Matthew Iott
Forum Replies Created
-
Matthew Iott’s Favorite Movie Outline
What I learned doing this assignment is that structure is everything. The bones of a script are essential to a cohesive and entertaining story.
Dramatic Question: Will Carl bounce back from being humiliated and find his true purpose?
Main Conflict: A massively influential food critic versus a talented and prideful chef.
Dilemma: Carl has to choose between what’s more important, his role as a chef or as a father.
Theme: Not getting the thing that we thought was going to make us happy often leads us to the thing that’s going to make us truly happy.
Outline of Chef
INT. Galoises Restaurant Kitchen. Day
Carl is in his kitchen prepping food. Clearly a professional at work. Martin brings in the pig which they carve up.
EXT. Parking lot. Day
Carl wakes up a hungover Tony in his car. “We got the pig”
EXT/INT. Carl’s Car. Day
Carl picks up his son Percy. He’s late. They talk about going to the farmers’ market.
EXT. Farmers Market. Day
Carl picks up vegetables. Percy wants kettle korn. Carl tells him to eat an orange.
EXT. Farmers Market. Day.
They eat kettle korn and Carl talks about reviewers and how they have it out for him because of his early success.
EXT. Sausage stand. Day.
Carl and Percy eat huge sausage sandwiches. They talk about going to New Orleans. Percy suggests going.
INT. Galoises Restaurant Kitchen. Day
Controlled chaos. 1 hour to open. Carl gets everyone ready to do a new menu. Molly the hostess tells Carl that “Riva is here”.
INT. Galoises Restaurant Kitchen. Day. Continuous.
Riva the restaurant owner comes into the kitchen. He asks Carl if he’s going to change the menu. Carl asks for space. Riva asks to speak with him privately. It’s tense.
INT. Galoises Restaurant Kitchen. Day. Continuous.
Riva emphasizes that the biggest critic in the city is coming that night. This is no time to take chances. Carl wants to be more creative.
INT. Galoises Restaurant Dining Room.
Carl gives in and tells the staff that they are going with the usual menu. Tony and Martin are bummed.
EXT. Third Street Santa Monica. Day.
Carl is with Percy. He’s distracted by a busker puppeteer of a skeleton. Clearly, Carl is not happy.
INT. Local Bar. Night.
The staff does tequila shots and Carl reads out loud the review from the critic. It’s a brutal pan of his food. Critic even goes after him personally.
EXT. Outside of Bar. Night.
Carl and Molly share a joint and talk about the review. Molly tells him he’s the best chef she’s ever worked with. They have a moment. He offers to cook her food.
INT. Carl’s Apartment. Night.
Carl cooks for Molly. It’s amazing looking food. Sensual experience for her.
EXT. Carl’s car outside of Inez’s house. Day
Percy comes to the window and tells him that Inez, his ex-wife, wants to talk to him.
INT. Inez’s House. Day.
Carl talks with Inez about the review. She tells him that Percy misses him. He was late. She’s concerned.
Montage.
Carl and Percy go to a movie and the amusement park.
INT. Galoises Restaurant Kitchen. Day into Night
Carl goes to work and starts to make the most delicious looking food. Martin and Tony come in, tastes his food. They tell him it’s insanely good. They both tell him to not pay attention to Twitter.
INT. Carl’s Apartment. Night.
Carl makes his famous grilled cheese for Percy. Percy teaches him about Twitter. Percy wants him to move back home.
INT. Carl’s Apartment. Later that Night.
While Percy sleeps, Carl scrolls through Twitter. He messages Ramsey the critic and nasty rebuttal.
INT. Carl’s Apartment. Day.
Next morning while Carl makes breakfast for him and Percy, Percy sees that the message that Carl sent went viral. Percy reads Ramsey’s response.
INT. Galoises Kitchen. Day
Tony, Martin and Carl discuss the twitter controversy. Against their wishes he invites Ramsey back for another meal and he’s going to cook the menu he wanted to cook the night before.
INT. Carl’s car. Day.
Percy wants to go to the restaurant with Carl. He drops Percy off at Inez’s house instead. Inez suggests that he speak with her publicist.
