Can you guess the character?

I've been following along with the Future of Storytelling course provided by iversity, or as they call it, a MOOC (Massive Open On-line Course). As you might have guessed, it's a big course that anyone can join on the Internet, and like all courses has hours of on-line content, interviews and lectures, and weekly homework in the form of creative tasks. Last week we had to describe our all time favourite story from memory (I went with Danny the Champion of the World) and this week I've written a character profile for one of my favourite TV characters. Can you guess who I've written about? Click the word cloud to enlarge.


 

Think you know? Find the answer below!

The second question asked; what makes this protagonist worth following through a whole series of episodes. What is it that HOOKed you? 

I like that this character doesn't take c**p from anyone. He's a bit of a contradiction in that he's adamant that he's nothing like his father yet in trying to uphold the law he breaks most of the rules in the book. He's also got relationship issues and can't seem to hold a girl down. I empathise with him on that one. He's also cool in the way he always wears his cowboy hat and walks about as if he owns the place. Underneath it all, is a very complex man. He proved himself willing to put others first but must open up about his true feelings for his father. Perhaps he'll do that in season five...

Worked it out? See below...

 Oh and if you want to join with the the MOOC, follow this link and get posting :)










Character Name: Raylan Givens
TV series this character is in: Justified

Casualty, Cars and Crisis Points; a Three Day Storywriting Workshop with John Yorke

Free stationary, coffee, and John Yorke; Nope, I can't think of a better writing prize either!

I still remember how excited I was when I got the email. “You’ve won!” it said, “a three day story writing course in London with the former Controller of BBC Drama Production, John Yorke, who’s worked on Eastenders, Casualty, and Waterloo Road.” I went in with sweaty palms. Then John asked everyone what car they drove and laughed at how telling of my character a Peugot 106 was. I relaxed into my chair; this was going to be a fun few days.

It was all to promote John’s new book, Into the Woods; a Five Act Journey into Story. For a free course it wasn’t bad. We all met at the main office of Penguin Books, John’s publisher. I was a little worried when the receptionist had no clue who I was, but as the others slowly crept in, I was relieved to meet the wonderful people I’d be sharing my prize with, seven of us in total. We got our free journals (I claimed two…) and moved to an intimate office in a busy media building, which was kitted out with coffee, biscuits, and later a spread of wraps.

Once the computer technician had made his hundredth trip to hook up the power point, we were ready to begin…

John started with 25 tips on writing drama, which went over a lot of stuff I’ve covered before, such as hit the ground running, have a concrete goal, reveal character in action, but a few things stood out. I liked his definition of how not to write on the nose, that the more interesting emotion is the one your character is hiding. The best part was debating the inciting incident of Star Wars (and John, if you’re reading, it’s when the droids arrive, okay?).

The ten questions crib sheet was one of the best tools; a list of points needed for an interesting story that works. I could spend a whole post describing them, but effectively they pin-point a protagonist, give him a goal, set him against an opponent and a series of obstacles until they learn something and change. I’ve struggled to create believable change before, but John’s definition just made sense.

It was interesting to hear John’s thesis, one which sets his book apart from the many other screenwriting ‘how to manuals,’ about the way we as humans perceive the world, and how that process of perception has been translated into the way we tell stories. It was also helpful to talk about five act structure, which gives an extra two acts to three act structure to prevent the dreaded sagging middle section. It was also a great way to study TV drama.

John used to run the BBC Writer’s Academy, and we had a little sample of what that might be like when we had to break episodes of Eastenders, Casualty, and Holby City. In other words, we had to analyse the episode using the ten steps, and write a better version. It was intense, but made me realise the potential of continuing drama to produce an exciting story.

Our final task, on the final morning, was to use all our knowledge to break a documentary about the building of the Brooklyn Bridge into a feature film, cast it, and give it a title, all in two hours. We had to work fast to make it exciting and create believable change, but I think Mary and I had a winner, if only our appalling title, Mrs Robling’s Bridge, hadn’t let us down.

My journey into the woods introduced me to some wonderful people, and their business cards are now stored readily with my thought provoking notes. I can’t thank John enough, and a shout out also goes to Ingrid from Penguin for keeping everything afloat; thanks! I leave with respect for continuing drama, and a new found urge to continue my quest as a professional story geek.

You can read more about John Yorke on this page from the BBC Press Office  and on the Company Pictures website.

Check out the following link for his book, Into the Woods; a Five Act Journey into Story.

A Main Character; is There Such a Thing?

 I saw this great film; it was about a girl who...

Admittedly, when we describe a film, we often talk about one central character, usually the character with a weakness that goes on a journey and changes, often called the protagonist. But is the protagonist the only important character? Perhaps the protagonist is the most central character in terms of conflict and theme, but I think it’s better to consider all characters as equally important, something I’ve been able to do better when using Roger Stennett’s five story development questions, which I look at below with examples from the film, My Sister’s Keeper.

Spoilers below.

1.    What do I want to say?

As I mentioned in my Down on the Farm post, you’ve really got to have a passion for the story you are telling and have a strong message to express. I can imagine that Jodi Picoult, who wrote the original Novel of My Sister’s Keeper, had a strong sense of what the story was all about.

For those who don’t know, My Sister’s Keeper is all about Anna, who’s engineered cells and tissues are saving her older sister Kate’s life from Leukaemia, who sues her family for the rights to her own body. There are lots of moral questions, but mainly it’s about the mother, Sara, the protagonist, who fights to keep Kate alive, damaging her family and sometimes even preventing Kate from positive life experiences, whilst Anna sues not just for the rights to her body, but for Kate’s right to die. The film asks how far we are willing to go to save a loved one; is it right to put the needs of everyone else, including the one we are protecting, second to our need to keep them alive? What I think is wonderful, is how there are no easy solutions, and finally Sara is forced to let Kate go, giving her what she wants, celebrating the good life she’s lived, and finally bringing her family together.

2.    Who are these people?

This question seems to ask about a community, and unless your character is a hermit (but then consider how the community feels about that hermit) they have people in their lives with values. How to Train Your Dragon features a community of tough Viking dragon slayers, and The Firm a community of highflying, intrusive businessmen. My Sister’s Keeper is all about the family unit, and each one is dealing with the care of Kate whilst trying to keep their family together, and it’s through how they go about this that the story and theme unfolds.

3.    What do they want?

Sara wants to keep Kate alive and well, whereas Anna wants to sue her parents for the rights to her own body, until it’s then revealed she, along with her brother Jesse, wants to help Kate to die. Brian, Sara’s husband initially helps with Kate’s treatment, but then he discharges Kate to take her to the beach against Sara’s wishes, showing his allegiance to Anna and Jesse.

Everyone wants something and side under two distinct moral points of view, to let Kate live or die, but overall everyone wants to keep their family together and each go separate ways to achieve it.

4.    What stops them getting it?

The film is based upon the idea that Sara would never allow Kate to die, and Anna has to get the rights to her body to make that decision. We have the scenes in the court room involving Campbell, Anna’s lawyer, and Judge De Salvo, who is dealing with her own grief. I love how the family are all in opposition, but still sit around the dinner table together, attempting to function as best they can as a normal family despite the conflicts bubbling under the surface.

5.    Why should I care?

This is hard question to answer. “It’s my story, of course you should care!” I think it’s about the stakes of the film, what happens if the characters should fail. If Anna doesn’t get the rights to her body she will have to undergo several operations. It’s horrible to think that a child should have to do that, and we care because there is something moral going on here and a person could get hurt.

I also think we care when we empathise with the situation. We don’t like Sara for doing what she’s doing to Anna, but we understand the lengths a mother would go to save her daughter. If a character does something morally wrong yet we get why they are doing it, I think we are gripped. We start to question the way we view the world. What is right or wrong? That’s what a great film or story is supposed to do. Make use reassess the way we view the world, and come out feeling changed ourselves. That’s why we should care, because this film is saying something important.


I thought I’d wrap up with my inspiration to this post. I read an article describing the primary character and secondary characters, with a warning not to reveal too many surprises about the secondary characters as this might distract from the primary character. Although I do agree that we don’t want to dilute the film too much or else it could lose its focus on the protagonist’s journey, we, as writers shouldn’t think in a black and white sense of primary and secondary. All the character’s in My Sister’s Keeper serve the change in Sara’s character through added texture and colour. Even if certain aspects of character don’t make the final cut, it’s good to know all your characters inside out, and to remember that all characters are central to the story with their own unique purpose.

