Advice — expert series

Warning: If you haven't seen Cold Mountain, this article contains spoilers which may impair your viewing pleasure. The myth-drama is one of the most powerful story combinations that we have. Myth gives us the hero's journey and the epic scope. Drama gives us the family and the deep, complex issue. When the love story is added, we have the potential for a real knockout. Unfortunately, the original writer of Cold Mountain structured his story in such a way as to remove much of the power of the myth-drama. By doing a straight cross-cut between the two leads for most of...

I wrote the original Writing in Restaurants for the eZine nearly two years ago. But dining out is still one of my favorite things to do. And, of course, so is writing. So it seemed only fitting to revisit Writing in Restaurants with some new restaurant suggestions and writing tips designed to help you, whether you write plays or screenplays, take your script to the next level. ~ Appetizer Writing Tip A common note is "not enough conflict" or "the conflict needs punching up." But what does that mean? It often means that the characters need to move closer to...

For many people plot is the same thing as structure. Both deal with designing the story, creating relationships between its elements and developing how action builds to a climax. When you structure a film story, you're working out the plot to discover the best way of telling it. ~ The Principles of Organization - Story Structure Real structure gives you the organizing principles for your material. It is far more than plot points, turning points, act breaks or whatever you choose to call them. Structure gives you a framework to manage and make sense of all your material - the...

Want to double your chance for success in this business? If so, we strongly suggest you write with a partner. Yes, you have to find the right person, and when you start selling your scripts, you'll split the money, but we, and the successful script partners we've talked to, agree that the advantages of sharing the writing far outweigh the disadvantages of sharing the bottom line. It would take a book (and we wrote it!) to explore all the reasons to write with a partner, so we've assembled the consensus Top Ten, as follows: 10. It's a dog-eat-dog business -...

2004: On the TV show The Apprentice 16 young entrepreneurial types compete to be the apprentice to Donald Trump. It's a truly coveted position because it means learning from a master. For those who don't succeed, their fate is summed up in two words at the end of the show. "You're fired!" 1940: Fantasia opens. Mickey Mouse stars in The Sorcerers Apprentice. Logline: A Sorcerer's young apprentice attempts to practice magic in his master's absence, with disastrous results. Theme: Never underestimate the value of age and experience 1545: The Middle Ages - a brief history. The majority of the people...