Blake Snyder’s ten “genres” and fifty “subgenres” in his Save the Cat books are my single favorite tool for screenwriters.  I have long believed that studying this system of story types, and making sure each script you write clearly fits within one of them, is one of the most important and helpful decisions a writer can make.

It seems to me that pretty much every good and successful movie does have the key elements of one of these ten genres, and really squarely fits within one of them.  When I see movie trailers, or read loglines of scripts that sold, or just go to the movies, I constantly see endless new variations on these.  And it’s usually crystal clear which type of story is on offer.

In my script consulting work, when I read scripts that I think have significant conceptual issues (which is pretty normal), one of the key problems is virtually always that there is not a clear, compelling and difficult enough story problem and goal for the audience to get behind.  And that’s what these ten genres offer — ten specific types of viable story problems and goals which have worked over and over again, in all the best movies, with near infinite potential variations.

We writers tend to resist “formulas”, and rightly so.  But we also know that some stories work and some don’t — meaning, some basic story concepts seem to be able to engage an audience enthusiastically, and some don’t.  To me, understanding the reasons for this is key to learning how to create ones that do.  And I know of no other, handier system for thinking about what kind of story you’re really trying to tell, and what great movies from the past also fit the same tradition.  (I know it probably sounds like the Save the Cat people are paying me to say this, but I swear they aren’t!)

On the Save the Cat website, there’s a handy chart breaking down each of the genres and subgenres, with lists of titles that Blake Snyder felt fit within each type, plus the three main criteria for a story in each genre.  For instance, the genre he calls “Dude with a Problem” always focuses on an “Innocent Hero,” who, after a “Sudden Event,” finds themselves engaged in a “Live and Death Battle” — that takes the whole rest of the movie to resolve.  As in Die Hard, The Bourne Identity or, in a very different subgenre, Apollo 13.

For the top listed title under each subgenre, Blake also offered a full “beat sheet” for the movie in his great reference book Save the Cat Goes to the Movies.

Since Mr. Snyder is no longer with us, I have taken the liberty of adding more titles to this master chart, as they occur to me — including newer movies that have come out since his passing, such as Bridesmaids, The Hangover, Twilight, Enchanted, An Education, Temple Grandin and Up.

So check out my modified version of this pdf, where you’ll see little “sticky notes” under most of the subgenres, containing additional titles that to me, show how these genres continue to power the most popular and best-loved stories that make it to theaters.  (Hovering over the sticky note icons should be enough to reveal the additional titles.)

And of course, feel free to comment if you disagree on where I place certain titles!

The post Finding the right genre appeared first on flying wrestler.

I’m teaching my first class at UCLA Extension Writers Program this fall, on adapting true stories into feature screenplays. It will be a ten-week online class, available from anywhere.  I’ll be using the Save the Cat books to help writers identify the proper genre for their adaptation of something historical, and its “beat sheet” as a method of arriving at their own unique take on the “story’ within the true facts.

I took classes at this program myself in the early stages of my career, and am excited about joining the faculty there myself. They bill themselves as ”the largest open-enrollment creative writing and screenwriting program in the nation.”  (Probably in the world, actually.)

My instructor bio page is now up — more details on the specific class as it gets posted on their site…

The post Teaching at UCLA appeared first on flying wrestler.

Script Magazine has published my new article delineating the two types of stories on television — “procedural” and “personal” — which are easy for writers to get confused by.

It’s being posted on their website in connection with my upcoming April 3 webinar for The Writers Store on “What Makes a Great TV Idea? Learn What Hollywood Looks for in a TV Idea and Pilot Script”.

Reservations for this 90-minute audio/powerpoint class at 1 PM Pacific next Wednesday are available through The Writers Store for $59 until Sunday, and $79 after that.  Even if you can’t attend live, they will send it to you after the fact to watch/listen at your leisure.

Here’s an excerpt from the article:

I used to lament the fact that so many network series focus on cops, lawyers, and/or doctors. I tried pitching and developing multiple series about other kinds of workplaces. I felt, like many aspiring television writers do, that there are many different kinds of job challenges that could make for compelling television.

But in my years of doing it professionally – selling some ideas, but having many others be batted down by executives, producers, or my own agents – I’ve learned some things. And one of the chief lessons is that “work responsibilities” generally can only drive stories and series concepts for certain kinds of occupations.