INT. Inez’s kitchen. Day
Inez brings up the idea of a food truck with him again. He doesn’t want to do it.
INT. Galoises Kitchen. Night.
Molly tells Carl that they’re overbooked. Carl says he’s doing the new menu. Riva comes in and says they’re doing the regular menu. He gives him an ultimatum. Carl quits. Tony stays.
INT. Carl’s Apartment. Night.
Carl comes in with groceries and makes the menu just for himself.
Intercut with what’s happening at Galoises.
INT. Galoises Dining Room. Night.
Molly seats Ramsey. In a series of shots, he sees that he’s getting the same menu he got the previous night. Ramsey asks to speak with Carl. Riva tells him he’s gone.
INT. Galoises Dining Room. Night.
Ramsey tweets out his disappointment.
INT. Galoises Kitchen. Night.
Molly is on the phone with Carl. Carl says he’s coming in.
INT. Galoises Dining Room. Night
Carl melts down in front of Ramsey. He loses it about the molten lava cake. The entire restaurant has their phones out recording everything.
INT. Carl’s Apartment. Day.
Carl is on the phone with Inez’s publicist. She tells him that there’s no going back. She offers him a reality show instead.
INT. Carl’s Apartment/Inez’s Apartment. Day.
Carl and Inez talk on the phone about the publicist. He tells Percy that they can’t go to New Orleans.
INT. Local Bar. Night.
Martin and Tony and Carl drink and talk about what happened. Tony tells him he’s sorry for staying.
EXT. Outside of Local Bar. Night.
Carl and Molly share another joint. She tells him he’s miserable and it’s time for him to get real particularly about Percy.
INT. Inez’s house. Morning.
Carl comes to see Percy. Inez asks him to come to Miami with them to see her father.
INT. Miami Hotel. Day.
Inez tells Carl and Percy that they’re going to Hoy como Ayer in Little Havana.
EXT. Hoy Como Ayer. Night
The three of them enter the club. Inez tells Percy this is where she grew up.
INT. Hoy Como Ayer. Night.
Inez’s father plays Cubano music. Carl and Inez get Percy to dance.
INT. Versailles Restaurant. Night.
After the show, Inez’s father, Carl, Percy and Inez order Cuban sandwiches. Grandpa tells Carl he’s gained weight. Percy falls asleep. Carl tells Inez that he’ll talk to Marvin.
INT. Marvin’s Warehouse office. Day.
Percy comes to talk to Marvin about the food truck. Marvin asks him to select a swatch for the carpet he wants to install.
EXT. Marvin’s Warehouse. Day.
The food truck is brought out to Carl. It’s a hunk of junk. He’s on the phone with Martin telling him his plan. Martin is at Galoises, got promoted to Sous.
EXT. Marvin’s Warehouse. Day. Continuous.
Inez and Percy come by to see the truck. Carl asks Inez if she slept with Marvin while they were together.
EXT. Marvin’s Warehouse. Day.
Carl and Percy clean the truck. It’s gross and smelly. There’s a dead rat in a hotel pan. Percy refuses to clean it and runs off.
INT. Marvin’s Warehouse Garage. Day.
Carl apologizes to Percy for yelling at him.
INT. Restaurant Supply Store. Day.
Carl and Percy shop for equipment for the truck.
EXT. Restaurant Supply Loading Dock. Day.
Martin arrives by cab. He wants to join them. Martin speaks Spanish to a group of workers to get them to help get refrigeration unit into the truck.
INT./ EXT. Food Truck. Day.
Martin tells him he’s going to cook the workers the best sandwich they’ve ever had.
INT. Outdoor Market. Day.
Carl and Percy shop.
INT. Food Truck. Day.
Martin preps the pork for the sandwiches.
INT. Food Truck. Day.
They all taste test the pork Martin and Carl tease Percy.
INT. Food Truck. Day.
Martin and Carl teach Percy how to make the perfect Cubano. They taste their first sandwich. It’s on baby!
INT./EXT. Food Truck. Day.
