Advice — expert series

What do such movies as The Hours, Shakespeare in Love, Empire of the Sun, Wag the Dog and The Untouchables have in common? Here's a hint: their authors are David Hare (The Hours), Tom Stoppard (Shakespeare in Love and Empire of the Sun) and David Mamet (Wag the Dog and The Untouchables). Still stumped? Each of these movies--and we're talking about some very good films--was written by a playwright. OK. So a few good playwrights needed to make some extra cash, and they turned to the much more lucrative film industry to finance house payments and upscale vacations. That may...

Myths are the stories we tell ourselves to explain the worlds around us and within us. Is your story mythic? Well, it should be. And it can be, if you tap into the timeless and powerful tools of storytelling that make some tales so universal yet so personal that they stand the test of time and become classics. It's said that every "real" myth is true on at least seven levels. So, no matter your genre or your style, more than likely some aspect of your story is directly related to a myth. The more you play that up -...

In my twenty years plus as a screenwriter, I've heard thousands of pitches at pitch festivals, my seminars and in my writing classes. I'd say that 90% of the screenplays, treatments and ideas I've had pitched to me had a weak premise and probably won't sell. And a weak premise, even well executed, is still weak at its core. On the other hand, a strong, unique premise that is poorly executed can always be improved upon. Studios and production companies have paid sizable sums of money to acquire a slam-dunk premise which they will then hire a seasoned writer to...

The toughest part of any writing project is crafting the middle. Why so daunting? The Middle of most projects makes up a whopping 1/2 of the entire page count or scene count. The moment the main character leaves the Beginning and enters the heart of the story world, a door slams shut. Nothing will ever be the same again. Any lingering thought the protagonist has of turning back vanishes. Not so with the writer. When faced with the long, empty expanse of the Middle, many writers catch the "going back to the beginning" bug. That is, they continually go back...

Even when a story has memorable characters, a riveting plot and a fully developed genre, it may still be coming apart at the themes. Theme is perhaps the most powerful, yet least understood element of story structure. It is powerful because theme is an emotional argument: It speaks directly to the heart of the reader or audience. It is least understood because of its intangible nature, working behind the scenes, and between the lines. When misused, theme can become a ham-handed moral statement in black and white, alienating the reader/audience with its dogmatic pontifications. When properly used, theme can add...