 You can read more about screenwriter, dramatist and director Roger Stennett, on his website 

 

The Case of The Station Agent; Do We Always Need a Concrete Goal?

I was once told in a screenwriting workshop in Cologne that characters must always have a visible, tangible goal, the more concrete the better. If she wants to win a contest, she wants to win a medal. If he wants his son back, he wants the custody papers. But what about stories where the character has no goal, such as the Station Agent? This post looks at how this film works without a concrete goal, and how instead of an aimless, wandering narrative, becomes a gripping, emotional drama.

Peter Dinklage, who plays Tyrion Lannister in HBO’s A Game of Thrones, got his first central role in the Station Agent in 2003, a film which focuses solely on the difficulties that being a dwarf has placed upon his character. Fin avoids all social situations, be it riding on the train or going to bars, and when we’re first introduced to his character in a day in the life sequence of him working at a toy store in the city, we gather he only has one friend in the world, Henry, and besides that, keeps himself to himself, and avoids reacting to the many japes people make at his expense. It’s a defence mechanism to keep the bad people out, but has instead distanced Fin from life’s good experiences.

This distancing is Fin’s weakness, his character flaw that needs to change for him to find happiness, and he has no intention of changing any time soon. Spoilers follow!

Henry dies suddenly of a heart attack and, in accordance with his will, the toy shop is closed and its stock liquidated. With noting left, except the inheritance of a small train depot in rural New Jersey, Fin walks (he doesn’t drive or take a train) all the way to his new property in the small town of Newfoundland. Fin could easily keep himself to himself in the city, but in this small, lonely community, Fin has to avoid the advances of two people desperate for his friendship.

To recap, we have this guy, Fin, a dwarf, who would rather walk many miles than take a crowded train, who tries his hardest to avoid Joe, who works the refreshment van right outside the train depot, and Olivia who has recently lost her son, and who, after accidentally running Fin down a few times, tries to apologise to him. Fin is avoiding things (albeit rather actively) rather than trying to get them, but this only works because of the active characters around him.

Olivia sees a bit of her son in Fin, and gradually she and Joe, through their constant advances, and their interest in Fins hobbies, in train watching, and train chasing (which Fin couldn’t do until they came along as he can’t drive) they become close friends.

As in Thomas McCarthy’s second film, The Visitor, around the middle of the film we see our passive hero become active. In the Visitor, Walter, a lonely businessman discovers two immigrants in his apartment, Tarek and Zainab, and lets them stay. He bonds with Tarek over a common interest in music (notice again an interesting hobby forming a bridge of friendship, but one that is central; the music is actually him grieving for his dead wife, as trains form the theme of distancing through how Fin walks the tracks, the right of way as he calls it, as opposed to travelling on trains).

Then, something happens. Tarek is arrested and Walter has to fight to get him released. In the Station Agent, the goal is less concrete, but it's still there. Olivia’s estranged husband comes to visit one morning whilst Fin and Joe are in the house, and after that she ignores them. Fin makes it his mission to get back her friendship. He gets hurt, and hurts others too, and this gives him the push he needed to come into the open and live; he gets drunk in a bar, stands on a bar stool and tells those making japes to take a long, hard look at him.

This film works because of the characters around the protagonist. Olivia has a problem which directly involves Fin (she admits, when Fin saves her from killing herself, that she wanted her son back and was distant from Fin as he reminded her of him), and allows Fin through no fault of his own to cause her hurt. She’s the hero of the film, and without her, Fin wouldn’t change. Joe is great too, because he is lonely and desperately wants a friend.

As drama works when someone wants something and has trouble getting it, a concrete goal lets this build easily, and lets us know if they pass or fail. But I think it’s possible for a film to work without a goal, as long as there are active characters to build conflict, the protagonist has a weakness, and is in a situation that encourages him to embrace his need.

The Station Agent, on IMDB, by Thomas McCarthy (2003)

The Visitor, on IMDB, by Thomas McCarthy (2007)

Here’s a link to The Visitor script. If anyone can find the script of the Station Agent let me know!

How to Make Your Monologue Dramatic; Emerging Writer’s Workshop Two

I’ve written a few monologues before, but all have read like a sprawl of thought slammed onto the page, poorly written and certainly not dramatic. Thankfully, Angela Street showed me and the rest of her Emerging Writer’s Workshop how to make a more engaging monologue through three simple steps, giving us the confidence to rewrite our attempts.

1. Is your central character doing something to someone?

This forms the basic action of the scene; what your character is doing. The prisoner struggles to persuade the interrogator of his innocence. The boyfriend tries to apologise to his girlfriend. A patient struggles to hide their pain and convince a loved one of their comfort. It’s much like a scene in any film or play, except the character cannot just be retelling a story, or else they are a narrator, saying what happened instead of trying to achieve a goal.

Before the class had even begun, Angela tasked us with writing a monologue inspired by bits of fluff and glitter left on the floor by an earlier art and craft session. I was a bit nervous as we only had a few minutes, and ended up writing a fantasy story about a father’s mistake.

Was I too late? Did I not say the words in time? These stars; her ashes, poor little ashes are all that remains of her. I didn’t believe, I didn’t want to believe, and my imaginative lack the chain that choked her life away. Is this how they all end, in a puddle on the floor, from long life or from the likes of me, a disbeliever, chanting with refuses of, “they don’t exist.” Such childishness. She was right, and Christ she’ll be back soon. Could I say I spilled some art and craft kit? Perhaps a sign, yes for Aunt Jude’s birthday – but what sign? Do I have time to make one? Or will she know? She knew a lot; she must know how fairies reach their end.

Rather than addressing the audience, this is just the father’s internal thoughts. If he spoke to us as if a friend, for example, it could work, but only if he tried to do something to that friend, perhaps justifying an action, such as to hide the dead fairy and conceal the truth.

2. Why is your character saying it now?

In Dial M for Murder, Tony decides to kill his wife Margot because of the secret affair he discovers she had with Mark, who is now right under his nose. A character must act for a reason. Perhaps they have witnessed something shocking, or need to borrow money after losing a job, and must turn to a parent without appearing to be a failure. My attempt seems obvious; he’s just killed a fairy by accident, but why? If he hasn’t believed in fairies his whole life, why is this the first to die? Are they in a new house near fairies? Or, has he had the time to play along with his daughter’s ideas until a new project at work stole his attention, repressing his imagination to the point that he no longer played along with her beliefs?

3. Who is your character speaking to?

You might have already done this when considering your character’s basic action, but you need to know who your character is speaking to. It could be a radio show, a board-room meeting, or an alien communicating with the mother-ship. It could be anything, so long as one character is doing something to another. In my example, I could put someone in the room with him, such as his daughter, and have him conceal the truth and make up excuses on the spot, or it could be him telling a friend about the situation. In the latter example, he needs to be doing something other than telling. Perhaps his daughter came in and he made out he’d spilt an art and craft kit, and allowed her to use the glitter/fairy entrails to finish the birthday card she’d started to make her fairy friend, and Dad is now struggling to justify his actions to a friend, trying to make out that he was protecting her from a painful truth.

I recently heard a great monologue on a radio play called, The Interrogation, which started with a husband telling the story of how he lost the trust of his wife after an accident hurt his child, and how he now felt like a stranger in his own home. What made it work was how it revealed the husbands violent outbursts towards his wife and how he didn’t want to admit he was a bad man.

1. Is your central character doing something to someone? His basic action was to justify his violence to the audience and himself.

2. Why is your character saying it now? His estrangement had bubbled to the point of him striking his wife.

3. Who is your character speaking to? This was a little vague, though I could imagine he was talking to a friend, or perhaps this is the argument he later tells the police.

These three steps have already given me an idea on how to rewrite my monologue. It’s all very new to me, but underneath are the same principles of storytelling, though this form seems more about how the words themselves are actions; tools in your characters’ arsenal to get what they want. Hopefully, practice with the characters I’m currently writing will not only reveal more about them, but hone my dialogue skills as well.

You can find out more about Angela Street and her writing workshops on her website.

