secret identity.
The Knowledge Keeper also has all of these hidden agendas. He conspires with Arthur to create a new world on Earth. He keeps secrets from both the robots, the Computer God, and even Arthur. His unspoken wound is that he is lonely. His secret identity is that he is the wizard known as Merlin.
Character Name: Mathilda
Role: Antagonist
Hidden Agendas: Secrets, competition.
Mathilda is a robot who is designed to watch over Arthur Pelias’ family and keep them in line. She goes against Arthur and The Knowledge Keeper all the time and spies on Arthur when she begins to wonder if he is up to something. She mobilizes the army of robots against them and eventually has Arthur captured.
In the end however, a bit of humanity will awaken in this character….I am toying with the idea that Mathilda will be the only one who chooses to join Arthur and go through the portal and become fully human. That is the secret, that Mathilda begins to long for something more than to be a programmed robot.
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MOD 3: Lesson 3 CHARACTER SUBTEXT
Margaret Donner
My Vision: I find the time to create well-written scripts that will sell and be produced
What I learned: How to build subtext into my script.
MOVIE I CHOSE:
1, Bladerunner 1982
Character name: Rick Deckard
Subtext Identity: A Bladerunner (replicant killer) who doesn’t want to do the job anymore because of the violence.
Subtext Trait: Suspicious, secretive
Subtext logline: Rick is a Bladerunner who has begun to doubt the morality of his job and secretly falls in love with a replicant.
MY SCRIPT:
2. The Knowledge Keeper – TITLE
Character 1 Name: Arthur Pelias
Subtext Identity: Only shows happiness and goodness, but isn’t really happy.
Subtext Trait: Secretive, sneaky
Subtext Logline: Arthur must be well-behaved at all times, but secretly wants to express passionate emotions.
Possible areas of Subtext:
Act I: Arthur looks outside the borders of his world and hears voices calling him to explore.
Act 2: Arthur answers the call of the Knowledge Keeper and discovers a world of violence.
Act 3: Arthur falls in love with a woman other than his wife and experiences love and loss.
Act 4: Arthur chooses to return to Earth in a previous time when the world was filled with passion and emotional extremes.
Character 2 Name: The Knowledge Keeper
Subtext Identity: Appears to be happy as a loner, but longs to join his life with another for a purposeful mission.
Subtext Trait: Secretive, Vulnerable
Subtext Logline: The Knowledge Keeper must pretend to be completely independent and without emotion when he wants to express love and concern.
Possible areas of Subtext:
Act 1: The Knowledge Keeper is deeply impacted by the violence he witnesses in Vlad’s Forest of the Impaled.
Act 2: The Knowledge Keeper calls Arthur to him and send him back in time. He has a secret plan, in the end he wants to join forces with Arthur to set up a utopia called Camelot.
Act 3: The Knowledge Keeper knows he is endangering Arthur, but he realizes the only way to free them is to get caught.
Act 4: The Knowledge Keeper hatches a plan to separate Arthur from his world permanently and take him back in time to start a new world on the Earth. One that allows passion but also fairness.
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Mod 3 – Lesson 2 – Actor Attractors for my lead characters
Margaret Doner
The Knowledge Keeper
My Vision: I find the time to create well-written scripts will sell and be produced
What I learned: Asking myself these questions before I tackle the script puts me well ahead of the game.
Two Actors: Arthur Pelias and The Knowledge Keeper
CONCEPT: In the future, in the attempt to wipe evil from the Earth, robots take away free will and allow only goodness, tasking one man, hidden away, to keep the historical records.
Character One: Arthur Pelias
1. What about this role would attract an actor?
It is a multi-level emotional range role. The character gets to go from the extreme of bland “goodness” to the other extreme of a “passionate” and deeply feeling individual.
2. What makes the character one of the most interesting?
Not only is the emotional range vast, but also the actual worlds the character inhabits. This character will go from the future to the most savage past to uncover the historical truth of the human race.
3. Interesting actions?
The interesting actions include participating in battle scenes, falling in love with a woman who dies in his arms, being the apprentice of the Knowledge Keeper, awakening his village to the truth
4. How can you introduce this role in a way that could sell it to an actor?
That’s a tough one….still a little stumped on that. I feel that the opening of the script is good, it opens with a bang, but the opening scenes of Arthur are in the “pleasantville” world and aren’t powerful. I’m still wrestling with that and haven’t come up with the answer.
5. What could be this character’s emotional range?
Said earlier.
6. What subtext can the actor play?
I think the subtext will be in the fact that Arthur is hiding the truth of his knowledge from the robots who control his world and also from the computer “god.”
7. What’s the most interesting relationships the character can have?
With the Knowledge Keeper and with the woman who he falls in love with in the past. Although I am working on developing a interesting and conflicted relationship between him and Mathilda, the robot who is in charge of keeping him and his family safe and “in line.”
8. How will this character’s unique voice be presented?
The voice will change as he evolves…from bland to passionate. Soft spoken to loud.
9. What could make this character special and unique?
His passion and inability to “fit in” to society. Also I think I am going to have him injured and scarred in the past life, which he will bring into the future life….(present life for him). This scar will be different because everyone else is perfect…and will be why he is “found out.”
ACTOR TWO: THE KNOWLEDGE KEEPER
1. What about this role would attract an actor?
I believe that the Merlin-like or Dumbledore-like role of the wisdom keeper who awakens a member of the future-world in hope to reignite passion back into the world is deep and rich enough to attract an older actor.
2. What makes the character one of the most interesting?
The character is the only one who remembers the true history of the human race. He records the history holographically, and opens portals back in time.
3. Interesting actions?
Opening portals back into time, and time-travelling.
4. How can you introduce this role in a way that could sell it to an actor?
The opening scene takes place in Vlad Dracula’s (Vlad Tepes aka Dracula) (a real historical character BTW) Forest of the Impaled. The Knowledge Keeper is recording the horrors of that experience and emerges through a portal from that scene into his “laboratory-like cave.”
5. What could be this character’s emotional range?
Although the character is a hermit; we see that he longs for emotional connection with another person and enlists Arthur to be his protégé.
6. What subtext can the actor play?
The Knowledge Keeper knows “all,” and so knows secrets that others do not. In the end I am playing with the idea that he is indeed, Merlin, and he and Arthur travel back to create Camelot. A utopia on Earth during the Middle Ages…no robots.
7. What’s the most interesting relationships the character can have?
With both Arthur and the robots. After all the robots have almost enslaved him as well; making him hold all the historical records but keeping them away from other humans.
8. How will this character’s unique voice be presented?
I think I will write him speaking as though he were Merlin from Camelot. Not “modern” English, but an old-fashioned edge.
9. What could make this character special and unique?
His hidden fear: Although he seems “all-powerful” I think he needs a fear…the God-like computer cube also “knows all,” and is his rival. He must trick the cube in order to accomplish his goal. In otherwards, trick God, to accomplish his aim. His is afraid of the robot-computer power in that cube.
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MODULE 3: Lesson 1: Roles that Attract Actors
Margaret Doner
My vision: I find the time to create well-written scripts that will sell and be produced.
What I learned: To think of ways to attract star actors and actresses
Blade Runner 1982
Protagonist: Harrison Ford Character: Rick Deckard
1. What about role would cause actor to want to be known for it: The movie at the time was extremely unusual and the director was Ridley Scott. The setting was NEO-NOIR, dark, futuristic and everything about it pushed the envelope at the time. When Harrison got there, however, he argued a lot with Ridley and hated playing almost every scene soaking wet! In time Harrison came to love the film. It is indeed a classic.
2. What makes this character one of the most interesting characters in the story? Harrison is caught in a brutal job of terminating replicants who come onto Earth; and he falls in love with one.
3. What are the most interesting actions the Lead takes in the script? Falls in love with a replicant he is duty bound to kill.
4. How is this character introduced that could sell it to an actor? The role is very deep and dark and disturbed. There were hints at a subtext that in fact Harrison’s character could be a replicant.
5. What is this character’s emotional range? He is tough and unfeeling in a brutal futuristic world; and yet he begins to feel something for the replicants who become aware of their termination date and cannot escape it.
6. The subtext the character plays? I think the subtext is the relationship between the humans and the replicants. As the replicants become self-aware they resent the humans and seek to kill them. The empathetic nature in Rick Deckard grows by the end of the film.
7. What the most interesting relationship the character has? With Sean Young’s character, who is a replicant unaware that she is a replicant and all her memories were implants. He falls in love with her.
8. What gives the character a unique voice? Not sure. The only thing besides his job is his ability to begin to “feel” for the replicants dilemma.
9. What makes the character special or unique? I think just the setting itself and the character’s job and conflicts within the job.
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Mod 2: Lesson 6. Build in Genre conventions
My vision: I find the time to create well-written scripts that will sell and be produced.
What I learned: To consider genre conventions early on in the process and clarify the 4 act structure
TITLE: The Knowledge Keeper
Concept: In the future, in the attempt to wipe evil from the Earth, robots take away free will and allow only goodness, tasking one man, hidden away, to record mankind’s true history.
GENRE: Sci/Fi
Conventions: Fantastic worlds, new technologies, Incredible visuals, social commentary.
ACT 1:
Opening: The Knowledge keeper is in his secret “cave” and recording historical records with holographic portals. The first vision is that of the horrible world of Vlad the Impaler and his legendary Forest of Impaled Bodies. This contrasts profoundly with the current world which is controlled by robots and where everyone lives in a “Pleasantville” sanitized existence.
Inciting Incident: Arthur takes his daughter to become indoctrinated into their way of life by visiting the giant computer that they call God and learning the way the robots keep everyone happy by microchipping them and connecting them to “God.” During this event Arthur hears the Knowledge Keeper whisper in his mind and call out to him.
Turning Point: Arthur escapes the control of the robot who is assigned to his family and seeks out the Knowledge Keeper.
ACT 2:
New Plan: Arthur discovers the Knowledge Keeper and is convinced to enter a portal which will send him back in time.
Plan in Action: Arthur enters the portal and discovers the truth of humanity’s past. He experiences war and violence and is shown the moment at which the robots decide to take over Earth and create a world free of suffering.
Midpoint: Arthur decides to return to his current day home and tell his wife about what he discovered. He hopes to convince her to come with him, but she is afraid to go against the robots.
ACT 3:
Rethink Everything: Arthur decides to return alone to visit the Knowledge Keeper and once again goes through the portal. This time he discovers art and passion, and falls in love for the first time. He sees the “good” that was eliminated from the world…he begins to think that the new world is not better.
New Plan: Arthur returns to “pleasantville’ and decides to tell everyone about what he has uncovered.
Turning Point Huge Failure: Arthur is captured by the robots and told he will be microchipped once more and hooked back into the computer God.
Act 4:
Climax: The Knowledge Keeper appears and tells the people that Arthur speaks the truth. Robots realize they must offer humans the chance to choose to stay with them, or to go through the portal back in time with Arthur.
Resolution: Everyone chooses to be re-chipped and return to Pleasantville except for Arthur who goes back through the portal and reunites with the woman he fell in love with. He becomes the Knowledge Keeper’s protégé.
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Mod 2: Lesson 5 Four-Act Transformational Journey
Margaret Doner
My vision: I find the time to create well-written scripts that will sell and be produced.
What I learned: to break down my story into 4 well-managed acts.
CONCEPT: In the Future, in the attempt to wipe evil from the Earth, robots take away free will and allow only goodness, and task one man, hidden away, to record the ancient battles.
MAIN CONFLICT: The protagonist, Arthur Pelias, uncovers the truth about his world and seeks to reveal to humanity to what he has discovered. The robots attempt to stop him.