They serve sandwiches all the local workers. Happy faces all the way around. Percy burns a sandwich. Carl has a heart to heart with Percy and teaches a lesson.
EXT. Marvin’s Warehouse. Night.
Martin, Percy and Carl sit outside the truck and discuss the menu for the truck and the route they’re going to take back to LA. Percy tries his first beer.
EXT. Streets of Miami. Day.
Martin has taken the truck to his cousin’s to get it repainted. It looks incredible. Percy tweets out the Chef Carl Casper is back! Gives location of the truck near the beach.
EXT. Miami Beach. Day.
The truck is immediately swamped with hungry beach goers. The trio crush it. Percy loves it. People tweet all over the place.
EXT. Miami Beach. Day.
A cop shows up. Asks for permit. Tells him to move along a couple blocks. The cop recognizes Carl from the Galoises meltdown. Asks for a picture of him and Carl.
EXT./INT. Montage. Day.
Percy checks and works on the twitter page for Carl. They travel and cook. Percy tells him they should stop in New Orleans.
INT. Food Truck. Night.
Martin is driving. Percy sees him put corn starch down his pants to ease the crotch rot from the humidity.
EXT. New Orleans Street. Day.
The guys arrive in New Orleans. Carl takes Percy to the French Quarter to get beignets.
EXT. French Quarter. Day.
Percy and Carl walk and munch their beignets.
EXT. Food Truck on Street. Day.
Carl and Percy arrive back and discover that because of Percy going on Twitter, there’s a huge line outside wanting Cubanos.
EXT. Food Truck. Day.
The guys are slammed.
INT. Food Truck. Day.
After New Orleans, the guys head to Texas. Percy continues to Tweet. Carl is happy.
INT. Frankie’s BBQ. Day.
Carl stops at world famous Frankie’s to get four briskets.
EXT. Frankie’s BBQ back yard. Day
The guys eat and add the brisket to the menu.
EXT. Austin Street. Day.
Food truck is parked and they serve a long line of people while a Texas blues band plays. Percy answers the phone. It’s Inez. Carl says everything is great and that Percy is a cook now! Carl and Inez kinda sorta say “I love you”.
EXT. Austin Street. Night.
Percy and Carl sit on top of the truck listening to music. Carl tells Percy how hard he’s worked but that things are still going to be the same back in LA.
EXT. Inez’s House. Day
Carl drops Percy off. They embrace for a while.
INT. Carl’s Apartment. Day.
Carl checks his phone. Percy watches the 1 second/day video he made. Carl calls Percy and offers him a job on the truck.
EXT. Venice. Night.
On Abbot Kinney all the trucks are lined up. Inez is helping now. They’re killing it. Ramsey shows up and asks to speak with Carl.
EXT. Venice. Night. Continuous.
Carl and Ramsey talk about what happened. Ramsey tells him how much he believes in him. He says he’s got an open space and he’d like to bankroll Carl and he can cook whatever he wants.
INT. El Jefe Restaurant. Night.
6 months later. The new place is opened. Carl and Inez get remarried. It’s a wedding feast. Grandpa comes from Miami and plays. Everyone dances.
-
What I learned doing this assignment is that…This is hard. I learned that the initial seed idea can quickly collapse under the weight of structure and can be frustrating to work through. Every writer I know has talked about how tough Act 2 is. This is building the foundation, the proverbial “ditch digging” and I know without it, I won’t have much of story no matter how excited I was about the original idea.
Logline – Life is complicated and nothing is easy, most especially finding out who you really are and what you really want. But once it’s in front of you and within reach, there’s no going back.
9 Beat Structure
1. Opening
A beeping alarm clock reveals Katie, clearly already up for hours. From there we see her get her son ready for school all the while taking calls and answering texts about the restaurant and the new menu she’s going to present for the first time. Stress and anxiety levels are high.
2. Inciting Incident
Thinking he’s in New York on business, Katie is unpleasantly surprised to see her father enter just as service is getting started. After seeing that Katie has completely altered his menu, he goes ballistic, ending in Katie quitting/being fired in front of her entire staff. She leaves, mortified and humiliated.
