Patricia Brown
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Patricia Brown CHARACTER PROFILES PT 1
MY MOTHER’S MUSTACHE ROM/COM
What I learned from this assignment: Coming of Age Crowe’s “Almost Famous” (2000) meets Branagh’s “Much Ado About Nothing.” I don’t have to use the same characters from MAAN–only the tone. Then my lead characters came easily.
ALYSON GIDEON–Protagonist/Dreamer in this love triangle
19, willowy with long blonde hair, blue steel eyes and California tan
Internal journey= covers her fear and shyness with verbal sparing
External journey= finally rejects Tex’s advances and “marries” Matt in the stage production of the final scene of ” Much Ado About Nothing” as her final exam in her Shakespeare class taught by Miss Jones
Motivation= Wants the lead in MAAN and to lose her virginity and fall in love like in her dreams. More motivated by fame than being rich.
Wound= Parents married for 53 years after having her at 19–her age now. Believes she will never be loved. Never have a marriage like theirs.
Mission= To decide if its sex or love
Agenda/Plan=Tests the water with Tex or Matt
Secret= She is a virgin despite her vibrato and raging hormones
What makes her special? Soft and cuddly internally, but a bulldog with language
TEX–Antagonist/Predator
21, tall, rich, narcissist, never without his white stetson and the keys to his red corvette and to the London Playboy mansion. Student body president and bar-keep of the crawl space where students can go and have sex behind the bar in basement of the on-campus pub called “My Mother’s Mustache”
Mission= to get Alyson in that crawl space for his sexual peccadilloes
Agenda/Plan= to “win” her in Texas Holdem, Pooh Bear Cards Alyson creates, and playing Matt and the Pooh Bears in basketball game
Motivation= Big man on campus. Playboy.
Wound= first love jilted him. Objectifies women with subconscious anger ever since.
Internal journey= from sexpot to charmer
External journey=gives his keys to /alyson and Matt, closes down the crawl space in MMM, apologizes to Babs and calls her by her eal name, Barbara
Unique= pompous ass can be reformed after all
MATT Alyson’s love interest, rival of Tex, damn good actor/singer
20, tall athletic. mop of black hair and beard
Internal journey= from betrothed to Liz, to falling in love with Alyson
External journey=From wanting lead in MAAN, getting Alyson play opposite to his lead
Secret= engaged to his girlfriend back in CA, Liz
OTHER MINOR CHARACTERS:
Mrs. Hurst, 60ish, headmistress in tweed and felt fedora with two corgis trailing her everywhere, rules college with iron fist, wound very tight indeed
Mother Superior, ancient, comes on Sundays to visit the nuns’ graveyard, surprisingly and unexpected change agent for Alyson giving her love advice to go with Matt
Gaily Cowgill. 19. pigtailed, Alyson’s roommate and BFF
Miss Jones, 30, always seen in her Oxford doctorate robe. Preeminent Shakespeare scholar, she played Calaban in The Tempest at Oxford at age 18. lectures every Wednesday on everything Shakespeare without notes in cold quonset hut next to convent. Cherubic face and short cropped white hair.
Liz, 20, dark haired sour debutante. Matt’s fiance shows up at beginning of second semester to be obstacle for Alyson
Babs/Barbara, 19, Tex’s big-boobed sex toy used to spy on Alyson for Tex. In the end, demands Tex calls her by her real name Barbara. Same blond hair as Alyson.
Ruben-Matt’s BFF
Elaine–rich Egyptian princess. Student 21
Tarak and Tarook–rich Bedouin princes/brothers/students 20
Professor Boris Bagdasorov, 40 set designer/director complete with cape and goatee.