OLD WAYS: Arthur lives without deep feeling or passion or fear. Does what he is told. Lives within strict physical and mental boundaries. Worships as God the computer who controls him.
NEW WAYS: Sneaks away from the community to visit the Knowledge Keeper. Goes back in time through a portal and discovers war and violence. Goes back in time and discovers true love and art and passion and free will. Decides he needs to tell the others about what he has learned.
ACT 1:
Opening: We see Vlad the Impaler’s Forest of the Impaled…and then see the Knowledge Keeper recording this old violence. We see the “Pleasantville” world Arthur and his family inhabit controlled by robots.
Inciting Incident: The Knowledge Keeper visits Arthur in his bedroom and whispers to him to awaken him.
Turning Point: Arthur decides to try to find the Knowledge Keeper
Act 11:
New Plan: Arthur sets out to find the Knowledge Keeper
Plan in Action: Arthur goes through a portal and uncovers humanity’s violent past.
Midpoint Turning Point: Arthur discovers the truth and sees how is world really came into being.
ACT 111:
Rethink Everything: Arthur also finds passion with a woman, and art and begins to decide that the world he is living in is flavorless. He bonds with the Knowledge Keeper.
New Plan: Arthur decides to try and upset his world by revealing the truth
Turning Point: Huge Failure: Arthur is captured and imprisoned.
ACT 1V:
Climax: Knowledge Keeper frees Arthur and robots offer humans the opportunity to return to their old world or choose to return to “pleasantville.”
Resolution: Everyone chooses to return to “Pleasantville,” but Arthur who returns to the past and reunites with the woman he fell in love with. Arthur becomes Knowledge Keeper’s protégé.
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The forum will not let me reply on Lesson 3. So I am posting my lesson 3 and my lesson 4 here until that straightens itself out.
Module 2: Lesson 3 Transformational Journey
Margaret Doner
The Knowledge Keeper
My Vision: I find the time to create well-written scripts that will sell and be produced.
What I learned: Once again to break things down into small lessons to help me organize my thoughts.
Arc Beginning: Arthur Pelias
He is a member of the futuristic robot-controlled and micro-chipped “perfect” world, who is unaware of the true history of humanity.
Arc Ending: Arthur Pelias
He has become enlightened by the Knowledge Keeper and chooses to “go back in time” to experience the world of duality.
Internal Journey: He morphs from the micro-chipped “perfect man,” into a fearless leader who tries to awaken his community to the possibility of free will.
External Journey: From one of the many micro-chipped people to the one who tries to awaken the people to the truth of their existence.
OLD WAYS:
Lives without deep feeling or passion.
Does what he is told…always.
Lives within strict physical and mental boundaries.
Worships as God the computer who controls all people.
NEW WAYS:
Sneaks away from the community to visit the Knowledge Keeper.
Goes back in time through a portal and discovers war and violence.
Goes back in time and discovers true love and art and passion and free will.
Decides he needs to tell the others about what he has learned.
Mod 2: Lesson 4: What’s Beneath the Surface?
The Knowledge Keeper
My Vision: I find the time to create well-written scripts that will sell and be produced.
What I learned: To write down my sub-text before starting the script.
CONCEPT: In the future, in the attempt to wipe evil from the Earth, robots take away free will and task one man, hidden away, to record the ancient battles.
1. Someone Who Hides Who They Are
2. The Fish Out of Water
How the Sub-text Plays Out in my Story:
1. Someone Who Hides Who They Are: Arthur Pelias pretends to be a part of the “perfect micro-chipped world” while he uncovers the truth of humanity’s history. On the other side of the portal, when he goes back in time, Arthur hides that he is a time traveler from the future to the humans he encounters.
2. The Fish Out of Water: Arthur Pelias belongs no-where and becomes a fish out of water in his world when he turns on the robot-controlled world. He also feels like a fish out of water when he falls in love with a woman in the past and realizes that he cannot stay with her as he must go back to his own time.
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Margaret Doner’s Intentional Lead Characters
The Knowledge Keeper
My Vision: I find the time to create well-written scripts that will sell and be produced.
What I learned: to break things down into small ideas so that I don’t rush ahead and begin to write my script before having a clear idea where I want to end.
Protagonist: Arthur Pelias
Arthur is a Seeker of Truth who uncovers the fact that the world he is living in is a lie.
He is unique because he is the only one who chooses knowledge and passion over the safe but dull world of the robot’s making.
Antagonist: Mathilda the Robot Caretaker of Arthur and his family
Mathilda is a robot whose sole job is to keep the family she oversees “in line,” and make sure that they obey all the rules of society.
She is unique because although she appears human, she is a robot, unable to perform anything but what she is programmed to do.
Triangle character: The Knowledge Keeper
The Knowledge Keeper is a Merlin-like character who has been tasked with the job of keeping the true historical records of humanity, and making sure they never enter the robot-designed world.
He is unique because he is the only one in the story who is completely “awake” to the truth.
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MODULE 2 – LESSON 1: Great Outlines Make Great Scripts!
Margaret Doner
My Vision: I find the time to create well-written scripts that sell and are produced.
What I learned: This assignment was more a declaration of what I had put together in the other assignments.
TITLE: The Knowledge Keeper
GENRE: Sci/Fi
CONCEPT: In the future, in the attempt to wipe evil from the Earth, robots take away free will and allow only goodness, tasking one man, hidden away, to record humanity’s true history.
CHARACTER STRUCTURE: Protagonist/Antagonist
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MODULE 2 – LESSON 1: Great Outlines Make Great Scripts!
My Vision: I find the time to create well-written scripts that sell and are produced.
What I learned: This assignment was more a declaration of what I had put together in the other assignments.
We were told to post this under forums for first time. I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to post it under Introduce yourself to Group…but here goes.
TITLE: The Knowledge Keeper
GENRE: Sci/Fi
CONCEPT: In the future, in the attempt to wipe evil from the Earth, robots take away free will and allow only goodness, tasking one man, hidden away, to record humanity’s true history.
CHARACTER STRUCTURE: Protagonist/Antagonist
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Margaret Doner reply.
I just finished listening to the opening audio. What did I learn from the Opening Audio? To keep creating and expanding my ideas and not to get hung up on perfection, especially in early stages. I was delighted that Hal has given us the opportunity to hire “his guy” for feedback at such reasonable prices. I have to say that the section on critiques and criticism really rang true to me. I have paid for coverage and entered contests and I have found the critiques are all over the place. I have received a finalist award from a prestigious contest for a script that another person might find little value in….It has taught me to believe first and foremost in my gut when reading a critique and also be aware of the origin of the person giving criticism. Not all critiques are created equal! I love that Hal is so careful to keep everything respectful. Writers should be respected!
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Margaret Doner
I have written six scripts.
I am also a novelist
I have taken the class to continue to improve my script writing and to challenge myself.
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Margaret Doner
I agree to the terms of this release form.
GROUP RELEASE FORM
As a member of this group, I agree to the following:
1. That I will keep the processes, strategies, teleconferences, communications, lessons, and models of the class confidential, and that I will NOT share any of this program either privately, with a group, posting online, writing articles, through video or computer programming, or in any other way that would make those processes, teleconferences, communications, lessons, and models of the class available to anyone who is not a member of this class.
2. That each writer’s work here is copyrighted and that writer is the sole owner of that work. That includes this program which is copyrighted by Hal Croasmun. I acknowledge that submission of an idea to this group constitutes a claim of and the recognition of ownership of that idea.
I will keep the other writer’s ideas and writing confidential and will not share this information with anyone without the express written permission of the writer/owner. I will not market or even discuss this information with anyone outside this group.
3. I also understand that many stories and ideas are similar and/or have common themes and from time to time, two or more people can independently and simultaneously generate the same concept or movie idea.
4. If I have an idea that is the same as or very similar to another group member’s idea, I’ll immediately contact Hal and present proof that I had this idea prior to the beginning of the class. If Hal deems them to be the same idea or close enough to cause harm to either party, he’ll request both parties to present another concept for the class.
5. If you don’t present proof to Hal that you have the same idea as another person, you agree that all ideas presented to this group are the sole ownership of the person who presented them and you will not write or market another group member’s ideas.
6. Finally, I agree not to bring suit against anyone in this group for any reason, unless they use a substantial portion of my copyrighted work in a manner that is public and/or that prevents me from marketing my script by shopping it to production companies, agents, managers, actors, networks, studios or any other entertainment industry organizations or people.
This completes the Group Release Form for the class.
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Wordsmithing.
God bless you Christopher for being able to do the reverse edit. I gave it the old college try but my eyes kept going crossed. I found 10 pages of changes…mostly things like a should be an, or the that should be they. A missing question mark. I will probably do it all again soon. My husband is a great editor because he is a slow reader. I hate to admit it, but it next goes into his hands…. What surprised me the most is that I actually ended up liking the screenplay which I never thought I would. All the rewrites and changes made it so much better. Looking forward to the next class in December. These classes have really helped me. Even when some point in the middle I feel hopeless, if I push through I get there!!
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Margaret’s improved descriptions.
I went through the entire screenplay and asked myself if the descriptions were clear enough. I heightened a few descriptions of characters to bring them more to life. I think that was where it was too brief. Overall, I felt it was balanced between too much description and too little. I tend to err on the side of brevity, which is odd since I am a novelist first. I think I have heard the less is more so often, that I go too far in that direction. I also discovered that in a pitch I was doing…although the producer asked for the script…he also wanted more description and information. When I went back I realized that I needed to round out the pitch with more information. I find this balance, between too much and too little, to be very challenging both in the writing and the pitching!
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Key scenes improvement.
Honestly after doing all the other exercises I felt that my key scenes were where they needed to be. The most important key scene that was changed was the ending. I tied up the script so much more powerfully by bringing in a very important character and making him appear in the ending….it finally felt “finished.”
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Characters Entrance and Exits: Lesson 16 Margaret Doner
Although I am happy with the entrance of both main characters in my script, I felt the dialogue could be snappier and improved so I rewrote the dialogue. I removed anything that was generic and made each piece of dialogue reveal the characters. For the ending I rewrote the ending as well. I put Dennis in a scene that completes his journey, and I strengthened Victoria’s ending by adding a character that brings the story full circle and gives the ending deeper meaning.
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Aligning Dialogue to the Character Profiles.
I reread the entire script to see where the dialogue is aligned with the character. I changed very little as I had been doing that through all my rereads, however, I found that as I changed the action in the script…last assignment…it brought me to also rethink the character of Dennis. I put his positive traits as Kind, Smart, Open-minded, patient, and his negative traits as Easily manipulated and insecure. When i went back to reread with that in mind I changed some interaction with his old friend Tom Banks to highlight his insecurity and his new interaction with Victoria to show his kindness.
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Lesson 14: Meaningful action rewrite of a scene…or two…or more! I loved this assignment and found it so helpful. The biggest change I made was after Dennis and Victoria witness a brutal murder I had them drowning their sorrows at a bar. I knew it wasn’t working but this really helped me to find a way to get some action. Instead of sitting and drowning sorrows, Victoria now comes into Dennis’ office and is angry at the horrible death of a student she just witnessed. Dennis leads her outside and starts running to help her move her anger…faster and faster she chases him until she screams her anger at the perpetrators. Then she falls from exhaustion and now their “Shields are down.” The scene accomplished a lot more…made more emotional sense…and I could still lead them where they needed to go in the story.
I also made a big change to the final scene. I am feeling better about the script after Lesson 13 and 14. And I’m sure character dialogue in Lesson 15 will help even more!