Subscribe to Radio 4’s Drama of the Week to listen to future episodes.

How to Turn-Out Your Creativity like a Wardrobe

When was the last time you had a turn-out? If you’re anything like me, it’s been a while; five years of bills and receipts, CDs I once enjoyed, and photos and bric-a-brac of memories long since passed. It was liberating to clear out the clutter, lending to clear thought and concentration, leading me to wonder if the same could be done with creative ideas.

My turn-out was inspired in part by Julia Cameron’s book, The Prosperous Heart, which views prosperity not as money but as self-worth, and hopes to free readers of anxiety and increase the flow of creativity into their lives. “Clearing away the rubble makes for clear thoughts,” she says in chapter four, and such was my experience.

I was meant to be packing up my room for moving, but instead filled several bin-bags with paperwork and boxes of CDs to sell. It didn’t stop there though. I unsubscribed from several newsletters and emails that I never read, and tossed out old magazines. It was nice to feel clarity returning as I filed away my neatly closed folder of documents into my tidy drawer.

Memories and bric-a-brac were the worst, such as old photos of out of touch friends from school, and old receipts, badges and tickets. I threw it all out, save a few key cards from big events and photos from treasured family holidays. What was scary was how those items brought back the same memories, feelings and emotions as when I’d first filed them away, although now I’d changed and the memories no longer fit. I found a ring once given to a past girlfriend, and could remember the same love I’d felt, which now seemed naïve and wrong. From out of sight, energy remains, and stops new energy flowing into your life, energy you may need, so it’s good to throw out these things, like old clothes you no longer like to wear.

The experience reminded me of something I’d read in The Wind is My Mother, a book by Native American Medicine Man, Bear Heart. He spoke of the vision quest, a venture into wilderness to communicate with a higher being. His questers fasted for up to four days in the wild, which allowed them to become vessels, empty of daily requirements and thought to allow communication to flow through them. I re-read this and thought about my turn-out, how I was now free of clutter and open to receive.

I’m not saying we need to go without daily requirements or possessions to be creative (and stress Bear Heart’s warnings that these quests are only done with an experienced sponsor) but look at how freeing ourselves of clutter, filling our lives with only that which we enjoy, and how, for example, clearing out junk emails and staying on top of our finances can leave us with a clearer, freer mind, hopefully allowing creativity to flow more easily though us.

I also believe you can turn-out your creativity, much like a cupboard or a wardrobe, and discard those ideas and projects that no longer fit or excite. I really wanted to crack on with another project after my masters, and filled my head with ideas for feature films, shorts and plays. My insecurity over writing my next big thing led me to become so clogged with story threads that I couldn’t concentrate on a single one.

I wrote down my ideas in a word document, taking them from brain to paper, freeing me of the burden of carrying them. I then went through and asked of each story what it was really about. Several seemed to be about the same thing, so I collated those ideas into a single idea that expressed what I wanted to say. Some seemed to best relate to old projects that still needed work, so I decided rather than write something new, I’d revisit a past project.

I also asked why I want to write this story. What excites me about it, and if nothing, out it went. I also asked if the idea was practical, if the characters and motivations were believable, and some I found didn’t really fit together, and so I cast those aside too. In the end, I had a much shorter list, but of ideas that I could honestly say I wanted to work on.

Clearing our environment of junk to allow clear thinking, allowing ourselves to become a vessel for creativity to flow through us, and organising our creative ideas to stop us being weighed down and unable to write have been the focus of this post. If you’ve been at all clogged or unfocused, perhaps some of this could apply to you. If so, take a breath, relax, turn-out unwanted possessions and ideas, and take baby-steps each day towards your goal.

If anything, I hope this advice will guide you to a freer and happier existence, and open doors to fresh energies and experiences, as I hope to bring into my renewed, creative life.

Click the following link to check out Julia Cameron's, The Prosperous Heart.

And here for more information on Bear Heart's book, The Wind is My Mother.

My Season Inspired Sonnet; Summer's End

I'd already started writing a poem before I read John Keats, To Autumn, a poem that paints a majestic picture of a season, and used a similar personification of nature to write my finished piece.

I started out with the last two lines, which I thought made a profound statement that could be used as the final couplet in a sonnet, which ends like a good story with a clear expression of theme. The rest came from lots of scribbles in my A4 notebook, a good size for writing poetry as it gives you lots of space to play around with different rhymes alongside the poem and cross-out and start over several times.

Below, I've linked to Keats' poem and a walk in Winchester which supposedly gave him inspiration; I'll be taking that walk later this week as part of my travel and hiking blog. For now, if you can spare a few minutes, let me know what you think of my poem in the comments section below.
 

Summer's End

I know, with misty breath and empty sky,
That creatures will have flocked or taken sleep,
And from my frosted window, wonder why
Our summer fun must fade and turn life bleak.
Creeping its glimmering decay, a snail
Like frost eats autumn’s crunch, replacing lake
Side laughter with a howling empty gale
That strips the trees till neither ash nor oak.
Then, the first flake weaves onto skin like silk,
And stepping-stones of crystal spread the pond,
And townsfolk, snowball playing, skate the milk
With knowing hope, a dance till winter’s end,
For trees that lose their colour
Return full bloom in summer.


Click here for a link to Keats' poem, and here for a guide to Keats' walk in Winchester. 

Down at the Farm; A London Short Film Festival Weekend

I couldn’t resist a weekend of short films, lectures and networking opportunities, but what really sold this London Short Film Festival (LSFF) event was combining all this with a countryside camping weekend at the Quadrangle farmhouse and barn near Shoreham, Kent. I saw great films, met wonderful people, learnt more about producing a film, and left feeling validated as a professional screenwriter, filled with the confidence to go forth and make a film, not tomorrow, but today.

The LSFF runs every January, but this was their first time Down at the Farm. They’d invited about thirty farmhands to camp from Friday to Sunday afternoon, and really looked after us, with many IPA’s included as networking drinks, and all our locally sourced, top notch meals for a little extra, which kept us going through the back-to-back line up of films and talks.

In the first talk, Valentina Brazzini and Tristan Goligher from London film production company, The Bureau, mentioned how you have to love the project you are working on. This is something I remembered from my MA. Not only do you have to have something to say, you have to have passion for the project, and be able to defend it. When I pitched my latest feature film to David Pope of Advance films, I discovered a part of my story that I wasn’t passionate about, couldn’t defend it, and realised it didn’t match what I wanted to say.

You also have to be able to identify your projects weaknesses and counter them before they become a problem. Jamie Stone spoke about his latest film project, Orbit Ever After, a magnificent sci-fi love story, all made for a measly fifty thousand pounds. Instead of ignoring the projects weaknesses, Jamie developed new, shoe-string budget in-camera special effects and demonstrated them in his pitch with the BFI, which secured him the funding.

Roger Hyams from the London Film School discussed how short films don’t have to be narrative based. At first, I was a little uneasy as I’m passionate about storytelling and felt Roger wanted to see more art house pieces, but I left realising the scope of short films. He said that a film can be like a poem, with the example of a film about the New York Elevated Train, which was a succession of train images, glorifying the filmmaker’s joy of trains. He spoke about La Jetée (which I saw the following day and loved), a huge narrative set in a dystopia after world war three, but told in about thirty minutes through a succession of still images. It really only worked as it fit the film's idea of memories and images, but showed how you can think outside the box about which form works best for your piece. 

It was great to hear from Polly Stokes, Producer and Development Editor at Film4, who said they would like feature films, specifically genre pieces, such as comedy and sci-fi, as quite a lot of new writers write straight dramas. One of the best pieces of advice was how shorts are best as simple, beautifully expressed single ideas, such as the short, Talk, which follows a lonely man who wants to find someone to talk to. It made me reassess my shorts, which I find are quite complicated as there are often several ideas and possible themes at work.

Michael Caton-Jones, director of films such as The Jackal and Rob Roy, showed us his essential short, a 1936 documentary called Night Mail, which he said was a simple film that became something else when explored, which I often find in poetry. I felt it was like a war-time army going into battle, a very serious, well-oiled machine with honour. The best thing was how Michael said that film is not a visual medium, but an emotional one, that film isn’t about showing a story through pictures, but expressing emotion through picture and noise.