The kind of jobs that can do this generally have two specific qualities. The first is that they are heroic: they involve doing something for others. The stakes of a typical story are not just friends and family, but society at large. The show’s regulars are involved in protecting, helping and/or fighting for humanity, beyond their personal sphere.

The second quality is that the nature of their work consists of… (read the rest on Script Magazine’s site)

The post The Two Types of TV Stories appeared first on flying wrestler.

Loglines describe a movie (or series) idea in a quick sentence or two that provide enough of an idea of what it’s about to (hopefully) seem like a grabby, fresh and commercially viable concept.  They present a compelling situation for characters one can imagine audiences caring about.  And they lay out a central challenge to solve that situation which sounds really difficult, and entertaining to watch.

Basically, people who hear the logline should think, “I’d like to see that!”  It should be obvious that it’s a good idea, and clear what the idea is.  There should be enough there that they can really picture the story.  They shouldn’t need to ask a bunch of questions to understand what you’re talking about.  They should instantly “get it.”

This is not easy to do – especially with ideas that have some sort of fantastical underpinnings that have to be explained, before a reader or listener can grasp how it all works, and why.  Traditionally those “rules” need to be laid out first, in such an idea, for people to be able to buy into what’s being pitched.

But even with non-fantastical ideas, loglines can be a struggle for writers.

The real difficulty, though, is not in crafting those couple of sentences to describe a script that’s been written.  It’s in making sure your idea is clean and workable enough – and is based on something that could be easily pitched in a logline that works – before you commit to writing it.

This is why Blake Snyder in Save the Cat recommends spending a lot of time on the concept first, and even pitching it to people to see if they get it and think it sounds good.  He would even do that with strangers, and watch their eyes as they took in and responded to his couple of sentences.

I highly recommend this – and think the biggest mistake writers tend to make is to begin to write a screenplay based on a concept that may never quite be “sellable” in a logline.  It can lead to a lot of wasted effort.  Because ultimately this central concept is where most scripts are going to live or die, in terms of moving a writer’s career forward.  It’s probably the most important part of the process – the very first part – and the hardest to get really right.  It can take lots of work, on lots of different possible ideas.  It’s worth spending the time.

The issue I see with many loglines (beyond describing a concept that maybe can’t really sell itself in this short form) – is that it’s hard to really picture the movie from them, and to really grasp what the writer is saying happens in the movie, or what its central challenge is.  This could be partly due to a misunderstanding of the function of a logline.  It’s not meant to “tease” someone and leave them wanting more, the way advertising tag lines for movies sometimes try to do to potential audiences.  The logline’s job is to clearly communicate to industry professionals the big idea behind the movie you’re proposing, so they instantly “get it.”  And you don’t get a lot of word count!  Twenty-five words, maybe.  If it will fit in a tweet (140 characters, including spaces), even better!  If it sounds great at that length, people will want to read more.  If it doesn’t, they probably won’t.

Basically, a producer or executive looking at a logline wants to be able to imagine the poster, the trailer, the audience, and the genre.  They want to be able to see how this idea clearly fits a certain type of movie that tends to work with audiences – and that it’s a unique and engaging variation on that.

A good logline include includes three basic elements:

1.  A very quick sense of who the main character is
2. The Catalyst that sets the story in motion (their big “uh oh”)
3. The nature of the challenge they now must face, and its huge difficulty

That’s really it.

The key thing that’s often missing is number 3.  That’s really the most important thing to get across.  Great movie ideas have a “mission” of some sort for the main character, which will take the whole movie to accomplish, be incredibly difficult, and go very badly for most of the movie.  An audience is meant to become emotionally invested in this character and mission, while also hugely entertained in some way.

There might also be an “inner journey” the character goes on – an arc of growth and change.  But that is not what loglines are meant to communicate.  This is more secondary, in terms of presenting your concept to others.  It’s more implied.  The logline should not focus on what the character has to “learn”.  It should lay out what they want and what’s in the way – in terms of outer life circumstances and interactions with others – which will make people think, “What an enormously difficult and fun-to-watch challenge that sounds like!”

The post Loglines don’t tease. They tell. appeared first on flying wrestler.

A very cool new website called “Spec Scout” tracks the status of currently unproduced screenplays in the Hollywood marketplace, in a variety of categories.  It also offers aspiring writers a chance to get their work professionally evaluated and ranked — with the highest ranked scripts going up on their site for producers, executives, agents and managers to look at.