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Elevating scene structure. I learned to go into a scene and add what is needed to make it have more punch or move the script forward.
I knew I needed to add something to the “diner scene” with Sally, especially when Dennis enters with his family. the new addition brings Victoria and Dennis face to face when she is trying to “escape” seeing him. It heightens the tension and helps to bring the next past life scene into clearer focus. (converting to word from PDF made this weird format.)
INT. FRANKLIN EBCOTT’S BEDROOM. LONDON. ENGLAND. 1868
Franklin ushers Jean into the room, they kiss and undress
one another passionately.
VICTORIA (V.O.)
Corsets, hairpins and starched
collars were removed between
frantic kisses. I can still
remember what it felt like as his
hands slid down my legs to remove
my stockings.
DISSOLVE TO:
INT. MOONGLO DINER. ST. GEORGE, VT. DAY
Victoria speaks to SALLY O’CONNELL (30s), a pretty, plump-faced
“hometown girl,” Sally sits with Victoria in a
booth in an old-fashioned slightly faded diner.
VICTORIA
That’s it, Sally. I had to tell
you. I know I sound crazy, but
these past life visions are coming
on faster and faster.
SALLY
Hell, give me visions like that
and I might be okay with crazy.
But maybe you are just making it
up. (pause) You know.
VICTORIA
I think the past life lover is a
man I met recently, Dennis Manon.
He’s in the English department.
SALLY
Listen, Victoria. I’m no
therapist, but it sounds to me
like you are living in some kind
of daydream.
The waitress arrives to take their orders.
VICTORIA
Coffee. Two eggs over easy. Toast.
SALLY
Same thing but give me a cake
donut instead of toast.
The waitress leaves.
SALLY
(continued)
Okay. So, we’re alone. Tell me
more. Even if it is a daydream,
its better than any I ever had.
The waitress arrives with the coffee pot.
DISSOLVE TO:
INT. FRANKLIN’S BEDROOM – 1868. DAY
Jean and Franklin are in bed together making love.
Suddenly, Jean pulls away from him.
JEAN
I have to leave now, my love.
Franklin turns away from her, then he turns back.
JEAN
They are expecting me at home.
FRANKLIN
To hell with them. They don’t love
you as I do. Why should you return
to him and to his children, when
your heart is with me?
JEAN
Because I am married to him.
FRANKLIN
And yet, you are in bed with me.
Jean tears up and turns away from him.
JEAN
Do you think this is easy for me?
Do you think I am happy for one
moment in this cursed existence? I
feel imprisoned by my life.
Franklin reaches out and tugs at her.
FRANKLIN
We can run away to America.
JEAN
But, John’s children. They have
lost one mother. If I leave they
would lose two. How can I do that?
DISSOLVE TO:
INT. MOONGLO DINER. PRESENT DAY.
VICTORIA
I was pregnant. I knew it.
Franklin didn’t.
SALLY
You must have felt like shit.
VICTORIA
So, you do believe me. That’s more
than I can say for my therapist.
The waitress stares at them, her mouth agape.
WAITRESS
Wow.
Sally and Victoria glare up at her. The waitress hurries
away.
Victoria glances out of the window. She scrunches up in
the booth.
VICTORIA
Oh, no.
SALLY
What?
VICTORIA
He’s walking into the diner with
his wife and daughter.
SALLY
Who?
VICTORIA
Dennis.
SALLY
Where?
Sally wheels around to see Dennis ENTER with his wife and
daughter.
SALLY (CONT’D)
She looks preggers.
VICTORIA
Maybe she’s just fat.
SALLY
Don’t think so.
Dennis and his family take a booth. Dennis is facing away
from them.
VICTORIA
Well, that’s a relief. He isn’t
staring at me.
SALLY
Listen, Victoria. I have to tell
you something important. I’m
getting married.
VICTORIA
What! When?
SALLY
In the spring. I want you to be my
Maid of Honor.
VICTORIA
Of course. Listen Sally, would you
mind so very much if I left before
the food gets here. I feel kind of
ill.
Victoria puts money on the table.
SALLY
What are you doing?
VICTORIA
I don’t know. I feel nauseous all
of a sudden. Sorry.
Victoria RUSHES OUT of the diner. It has started to rain
and she lifts her hands over her head to protect herself
as rivulets of water run down the street.
DISSOLVE TO:
EXT. STREET IN VICTORIAN ENGLAND – 1868. DAY
Rain pours down in rivulets between the grooves of the
cobblestone street. Jean lifts her heavy skirt out of the
wet mess as she runs. In the distance she sees a carriage
pull away from a house.
JEAN
Don’t leave me! Franklin, please
don’t leave! I love you. I want to
go with you.
She runs harder, slipping on the wet cobblestones as she
tries in vain to catch the carriage. A strong hand grabs
her from behind and holds tightly to her arm. It is her
husband, John Cobb.
JOHN
You are making a fool of yourself.
JEAN
Let me go!
REWRITE OF SCENE:
INT. FRANKLIN EBCOTT’S BEDROOM. LONDON. ENGLAND. 1868
Franklin ushers Jean into the room, they kiss and undress
one another passionately.
VICTORIA (V.O.)
Corsets, hairpins and starched
collars were removed between
frantic kisses. I can still
remember what it felt like as his
hands slid down my legs to remove
my stockings.
DISSOLVE TO:
INT. MOONGLO DINER. ST. GEORGE, VT. DAY
Victoria speaks to SALLY O’CONNELL (30s), a pretty, plump-faced
“hometown girl,” Sally sits with Victoria in a
booth in an old-fashioned slightly faded diner.
VICTORIA
That’s it, Sally. I had to tell
you. I know I sound crazy, but
these past life visions are coming
on faster and faster.
SALLY
Hell, give me visions like that
and I might be okay with crazy.
But maybe you are just making it
up. (pause) You know.
VICTORIA
I think the past life lover is a
man I met recently, Dennis Manon.
He’s in the English department. In the past
life his name was Franklin and mine was Jean.
SALLY
Listen, Victoria. I’m no
therapist, but it sounds to me
like you are living in some kind
of daydream. How the hell could you possibly know all that?
The waitress arrives to take their orders.
VICTORIA
Coffee. Two eggs over easy. Toast.
SALLY
Same thing but give me a cake
donut instead of toast.
The waitress leaves.
SALLY
(continued)
Okay. So, we’re alone. Even if what
You say is true, why does it matter?
You can’t go back in time.
VICTORIA
It’s karma, Sally. I feel it. Something is
unfinished with Dennis, or Franklin as
he was called.
SALLY
Karma? What are you suddenly Hindu? Besides,
What you told me didn’t sound bad. It sounded
Pretty hot. So come on, tell me
more. Even if it is a daydream,
its better than any I ever had.
The waitress arrives with the coffee pot.
DISSOLVE TO:
INT. FRANKLIN’S BEDROOM – 1868. DAY
Jean and Franklin are in bed together making love.
Suddenly, Jean pulls away from him.
JEAN
I have to leave now, my love.
Franklin turns away from her, then he turns back.
JEAN
They are expecting me at home.
FRANKLIN
To hell with them. They don’t love
you as I do. Why should you return
to him and to his children, when
your heart is with me?
JEAN
Because I am married to him.
FRANKLIN
And yet, you are in bed with me.
Jean tears up and turns away from him.
JEAN
Do you think this is easy for me?
Do you think I am happy for one
moment in this cursed existence? I
feel imprisoned by my life.
Franklin reaches out and tugs at her.
FRANKLIN
We can run away to America.
JEAN
But, John’s children. They have
lost one mother. If I leave they
would lose two. How can I do that?
DISSOLVE TO:
INT. MOONGLO DINER. PRESENT DAY.
VICTORIA
I was pregnant. I knew it.
Franklin didn’t.
SALLY
You must have felt like shit.
VICTORIA
So, you do believe me. That’s more
than I can say for my therapist.
The waitress stares at them, her mouth agape.
WAITRESS
(eavesdropping)
Wow.
Sally and Victoria glare up at her. The waitress hurries
away.
Victoria glances out of the window. She scrunches up in
the booth.
VICTORIA
Oh, no.
SALLY
What?
VICTORIA
He’s walking into the diner with
his wife and daughter.
SALLY
Who?
VICTORIA
Dennis.
SALLY
Where?
Sally wheels around to see Dennis ENTER with his wife and
daughter.
SALLY (CONT’D)
She looks preggers.
VICTORIA
Maybe she’s just fat.
SALLY
Don’t think so.
Dennis and his family take a booth. Dennis faces away
from them.
VICTORIA
Well, that’s a relief. He isn’t
staring at me.
SALLY
Listen, Victoria. I have to tell
you something important. I’m
getting married.
VICTORIA
What! When?
SALLY
In the spring. I want you to be my
Maid of Honor.
VICTORIA
Of course. Listen Sally, would you
mind so very much if I left before
the food gets here. I feel kind of
ill.
Victoria puts money on the table.
SALLY
What are you doing?
VICTORIA
I don’t know. I feel nauseous all
of a sudden. Sorry.
As Victoria stands up to leave Dennis gets up
from his booth. Victoria runs toward the bathrooms to
avoid him. The bathrooms are located behind swinging doors and Victoria disappears behind
the doors.
INT. HALLWAY OF DINER BY BATHROOMS
Victoria huddles behind the doors. Suddenly
Dennis pushes the swinging door open and they are
Face-to-face.
VICTORIA (surprised)
Oh!
DENNIS
Victoria.
They pause for a moment. Dennis reaches out his hand
and gently touches her arm. Victoria glances down at his hand.
VICTORIA
I was just leaving.
DENNIS
Stay. Meet my wife and daughter. I’ll be
Out in a moment.
VICTORIA
Okay.
Dennis goes into the bathroom and Victoria pushes
The swinging door and rushes into the restaurant.
INT. MOONGLO DINER. DAY
Without looking at his wife and children, and without a pause,
Victoria runs out of the diner.
EXT. DINER. DAY
Victoria EXITS. It has started to rain
and she lifts her hands over her head to protect herself as
she runs toward her car. Rivulets of water run down the street.
DISSOLVE TO:
EXT. STREET IN VICTORIAN ENGLAND – 1868. DAY
Rain pours down in rivulets between the grooves of the
cobblestone street. Jean lifts her heavy skirt out of the
wet mess as she runs. In the distance she sees a carriage
pull away from a house.
JEAN
Don’t leave me! Franklin, please
don’t leave! I love you. I want to
go with you.
She runs harder, slipping on the wet cobblestones as she
tries in vain to catch the carriage. A strong hand grabs
her from behind and holds tightly to her arm. It is her
husband, John Cobb.
JOHN
You are making a fool of yourself.
JEAN
Let me go!
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Scene rating for entertainment value: What I learned.
I think overall this is a good exercise to separate the scenes from one another and see if the scene stands alone as interesting, regardless of the role it plays in the overall script. The biggest thing I learned was that the ending of my script needed another tie-in to make it stand out. Overall though most of the scenes, after doing exercise 11, were much better in terms of entertainment value. Not all scenes obviously should be a 10 in terms of action, especially since my script is a drama; however, did they add to the movement of the overall script? That’s what I really looked at.
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Outline Exchange with Edward.
Edward and I exchanged outlines and it seems we were definitely meant to communicate. He was very helpful to me and I am wondering if I need to make the transitions to the past lives more like Outlander with a portal jump or some such thing. I am adapting my novel entitled Infinite Darkness/Infinite Light to this script. A tough assignment, as novels are sometimes a tough transition to film. I feel like I need to step back at this point and get some distance from my script of a few days. I bet a lot of people feel like that can’t “see” their own scripts clearly at times…too close. That’s why this feedback was helpful.