EXTRAS:
Gay Turkish waiters #1-#5, Toga party revelers/Robuck Inn pub American students only/ Much Ado About Nothing cast and audience/ visiting nuns/MMM extra students
PATRICIA BROWN LESSON 3: CHARACTER PROFILES PT 2
What I learned from this assignment came from reading the other classmates’ entries for Pt. 1. Saw how they were succinct. Saw how they were consistent with the chosen genre and missions throughout. Saw some harbingers of twists too. I can cut my descriptions and get to the meat of the matter. Even though it has been decades since I saw Silence of the Lambs and was so off-put by it I only saw it once, the character profiles of Clarisse and Hannibal
ALYSON
TRAITS=kind, fish out of water, curious about others, hilarious, verbally witty.
SUBTEXT=gas “tells” when playing cards and flirting with Matt: touches her hair, tiny smirk, spouts Shakespeare instead of expressing desire directly even when kissing him
FLAW=naive, can’t carry a tune or stutters when sings?
VALUES- fame over fortune, love for love’s sake, wants her “authentic self” to be known
IRONY=her indecisiveness about to which suitor to lose her virginity with, could sabotage her chance of losing it.
What makes this the right character for this role? Incongruity of pairing (Alyson and Tex)=Comedy
TEX
TRAITIS=narcissi
tic, boastful, stubborn, little empathy
SUBTEXT=flirting always equals sex
FLAW= misogynistic exponentially
VALUES= Money can buy you sex if not love. Flipside, he can sell anything—even himself to Alyson
IRONY= If he stopped leading with sex, would probably get more of it AND love
Why is this the right character for this role?
Incongruity of Pairing (Alyson/Tex) is equal to Comedy
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Patricia Brown CHARACTER PROFILES PT 1
MY MOTHER’S MUSTACHE ROM/COM
What I learned from this assignment: Coming of Age Crowe’s “Almost Famous” (2000) meets Branagh’s “Much Ado About Nothing.” I don’t have to use the same characters from MAAN–only the tone. Then my lead characters came easily.
ALYSON GIDEON–Protagonist/Dreamer in this love triangle
19, willowy with long blonde hair, blue steel eyes and California tan
Internal journey= covers her fear and shyness with verbal sparing
External journey= finally rejects Tex’s advances and “marries” Matt in the stage production of the final scene of ” Much Ado About Nothing” as her final exam in her Shakespeare class taught by Miss Jones
Motivation= Wants the lead in MAAN and to lose her virginity and fall in love like in her dreams
Wound= Parents married for 53 years after having her at 19–her age now. Believes she will never be loved. Never have a marriage like theirs.
Mission= To decide if its sex or love
Agenda/Plan=Tests the water with Tex or Matt
Secret= She is a virgin despite her vibrato and raging hormones
What makes her special? Soft and cuddly internally, but a bulldog with language
TEX–Antagonist/Predator
21, tall, rich, narcissist, never without his white stetson and the keys to his red corvette and to the London Playboy mansion. Student body president and bar-keep of the crawl space where students can go and have sex behind the bar in basement of the on-campus pub called “My Mother’s Mustache”
Mission= to get Alyson in that crawl space for his sexual peccadilloes
Agenda/Plan= to “win” her in Texas Holdem, Pooh Bear Cards Alyson creates, and playing Matt and the Pooh Bears in basketball game
Motivation= Big man on campus. Playboy.
Wound= first love jilted him. Objectifies women with subconscious anger ever since.
Internal journey= from sexpot to charmer
External journey=gives his keys to /alyson and Matt, closes down the crawl space in MMM, apologizes to Babs and calls her by her eal name, Barbara
Unique= pompous ass can be reformed after all
MATT Alyson’s love interest, rival of Tex, damn good actor/singer
20, tall athletic. mop of black hair and beard
Internal journey= from betrothed to Liz, to falling in love with Alyson
External journey=From wanting lead in MAAN, getting Alyson play opposite to his lead
Secret= engaged to his girlfriend back in CA, Liz
OTHER MINOR CHARACTERS:
Mrs. Hurst, 60ish, headmistress in tweed and felt fedora with two corgis trailing her everywhere, rules college with iron fist, wound very tight indeed
Mother Superior, ancient, comes on Sundays to visit the nuns’ graveyard, surprisingly and unexpected change agent for Alyson giving her love advice to go with Matt
Gaily Cowgill. 19. pigtailed, Alyson’s roommate and BFF
Miss Jones, 30, always seen in her Oxford doctorate robe. Preeminent Shakespeare scholar, she played Calaban in The Tempest at Oxford at age 18. lectures every Wednesday on everything Shakespeare without notes in cold quonset hut next to convent.