3. By page 10, you know what the movie is about.
Amid the challenges of raising a child and at her lowest point in her career, we watch to see if Katie can find herself and emerge with renewed confidence and a brighter more accomplished future.
4. First turning point at end of Act 1
She meets Eamon.
5. Mid-Point
By chance, Katie comes across a broken down coffee shop that still has a workable kitchen and with a lot of work and elbow grease, it could become the restaurant that Katie always dreamed of having. Pouring her life’s savings into it along with running a few credit cards, Katie is reinvigorated. For the first time in a long while she remembers why she wanted to be a chef in the first place.
6. Second turning point at end of Act 2
Just as Katie’s new restaurant is getting going, there’s an electrical fire that nearly destroys everything except for Eamon’s actions that save it from total disaster.
7. Crisis
Katie’s father ends up in the hospital from a heart attack and in the ensuing scene, she finds out that he’s on the verge of losing everything. He asks her to come back and work for him and she must choose between going backward or forward.
8. Climax
Knowing she has to go her own way, Katie turns down her father’s request and she sets out to do all she can to win the James Beard Award, pitting herself against the Sous Chef who her father has put in charge and who has ambitions of his own.
9. Resolution
Things don’t go as Katie hoped but she realizes that she’s okay with that and in the end her relationship with Eamon offers her a chance to profoundly change her life forever.
-
Matt’s Necessary Questions
1. List your answer for each of these areas for your story.
a. Concept:
A single mother and chef works to escape out from the shadow of her famous chef father, finding love and a reignition of her passion for food along the way.
b. Dramatic Question:
Will Katie emerge from her father’s enormous shadow and find happiness in her own right without feeling like an entitled, unhappy daughter of a powerful and wealthy man.
c. Main conflict:
As Katie asserts herself and launches her own restaurant, in close proximity to her father’s and the jerk Sous Chef’s restaurant, the James Beard Award is on the line. It’s recognition is everything to the financial success of any high end restaurant. This world is a 50/50 proposition. Most restaurants fail in the first year and Katie must assert herself among the first rung of chefs and be free from her father shadow but the clock is ticking.
d. Dilemma:
The dilemma comes when Katie comes into possession of information that her father’s empire is crumbling. He has been sloppy and allowed several co investors to swindle him for millions. He’s nearly broke and the restaurant (I’m tentatively calling “Brigade”) that he fired Katie from is his last chance to salvage his reputation. She must choose between going all out to take the award from her father or intentionally tank it so her father can have one last taste of glory.
e. Theme:
Happiness doesn’t happen in a vacuum. It’s not entitled. It’s not given. It’s self generated.
2. Above your work, answer the question “What I’ve learned doing this assignment is…?”
What I’ve learned doing this assignment is that thinking on these four tenets of storytelling is really fun and informative once I allowed myself to think outside the box that I was putting myself in with the original seed idea.
-
What I learned from this assignment is that defining plot can be difficult at first but once I started to focus on the character’s emotional need then it was easier to ascribe a plotline to satisfy those needs.
Original concept.
A single mother and chef works to escape out from the shadow of her famous chef father, finding love and a reignition of her passion for food along the way.
1. Tell the name of the plot selection and write a logline for each one
Transformation
Katie’s transformation begins the moment her father fires her from the restaurant. It is at this point that she must come to terms with who she really is and what she really wants. Her confidence in herself and her ability to balance a career/dream and being a mother are struck low. She feels alone and abandoned by the one person she thought she could always count on. A chance encounter with someone from her father’s past becomes the spark that leads to her redemption and ultimate success and happiness.
Love
Although there is an instant attraction between them, Katie and Eamon take awhile to succumb to a relationship as there are so many obstacles in their way; the age difference, she is a single mother with serious issues with the child’s father, the restaurant business itself is taxing and stressful, the domineering nature of her father and most of all, Eamon’s opportunity to open his own restaurant in Ireland. In the end, these two are forced to choose between carrying on together as a couple come what may or split forever.