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Outline to Script. Margaret Doner Love and Destiny
Doing the outline and comparing it to the script showed me where I needed to ADD scenes for clarity. I know I still need some more work in that area, but it’s come a long way from the beginning. I added 3 new scenes and I changed 4 scenes.
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I will exchange with Edward if he is willing to exchange with me. Horror isn’t my specialty but I will give it my best. My script may not be down your alley either, though. I have written a drama based on my novel entitled: Infinite Darkness/Infinite Light. It is about reincarnation, past lives, karma and the theory that time is fluid and an illusion. If you are interested let me know and I’ll give you my email address and we can exchange scripts. Thanks Margaret P.S. My outline is 7 pages and 54 scenes.
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Fascinating scene outline. What I learned from this assignment was a very useful technique for breaking down and evaluating my script.
As I broke down each scene and assigned it a number, in the outline, I found out where I needed to add two new scenes for both transition purposes and to strengthen characters and also clarity of information. I had never broken down a script in this way before and I will be using this technique from this day forward. After I tackle this rewrite I have another rewrite in the wings…and you better believe that this type of scene by scene outline will be extremely useful for that script as well.
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Elevates Lead Characters = what I learned. My character Dennis needs to be fleshed out more.
A. Need Stronger Lead Characters: I believe that Victoria my protagonist is now quite strong. However, the love interest Dennis, was not developed enough
B. Need Stronger Character Intros: That I felt was good. I like the intros.
C. Playing it too safe: With Dennis I believe I was.
D. Lead Characters Not Present: That isn’t a problem. They are in every scene
Changes to script: wrote new scenes to show more complexity in Dennis’ character and his relationship to Victoria.
I have begun to feel freer to move away from the novel when needed to illustrate a character flaw or strength.
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Lesson 7: Solving major problems. Margaret Doner Love and Destiny
What I learned: To tighten the script but getting rid of unnecessary scenes. Make my protagonist stronger in her convictions. Move the story along faster with less dialogue and more action.
I eliminated two past life stories and concentrated on the other two. I brought in the understanding that Victoria’s past life experiences align with what quantum physicists have discovered…time goes both forward and backward. I strengthened Dennis and fleshed him out.
Basically streamlined the story and strengthened the two main characters.
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Outline Improvements: What I learned is that in order to rewrite a script I must go back to my original outline and see which characters are underrepresented in their motivation and transitions. I also saw ways to strengthen the protagonist without compromising her transitional journey. I think the distance given by working through an outline can be very helpful to get some clarity on the overall path of the screenplay. I also eliminate superfluous scenes that only dragged down the screenplay.
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Lesson Five – Rewrite Class Character Story Lines
What I learned: Breaking the story apart and looking at individual story lines helps to make certain the ideas that have been presented for each character have continuity.
1. Victoria Barkley: Protagonist
a. Where does the character start? A past life image of her as Jean Cobb in Kensington Gardens dissolves into her in the present day (matching images to lead into present day and give audience the clue that they are one in the same, or at least connected somehow)…She is at St. George college before start of school gathering outside under a tent.
b. Inciting Incident: She “rescues” Dennis Manon from an arrogant faculty member who is very loudly embarrassing him. They meet for first time.
c. Turning Point 1: Victoria and Dennis admit their attraction for one another. Victoria realizes Dennis is the man in her past life visions. She tells him about her visions.
d. Midpoint: A student is killed by his father because of his performance in drag in the play “The Maids.” Victoria assists on the production and sees him shot in close range. This challenges her mental health even more.
e. Turning Point 2: Victoria and Dennis have sex and Victoria begins to have memories of a past life in Dachau as a young Jewish woman.
f. Dilemma: Victoria and Dennis have to decide what to do with their passionate attraction.
g. Major Conflict: Victoria realizes that Dennis was also in Dachau as a Nazi who fell in love with her. She convinces Dennis to journey to his past lives.
h. Ending: Victoria is given confirmation of the truth of her being in Dachau by a man who was there as a young boy and remembers her story. Victoria leaves her current job, boyfriend and Dennis and ventures away from the past. But now its healed. The visions have stopped.
2. Dennis Manon: Love Interest
a. Beginning: where does character start? At St. George College right before opening of school year, being insulted by arrogant faculty member.
b. Inciting Incident: Is “rescued” by Victoria.
c. Turning point 1: Victoria tells him about her visions and he remembers that he wrote a short story in college that mirrors the past life in England. He kisses Victoria.
d. Midpoint: Dennis gives into his desire and they have sex. His guilt haunts him.
e. Turning Point 2: Dennis tells Victoria that they have to stay away from each other.
f. Dilemma: Is Victoria his soulmate? Why does he feel so strongly about her?
g. Major Conflict: Dennis realizes through past life remembrance that Victoria is right about what she has told him.
h. Ending: Although Dennis and Victoria have feelings for one another, they can go their separate ways now that they realize why they were so attracted. They agree to let it go.
3. Gary Dubitsky: Boyfriend to Victoria
a. Beginning: Where does character start? In his “funky” café near college campus.
b. Turning point 1: Victoria tells him about her past life visions thinking he would understand as he is a Buddhist. Instead, he gets jealous when he realizes that Dennis is in the picture.
c. Midpoint: He flirts and is attracted to another woman.
d. Turning point 2: Victoria, in a state of mental confusion and wanting to deny her feelings for Dennis asks Gary to marry her. He turns her down.
e. Major conflict: Victoria and Gary’s relationship is thrown upside by Victoria’s past life visions and attraction to Dennis.
f. Ending: Gary and Victoria break up. Victoria leaves town. Gary stays.
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Lesson 4 Rewrite Class
Margaret Doner: Love and Destiny – Drama
What I learned: To flesh out characters in order to bring more depth to them.
Characters:
A. Victoria Barkley
B. Role in Story: Protagonist
C. Core Traits: Artistic, Intuitive, Intelligent, Seeker of Truth
D. Motivation: To understand the past life recall that rises up in her consciousness
E. Flaw: Obsession with Dennis, Emotions. Wound: Past life recall
F. Secret/Hidden Agenda: Obsession with and attraction to Dennis because of past life recall.
G. Internal Dilemma: Am I going crazy, or are these thoughts and images real?
H. What makes this character perfect for this story? As an artist, actor, director, she is creative and intuitive making her not only perfect for being an empath, but also wonder if this is her imagination.
Improvements: Some people have suggested she doesn’t seem strong enough. I think this could be improved, although her strength is more evident in script than in the outline.
A. Dennis Manon
B. Role in Story: Love Interest
C. Core Traits: Intelligent, Loyal, Kind, Artistic
D. Motivation: To understand why this woman (Victoria) suddenly has an emotional hold on him
E. Flaw: Driven by emotions
F. Secret/Hidden Agenda: Has memory of past life in Victorian England with Victoria
G. Internal Dilemma: Is Victoria right? Do we share these past lives?
H. As an academic he shares Victoria’s knowledge of literature and understands her references and motivations.
Improvements: Clarify his dilemma with his wife and child versus this strange newfound attraction to Victoria.
A. Victoria’s Mental Health
B. Role in Story: Antagonist
C. Core Traits: Overwhelming, confusing, lacks focus, flip/flops
D. Motivation: To wake her up to alternate realities and shake her from everyday reality
E. Flaw: Uncontrollable
F. Secret/Hidden Agenda: Life in Dachau
G. Internal Dilemma: Am I crazy or is this real?
H. As a drama it works to have an Internal Main antagonist, instead of an Outside Mail antagonist.
Improvements: Not sure.
A. Gary Dubitsky
B. Role in Story: Love Interest (boyfriend)
C. Core Traits: Creative, Hardworking, Unusual
D. Motivation: To live life one moment at a time while being true to the self.
E. Flaw: Self-centered
F. Secret/Hidden Agenda: Is attracted to another woman
G. Internal Dilemma: How to process Victoria’s past lives through is Buddhist perspective
H. As a Buddhist he understands reincarnation and karma
A. Sally Benton
B. Role in Story: Confidant: Victoria’s girlfriend
C. Core Traits: Kind, innocent, ordinary, loyal
D. Motivation: Wants and needs to get married and settle down
E. Flaw/Wound: Struggles to see “outside the box.”
F. Secret/Hidden Agenda: Doesn’t really believe in past lives but tries to
G. Internal Dilemma: Should I “step outside the box” with Victoria?
H. Character is perfect foil for Victoria’s unusual behavior and point of view. As maid of honor to Sally, Victoria wears a puffy pink dress as she struggles with images of Dachau. Sally adds contrast.
Improvements: Flesh out her personality.
A. Mrs. Thompson, Bill Johnson
B. Role in Story: Foils
C. Core Traits: Unbending, Believe no matter what they do or think they are always right
D. Motivation: To stop the production of The Maids at Victoria’s college.
E. Flaw/Wound: Can’t see beyond their own noses.
F. Secret/Hidden Agenda: To murder Bill Johnson’s son who is gay and performs in drag during the production of The Maids.
G. Internal Dilemma: I am upholding my Christian values?
H. Characters are perfect to contrast with Victoria and her staff members and students, but also their actions trigger Victoria’s memories of Dachau.
Improvements: Have another scene between Mrs. Thompson and Bill Johnson to illuminate their mindset.
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ASSIGNMENT lesson 3 \
Margaret Doner – DRAMA
What I learned from this assignment: This is complicated to some degree as I am writing this screenplay from a novel I wrote and so always trying to figure out what to put in and leave out. I have decided (at least at this point), to trim the past life memories down to two (from four) to make it much easier to follow in the screenplay. The script I am rewriting had all four in and I found it cumbersome. In the meantime I am figuring out ways to trim certain characters, or eliminate them altogether, or in other cases highlight a figure to make them even more prominent. The basic structure is inherent in the novel, and I am playing around with that to make it more streamline and fit into a screenplay genre structure.
Assignment: Like you saw in the example above, build the genre conventions into your 4-Act structure.
1. Tell us the following:
Title: Love and Destiny
Concept: A woman discovers her past lives are influencing her current life and lovers.
Genre: Drama
2. Make a list of the conventions for your chosen genre, like this:
Example for Drama:
Purpose: To delve into the interior landscape of human thought and emotion and reveal profound truths.
Demand for Emotional Impact: Protagonist undergoes a shift in her reality when spiritual and metaphysical realities push her to re-evaluate her life.
Mission: To prove to the doubters that her past life flashbacks are real.
Escalating Action: A murder of a son by his father in the theater she is involved with, causes her mental stability to be even more challenged and triggers another past life.
Protagonist: Victoria Barkley
Antagonist: Her deteriorating mental health as the people around her doubt her experiences as real.
PREVIOUS OUTLINE: LOVE AND DESTINY
Act 1: Opening
Flashback of Past Life with Jean Cobb and her husband John Cobb in Kensington Garden 1863…leads into present day. The Leads are introduced. Victoria and Dennis meet at outdoor faculty event at St. George college. Introduce the idea that the past life and the present life are linked. She is in Theater department he is in English department. Dennis is wearing a wedding ring.
Victoria’s boyfriend, Gary, is introduced as the owner of a Café in town. His father, who plays a big role in the ending is introduced. We find out that the father was in Dachau as a child.
Victoria is at faculty meeting and the idea of the play The Maids being performed is introduced with its potential controversy as characters are men in drag. This sets up the Midpoint which spirals Victoria downward.
Dennis visits Victoria’s classroom as she teaches Romeo and Juliet to a Shakespeare class. The sexual tension between them is heightened.