Liz, 20, dark haired sour debutante. Matt’s fiance shows up at beginning of second semester to be obstacle for Alyson
Babs/Barbara, 19, Tex’s big-boobed sex toy used to spy on Alyson for Tex. In the end, demands Tex calls her by her real name Barbara. Same blond hair as Alyson.
Ruben-Matt’s BFF
Elaine–rich Egyptian princess. Student 21
Tarak and Tarook–rich Bedouin princes/brothers/students 20
Professor Boris Bagdasorov, 40 set designer/director complete with cape
EXTRAS:
Gay Turkish waiters #1-#5
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Patricia Brown The Transformational Journey
What I learned from this assignment was it was easier to design the beginning mission of old ways, than the the final mission arc.
4 ideas:
CONCORDE Thriller
High Concept: Pregnant attorney Calista wins a trip around the world on the Concorde and soon figures out that the famous people on board are planning on hijacking to boost their fame even more!
Internal=Calista all about herself.
External=Do anything to protect her unborn child, her mom–and later, her husband.
CHRISTMAS ON THE CONCORDE or LOVE AT MACH TWO ROM/COM
High Concept: After breaking up with her partner, Calista finds herself at Christmas navigating her pregnancy alone when she wins a trip around the world on the Concorde and decides to go!
Old ways= Calista has had it with men. Will go it alone with this baby.
New ways=Trusts again, loves again.
MY MOTHER’S MUSTACHE Cozy Mystery
High Concept: California student Alyson Gideon at a deconsecrated English convent solves the mystery when a student is found dead in the basement on-campus pub called “My Mother’s Mustache.”
Old ways=Squirms and wants to flee.
New Ways=Confidently solves the mystery single-handedly.
MY MOTHER’S MUSTACHE Comedy/COM/ROM
High Concept: Poor California student Alyson Gideon is thrown into an elite Sussex college with rich international students housed in an ex-convent.
Old ways= Eager to trade sex for free
New Ways=Out of her compassion, chooses love.
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Hi, I’m Patricia Brown, Esq.
What I hope to get out of this class: to finish draft one of my romantic comedy on my way to 8-10 rewrites to sell my final draft that is made into a movie or streaming series. Unique? I went around the world on the Concorde in 31 hours–while pregnant; was one of the first women in CA licensed to drive a fire engine; was twice-blessed by the Dalai Lama; stood on Machu Picchu & the Acropolis. Getting ready to retire as a divorce attorney of 30 years to create the third act of my life writing profound screenplays made into movies. Please to meet you all.
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Patricia Brown
I agree to the terms of this release form.
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<font size=”5″>PATRICIA BROWN Likeability/Empathy/Justification #8 </font>
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What I learned from this assignment…oh, how I want to wordsmith. Tugging at the reins to hold back from prematurely wordsmithing, signaled I found my right action story.