I got valuable tips on pitching to industry professionals when I pitched with David. He said it’s important to give your job title up front, as, for example, if I say I’m the screenwriter and he’s the financier or studio executive, he can relax, as he knows he won’t do business directly with me. When I pitched, I kept swapping between detailing the story and the characterisation of my protagonist, but he said that next time I should just tell him the story, because if it’s well written, the characterisation will come out naturally. I need to let the story speak for itself.

The final talk on producing got me thinking about forms, permissions and wages; all the practical stages of producing a film. This, along with seeing Jamie’s film and the films of Steve Oram, who was unafraid to make the films he liked making, made me realise that it isn’t impossible to get a project on screen. I’d started this weekend worried that everyone else would be more professional and successful than me, but I left feeling a part of this short film family, and confident that if I wanted to get a project produced, that I could do so. It’s actually quite easy to get hold of cameras in today’s world, and there are lots of people to collaborate with. Time and money are often excuses used to mask fear of failure, but in the end, it doesn’t matter what happens so long as you make the films you’re passionate about.


The next LSFF takes place in January 2014, but there are events throughout the year.

The next big short film festival on the calendar is Encounters in Bristol. I hope to be there. If you're interested, check it out, here.

Exciting News! Settle Stories; New Guest Blogger.

A good few months ago I liaised with Settle Stories, a traditional storytelling charity in the Yorkshire Dales about posting on their blog, and now my first post has been published.

Settle Stories are all about oral stories as once told around a camp-fire and look at how stories might be useful in all walks of life, from self-help to business. They're home of the W.R.Mitchell archive (a local magazine editor and author of many books on local Yorkshire history), run an annual storytelling festival, and have regular updates on twitter with many links to interesting articles.

My first post on personal storytelling looks at the range of stories you could tap into to inspire and entertain audiences, and how it's a good thing to share our experiences to each other. Take a look, here.

Finding your Character’s Voice: Angela Street's Role-Play Exercise

Last week at the Salisbury Playhouse, I went to the first summer term class of playwright and mentor Angela Street’s Emerging Writer’s Workshop, which aims to nurture new writers and provide a platform to discuss opportunities, successes and how to overcome physical writing problems. We looked at how to avoid on the nose dialogue and how to find and write the unique voice of characters by using an interactive role-play task.

It’s important to have each of your characters speak differently. A limp and an eye-patch as Blake Snyder liked to say. What you certainly don’t want is every character to sound like you. They are individuals, and you need to express their unique attributes on the page.

To get inside the head of our characters, Angela had us write a few pages of their interior monologue, then write a few interesting facts about them and what they’re afraid of.

The role-play needed two people to have a conversation, answering and speaking as their characters as if they were stuck in a lift together. We weren’t allowed to tell each other about our characters, everything had to come out of the dialogue. This presented a few problems, mainly gender and race; all the observable qualities of character. My role-play partner took a while to figure out my character, Fran, was a girl, and that changed the tone of dialogue considerably. It was interesting though, as my character is a bit of a tom-boy, so perhaps this is something that could happen to her, like Arya in Game of Thrones.

I did have a few surprises. The character in the lift with me was a drunken defeatist, and Fran told him off for swearing and drinking. When the lift started to smoke (an action given by Angela who was supervising the exercise) Fran sprang to life and tried to figure out a way to get them out the lift. So I learnt she’s morally strict, resourceful, and a natural leader.

Doing this exercise can show you how well you know your characters and indicate if you need to do more development. I found it hard to think of what to say, and most of the dialogue was simple hellos and Fran commenting on things going on around her. I think it showed I didn’t know her very well, which isn’t surprising as she’s a new character.

I think next time I would specify the setting a bit more. As the lift was just a random lift with no indication of the type of building, city, town, country. I found it hard to think of how she would react to things around her. It was hard also not really knowing why she was in the building in the first place, so perhaps a few useful things, such as, it’s a gratified lift in an apartment block, or it’s an immaculate shinny lift with a sofa, each indicating the type of building and person she might meet, enhancing dialogue with values, and possibly conflict.

It’s important to understand your characters personality if you want to capture their unique voice. This role-play can help you imagine what they’re like, what they value, what they desire and what they’re afraid of. I’ve never taken much stock in writing a character bio with every detail including favourite type of cereal and TV show (if they even like cereal or TV), but I suppose it is useful to try and think of more than the bare bones of story and spend a bit of time hanging-out with characters, learning as we do with a new friend what it is that makes them who they are.

The next Emerging Writer’s Workshop takes place on the 15th June, where Angela will be looking at a sample of our dialogue to give us useful tips. You can find more details on Angela Street and her upcoming courses (including a summer residential in Salisbury) on her website.

Witty Dialogue in Double Indemnity

Besides drafting a one page treatment for my new play, (which I realised is an ugly new-born baby) I’ve spent my spare time this week catching up on a few films. Firstly, Kiki’s Delivery Service from Studio Ghibli, a wonderfully uplifting story of a young witch coming of age when she trains away from home for a year to develop her powers. I highly recommend it. I also watched  Double Indemnity for the first time, and was really impressed with how the characters set up the story with only a few lines directly stating their intentions, creating dialogue with depth and intrigue. In this post I look at DI (okay yes a highly looked at film) but also talk about my experience of writing dialogue and how I’ve tried to improve it.

Alexander Mackendrick’s great film, the Sweet Smell of Success, is another example of great dialogue, and in his book, On Film-Making, Mackendrick says that dialogue works best when the emphasis isn’t on the words but the ‘real intentions and motivations of the characters.’ In this way, it might be better for a character to talk around what they want or mean to say, encouraging the audience to dig beneath the surface. 

The following extract is from the beginning of DI on the second visit that protagonist, Walter Neff, an avid insurance salesman, makes to client Phyllis Dietrichson, who is enquiring about accident insurance for her husband, but her dialogue creates the feeling that she's really talking about something else.

NEFF
Wait a minute. Why shouldn't he know?

PHYLLIS
Because I know he doesn't want accident insurance. He's superstitious about it.

NEFF
A lot of people are. Funny, isn't it?

And then a few lines later…

NEFF
Of course, it doesn't have to be a crown block. It can be a car backing over him, or he can fall out of an upstairs window. Any little thing like that, as long as it's a morgue job.

PHYLLIS
Are you crazy?

NEFF
Not that crazy. Goodbye, Mrs. Dietrichson.

PHYLLIS
What's the matter?

NEFF
Look, baby, you can't get away with it.

PHYLLIS
Get away with what?

NEFF
You want to knock him off, don't you, baby.

The dialogue is bouncy and witty mainly because we can tell something else is going on, and then we get that line at the end which acts as a dramatic full stop, a direct line to make her intentions crystal clear. Phyllis then visits Neff at his apartment to return his hat.

NEFF
How were you going to do it?

PHYLLIS
Do what?

NEFF
Kill him.

PHYLLIS
Walter, for the last time –

 “You want to knock him off,” and “Kill him,” are the only direct references in the entire set-up of the film. This scene is great because instead of saying, “you know how hard it’ll be,” he just reels off past examples where people have failed to fake a claim. She says how hard it is for her in her relationship, whilst still denying her intentions, and then finally, Neff, whose dialogue and voice-over has implied his desire for her, agrees to help.

NEFF
-- you're not going to hang, baby. Not ever. Because you're going to do it the smart way. Because I'm going to help you.

I can’t claim to have written anything nearly as exciting as that, but here’s an example of a line that came out very on the nose at first and had to be tweaked. It’s set in a diner where the protagonist, Steve, stops whilst on his way to a Native Indian Reservation, where he will discover lots of things he didn’t know about his recently deceased ex-wife, Justine. In this scene, he finds she became a great painter, and I thought it’d be cool to have someone make it clear these were painted by Justine and imply a few things about who she had become. 

WAITRESS
Yeah, by a real famous local artist. A saint of a woman. Sad story though. She died recently.

And later changed to…

WAITRESS
Yeah, Hounslow’s. We love ‘em. I saw her in Santa Fe. She’s a hippy volunteer type, but lovely though.

The first example was on the nose, as it heavily states, yes, we’re talking about your ex-wife who recently died, duh. The second is a bit more natural. It implies Santa Fe, a very arty place, and how wonderful (and different to Steve’s expectations) that Justine is.