Sexual tension in Past Life Vision between Jean Cobb and her lover Franklin is intensified.
Victoria sees her friend Sally and tells her about her visions and tries to get her to understand. CHANGE TO THE OUTLINE IS: SALLY DOESN’T UNDERSTAND…and INVITES VICTORIA TO BE MAID OF HONOR IN HER VERY TRADITIONAL WEDDING WHICH HIGHLIGHTS THE FACT THAT VICTORIA FEELS EVEN MORE MISUNDERSTOOD AND DIFFERENT THAN THOSE AROUND HER.
The play The Maids is drawing the controversy from a parent of one of the actors…sets up the Midpoint tragedy further. CHANGE: THE YOUNG ACTOR IS STANDING FIRM TO HIS CONVICTIONS EVEN WHEN THOSE AROUND HIM ARE THREATENING HIM BECAUSE OF HIS LIFE CHOICES. THIS HIGHLIGHTS VICTORIA’S STRUGGLE TO BE TRUE TO HERSELF EVEN THOUGH THOSE AROUND HER DON’T SUPPORT HER VISION OF REALITY.
Inciting Incident: Victoria is in her therapist’s office and reveals her past life visions that are making her crazy. She tells him an old memory from this life and introduces a spiritual/helper figure that visited her as a teenager. Her therapist doesn’t want to deal with past life visions and Victoria realizes TURNING POINT that Dennis is the man she has been seeing in her past life visions and that they are linked karmically.
End Act One
ACT 11
New Plan: Victoria decides to tell Gary about the past life visions in the hope that, as a Buddhist, he can understand what’s happening to her. Instead they argue and she storms out.
Midpoint: Turning point. The controversy over the play The Maids reaches a peak when people are protesting with pickets on her lawn. They say the devil is at St. George college. Actors and faculty have to decide whether to go on with the play. They do and one of the fathers shoots his son when he is on stage in drag, and then kills himself on opening night.
Shaken to the core Victoria turns to Dennis for comfort and tells him about the past life visions she has been having. He reminds her he is married and can’t follow through on their attraction. Before he leaves, however, he kisses her deeply, sending her very mixed messages.
Victoria is in Ted’s office and trying to help her get over her trauma and images. Instead, she has more images in his office this time of Nazi Germany. Ted tries to tell her that the trauma she experienced is fueling these images and they have nothing to do with Nazi Germany.
ACT III
Rethink/React: Victoria is having a terrible time now with all the images and trauma and she reacts by asking her boyfriend Gary to marry her. He refuses because he sees that it is merely a reaction to all she is experiencing. This spirals her down further.
She goes to Gary’s café and sees him flirt with another woman. Her friend Sally meets her here and CHANGE: TALKS TO HER ALL ABOUT HER WEDDING PLANS WITHOUT NOTICING HOW UPSET VICTORIA IS ENHANCING VICTORIA’S FEELINGS OF BEING ALONE, ONCE AGAIN. Suddenly silent, they both watch Gary flirt with the woman. Victoria can’t watch anymore and she leaves and goes to the park.
While feeding the pigeons in the park a “wise man” spiritual/helper figure sits next to her, like when she was a child, and gives her wise advice and help.
Victoria must launch the Shakespeare play Hamlet and is auditioning students for the role. Dennis walks into theater and sits with her. They laugh and talk until he tells her that he remembered that he wrote a short story in college which mimics her visions of Jean and Franklin as Victorian lovers.
Victoria reads a few telltale lines as the student is performing lines from Hamlet. Dennis gets up and leaves his seat. Victoria is alone holding the pages of his short story.
Victoria goes home, its NIGHT Christmas and pours herself brandy. She grabs her coat and the bottle of brandy and goes outside to walk in the snow.
LOWEST POINT: She walks to Dennis Manon’s house and sees the lights and Christmas tree and people happy inside. She continues onward to main street and plops down on the empty street in front of Gary’s café and drinks more brandy. She staggers to her feet and looks that she has drunk more than half a bottle of brandy. She tries to take her pants down to pee and falls down on the ground. The police come by and arrest her and put her in jail to sober up. CHANGE; AFTER SOBERING UP VICTORIA HAS A MOMENT WHERE SHE PULLS HERSELF TOGETHER. BUT IT DOESN’T LAST.
Next day she leaves jail and goes home. Gary arrives to take her to his parent’s house for dinner and wonders why she is so disheveled. Victoria brings up marriage to Gary and his saying NO which sets everybody on edge and makes Gary angry. Their relationship reaches breaking point. Herman talks about being a Jew in Dachau which sets up flashbacks of Victoria to Dachau in her past life.
ACT IV:
Nazi flashbacks – Ted’s office. He tells her she needs a psychiatrist and drugs because she is having a breakdown.
She goes to Gary’s house, walks in on him and the woman he is flirting with having sex. She runs away and goes to her office. Dennis comes to her office and they have sex. She has Nazi flashback when she is having sex with Dennis (a Nazi and she is a Jew in his home at Dachau).
Dennis freaks out that they had sex and leaves.
Theater Arts department meeting to discuss the plays for the next semester. Everyone is nervous because of what happened with The Maids.
Victoria is maid of honor at Sally’s wedding. She wears a gaudy pink poofy dress which contrast with her mood.
As Victoria stands next to the bride and groom the Nazi flashbacks grow worse. She is pregnant with the Nazi’s baby. Tears roll down her face as they say their vows.
Flashback of Nazi’s gunning down children. Sally and her groom take the vows and go up the aisle. As people are leaving Victoria runs from church.
She goes to Ted’s office and tells him she needs to check into a mental hospital for a rest.
Towering Pines: Final flashbacks of her death at Dachau. A janitor comes to her room, but it isn’t a janitor, it’s the spiritual/wise man figure that comes to her when she is at her lowest points. Once again he imparts wisdom to help her get back on her feet. CHANGE; THIS ANGELIC FIGURE THAT COMES TO VICTORIA AT HER LOW POINTS IN LIFE IS ABLE TO ASSIST HER TO UNDERSTAND AND INTEGRATE HER THOUGHTS AND VISIONS.
She goes back home and Dennis comes over and they heal the wounds of their heart. She tells her therapist that she knows that the past lives are real and he tells her she is crazy. CHANGE; THIS TIME SHE STANDS UP TO HIM AND WE SEE HER STRENGTH RETURNING.
She meets Herman, Gary’s father, and tells him that she too was in Dachau. When she tells him her story he realizes that they were there together and he tell her that he remembers when the Nazi’s dragged her screaming across the camp and killed her, even though he was a young boy. CHANGE; ULTIMATE HEALING FOR VICTORIA. SHE REALIZES THAT SHE ISN’T CRAZY AND HERMAN AND VICTORIA HUG AND REJOICE IN THEIR SHARED EXPERIENCE WHICH MAKES BOTH OF THEM FEEL LESS ALONE AND VULNERABLE.
Resolution: Victoria quits her job and takes and offer to go to Boston and work in a theater there as a director. She leaves Gary, Dennis and her job behind and starts new with strength and determination having healed her past life karma with Dennis.
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What I learned: How to break out the script into four acts and outline the main points in the conflict.
Title: Love and Destiny
Genre: Drama
OUTLINE: LOVE AND DESTINY
Act 1: Opening
Flashback of Past Life with Jean Cobb and her husband John Cobb in Kensington Garden 1863…leads into present day. The Leads are introduced. Victoria and Dennis meet at outdoor faculty event at St. George college. Introduce the idea that the past life and the present life are linked. She is in Theater department he is in English department. Dennis is wearing a wedding ring.
Victoria’s boyfriend, Gary, is introduced as the owner of a Café in town. His father, who plays a big role in the ending is introduced. We find out that the father was in Dachau as a child.
Victoria is at faculty meeting and the idea of the play The Maids being performed is introduced with its potential controversy as characters are men in drag. This sets up the Midpoint which spirals Victoria downward.
Dennis visits Victoria’s classroom as she teaches Romeo and Juliet to a Shakespeare class. The sexual tension between them is heightened.
Sexual tension in Past Life Vision between Jean Cobb and her lover Franklin is intensified.
Victoria sees her friend Sally and tells her about her visions and tries to get her to understand.
The play The Maids is drawing the controversy from a parent of one of the actors…sets up the Midpoint tragedy further.
Inciting Incident: Victoria is in her therapist’s office and reveals her past life visions that are making her crazy. She tells him an old memory from this life and introduces a spiritual/helper figure that visited her as a teenager. Her therapist doesn’t want to deal with past life visions and Victoria realizes TURNING POINT that Dennis is the man she has been seeing in her past life visions and that they are linked karmically.
End Act One
ACT 11
New Plan: Victoria decides to tell Gary about the past life visions in the hope that, as a Buddhist, he can understand what’s happening to her. Instead they argue and she storms out.
Midpoint: Turning point. The controversy over the play The Maids reaches a peak when people are protesting with pickets on her lawn. They say the devil is at St. George college. Actors and faculty have to decide whether to go on with the play. They do and one of the fathers shoots his son when he is on stage in drag, and then kills himself on opening night.
Shaken to the core Victoria turns to Dennis for comfort and tells him about the past life visions she has been having. He reminds her he is married and can’t follow through on their attraction. Before he leaves, however, he kisses her deeply, sending her very mixed messages.
Victoria is in Ted’s office and trying to help her get over her trauma and images. Instead, she has more images in his office this time of Nazi Germany. Ted tries to tell her that the trauma she experienced is fueling these images and they have nothing to do with Nazi Germany.
ACT III
Rethink/React: Victoria is having a terrible time now with all the images and trauma and she reacts by asking her boyfriend Gary to marry her. He refuses because he sees that it is merely a reaction to all she is experiencing. This spirals her down further.
She goes to Gary’s café and sees him flirt with another woman. Her friend Sally meets her here and tells her she is getting married and asks Victoria to be her maid of honor. They both watch Gary flirt with the woman. Victoria can’t watch anymore and she leaves and goes to the park.
While feeding the pigeons in the park a “wise man” spiritual/helper figure sits next to her, like when she was a child, and gives her wise advice and help.
Victoria must launch the Shakespeare play Hamlet and is auditioning students for the role. Dennis walks into theater and sits with her. They laugh and talk until he tells her that he remembered that he wrote a short story in college which mimics her visions of Jean and Franklin as Victorian lovers.
Victoria reads a few telltale lines as the student is performing lines from Hamlet. Dennis gets up and leaves his seat. Victoria is alone holding the pages of his short story.
Victoria goes home, its NIGHT Christmas and pours herself brandy. She grabs her coat and the bottle of brandy and goes outside to walk in the snow.
LOWEST POINT: She walks to Dennis Manon’s house and sees the lights and Christmas tree and people happy inside. She continues onward to main street and plops down on the empty street in front of Gary’s café and drinks more brandy. She staggers to her feet and looks that she has drunk more than half a bottle of brandy. She tries to take her pants down to pee and falls down on the ground. The police come by and arrest her and put her in jail to sober up.
Next day she leaves jail and goes home. Gary arrives to take her to his parent’s house for dinner and wonders why she is so disheveled. Victoria brings up marriage to Gary and his saying NO which sets everybody on edge and makes Gary angry. Their relationship reaches breaking point. Herman talks about being a Jew in Dachau which sets up flashbacks of Victoria to Dachau in her past life.
ACT IV:
Nazi flashbacks – Ted’s office. He tells her she needs a psychiatrist and drugs because she is having a breakdown.
She goes to Gary’s house, walks in on him and the woman he is flirting with having sex. She runs away and goes to her office. Dennis comes to her office and they have sex. She has Nazi flashback when she is having sex with Dennis (a Nazi and she is a Jew in his home at Dachau).