“CONCORDE” by Patricia Brown
(based loosely on a true story)
LIKEABILITY
A. Other people: Her husband adores her
B. Shows love: Her mother depends upon her; she loves both of them; only wants her husband’s child
C. Trying to do something good: They have been trying to have their own baby for 2½ years
D. Something good for someone else: She helps the little girl in the doctor’s office
E. Kindness: She goes grocery shopping with her dying mother and humors her when she wants to enter a contest to win a trip around the world on the Concorde
F. Funny/witty: flirts with her husband, jokes in French, Spanish and English
G. Good moral decisions/being on the right side: Adamant they will do anything it takes to have each other’s baby, including years of fertility shots; when she finds out after entering that her mother is dying and she is pregnant, she decides this is her last chance to spend with her mother on the trip and risks even her unborn child
EMPATHY/DISTRESS
A. Undeserved misfortune: she took shots for 2 ½ years and still isn’t pregnant
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B. External Character Conflict: fertility doctor wants to cut the shots off because she is too old and ruining his trials; when she wins the contest for the trip with her dying mother, she fights with her husband about going after they learn she IS pregnant after all
C. Plot intruding on life: her biological clock ticking, but she enters a once-in-a-life trip around the world because she is resigned she won’t get pregnant the very last month of her last shot. She discovers her mother’s clock is also ticking down on her life expectancy
D. Moral dilemmas: should she go on the last trip with her dying mother around the world, or risk her unborn child? Should she tell her mother that she knows her mother is dying? Should she tell her husband and mother she is pregnant?
E. Forced decisions they’d never make: If she had her way, she’s be on shots another year. If her mother was well or she wasn’t trying to get pregnant, she’d skip the trip. But, they won and have hours to accept. It’s only a “day” trip, how much damage can be done?
F. Wound attacked: Grieving the chance to have a baby and her mother dying, she decides to go on the trip to help her cope with her pending “losses”
JUSTIFICATION
A. Character and family abused: Villain cuts her shots off. Gives her a placebo. Kidnaps husband. Takes mother hostage. She must fight to save who she
loves the most, her family: her husband, mother and unborn child.
B. Threatened by others: Villain will explode the Concorde when it reaches maximum speed of Mach 2.2.
C. Hero is the victim of attacks: Chases her after her TV appearance on French TV in Toulouse. Tries to lace her French cuisine on the Concorde to force her miscarriage inflight? Also stabbed while being strip-searched in the UAE. Villain mission shifts from killing her to harvesting the placenta which contains his formula for the world-wide patent worth billions
D. Major losses: her husband gets taken hostage back home; the kind stewardess gets killed onboard; her mother is taken in Acapulco
E. Trespasses: Enters her home to kidnap her husband and destroy the records of her shots. Enters her mother’s home to get id to plant decoy in Acapulco. Has goons in the crew on the Concorde.
SEQUENCE:
Opening: Rich and Dr. Calista Novak are in a doctor’s office surrounded by 30 very-pregnant women, some with their kids in tow. We learn they want a child, have been on experimental fertility shots, they love each other, and time is running out. We see Calista is a vet, is good with kids, can joke in three languages, and has the tenacity of a bulldog.
Dr. Carolos Sueldo, the creator of the designer fertility drugs, has his mission: to win the XPRIZE worth $10 million for scientific innovation, create a world-wide monopoly on his patent and rake in billions in perpetuity. Calista is the only cog in his plans. At 42, she has not gotten pregnant, so he lies to her and says “The Board” is kicking her off his trials. She begs for one more month of shots. He says okay, but, in fact, he will give her only a placebo. He’s done with her.
Calista is at the grocery store with her mother, Joan, shopping for cancer-fighting veggies. Joan does not disclose that her doctor has told her to “get her affairs in order” because she is in stage four. At the checkout stand, Joan grabs a contest entry form to win a trip around the globe on the Concorde for two, sponsored by a beer company and XPRIZE.
The next day, Joan gives Calista $20 to overnight the entry form for both of them to win the trip. She humors her mother thinking the odds of winning are against them and, even though she thinks Joan is in remission, believes such a trip would be too taxing on Joan’s health. She mails it per Joan’s instructions.
Rich and Calista are at home getting ready to perform the now-ritualistic and optimistic ritual of him shooting the fertility drug into her butt. They pray, they dance. They dance with their dog. They have no idea that it contains no magic elixir and that they are now off fertility drugs. Ovulating, they make exuberant love.