It’s Justine, dead, but still looking beautiful. Steve studies her and notices a braid in her hair, turquoise earrings and a necklace, and native markings on her skin. Lisa takes Steve’s hand and squeezes.

Steve just stares at Justine’s body.

STEVE
She looks so...

LISA
Peaceful.

STEVE
Yeah. She looks peaceful.

That’s probably one of my favourite lines. I think it reveals Steve’s true reaction without actually saying it, though because of what we know about Steve, we understand what’s really going on.

Witty dialogue isn’t just people saying cool stuff all the time, like when Neff flirts with Phyllis (although this again is a fantastic example of talking around what you truly mean).

PHYLLIS
There's a speed limit in this state, Mr. Neff. Forty-Five miles an hour.

NEFF
How fast was I going, officer?

PHYLLIS
I'd say about ninety.

What it seems more about is having characters a little more indirect (remembering they are their own people, not just a device to get across the story), perhaps saying the opposite of what they truly mean whilst implying what they think. Mrs Dietrichson being concerned about her husband having accident insurance whilst her questions state otherwise, or Steve look like he’s about to say one thing, but says another. Doing this might draw an audience in by making them have to dig a little deeper beneath the surface, and it certainly does make for a more entertaining film.

Can you think of any more examples of films with witty dialogue, perhaps less well known ones than this? If you can (or disagree with my ranting), tell me in the comments section.

Read Double Indemnity script here

Check out Mackendrick's book, On Film-Making, here

Read the Sweet Smell of Success script here

When the Cool Character of Your Story Isn’t Your Hero

Sometimes you dream up an amazing character with a really gripping struggle, and then, as I’m sure as happened with the BBC’s latest zombie drama, In the Flesh, you realise they’re not your hero. This post analyses the first episode and looks at how to write a story about an interesting character through the eyes a character you might have overlooked.

Dominic Mitchell’s, In the Flesh, was developed after submission to the BBC Writer’s Room Northern Voices scheme. It became a three-part series, though I felt there needed to be a lot more episodes (unless there’s a season two?), but regardless, the first episode was bit of a gem. Spoilers follow, so if you like you can read the script here as it’s no longer on BBC iPlayer.

Episode one follows Kieren, a Partially Deceased Syndrome Sufferer (PDS), which basically means zombies walked the earth and were then treated with a special drug to restore brain function, controlling their rabid urges, and allowing them to reintegrate into society.

At least, that was the plan. Kieren is sent back to his home in Roarton, where, unlucky for him, the Human Volunteer Force (HVF) is determined to kill zombies, rabid or otherwise. Kieren is forced to hide in his bedroom for fear of his life. This is where Kieren’s sister, Jem, a metal loving teenage badass and respected member of the HVF, takes over the story.

Jem has a meeting with slightly crazed HFV leader, Bill, who states that he will kill any PDS zombie he finds, and as Jem’s family are planning Kieren’s arrival, we get a sense that she’s caught between the values of her HVF buddies and the love she once had for Kieren.

Jem’s goal isn’t very tangible, but she does interrogate Kieren for proof that he is her brother and not just a monster. I suppose she’d like him to be a monster, in a way, because then her HVF buddies were right and she can kill this monster and go back to life as normal.

There’s a fantastic moment when Kieren describes past events that only he could know, and Jem realises in a teary moment that he is her brother after all. Jem’s change is cemented in the climax where the HVF come to kill a PDS suffer on her street, and Jem stays at Kieren’s side with her gun loaded, ready to protect him at all costs, which proves her love for him.

It doesn’t end until the final twist (major spoiler) where Jem witnesses Bill kill a neighbour’s wife (a PDS sufferer) in cold blood, revealing they weren’t after Kieren after all. It is, however, a mirror to what could’ve happened to Kieren, and as we’ve just seen Jem ready to defend him, we know that when she sees Bill do this, she is thinking of him, and is the punch that switches her allegiance and ends the story. Jem changes from hating Kieren to loving him, and from supporting the HVF, to adamantly despising all they stand for.

It feels like it should be Kieren’s story, his struggle to survive when he goes home to possibly the worst place on earth for him to be, but once he goes into hiding, there isn't much else he can do. It’s a world change story, as now Kieren’s sister accepts him, and perhaps in time the rest of the world will too, but it isn’t Kieren driving the story. He does have his own struggle, the same as Jem, but is dealing with his own crisis of whether he is a man or a monster, and I think that’s what makes it work. Jem is the active character who discovers Kieren isn’t a monster, giving Kieren an insight into himself. “If Jem loves me, I can’t be a monster.”

If you have an interesting character you want to be the hero but seems passive, you could try and give them a goal, or follow In the Flesh, and pick another character whose struggle mirrors the interesting character, one that directly involves them, and allow this other character to become the hero and drive the story. Once this new hero has a revelation and changes, the interesting character might get a glimpse of change themselves, and the world might change to one where they can live, even if that change is a small as a sister’s love.

Getting an Idea Through Re-Writes

I spent the last few weeks writing a two-minute film, but gradually, through re-writes, I saw it morph into a longer, deeper, and hopefully more interesting piece. I had to rely on my own reactions to the script as my usual writing group were busy with their master’s scripts, but I did make some interesting observations, summarised as a sort of self-review guideline at the end of this post. It reminded me of the importance of re-writes, but also how not assuming you know what you’re writing at the start (ten-minute short, sixty-minute drama, feature) can give you the flexibility to develop the best possible story from your initial idea.

My film focused on a fussy guy at a new year’s party who struggles to find a girl to kiss before the countdown ends, and can't even get a kiss from a granny in the end, the joke being that the granny could’ve been good for him. I thought it was a fun idea, but once it was written, I found it really dull.

I wondered if I had too much going on, until after I had written an article about empathy, I realised it was boring because I had no empathy for the main character. He objectified women and got what he deserved; not a character I could follow or feel anything for.

For draft two, I made the hero insecure about the way he looked, which made him a bit of a cliché geek up against a handsome lad, but it did make for a more interesting read. This version came crashing down, however, because the story of a guy trying and failing to get a kiss became repetitive and unsurprising. I made him kiss the old woman in the end, but it didn’t mean anything. A guy struggles to get a kiss, and gets one, and that was about it.

I remedied this by focusing on what was interesting, which to me, was an older woman in a nightclub. I fleshed out her character, focusing on her strengths and weaknesses, and made the story about the hero (Chris) having a relationship with this older woman (Linda), but had Chris worried about being with her because of what his family and friends might think. Chris kissed another girl in an attempt to move on from Linda, and Linda saw him and ran into the bathroom, where Chris came in to apologise. It felt nice to set it in a small location after an event had occurred, and allowed me to surprise the audience when Linda opened the cubicle door and revealed her age.

Thanks to feedback from a trusted friend, I realised my theme was unsatisfying. Linda had to stop partying so hard, and in the end, became friends with Chris, which was basically saying when you get old you can’t act young or have a relationship with your true love if they’re too young for you.

My final version had Chris too afraid to reveal his true self to the world (and thus clubs to meet girls when he’d rather be out hiking and writing poems) and therefore is unable to accept being with Linda, and ends with a revelation that if he did have Linda, he wouldn’t be alone.

My final problem was even though Chris realises his true fear is being alone, he was still too afraid to choose Linda over friends and family. I ended up playing off the 'Linda-as-older' idea that she'd been clubbing so hard (in an attempt to not become what she perceived as a 'dull old-person') that she became exhausted and fainted. Chris realised he couldn't live without Linda and openly loved her at the end. It felt good, but I had trouble bringing in this new element without having set it up, and it made me wonder where to open the film.

It’s great to have flexibility, but there comes a time to decide upon the best path to take. I’m not sure how interesting it’d be if I began at the start of their relationship, and really I'm just starting to get the idea, but re-writing the script has shown me what has and hasn’t worked, and brought it to the point where I feel I have something to say. So if you feel you have an idea worth telling, tell it, but don’t be afraid to change and re-write.