Dennis freaks out that they had sex and leaves.
Theater Arts department meeting to discuss the plays for the next semester. Everyone is nervous because of what happened with The Maids.
Victoria is maid of honor at Sally’s wedding. She wears a gaudy pink poofy dress which contrast with her mood.
As Victoria stands next to the bride and groom the Nazi flashbacks grow worse. She is pregnant with the Nazi’s baby. Tears roll down her face as they say their vows.
Flashback of Nazi’s gunning down children. Sally and her groom take the vows and go up the aisle. As people are leaving Victoria runs from church.
She goes to Ted’s office and tells him she needs to check into a mental hospital for a rest.
Towering Pines: Final flashbacks of her death at Dachau. A janitor comes to her room, but it isn’t a janitor, it’s the spiritual/wise man figure that comes to her when she is at her lowest points. Once again he imparts wisdom to help her get back on her feet.
She goes back home and Dennis comes over and they heal the wounds of their heart. She tells her therapist that she knows that the past lives are real and he tells her she is crazy.
She meets Herman, Gary’s father, and tells him that she too was in Dauchau. When she tells him her story he realizes that they were there together and he tell her that he remembers when the Nazi’s dragged her screaming across the camp and killed her, even though he was a young boy.
Resolution: Victoria quits her job and takes an offer to go to Boston and work in a theater there as a director. She leaves Gary, Dennis and her job behind and starts new with strength and determination having healed her past life karma with Dennis.
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Logline: A woman haunted by her past lives, finds redemption when she reconnects with the man who kindles those memories.
Love and Destiny is a feature film drama about love and past lives. Victoria Barkley is haunted by past lives and her present-day obsession with the man who shared those lives with her. Despite the challenge of her memories and her resulting mental breakdown, she uncovers the truth that leads her into freedom from her troubled history. A story of courage and resilience it illustrates the power of love to bring us back to life when we are challenged. It reminds us that no matter how far we may have wandered, redemption can be found in even the most forgotten corners of our soul.
HIGH CONCEPT: A woman, haunted by past life memories and her obsession with a man who shares them, finds redemption through her search back in time.
MAIN CONFLICT: Victoria struggles with her own mental health and past life memories. A doubting therapist and friends provide little support.
TRANSFORMATIONAL JOURNEY: Victoria is vindicated when her boyfriend’s father remembers sharing her past life traumatic event when he was a young boy in Dachau.
OPPOSITION: Victoria’s mental health, her therapist, her best friend, and boyfriend.
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I agree to the terms of the release form. Margaret Doner
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My name is Margaret Doner. I have written 11 books, both fiction and non-fiction, and six screenplays. I am using this class to help rewrite a script of mine that is adapted from my novel entitled Infinite Darkness/Infinite Light. The script is entitled, Love and Destiny. It is a drama about past lives. Something unique: I am a past life regression therapist.
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Dear Roger: Great revision.
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Dear Roger: Great !!
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Roger: Sorry to take so long. I am a bit overwhelmed with work and personal matters at the moment. Reading your query my instinct is that it could be simplified so that it is more of a “hook” and less of an explanation of the script, since Hal keeps saying that they don’t want details of the script but want to be hooked by a few sentences. Perhaps go back to your elevator pitch and combine that simple version with your current query letter. I wish you the best of luck on your endeavors!
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MARKETING CAMPAIGN #3
Margaret Doner – I want to thank Hal for this class. I found it so helpful to hone my understanding of the market and how to approach producers and agents and managers.
GETTING AN AGENT. (Due to the Writers Strike I felt this was one I could do now)
1. Great Writing: I am paying to get professionals at scriptpro to give me coverage on my screenplays so that I know where they stand. I have one script that is giving me trouble, it is based on a book I wrote, and the coverage let me know how far that one had to go. I signed up for the rewrite class to assist me on the script. I got a recommend on another script, so that let me know that it is ready.
2. Make sure it is marketable: This is harder. I am reaching out to overseas markets for the two period pieces I have that I think are much more likely to be of interest overseas. In fact, one of the scripts was optioned already by a British producer a few years back. I have done nothing with those two since, I am ready to get back on the overseas horse. Again, I have to check with the WGA and see what is allowed.(Even non WGA have to follow rules or get blacklisted)
3. Recommendation. I think maybe coverage is the way to go with that. If I get a consider or recommend I know that the script is ready, or almost ready to send out.
4. Send out quality query letters…I have been working on perfecting the query letter and trying to figure out how to target the right people with my work. One of the sites I have had some success with on that end is virtualpitchfest.com. That is a good way to find out the target market as the producers, agents and managers tell you what they are looking for.
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Query Letter to Managers:
Down to Heaven is a romantic comedy feature film screenplay that dabbles in the supernatural. Annabelle, a guardian angel who struggles with the detachment her role demands, finds herself falling in love with her charge, Charlie. When his bride dies moments before the wedding, she hops into her body and takes her place. The bride’s ghost is desperate to evict Annabelle from her body, and enlists the help of the demonic realm to accomplish her task.
Now stuck on Earth, and faced with the awful truth that she is falling deeper in love with Charlie, Annabelle must fight off ghosts and demons all the while trying to protect Charlie from the consequences of her actions. Will she choose the right path, or make a mistake that could cost them both their lives? With ample wit, charm, and heart, Down to Heaven takes us into a world of angels and demons and shows us that love really can be found in unexpected places. In the end, Down to Heaven brings an angel down to earth to find heaven with the man she loves; and brings heaven to the earthbound man who falls in love with an angel.
BIO: I am an optioned screenwriter as well as a novelist. I adapted my novel, Lies and Lust in the Tudor Court: The Fifth Wife of Henry VIII into a screenplay which placed in the top 5% in the Nicholl Screenwriting Fellowship. My screenplay Portuguese Love Letters, based on the true story of an 18th century nun who fell in love with a French officer, was optioned by a British filmmaker. I am currently working on a rewrite of a screenplay based on my novel Infinite Darkness/Infinite Light, and a screenplay adapted from my books Merlin’s War and The Book of Merlin.
I thank you for your consideration and would happy to send you a copy of Down to Heaven, or any other of my completed scripts should you request it.
Margaret Doner
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Title: Margaret Doner Target Market
Down to Heaven
What I learned: The number of producers in Hollywood seems endless…and many actors call themselves producers. You have to look at credits carefully.
Logline: What happens when a bride dies moments before her wedding? The groom’s guardian angel inhabits her body and enrages the bride’s ghost.
Romantic comedy – Romance
1. City of Angels
2. Wings of Desire
3. Heaven Can Wait
4. Meet Joe Black
5. Michael
2. With the WGA on strike I felt I should be targeting managers and agents and not producers so I made a list of both producers and managers for myself to target. Managers now, producers post strike, I guess. I have gotten a script request from a manager I put on my list. Even if you are non-WGA you are not supposed to pitch to producers even if they are non-signatory. WGA says if you do they will blacklist you in the future. So, I have decided to stay with managers and agents….and also the WGA says you are supposed to tell a manager who signs you at this time they have to wait to pitch to producers. As I am sure we all agree this is a confusing time for screenwriters. And, the strike does not seem to have an end in sight. I just thought someone should mention the elephant in the room…WGA on strike and the rules they put out for members as well as “pre-members” as they call them.
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Margaret Doner :PHONE PITCH:
what i learned: it helped me to feel more confident to pitch on a phone and know what to expect.
Hi, my name is Margaret Doner and I am an optioned screenwriter. I have a supernatural-romance feature film screenplay, entitled Down to Heaven, and I would like to pitch it to you? Would that be okay?
Down to Heaven is the story of Annabelle, a guardian angel who struggles with the detachment her role demands and finds herself falling in love with her charge, Charlie. When his bride dies moments before the wedding, she hops into her body and takes her place. The bride’s ghost is desperate to evict Annabelle from her body, and enlists the help of the demonic realm to accomplish her task.
Could I send you a copy of the screenplay?
Budget range: Mid-budget.
In the roles: Perfect for actors such as Lily Collins or Josh Whitehouse
Number of pages: 107
Who else has seen this: No one
Why us: You expressed an interest in looking at romance feature films
Movie ends: An angel finds heaven by coming down to earth, and an earthbound man finds heaven by marrying an angel.
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Lesson 8: Margaret Doner’s Pitch Fest Pitch
What I learned: Again it’s about brevity, clarity and confidence.
1. I am an optioned screenwriter, novelist, and Nicholl Fellowship Finalist
2. I have written a Supernatural Romantic comedy entitled Down to Heaven.
3. What happens when a bride dies moments before her wedding? The groom’s guardian angel inhabits her body and enrages the bride’s ghost.
4. Budget range: Mid Budget $15 to $20 million
5. What Actors do you like for the lead roles: Actresses like: Lily Collins and Summer Bishil. Actor like: Josh Whitehouse
6. Acts of the Story:
a. Act 1: Characters are introduced and set-up happens….Bride (Betsy) dies before wedding…groom’s (Charlie’s) guardian angel (Annabelle) takes over body and marries groom.
b. Act 2: Annabelle and Charlie move to Woodstock, NY to start a new life. Charlie falls more in love with her than his original bride. Enraged at what has happened, Betsy’s ghost haunts them to get her body back and enlists otherworldly demonic help.
c. Act 3: Betsy succeeds in getting her body back and kicking out the angel but sells her soul to a demon to do it and dies. Charlie is a widow and sad. Annabelle finds a body to inhabit (this time by agreement) and begins life as a human. By chance Charlie meets her and they have an instant attraction. The ending has promise that they will finally get what they really always wanted: each other.
7. Act 3 is how it ends.
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Lesson 7: Query Letter Margaret Doner
What I learned: To really hone everything down to the basics!
QUERY LETTER FOR DOWN TO HEAVEN
What happens when a bride dies moments before her wedding? The groom’s guardian angel inhabits her body and enrages the bride’s ghost.
Annabelle, a guardian angel who struggles with the detachment her role demands, finds herself falling in love with her charge, Charlie. When his bride dies moments before the wedding, she hops into her body and takes her place.
The bride’s ghost becomes desperate to evict Annabelle from her body, and enlists the help of the demonic realm to accomplish her task.
Now stuck on Earth, and faced with the awful truth that she is falling deeper in love with Charlie, Annabelle must fight off ghosts and demons all the while trying to protect Charlie from the consequences of her actions. Will she choose the right path, or make a mistake that could cost them both their lives?
If you like the concept, I’d be happy to send you the request.
BIO: I am an optioned screenwriter, novelist, and Nicholl quarter-finalist.
Thank you,
Margaret Doner
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Margaret Doner Synopsis Hooks
1. The villain is a ghost and the hero is an angel.
2. Angels mess around in human’s lives.
3. Charlie’s bride dies minutes before the wedding.
4. Charlie’s guardian angel inhabits her body
5. Betsy’ ghost seeks revenge and wants her body back.
6. Betsy enlists demonic assistance to accomplish her task.
Synopsis:
A meddling guardian angel takes over a woman’s body hoping to find romance, but instead finds herself in a supernatural battle with the woman’s ghost. Annabelle is a guardian angel who puts her mission in jeopardy when she feels too much for her charge. She gets between him and his bride when she takes over the bride’s body, moments before their wedding. The bride’s ghost and a host of demons work together to oust Annabelle who has fallen in love with the groom after their wedding night, and decides she wants to stay human. Annabelle is now faced with the impossible task of letting go of Charlie while still trying to protect him from the truth, all while desperately trying to fight off Betsy’s ghostly advances. Will Annabelle be able to find a way out of this impossible situation and save Charlie from the pain and suffering that discovering the truth would bring? Or will she be forced to make the ultimate sacrifice in order to protect him?