The special delivery mail she must sign for arrives when Calista is in the bathroom taking a pregnancy test. She puts the test down before she can read it, washes her hands and goes out. She rips it open as Joan arrives—they won the trip! Joan and Calista must sign the affidavits immediately saying they accept and send back or their places will be given away. Pressured, Calista signs without consulting her doctor–or Rich. Joan goes to mail them. Calista returns to the bathroom and reads it: she is pregnant. Just to be sure, she takes a second confirming test.
Before she speaks to Rich, she goes to her long-time family doctor to confirm the pregnancy a third time. She confides to the doctor about her dilemma: should she stay home to protect her child, or go on the trip with Joan? Joan’s doctor too, she slips and tells Calista her mother doesn’t have much time left.
Back home, Calista has set the stage for telling Rich both the good news and the bad. He is ecstatic about the pregnancy (ironically, being off the fertility drugs triggered ovulation at the right time) and furious about the trip after so much investment in getting pregnant and putting the baby at risk.
Dr. Sueldo reveals to his goons he will shed crocodile tears after the Concorde explodes killing Calista and claiming his “favorite” patient chose to go on a dangerous trip without his blessing. His connections to the XPRIZE arranged not just the bomb, but for the Concorde contest and to have Calista win two seats. He assumes wrongly
that she is taking Rich with her. If Rich goes, there can be no inquiries about her treatments after their demise.
Rich, suppressing his anger, bids Calista and Joan a tearful goodbye before they board their flight to JFK and the Concorde. Joan is happy and can’t decipher the mixed messages she is getting from both of them. She doesn’t know that they know this will be her very last trip with her only child before cancer gets her, or that Calista is pregnant with her grandchild.
The trip leader from the sponsors welcomes all the winners and introduces the crew at a hotel at JFK the night before with balloons, bands and champagne, which Calista won’t drink. He explains the mission: set a Guinness World record for going around the world as fast as it can (Mach 2.2 tops), stops for refueling in Toulouse, France, the United Arab Emirates, Guam, Hawaii, Acapulco, and back to New York. The current world record is 36 hours. They will see four sunrises and have a gourmet French meal every leg of the flight. A raucous cheer goes up when he announces that the beer and French wines are free and unlimited.
The next day at the special Concorde pad at JFK, the parade of contestants embark.
TURNING POINT AT END OF FIRST ACT: The Concorde takes off. There is no turning back. The Hero and the Villain missions are set.
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@2021 Patricia Brown
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TITLE: “VANESSA SQUARED”:
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UNIQUE HEROES: There are two both named Vanessa, best friends since middle school. V1 is white, goes to UCSC, where she does outdoor Shakespeare under the redwoods, California girl all the way, loosey-goosey. V2 is Latina, goes to Columbia U, serious, scientific, ambitious, sophisticated. They talk or text every day.
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UNIQUE MISSION: They must race from each of their schools to meet in the middle of the country after they have each stolen from their school labs half of the secret, that combined together can provide the formula for the earth-shattering CRISPR technology that can cut out the DNA for Alzheimer’s of Vanessa2’s grandmother (who raised her) who has early on-set Alzheimer’s and can literally cure her before it gets worse if they get to St. Louis in six days before grandma’s point of no return.
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MOTIVATION: Both raised poor, the friends want to make sure the patent for the formula falls safely in the hands of the public domain, and not Dr. Wilson who wants the monopoly on the patent so he can drive the price up and make billions, winning a Noble Prize for chemistry. Hence, there are two simultaneous chases by the bad guys: one after V1 from San Francisco and after V2 from New York. Along the way, the two Vs (“VANESSA SQUARED”) text and call each other with the secret “code” they have had since middle school to avoid getting caught.