Gareth’s Self-Review Check-list

• If your script is dull, perhaps it’s because we have no empathy for your hero.
• If your story feels unsurprising or unsatisfying, perhaps you’re being repetitive or aren’t expressing a theme.
• Perhaps you can find a theme by focusing on what is interesting in your story.
• Shorts work well with fewer locations, when they start after an event has occurred, and are really interesting with a ‘surprise’ at the end (although one organic to the story).
• Have you thought about the resolution of your story, and what it might mean?
• Have you introduced a rouge element half-way thorough? Perhaps it needs to be set-up to not confuse the audience and create anticipation e.g. if we knew Linda was suffering from exhaustion, it would play out the whole scene until she faints.

Iron Man 3: Review

Iron Man 3 is built much like Tony Stark’s machines; it generally blasts super-power and awe, but on a few occasions, it flies into a wall and blows into smithereens.

Read the rest of my views on this latest kiddified yet dark-enough instalment of the Iron Man series on Yuppee Mag.com

Do You Know the Story of Each of Your Characters? See the Benefits in Nordost

"On Wednesday October 23, at 9:05PM, 42 Chechens attacked a theatre in Moscow. They interrupted a performance of the musical Nord-Ost and took the entire audience hostage."

A piece of paper handed me by one of the young actors set the stage for this hugely gripping Company of Angels and Salisbury Playhouse theatre play, but despite its blockbuster feature film sound, it’s told on a static set through three monologues. It shows how inventive theatre can be, but more interesting, from a scriptwriting perspective, shows how knowing the journey of each of your main characters, and considering fresh perspectives, can help you write a better story.

Nordost follows the attempt of a Chechen leader to use young women who lost their husbands in the struggle, known as black widows, to hold hostage a theatre until Russian troops pull out of Chechnya. The three monologues are from the point of view of Olga, a lady who treats her husband and nine year-old daughter to the family musical, Tamara, a doctor whose daughter is in the theatre with a friend, and Zura, one of the black widows.

It gets off to a choppy start as each character introduces life before the event, but when it becomes clear that each is heading towards the theatre, the monologues rapidly cross-cut to a spectacular midpoint where the terrorists take over, and things go from bad to worse.

Although it’s dramatic to see victims endure their ordeal, it’s Zura who really brings Nordost together. It’s her story and follows her change from loving death to loving life. She’s less driven by revenge for her husband than she is her desire for the terrorist leader, who takes a liking to her when he asks her to remove her Burka so he can take a look at her skin. She’s thrown into a dilemma when her nerves take over before the event, and gradually starts to question the raid when she befriends Olga and admires her courage with which she protects her family and others, and gradually, after a betrayal from the leader during the final siege, she manages to escape. It’s tragic as we know she’ll be on the run forever, but she wants to repent for her sins and embrace life, and there's hope she’ll find peace in the future.

The end was once again choppy as we followed the resolution for each character, but there was something interesting in the depth of knowing the ins and outs of each journey. I felt empathetic and didn’t want anything bad to happen to any of them, creating real moral grey areas, making the play more about inherent evil in the world, and the impact of war on individuals and how it can drive them to extremes.

Even more impressive was the choice to tell the story of one of the black widows. It could easily have been told from the point of view of Russian forces and their attempt to save the hostages, making the terrorists cardboard cut-out evil. Instead, it made Zura the protagonist and showed us how she was lured into this by another, misguided and misled, grappling with loss, anger, her place in her community, and its moral and psychological implications.

When writing a story, don’t just know your characters, like favourite hair products and breakfast cereals, know their stories. Tell us how they change. Even Olga changes from bubbly to vengeful and bitter, a great mirror to how Zura starts the story. Think also about whose point of view it would be more interesting to follow. What would happen if we focused on the criminals rather than the heroes? The victimiser than the victim?

Check out Nordost until Saturday 27th at Salisbury Playhouse, 7-8 May at the Egg in Bath, and 14-15 may at North Wall, Oxford. Nordost is written by Torsten Buchsteiner.

A Leap or a Tiptoe of Faith? The Artist’s Way, Check-In – Week 12

I’ve reached the end of the Artist’s Way, and feel bad for not posting this a few days ago. I hope this isn’t a sign of things to come; a decline in creativity and positive action. I’m sure it’s not, but this is how I feel as I reach not only a close to this great programme, but my masters as well. It’s as if all these doors are closing, which of course means many new ones are set to open, but like the focus of this week, I need to regain a sense of faith and trust all will be okay.

There are many competitions I’d like to enter, such as the Little Pieces of Gold Writing showcase, and I’ve recently found many opportunities through Ideas Tap, Literature Works and BBC Writer’s Room. I saw how much I could do and forced myself to come up with as many ideas as possible, but ended worried I’d never have a great idea again, if even I had already.

Cameron talks about the gestation period for ideas. That we must allow these ideas to grow in the dark before we force them out into the open. I took a few deep breaths and stepped back from my blocking pattern and took myself a little lighter, and soon, away from my computer and notebooks, I found new perspective and came up with a story I think in time could work.

It’s okay to mull on the page, says Cameron, and comments on the value of hobbies as a way to find inspiration. Since following this course, I’ve allowed myself to sign up to the Ramblers, a Tai Chi class, and this weekend I’m doing walk leader training. Through all these things, I have a greater chance to cultivate ideas than I do staring at my computer. I've started a report about the process of writing my script, and after staring at my machine for hours it feels like I have blinkers on. Perhaps if I go for a meditation or practise my Tai Chi, I’ll find the distance I so desperately need to get into a creative, fun having mind.

It’s all about succumbing to the great creator and trusting we’ll get there in the end. Slaving away for hours till numb does nothing for creativity, as much as we hope it might. We get the creative spark through fulfilling our desires, something I’m working to change as I look to the future.

I’d like to go travelling, but I think I’m afraid of failure or coming home poor. If this were a movie I’d need a shove out the door, at least I would if I thought I had to take a drastic step. A leap of faith sounds terrifying, and I think in reality it’s about a tiptoe of faith. Despite being unsure if I want to travel, I’ve gone for a meeting at a local school and secured a week’s worth of work experience to see if teaching abroad is the thing for me, as well as having researched countries and course providers. I didn’t wake up one morning and say, I’m off, boom. Instead, I listened to my intuition and took little steps as they came. Before I know it I’ll be in Taiwan thinking, “urm, excuse me, how did I get here?” I had a similar, surreal, suddenly in the moment awakening when I slept my first night in New Mexico. It’s a sign of the little steps you’ve taken, and a new adventure is your reward.

I’ve thoroughly enjoyed my journey along the Artist’s Way and will keep up morning pages and artist dates. I get anxious still, but can now identify what’s going on before I get too worked up. I hope I’ll get more scenes staged and find time to enter some competitions, but whatever happens, I vow to believe in myself, and go forth with excitement and anticipation for what comes next.

Has anyone else followed the Artist's Way or a similar course? How was it for you?

This article is based on my experiences from following Julia Cameron's, The Artist's Way, a twelve week course designed to help blocked artist's rediscover their creative selves. 

The World's Most Irritating Movie Baddies

Have you ever watched a film thinking it could really go some place, when a really annoying character comes on and you almost audibly boo them off the screen? Maybe it's just me, and as much as I love to watch a character do something really bad but still find myself drawn to them, I'd rather not spend a few hours with someone I'd like to punch in the nose. There are so many great baddies throughout movie history, and this article takes a look at why some work, and some really don't.

Read the full article on Yuppee Magazine.

Theatre Writing South West – The Art of Adaptation Workshop

The Salisbury Playhouse was buzzing with creative minds during Saturday’s latest workshop from Theatre Writing South West. Both new and established creatives came for a series of lectures and workshops on developing and adapting stories, with a networking event, and hot drinks and lunch bundled into an intense, yet highly rewarding and informative day.

Playwright Nell Leyshon gave a speech about the benefits of developing stories across multiple formats, and discussed the different features of novels, radio and theatre.  She put emphasis on working out what kind of a writer you are, whether you write alone or devise ideas with others, and suggested no play be entirely written in a vacuum. She encouraged writers to think about their scenes visually, for example, she uses A3 charts with boxes for key theatrical moments, which she adds to in later versions. Her session ended with the group considering the challenges of adapting the short story, Ashputtel to the stage, which revealed a bad habit of writers using narration and other non-visual cheats to get out of problems, and once again emphasised her point on developing more story through visuals.