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LESSON 5 High Concept and Elevator Pitch
Margaret Doner- Down to Heaven
What I learned from this lesson is how to bring my screenplay down to a single sentence that will hook a producer. From there I put that into a 15 second pitch.
HOOK: A meddling guardian angel takes over a woman’s body hoping to find romance, but instead finds herself in a supernatural battle with the woman’s ghost.
ELEVATOR PITCH: Annabelle is a guardian angel who puts her mission in jeopardy when she feels too much for her charge. She gets between him and his bride when she takes over the bride’s body, moments before their wedding. The bride’s ghost and a host of demons work together to oust Annabelle who has fallen in love with the groom after their wedding night, and decides she wants to stay human.
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Lesson 4: 10 Most Interesting Things
Margaret Doner
What I learned from this assignment: How to break down the script and pull-out important parts.
Answer to questions:
1. The most unique thing about the villain is she is a ghost. The most unique thing about the hero is she is a guardian angel.
2. Major hook of opening scene – Unbeknownst to the humans, angels are messing with their lives.
3. Turning points – Charlie’s bride, Betsy, dies minutes before their weeding.
4. Emotional dilemma – Charlie’s guardian angel, Annabelle, makes the difficult decision to enter Betsy’s body to save Charlie the pain of finding her dead.
5. Major twist – Annabelle goes through the wedding and falls in love with Charlie. Betsy’s ghost seeks revenge on Annabelle and enlist demonic help to accomplish her aim.
6. Reversals – Betsy manages to kick Annabelle out of her body and reclaim it.
7. Character betrayals – Charlie falls in love with Annabelle while she inhabits the body, far more than Betsy, the original owner
8. Big surprises – Betsy is killed in a freak accident and leaves Charlie a widower. With the woman, Ellie’s, permission, Annabelle finds another body to inhabit and finds her way back to Charlie so they can fall in love.
10 most interesting things:
1. The villain is a ghost and the hero is an angel.
2. Angels mess around in human’s lives.
3. Charlie’s bride dies minutes before the wedding.
4. Charlie’s guardian angel inhabits her body
5. Betsy’ ghost seeks revenge and wants her body back.
6. Betsy enlists demonic assistance to accomplish her task.
7. Charlie is more in love when the angel Annabelle is in Betsy’s body.
8. Betsy manages to kick Annabelle out of her body and re-enters it.
9. Betsy is killed once again in a freak accident and Charlie is a widower.
10. Annabelle and Charlie get together in the end when Annabelle (with permission) takes over the body of another woman.
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Lesson 3 Producers and Managers
Margaret Doner
I learned that producers and managers must be pitched to slightly differently because a producer is looking only at the one script and a manager is looking at a career. I understand that both producers and managers want something to the point as they receive many submissions and their time to consider new writers is limited. I always struggle with how much personal information to put into the pitch.
Down to Heaven
Logline: When a medical student’s wedding takes an unexpected turn, his guardian angel intervenes with a daring plan to save him: hopping into the body of the dead bride and facing off against her vengeful ghost
Different pitches…one for producer…one for manager
Pitch for producer:
Guardian angels becoming too attached to their human charges is a subject that film-goers have loved ever since Heaven Can Wait, City of Angels and Meet Joe Black. Annabelle, a guardian angel who struggles with the detachment her role demands, finds herself falling in love with her charge, Charlie O’Hirn. When Charlie’s bride, Betsy, dies moments before the wedding, Annabelle hops into her body, to bring it back to life and save Charlie the heartache of finding his dead bride’s body. Betsy, on the other hand is furious that she is stuck in the astral plane as a ghost, and is desperate to evict Annabelle from her body. Instead of saving Charlie the pain of finding his bride dead, Annabelle discovers that she is now “stuck” on Earth, and is faced with the impossible task of letting go of Charlie while still trying to protect him from the truth. All the while, she is desperately trying to fight off Betsy’s ghostly advances. There are no easy answers in this heartfelt tale of love, loss, and betrayal. Will Annabelle choose the right path, or will she make a mistake that could cost them both their lives?
I am a twice optioned screenwriter, and have written several novels including, Lies and Lust in the Tudor Court: The Fifth Wife of Henry VIII. I adapted this novel into a screenplay and it placed in the top 5% out of 6,044 scripts in the Nicholl Screenwriting competition.
I would love to send you my newest screenplay, Down to Heaven.
Thank you for your consideration,
Pitch for manager:
Logline: The same as above
I am the author of several novels and a series of books based on the wizard Merlin. My screenplay, Portuguese Love Letters was optioned twice, and I adapted my novel, Lies and Lust in the Tudor Court: The Fifth Wife of Henry VIII, into a screenplay which placed in the top 5% out of 6,044 scripts in the Nicholl Screenwriting competition. I would love to send you my latest screenplay, a romantic comedy in the vein of Heaven Can Wait, City of Angels and Meet Joe Black.
Annabelle, a guardian angel who struggles with the detachment her role demands, finds herself falling in love with her charge, Charlie O’Hirn. …
Same as above after this…
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Lesson Two:
What I learned from this assignment: How to consider marketable components and put them in my pitch.
Margaret Doner
Down to Heaven
Logline: When a good-hearted medical student’s bride dies minutes before the wedding, his guardian angel hops into her body and enrages the bride’s vengeful ghost.
Most Marketable Components:
1. Similarity to box-office success such as: City of Angels, Heaven Can Wait, Meet Joe Black, Wings of Desire
2. Great Role for Bankable Actors:
Annabelle: A quirky, and lovable angel who can’t do her job right because she feels too much for the humans she is bound to protect.
Yvonne: Annabelle’s side-kick. A street-wise, wise-cracking, angel who tries to keep Annabelle in line.
Charlie O’Hirn: A medical student who wants to “get out of the system,” and treat his patients like people instead of “cases.”
Betsy: The doomed bride, whose ghost teams up with the underworld to get her body back from Annabelle.
3. Wide audience appeal
How to pitch through these three components:
Guardian angels becoming too attached to their human charges is a subject that film goers have loved ever since Heaven Can Wait, City of Angels and Meet Joe Black. Annabelle is a quirky, lovable angel who can’t do her job right because she feels too much for the humans she is bound to protect. Her side-kick, Yvonne, a wise-cracking angel tries, with no success, to keep Annabelle in line. Annabelle doesn’t listen, and when her charge, Charlie O’Hirn’s bride, Betsy, dies right before the wedding, Annabelle enters the bride’s body. Suddenly, she is thrust onto Earth and into a wedding ceremony. Instead of saving Charlie the pain of finding his bride dead, Annabelle discovers that she is now “stuck” on Earth. After their wedding night she falls deeper in love with Charlie than she thought possible. Because the angel, Annabelle, has transformed Betsy into a soft and more loving person, Charlie, who had doubts about marrying the ambitious and cold (original owner of the body) Betsy, now finds he is more in love with her than he thought possible. Betsy, on the other hand is furious that she is stuck in the astral plane as a ghost, and is desperate to evict Annabelle from her body. When Annabelle and Charlie move to Woodstock, NY, a town where “old souls run amuck,” Betsy follows them and enlists the power of the demonic realm to help her evict Annabelle, and get her body back.
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Lesson One:
Down to Heaven
Romantic comedy
Logline: When a good-hearted medical student’s bride dies minutes before the wedding, his guardian angel hops into her body and enrages the bride’s vengeful ghost.
Concept: A guardian angel, Annabelle, falls in love with her charge, Charlie, and finagles her way onto Earth by entering his finance’s body when she dies moments before the wedding. Annabelle discovers the heaven she is missing, when she falls down to Earth and into his arms.
Target: Producers interested in romantic comedies
What I learned today: Conceiving the a concept, and how they differ from loglines and hooks.
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I agree.
Margaret Doner
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<div>1. Margaret Doner
</div><div>2. 6 completed screenplays. I have been optioned twice. I am also a novelist and I also write metaphysical and spiritual material.
3. Better understanding of marketing and writing loglines and pitches.
4. I work as a massage therapist…for 33 years!
</div>
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Module 4 – Lesson 9
Margaret Doner – The Knowledge Keeper – SCI/FI /FANTASY
This lesson confused me…and stymied me…After more than two weeks I decided to just post something which (maybe) fulfills requirements. I am still plotting out the scene by scene of the entire script as I wrestle with where I want it to go…but anyway…
ACT 1 – A SCI-FI FANTASY which takes place through time.
Covert Agenda: In a future world, run by robots and a central computer known as GOD – Greatest Operator of Divinity – The Knowledge Keeper, plans to bring Arthur into the real world of the past, and overthrow the world of the robots making.
Secret: Arthur connects with the Knowledge Keeper and keeps it secret from the people around him.
ACT 2 –
Intrigue: The Knowledge Keeper has been planning for centuries to bring Arthur back into his world. He believes that Arthur is destined to change the course of human history. The Knowledge Keeper is revealed as Merlin the Wizard of Camelot, and Arthur his protégé, that Merlin plans to bring to power to make justice and truth reign.
Scheme: Arthur goes back in time. His robot caretaker, unbeknownst to The Knowledge Keeper or Arthur, Mathilda goes with them. Mathilda is the direct antagonist, although Arthur’s entire world serves as an antagonist. Mathilda discovers the plan and appeals to GOD (Greatest Operator of Divinity) to reprogram Arthur back into the robot matrix. GOD already has, he tells her.
ACT 3 –
Scheme: The Knowledge Keeper hooks Arthur into understanding his destiny and the real world of human emotion by instigating a plot to have him fall in love with a woman in a past world = 2024. This fully awakens Arthur’s humanity and prepares him to re-enter the world of humanity that is not controlled by robots and a centralized computer.
Covert Agenda: Arthur decides to return to his world and tell people the truth about the illusion that the robots have put them into.
ACT 4 –
Scheme: Arthur shows people that their world is a holographic illusion. Mathilda, who has been plotting against them all along, has Arthur arrested.
Resolution: The Knowledge Keeper frees Arthur, and offers to give others the opportunity to return to “reality” and escape the illusion of “Pleasantville.” Only Arthur chooses to return, ,and is taken back in time to Camelot, to hopefully change the destiny of humanity. Mathilda jumps back with them, and becomes the enemy of King Arthur in the past.
OUTLINE DRAFT with SLUG LINES:
THE FIRST HALF OF THE SCRIPT IS CLEAR IN MY MIND: THESE ARE THE SCENE SLUG LINES SO FAR….THE SECOND HALF I ETCHED OUT HERE:
FIRST HALF:
EXT: FOREST OF THE IMPALED. DAY – 1462 ROMANIA
INT. KNOWLEDGE KEEPERS CAVE. DAY
FADE IN: TITLE: 2095 EARTH
EXT. COUNTRYSIDE. DAY
EXT. OUTSIDE GRETCHEN, ARTHUR, MATHILDA, BENJAMIN AND BEATRICE HOME. DAY
INT. KNOWLEDGE KEEPER’S CAVE. DAY
INT. GRETCHEN, ARTHUR ETC… HOME. DAY
INT. LARGE DOMED GOVERNMENT BUILDING. DAY
INT. KNOWLEDGE KEEPER’S CAVE. DAY
EXT. DRESDEN, GERMANY 1945 DAY
INT. KNOWLEDGE KEEPER’S CAVE. DAY
EXT. LARGE DOMED GOVERNMENT BUILDING. DAY
INT. LARGE DOMED GOVERNMENT. BUILDING. DAY
INT. KNOWLEDGE KEEPER’S CAVE. DAY
INT. GRETCHEN, ARTHUR ETC… HOME. DAY
INT. KNOWLEDGE KEEPER’S CAVE. DAY.