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HEROES’ SECRETS: In middle school, V1 would go over to V2’s grandma’s house. Grandma had taken V2 into her home because V2’s mother was a drug addict. But, V1 witnessed Grandma’s horrific and secretive abuse of V2: she locked V2 in her room, rationing her food, demanding she takes anti-depressants and calling her fat. V1 would sneak her food, smuggle her anti-depressants out so Grandma thought V2 was taking them when she counted the pills every night, and the girls devised a secret code so Grandma wouldn’t know what they were doing. The girls were so young, they hardly understood at the time that Grandma’s memory loss and abuse were all signs of early on-set of Alzheimer’s. V2 got as far away from grandma to study psychology at Columbia U when she finally realized that Grandma wasn’t at fault, and, more importantly, that there was revolutionary new technology that could cure Grandma from any more descent into oblivion. V1 would do anything for her BFF.
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VILLAIN: Dr. Charles Wilson, whose lab on the West Coast, V1 stole the sample from. His hubris is greater than his bank account and he is banking on his lab getting the exclusive patent to make billions for perpetuity. He can’t keep it out of the public domain if he can’t publish his lab’s scientific research by midnight in a week in the Scientific Journal Breakthrough. He will lose the financial benefits of his life’s work not to mention the fame, awards and accolades.
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ACTION: They can’t fly. V1 starts on the San Francisco Zephyr, using her thespian roots in disguise to hide from Dr. Wilson’s henchmen; then she hitchhikes, then tries “Hop a Dog”–i.e. their code for Greyhound where she meets a warlock on the back of the bus who protects her for a short time, and finally gets her a car for the last leg to St. Louis to meet V2. V2 starts at Penn Station at midnight, mistaking an undercover cop laying in the station dirty floor as a homeless man, she gives him some cash, he reveals himself when he tries to return the money to her. They bond and he helps to get her out of the city to hook up with a lorry driver who takes her on the next leg. Dr. Wilson’s lab assistant had gone to work in the Columbia U. in order to steal the other half of the formula, but V2 had beat him to it; so, he leads the chase after V2 from the East Coast. The girls’ code for Dr. Wilson is the UCSC mascot “Banana Slug,” and for Dr. Wilson’s lab assistant, the Columbia U. mascot “Roar-ee” (a lion).
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Essentially, a female buddy action movie that uniquely the buddies are not traveling together and the action naturally comes out of their respective personalities. Also, the real-life science is a hot topic, coming out of the development of the Covid-19 vaccines.
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<font color=”#000000″>PATRICIA BROWN </font><font color=”#000000″>HERO & VILLAIN #2</font>
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<font color=”#000000″>What I learned doing this assignment…this is based on a true story—mine. In 1979, I was one of the first women in the state of California to go to Fire Academy and was the only women there for ten days with 35 men. Definitely a FISH OUT OF WATER. I already have made lists of the gradients of obstacles and the gradient of actions based upon what I experienced first-hand. I have made some decisions already based upon earlier classes with Hal: like I want to keep to MY story and a period piece to keep it in the mid-range budget realm, because with all the recent mega fires, I imagine there are bigger, more action-packed and dangerous stories out there by other writers. I also long ago decided to make it a movie and not a novel or documentary. Clearly fiction. Because I am starting with the bones from my own story, I saw once again in this assignment that it is harder for me to stick to the conventions—which I will easily give up if I can sell my script. I got inspired by Hal’s analysis of THE FEMALE EMPOWERMENT MOVIE of “Arrival.” This is not the only real-life one-of-a-kind story I have to tell; I have autobiographical stories of coming of age in a nunnery in Sussex, being a shiksa at a Jewish law school, and my pregnant circumnavigation around the globe on the Concorde in a day and a half. </font>
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<font color=”#000000″>My first blush at the conventions today:</font>
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<font color=”#000000″>CONCEPT</font>
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<font color=”#000000″>HERO MORALLY RIGHT=Women can do anything men can do.</font>
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<font color=”#000000″>VILLAIN MORALLY WRONG=There is no place for women.</font>
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<font color=”#000000″>HERO </font>
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UNIQUE SKILL SET: Her motto is “You are only as good as your tools.” She jerry-rigs (makeshift repairs made with only the tools and material at hand) out of her ordinary, feminine arsenal: bobby pins, tampons, maxy pads, hair gel, K-Y Jelly, and suntan lotion. She also drives the blue roadster that her late father gave her very, very fast on the rough country roads night or day.