Plot for Outlining Module
Transformation. (But feels like a combo with Love)
-
What I learned doing this assignment is that having a handle on your plot is like having your hand on the steering wheel of a car. Without it, you’re going to crash. I tend to come at story from the character perspective and keep the figuring out of the plot until later. I now see how crucial it is to really think about and commit to the plot. It is your guidepost to making the story cohesive and having characters behave in believable ways. But to be honest, I’m still working out the mechanics of the plot to my script. This exercise was very helpful.
1. Underdog
Katie is clearly the underdog to her imperious, narcissistic father whose power and influence are no match for her as she rebels against him and tries to go her way. Once her father fires her, she is set adrift, suddenly without the stability that being in her father’s employ provided. Nonplussed and wounded by her father firing her and then investing in and backing her former Sous chef and now rival, Katie must reconcile a lot of emotions and then either be proactive or quit altogether. The entrance of Eamon into her life and world, help her to regain her confidence to face up to her father to fulfill her own dreams and ambitions.
2. Rivalry
As the story unfolds and Katie gains some notoriety, she becomes a rival to her father. Additionally, her former Sous Chef becomes her rival as well when he opens his own restaurant in close proximity. When they both find out that they are being evaluated for a James Beard award – the Oscars of the Food world – the rivalry heats up, literally. Feigning needing to borrow some produce for his restaurant, the Sous Chef takes advantage of some faulty electrical wiring in Katie’s restaurant and sets in motion a fire that will happen during that night’s service.
-
Matthew’s character structure
What I learned doing this assignment is that it is very easy to have the story run away from you. Keeping it contained and structured with so many ambiguous ideas and thoughts running through my mind is challenging.
1. List your concept.
A single mother and chef works to escape out from the shadow of her famous chef father, finding love and a reignition of her passion for food along the way.
2. Tell us the Character Structure you choose for your story.
Dramatic Triangle
3. Give us one sentence on each of your lead characters.
KATIE CANNON is a talented chef, balancing life as a single mother and the demands of running a high end restaurant in a world dominated by men, her world famous and egomaniacal father among them.
FREDERIC CANNON is a famous chef with restaurants all over the world and as someone who came from nothing believes that it should be the same for his daughter. No one gets a free ride.
Harboring a deep and painful secret, EAMON O’BRIEN is a middle aged Sous Chef who has drifted his entire life in and out of restaurants from his native Ireland to LA.
4. In one or two paragraphs, tell us how you see the character structure playing out in your story.
As the story begins, Katie is the executive Chef of one of her father’s restaurants. She feels constricted by having to do “his menu”. One night, without him knowing, Katie cooks the food she wants to make. Frederic, in a surprise visit, sees that Katie is doing her own thing and loses it. In a spectacular confrontation, Katie is fired by her father. Determined to make a go of it on her own, she cobbles together some money she has saved and opens her own place. It doesn’t go well. Forced to hire a Sous chef who she mistrusts, she struggles to make a go of it. When she discovers the Sous doing drugs in the employee bathroom, she fires him on the spot. Left without a number 2 in the kitchen, Katie reaches out to every source she knows.
Unemployed and adrift, Eamon answers the call to help Katie out for one week. Eamon claims that he’s got a cousin in Ireland who’s promising him his own place in Dublin. On his first night, he helps her get through a service which includes a chef’s table meal for a potential investor who tells Katie that “he’s between projects at the moment but will let her know soon”. Eamon agrees to stay on until Katie finds a replacement. In the interim, the coke snorting Sous chef opens his own restaurant not far from Katie’s and he’s being backed by her father.
-
Hello,
Typical of me, I am just now discovering this forum and that we were supposed to introduce ourselves…:/ Anyhooo… Apologies. I’ll be more on the ball here on out.
I’ve written 1 feature length script and one pilot. I am primarily an actor but because that business is so frigging easy, I decided to give scriptwriting a shot. Easy peasy, right? But seriously, I’m looking to become a more skilled writer and develop the skills to go from seed idea/concept/brainstorm to the page. More or less, at this point, I am Jon Snow and I know nothing.
I’ve been lucky to travel the world, have lived in New York, London, Montana and Minnesota as well as my home state of Vermont.
Looking forward to digging in and meeting everyone.
-
Matthew Iott
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.