The Playhouse’s creative director, Gareth Machin, spoke on his keenness for new writing, which he feels will allow him to stage something more modern about the issues of today. He favours unique pieces that stand up on their own, and gets excited when he has to adapt moments that are seemingly impossible to stage.

A session of speed-networking had delegates darting between tables and discussing what they’d like out of theatre and skills they can offer. It was great not just for finding out about initiatives, like pop-up venues and fringe theatre groups, but for working out what it really is you want out of theatre, and discovering useful skills you might not have thought you had.

It was interesting to hear from Paul Milton, creative director at the Everyman theatre in Cheltenham, and his challenges staging Nick Dark’s adaptation of Laurie Lee’s, Cider with Rosie. Paul was unable to show the darker side of the original piece as his hands were tied by the Lee family. These restraints are often something we don’t consider as writers, and perhaps emphasises Nell’s point that adaptations require more collaborative development.

The day closed with Rebecca Manson-Jones and her work-in-progress adapting Henrik Ibsen’s, An Enemy of The People into a modern day setting (which I was interested to hear was the inspiration behind Spielberg’s Jaws). Her final advice on writing a compelling story made for a nice close; “Show me a story with people affected by the world in which we live.”

I got a much needed confidence boost after hearing from all these passionate, creative people. Nell reassured us not to take writing so seriously; we don’t necessarily need any formal training, just the willingness to write every day. With people willing to collaborate, opportunities for performances in theatres and pop-up venues, and producing theatres keen to support new writing, it’s certainly an exciting time to be a part of the theatre scene.

You can find out more about Theatre Writing South West on their blog page

Going Against The Grain; How To Embrace An Artistic Life. The Artist’s Way, Check-in – Week 11

I felt good this week. I’d hit the nail on the head when thinking about creative blocks, and started to regain a sense of self-belief through affirmation. This week focused on accepting who we are, and being brave enough to be ourselves in the face of the opinions of others and society. It’s about believing in yourself, your dreams and lifestyle, regardless how irresponsible you might feel.

We live in a success driven world, at least that’s how I feel when I tell people I’m a writer. “What have you written? Isn’t that hard? I hear only people with connections get in?” The concept of getting in suggests you can’t be a writer until you have films commissioned. Talking about the difficulties is about a business plan, and if you don’t have one, why even try? I know writing is more than typing away at a secluded desk, and we need to gather connections to get films made, but did anyone say we need to do this overnight?

In job applications, you need to specify your skills and how you’ve used them to make a difference. This makes me feel I need to win competitions if I’m to call myself a writer, and instantly sparks up doubt. If I’ve not won anything, perhaps I’m no good. Perhaps I should call it a day and find a responsible job with a clear path to the top of the career ladder?

And where is this top, I ask? As a creative, whenever I finish a project, no matter how good or how bad, I’m left with a sense of dissatisfaction. There are other ideas to write and new things to try. Cameron calls artists spiritual sharks; we need to keep on swimming or else we die. If we take the career ladder notion, then how does it apply, for surely at the top there only more rungs to climb? Perhaps then, a creative life is not about a business plan, but the lifestyle we enjoy as we do that which we love.

This week helped me find things I enjoy and embrace my life, warts and all. I looked over changes I’d made on the Artist’s Way, and noticed I’ve started listening to classical music and film soundtracks. I’ve identified people I like to be around, and people I don’t. I’ve realised my urge to travel is real and needs to be embraced. And how have I done this? Through morning pages, artist dates, and the other exercises of this course. What lies at the root of these exercises is the ability to listen to my inner-child. To focus on me and what I like.

Affirmations have been the key to allowing me to be myself. I’ve posted them all around my Story Fort (my workstation), and most key to these past few weeks have been the words, “I get what I enjoy out of my writing, and that’s what makes it great.” It reminds me true greatness comes not from awards or glory, but through embracing my passion. Of course, films are made to entertain and inspire others, but I believe the key starts here. If I allow myself to re-work and re-write ideas and stories, embrace my artist and say what I have to say with true passion, then perhaps the story, script, play, will have something that audiences can enjoy.

This article is based on my experiences from following Julia Cameron's, The Artist's Way, a twelve week course designed to help blocked artist's rediscover their creative selves.

Before I Set Out; a Poem

Following my journey along the Artist's Way, I've started to allow myself to write more poetry. I mostly write single stanzas at the moment, but perhaps I'll develop some longer pieces soon. This poem is inspired by my weekly walks and my love of tea. 





Before I Set Out

I bow the laces on my boots and pack
Essential kit; a flask of water, a map,
An extra layer and coat, and most of all,
A flask of tea to warm my spirits
And bring me safely home.

Creative Blocks; The Artist’s Way, Check In – Week Ten

What is a creative block? In The Artist’s Way, Julia Cameron suggests work, alcohol, sex; anything to prevent us from facing the page. I never thought drinking with friends was a block, until I wondered if I aimed for a next day hangover to give myself a day free from writing.

This week was particularly hard for me as I freaked out about the value of my writing and desperately sought jobs to help me feel secure and successful, but after working though the exercises, I was back on track with some ground-breaking insights into why I sometimes pick up a creative block.

I started the week in a stupor about money and damned my writing. “This is so irresponsible,” I thought, “I really have to get my act together.” I wanted a back-up plan and a more secure career, something to support me and prove my greatness to others, a quick way up the ladder to success. I’m not actually all that competitive, but I do get jealous of other peoples successes and sometimes get angry at artists who're happy to get on with their creative work. It’s a defence mechanism. I’m not mad at them, but rather at myself for lacking the self-confidence to get on with my art.

I think it's okay to be sure of our abilities and rave about our latest ideas, as often it’s not us raving about how clever we are (although for some, it might be) but us getting excited about our art. This is passion. Happy, unblocked artists are happy to create till the cows come home and call themselves artists no matter what people think or how successful they are. It's like a musician friend once told me; "you can't please everyone," but you can certainly please yourself.

My desire for success stems out of a need for a success to hide behind. If I work in a pub, this is a threat, as how can I prove to others I'm an artist? I crave something tangible to show for my hard-work, otherwise I only have my creative projects to prove it, and what if they aren't any good? What am I then? I know I can’t not have a job for however long it takes for me to go from aspiring to published (although surely it's all about the journey and not a perceived goal of glory?), but I shouldn’t worry about the work I do in the meantime. As my passion is my writing, it doesn't matter what I do as long as I write. I am an artist no matter what it looks like to others.

Creative blocks seem to pop up when we are struck with fear, but as I learnt from the documentary, Finding Joe, fear doesn't go away. We can't get rid of it, but we can act in the face of it. Write despite our money fears and our insecurities about our day jobs or how we're going to pay the bills. This is my aim for the rest of this year. To become a carefree, happy writer. To become more me!

How to Cure Procrastination and Start an Artistic Project - The Artist’s Way, Check In – Week 9

Laziness. You might feel it as a painter who puts off buying a new canvas and starting a project, or a writer with a great idea that never makes the paper. Thanks to Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way, I’ve come to re-word laziness as the fear to start, no longer damning procrastination or beating myself up when I can’t face the page, but instead recognising my hurts and healing them with compassion. 

We might sometimes flog ourselves when we don’t write in a disciplined way, as we assume other great artists do. “Look at them go, they’re so disciplined, and here I am, making my fourth cup of tea.” As much as Cameron doesn’t slate discipline, and does mention we might still rise early to create, she talks about an even greater asset; enthusiasm. As a guitarist, I remember jumping out of bed at university with a song in my head. Two hours later, I hadn’t showered, and even when I did, played for half an hour in my towel. Discipline bought out of enthusiasm is a loving, creative exercise. We create because we must! We can’t expect it every day and shouldn’t be hard on ourselves when we're not. We’re not slaving machines. It’s okay to not be so disciplined.

That is, unless we’re so paralysed by fear that we don’t start at all. 

Since those towel guitaring uni days, I’ve stopped playing. This week’s exercise had me think about why. Firstly, I entered a competition for the second year running, and got the same score, despite practising hard. I read the winner’s comments on how this was their first entry, how they didn’t prepare, and must have a natural talent. These caused hurts, but not enough to quit. I played open mic nights in Norwich, and people hated it, at least I felt. I was actually invited to come to a new musicians group, but did I? No. I harboured my failings and started giving up. I guess I was also afraid of success. What happens if this group like me? Will I have the time? I joined a band, and that fell through. It seemed all my efforts were in vain, and it was easier to quit.