EXT. GRETCHEN, ARTHUR ETC.. HOME. NIGHT
INT. KNOWLEDGE KEEPER’S CAVE. NIGHT
INT. GRETCHEN, ARTHUR, ETC..HOME. ARTHUR BEDROOM. NIGHT
INT. KNOWLEDGE KEEPER’S CAVE. NIGHT
EXT. JERUSALEM. WESTERN WALL AKA WAILING WALL. 2019. DAY
INT. GRETCHEN, ARTHUR ETC…HOME. ARTHUR’S BEDROOM. NIGHT
EXT. GRETCHEN, ARTHUR, ETC…HOME NIGHT
EXT. LARGE DOMED GOVERNMENT BUILDING. DAY
INT. LARGE DOMED GOVERNMENT BUILDING. DAY
EXT. JERUSALEM. 2035. DAY
EXT. MOUNTAIN PATH LEADING TO THE KNOWLEDGE KEEPER’S CAVE. NIGHT
INT. THE KNOWLEDGE KEEPER’S CAVE. NIGHT
INT. CLOSET OF CAVE
INT. KNOWLEDGE KEEPER’S CAVE. NIGHT.
EXT. LINCOLN CENTER. NYC 2024. NIGHT
INT. METROPOLITAN OPERA HOUSE. NIGHT
INT. KNOWLEDGE KEEPER’S CAVE. NIGHT
INT. METROPOLITAN OPERA HOUSE. 2024. NIGHT
EXT. LINCOLN CENTER. NYC 2024 NIGHT
INT. THE KNOWLEDGE KEEPER’S CAVE. NIGHT
INT. GRETCHEN, ARTHUR, ETC…HOME. DAY
EXT. LARGE DOMED GOVERNMENT BUILDING. DAY
EXT. ENGLAND. 9<sup>TH</sup> CENTURY. DAY
INT. MEDIEVAL CASTLE 9<sup>TH</sup> CENTURY THRONE ROOM. DAY
INT. DINING ROOM IN CASTLE. DAY
INT. BEDROOM. NIGHT
INT. LARGE DOMED GOVERNMENT BUILDING. DAY
EXT. GRETCHEN, ARTHUR ETC…HOME. DAY
INT. BEDROOM. CASTLE NIGHT
INT. THE KNOWLEDGE KEEPER’S CAVE. DAY
INT. BEDROOM. TINTAGEL CASTLE. ENGLAND 9<sup>TH</sup> CENTURY. DAY
EXT. LARGE DOMED GOVERNMENT BUILDING. DAY
EXT. WOODS. 9<sup>TH</sup> CENTURY ENGLAND. DAY
EXT. LARGE DOMED GOVERNMENT BUILDING. DAY
EXT. JERUSALEM. CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHER. 2035 DAY
INT. GRETCHEN, ARTHUR ETC…HOME DAY
EXT. LARGE DOMED GOVERNMENT BUILDING. DAY
INT. GRETCHEN, ARTHUR ETC..HOME. DAY
INT THE KNOWLEDGE KEEPER’S CAVE DAY
EXT. PHILADELPHIA. DAY
INT. THE KNOWLEDGE KEEPER’S CAVE. DAY
INT. GRETCHEN, ARTHUR HOME. DAY
EXT. PATH LEADING TO ARTHUR’S HOME. DAY
INT. GRETCHEN, ARTHUR ETC…HOME DAY
INT. KITCHEN DAY
INT. ARTHURS BEDROOM. DAY
INT. DINING ROOM EVENING
INT. ARTHURS BEDROOM EVENING
INT. DINING ROOM. EVENING
EXT. LARGE DOMED GOVERNMENT BUILDING. DAY
INT. LARGE DOMED GOVERNMENT BUILDING. DAY
INT. THE KNOWLEDGE KEEPER’S CAVE. DAY
EXT. WASHINGTON SQUARE PARK. NYC. 2024 DAY – Arthur meets his true love the first time.
To this point the scenes are detailed and I am clear about their content….after this point ….I am still sketching out the scenes. So roughly….
EXT. NYC. DAY (a tour around city) – Arthur falls in love with violinist – Gwenivere. This awakens his “humanity.” Arthur’s first kiss.
INT. KNOWLEDGE KEEPER’S CAVE. DAY. They return to future life and Arthur can’t forget this woman.
INT. ARTHUR AND GRETCHEN ETC.. HOME. DAY. Arthur and Gretchen emerge from their separate bedrooms and stare at one another. No affection.
Arthur is more affectionate with his children, however.
INT. LARGE DOMED GOVERNMENT BUILDING. DAY
Mathilda reports to Aton…GOD’S assistant about concerns over Arthur.
INT. GRETCHEN ARTHUR HOME. DAY
Robots come to round up Arthur but he is nowhere.
INT. KNOWLEDGE KEEPERS CAVE. DAY
Robots enter the cave and both the Knowledge Keeper and Arthur are gone. They alert GOD that Arthur has gone AWOL.
EXT. WASHINGTON SQUARE PARK. DAY
They find Gwenivere and invite her to join them in their time-traveling journeys. She agrees.
EXT. 9<sup>th</sup> CENTURY ENGLAND. DAY – next scenes all take place there
Town square — Arthur, with Knowledge Keeper’s, who has been revealed as Merlin, help the sword is pulled from stone. Gwenivere is with them.
Merlin’s Bedroom – appeals to Vivienne (Lady of the Lake) to give Arthur a sword that will protect him from death
Arthur’s Bedchambers – Merlin grabs Arthur to collect sword from Vivieene. Lady of the Lake.
Arthur on battlefield – Arthur victorious.
BACK AT FUTURE…MATHILDA PLOTS TO FOLLOW ARTHUR AND BRING HIM BACK TO FUTURE. SHE GOES BACK INTO THE PAST, USING KNOWLEDGE KEEPERS DEVICE…as she did earlier in script.
Arthur on throne – collects the knights of the round table.
Gallahad and search for Holy Grail – Grail is in hands of evil witches.
Mathilda joins the witches and discovers power for the first time. Mathilda joins witches in a plot to destroy Arthur.
Witches teach Mathilda how to shape shift into Lancelot and seduce Gwenivere and weaken Arthur. Arthur is destroyed emotionally.
Knowledge Keeper takes Arthur back to FUTURE life.
Arthur decides to tell people the truth about their world.
People turn on him. He is imprisoned. Knowledge Keeper frees him and tells them that he is trying to build a perfect world but one which allows humans to have more free will.
No one chooses to return to past. They all choose to be reprogrammed. Arthur is banished from their world.
He takes Arthur back in time and does a re-set to start over and try to create a new and better world.
I am sure there will be many changes before script is finished!!!!!
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Module 4 – Lesson 7 – Emotional Moments
The Knowledge Keeper – Margaret Doner
My vision: I find the time to create well-written scripts that will sell and be produced.
What I learned: To hone the emotional moments in each act.
ACT 1:
DISTRESS: The audience is introduced to the horror of Vlad the Impaler’s Forest of the Impaled, as a historical reality, and the distress of the monk (The Knowledge Keeper’s) reaction.
SURPRISE: The monk disappears through a portal and reappears in a technologically advanced cave…then he holographically inserts the information of what he has seen into a holographic library.
SURPRISE: The Knowledge Keeper actually lives in a future world controlled by robots and wants to make contact with a member of that world, Arthur.
ACT 2:
SURPRISE: The world is controlled by a giant computer called GOD – Greatest Operator of Divinity. The children go through a ritual to be micro-chipped into the computer.
COURAGE: Arthur breaks away from his society to seek out The Knowledge Keeper.
EMOTIONAL DISTRESS: Arthur discovers that the world he lives in is nothing like what he has been told it is. He is brought back into the past through the portal by the Knowledge Keeper
SURRPISE: Arthur is put back into his bed and thinks it is all a dream. He hunts down a friend whose grandfather spoke of a Wisdom Keeper and discovers that it wasn’t a dream after all.
ACT 3:
BETRAYAL: Mathilda, the family’s personalized robot, gets suspicious and turns on Arthur.
BONDING: Arthur seeks out the Knowledge Keeper and they venture back in time together. Arthur experiences war and passion. Falls in love with a woman in the past.
COURAGE: Arthur decides he has to awaken the world he lives in to the truth.
ACT 4:
BETRAYAL: Arthur is arrested when Mathilda organizes the robots to turn against him. His own family also turns against him.
MORAL ISSUE: The Knowledge Keeper gives the people the opportunity to come back in time to awaken themselves to the truth.
SURPRISE: The people choose to remain In the robot-controlled world, hooked into GOD computer.
REVEAL: Arthur, The Knowledge Keeper, and unbeknownst to them, Mathilda, return to the past to begin Camelot. The Knowledge Keeper is revealed as the famous wizard, Merlin.
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Sorry to piggyback on your post Pamela, but it was the only reply button that worked!
Module 4 Lesson 6
What do you reveal and when?
The Knowledge Keeper – Margaret Doner
My Vision: I find the time to create well-written scripts that will sell and be produced.
What I learned: To build reveals into the script and outline.
ACT 1 –
SETUP: Vlad the Impaler, Forest of the Impaled….out of the edge of the forest a brown-robed man with a white beard emerges. He stares at the impaled bodies and tears run down his face.
REVEAL: He suddenly disappears and reappears in a technologically advanced cave…through a portal.
SET UP: He is a Knowledge Keeper and he waves a wand and the holographic image of the Forest of the Impaled appears. He waves his wand again and a holographic image of a library appears. After he notates the historical details of the scene he enters it in the library. The present time is introduced as a sanitized world of green grass and flowers, and happy homes.
REVEAL: Children live in a robot-controlled sanitized world… Their robot caretaker Mathilda introduces the robot dog they play with.
SET UP: The Knowledge Keeper whispers to Arthur, the children’s father, through the ethers, , and tries to reach him.
REVEAL: Arthur is ten seconds late, which alerts Mathilda to an issue…something has gone slightly awry in the robot-controlled world.
SET UP: Robots are bustling around a huge black cube computer named GOD: The GREATEST OPERATOR OF DIVINITY.
REVEAL – People are microchipped into the computer to keep them in line.
ACT 2 –
SET UP: The Knowledge Keeper shows up at night in Arthur’s bedroom and whisks him away through a portal, back to his cave.
REVEAL: The Knowledge Keeper creates a hologram of the history of the robot take over to convince Arthur that he is the appointed historian. He whisks Arthur back into his bed.
ACT 3 –
SETP UP: Arthur asks Mathilda if there is a man called The Knowledge Keeper? Mathilda says no, since GOD holds all knowledge.
REVEAL: Arthur finds a friend whose grandfather told him “Tales” of the Wisdom Keeper.
SET UP: Arthur hunts down The Knowledge Keeper.
REVEAL: Arthur goes back in time and experiences true historical records. Unbeknownst to The Knowledge Keeper and Arthur Mathilda tracked him and went through the portal too.
ACT 4 –
SET UP: Arthur returns to his world to tell people the truth.
REVEAL: Mathilda betrays him and has him arrested.
SET UP: The Knowledge Keeper appears and gives people the opportunity to return to the time before.
REVEAL: They choose to be microchipped back into their world…. except Arthur (and in a sneaky manner, Mathilda). Arthur and The Knowledge Keeper, who is really Merlin the wizard, return to past to begin Camelot. Mathilda becomes the enemy of Arthur…known as Morgana.