MOTIVATION: To avenge her dad’s death by arson and to prove she is her father’s daughter.
SECRET OR WOUND: An only child, she had no brothers, only her late beloved firefighter/father, so all men (her 35 classmates) are an enigma to her. He died from a heart attack after a fire set by an arsonist, and she wants to graduate Fire Academy on her way to being a Captain who carries a gun and arrests arsonists.
VILLAIN
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UNBEATABLE: Four male instructors are furious that she is taking the place of a male recruit
If they can without appearing biased, along with some of her classmates, sabotage and justify flunking her
WHAT THEY LOSE IF THE HERO SURVIVES: loss of self-righteousness, moral superiority, the status quo, and their men’s-only club
IMPOSSIBLE MISSION:
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The first and ONLY woman competing with 35 men to graduate from Fire Academy
Demands they go beyond their very best: There are rules and regulations that protect firefighters from life and death. The men don’t think physically she can measure up, even putting themselves in danger. She is totally alone and isolated the whole ten-days. This is before cellphones. The burden of proving that women can do anything men can do is agonizing. She is a pioneer.
Destroys the Villain: Like “Dead Poet’s Society”, there is one hold-out from her class that can’t give up his hostility at the end of Fire Academy. Like “Arrival”, she never bad-mouths the male “instructors,” who come around to seeing her worth and value as a team-player, but she has won them over. Especially the cute, young instructor who almost had to flunk her. This hard-fought perilous shift in their gestalt reflects the changes in 1979 in our society as a whole. Sometimes it is easy to forget that somebody had to go first.
IMPROVED ANSWERS:
HERO: Sidney Gideon discovers when she arrives at Fire Academy that it is the son of the Lead Instructor who intentionally set the fireworks starting the fire where her father died
MISSION: Graduate, earning a position as a Fire Captain that allows her to carry a gun and arrest the villain for covering up for his son, getting justice for her father
UNBEATABLE VILLAIN: Ranger Lloyd Lemprecht, lead Fire Academy Instructor, assembles instructors under him requiring them to conspire to flunk her, even kill her
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Patricia Brown CONVENTIONS#1
WHAT I LEARNED…transformational character can be the oppressor…harder to express the stakes succinctly…worried that I won’t be able to elevate the average action, or will turn my rom-com into an action film
CONCEPT: Book-worm blond lookout must be the first woman to graduate from Fire Academy in 10-days to avenge her firefighter dad’s death
DEMAND FOR ACTION: Keeping up with her 35 male classmates or risk flunking out
MISSION: Graduate from Fire Academy to avenge her dad’s death and save the lookout
ESCALATING ACTION: From hostile instructors/classmates in hydraulics class, driving doglegs, flipping an engine, driving night roads, fee-wheeling engines, final exam, heart attack, fire!
ANTAGONISTS: The “sexist” system; skeptical, even hostile instructors and classmates
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Patricia Brown, Esq.
I may or maybe not have written ten.
I hope to learn how to write more than the one joke I can ever remember: A woman with a migraine went to see her doctor. He said, let me ask you a few questions. Do you smoke? “No, doctor.” Do you drink? “No, doctor.” Do you fool around? Oh, no, doctor!” He said to her, “Then I know what’s wrong with you! Your halo’s too tight!”
At age 43, I won a contest and flew around the world on the Concorde in 31 hours and 43 seconds–and I was pregnant!