Cameron calls this process, where an artist stops in their tracks after failure (and success), a Creative U-turn. It’s fear, and can cause an artist to procrastinate, call themselves lazy, and give up entirely.

Oddly enough, I can feel lazy when I do write. If laziness is fear, writing makes me afraid. I often write feeling I should do something more productive, perhaps something that pays. I’m afraid writing will cause me to starve and should buck up my ideas and start a more serious living. I also fear my writing sucks and should leave it to the pros. This was a huge revelation for me, and I’ve started to heal through affirmation, telling myself writing will support me both financially and emotionally and bring me joy if I continue, and allowed myself to do so.

We need to be compassionate to cure procrastination and start an artistic project, which means embracing our paralysing hurts, being understanding of the creative child within, and encouraging it through love and understanding. I think it’s also about allowing our artist child to be a little silly. I visualised myself at a Q+A of a film I’d written, and made a cut and stick of me at the Oscars with an award. It was a silly but fun task, just the sort of thing my artist child needed. I vow to tread softly, and look forwarding to learning about self-protection in next week’s tenth week of the Artist’s Way.

Do Little, Achieve Much; The Artist's Way, Check-in - Week 8

After a weekend away, anxiety and guilt had me geared up to write a stream of pages, when disaster struck; I fell ill. I panicked about time and fell into desperation. Thankfully, this week of the Artist’s Way was about re-working our perceptions of time to regain a sense of strength, realising how much we can achieve through baby-steps towards our goals.

I became empowered after the previous week when I discovered many opportunities to further my career, until I realised I wasn’t doing those things, and spent hours clogging my head with jobs, freelancing work and competitions, forgetting my main goal of the week; to write my pages.

That’s where the exercises came in. Julia Cameron talks of filling the form, which in essence means taking small steps to reach your goals. One exercise had me state my true goal for different projects. As a songwriter, the goal was to have an audience enjoy a performance, and as I worked back from the big goal in five years, to join a local band, the steps got smaller, open mic in three years, record songs in a year, write songs in a month, play each week, eventually reaching today; buy new strings. 

It’s about realising we don’t need to act big to get things done. I often feel I must write in order to quantify myself as a writer. I must find opportunities and I must excel and be at the top of my game, but all of this is a distraction to actual writing. 

Why do I feel this way? 

I’ve not had a commission. I’ve not had a creative job in a long time, and failing as an artist is not an option. I don’t want to be a fool or fail parental figures. The hurts I’ve built up over the years force me to dwell on what I don’t have and waste time and energy contemplating them. 

But what do I have right now? When I think this way, I realise I’ve almost finished my first screenplay, so right now, I can finish it, and tick it off the list. I’m writing a lot of blog posts at the moment, so I can keep on doing those. I may not yet have paid work as a writer, but if I keep moving forward with projects regardless, I might just find some paid work in a few years’ time. This is empowering, taking stock of what I have, celebrating it, and using it to reach new heights, eventually.

The difference between how I felt at the start of the week and how I feel now is a subtle one, but it’s about realising how much we can do to better ourselves, but not worrying about it or thinking big, but thinking what we can do now to get there soon.

I got my power back by taking life a day at a time and accepting the time I had. I reduced my task list and eliminated the distractions of job hunting and everything else to get my pages done. By filling the form, I found time to submit an entry for a workshop I previously didn’t think I had the time to do.

Filling the form gets us active and moving, and helps us do what we enjoy. I’ve not written a poem in a while out of fear and the thought I should enter competitions. If I just get on with it, and write some poems, an activity I enjoy, I’ll not only end up with a poem, but a sense of bliss. That’s what it was like when I took my artist date, which I almost missed due to my anxiety. As I finished my walk, one I’ve wanted to do for a while in a new town, I felt like myself again. I can’t really explain it, but it was a mixture of joy, excitement and peace.

I think it’s all about acceptance of our situation and our needs; we can only do so much in a day. It’s also about thinking small, that by doing very little we can achieve so much. I can become a poet with a few daily words, a musician with a few minutes practice, and a writer with a few pages. When anxiety hits, I trust I'll eventually reach my goals if I just get on with it, one baby-step at a time. 

Following on from last week, I said I’d get back into poetry, and so as promised, is my first entry, Silly Poem, to reflect my approach of fun. It's only a stanza, a small poem, for a small step.

Silly Poem

A little ditty, a poem of fun
To free the child within
And cure the pain of work not done
For boredom is a sin

Jealousy; Negative Trait or Useful Guide? The Artist's Way, Check In - Week 7

This week of my journey along the Artist's Way focused upon cherishing ourselves by doing things we enjoy, but also asked a more difficult question; can jealousy be useful, and if so, how? I realised how many interests I'd left unexplored and my need for balance between achieving my goals and nurturing myself.

Julia Cameron includes many tools throughout the journey, but one very useful tool came up this week; the jealousy map. It's a list of people who make you jealous, what of, and what steps we can take to diffuse the jealousy. In this sense, jealousy can lead to interests, activities, hobbies, careers, and lifestyles we might enjoy, but for some reason have found a reason not to do. 

When I saw a friend had added her credit with the mountain rangers on her LinkedIn profile, I was hit by a surge of jealousy. I was glad for my friend's success, but felt I was missing out. I wrote down my feeling and instantly knew what was going on. A few weeks ago I'd considered joining the UK Charity, Ramblers, but I still hadn't. I'd put it off, and told myself I'd put my name down when I had less to do (whenever that would be). To cure my jealousy, I put my name down for the Ramblers and requested to join a local walking group, countering my negative reaction with a positive action.

I've put off Tai Chi, going to the theatre, baking, doing so few things I enjoy that I'm hardly ever me. Why? Anxiety, pressure. I'm heading towards the final deadline for my masters and I'm trying to write shorts, apply for jobs, ready, study, and once in a while, live a little for me. Not that I don't enjoy writing, but after being stuck in doors at my screen all day, I do tend to find my brain a little scrambled and crave a chance to get out and be me in all the other ways that my soul desires.

As much as allowing time, it's about taking risks. Not writing for an afternoon is a risk. I could miss a deadline for a competition or a great job. There are other risks too. What if I drive all the way to the martial arts centre and I don't like anyone? What if I go to the theatre alone and people look at me funny? I liberated myself with a trip alone to the cinema this week, the first step on my mission to act in the face of my fears, and embrace the things I love.

Cameron also talks about the fear of failure. I think the perfectionist within has stopped me writing poetry. This inner critique dates back a few summers where I'd spent it practising poetry and feeling quite good about it, so good that I entered a poem into a competition, heard nothing back, and didn't write for a while after. I may not be the best poet in the world after a summer, but I still won't allow myself to try, which is something I should fix, perhaps with weekly poems (watch this space!).

It's important to cherish ourselves by doing the things we enjoy, and doing them often, but I also think it's about slowing down and taking stock of what we have, and how we feel. One activity had me stand in a sacred space. This could be anywhere; a shop, museum, gallery, or for me, a grove of trees on my latest walk. I spent a few minutes being still and found the space filled me with energy. I think it's important to step back a while each day to just be you, as I often find I can loose sight of the world around me after a day of writing. This task helped me re-connect and find a sense of peace.

The hardest task of the week was making a collage of images to represent my past, present, and future, my dreams, and images I like. I found it hard to motivate myself as I've never really been cut and stick fan, but I loved it once I got started. I only had five out of ten magazines as we tend to read everything online at home (a sign of the times) but I found plenty of images. One magazine was from my old university which worked nicely for the past, and I included lots of images of hikers and places I'd like to travel to. It's now sitting proudly on my shelf as a testament to all things me.

I think, for me, a balance is needed between the time I put in to achieve my goals and connect with my true-self, even if it's work I enjoy, like writing. This comes back to my earlier post on creative workaholics, but now I can add the importance of nurturing ourselves by doing the 'me things' that make us happy. I think this could not only help us become happier in ourselves, but more active, creative, and ultimately, stronger, which is good, as next week is all about gaining a sense of strength.

As a little extra, listen to Scriptnotes Podcast episode #78 for an interesting discussion on jealousy and envy.