It’s the brain child of my friend Jason Scoggins.  A former screenwriters’  agent and manager himself, he has tracked and compiled information about Hollywood feature spec script and pitch sales for years — and shared the information with the world for free in “The Scoggins Report“.

His new site does a few things that I think can be extraordinarily helpful for screenwriters — and that I don’t see anyone else doing in quite this same way.  (The new services provided by the people at The Black List come close, with some key differences.)

The most obvious is that they provide a very affordable “coverage service” — where, for $147, you can get three reads of your screenplay by three separate professional readers.  You will then get to read their brief “coverage”, and see how each of them has ranked your script in ten different categories, on a scale of 1 to 5.

They don’t give you guidance and instruction on how you might improve it, or work with you to help you develop the script (you need someone like me who offers script consulting for that!).  But the price is definitely right to get a no-holds-barred sense of how people in “the industry” might view your work.

For those rare scripts that get a composite score above 68, the script’s logline, ranking and writer’s name will be publicly listed on the site as one of the “Top Unrepped” scripts (meaning, scripts with no agent or manager representing them yet).  The writer’s contact info and the script’s coverage (which includes a synopsis) will also be made available to industry professionals who are in the business of finding new material and writers (whose companies pay $19/month for a subscription to the site).

The other cool thing the site does is serve as an encyclopedic repository of information about virtually every script that is out there in the “Spec Market”.  It has separate categories for scripts that have managers and/or agents representing them, as well as scripts that have been Nicholl Fellowship finalists, or made the “Black List,” “Blood List,” or “Hit List” (each of which are industry surveys of the best unproduced scripts — most of which have been sold but not made).

It also gives updated status on each project, such as whether it’s been sold, which agents/managers represent it, what production company is attached, etc.  (In some cases, there are directors and actors attached, and the script is in production or recently produced).  And these scripts, too, have been read, ranked, and covered by the site’s staff.

Because you can see and compare the loglines for all these different scripts — from the biggest name “sold” projects, which are set up with top producers and studios, to the (for now) unrepped and unknown — I think the site performs one other key service.  It gives writers a chance to look at all these different movie concepts in logline form, and get a sense of what makes for a sell-able one (and/or a much lauded or repped one) — in every genre.

I always say the most important thing about any screenplay’s commercial marketability is the basic concept that could be expressed in a couple of sentences.  And that’s definitely what the industry judges scripts on, first and foremost.  (Though, of course, the story structure and scene writing have to be executed on a professional level, as well.)

To get to see all these concepts and compare them is a great education for any screenwriter — and something that is not available elsewhere in such an easy-to-explore format, to my knowledge.

Please let me know what you think when you check it out!

The post Spec Scout appeared first on flying wrestler.

A few years ago, screenwriter Craig Mazin wrote a blog post voicing his skepticism about “script consultants” —  titled “Screenwriting is Free“.  Craig (Identity Thief, The Hangover Part II) was advocating for aspiring writers, who he felt could be ripped off by script consultants, especially those who charge the highest rates, and/or don’t have respectable professional credits as writers themselves.

This post still comes up right away when you Google “script consultants”, because it was re-posted on John August’s (Frankenweenie, Charlie’s Angels) very popular and useful blog.  Though John disagreed with Craig about whether writers can learn from someone who hasn’t “done it” (but who perhaps professionally analyzed scripts or developed them, at some point), the post is titled “Don’t waste money on script consultants“.

My own professional arc from aspiring writer seeking guidance, to professional writer, to writer who also offers some teaching and script consulting myself, have led me to my own conclusions about the question of writers needing professional-level feedback and advice — and the costs of same.

Of course, it is totally self-serving for me to defend something that I myself do, but I also think this issue raises larger questions with relevance to everyone who writes.  And like the esteemed Messrs. Mazin and August (and the many others who commented on these posts), it turns out that I also have an opinion to offer!

When I started out, I don’t know that I had any innate “talent” (if such a thing exists) — but I had the three qualities that I think are most important — passion, openness to feedback, and persistence.  I believe if one applies those continuously, they have the best chance of arriving at a point where people will later say they have “talent”.

Now, it’s true that some writers seem to “get it” more quickly, and possess a seemingly innate ability to entertain and move readers without going through years and years of development.  But I think for most of us, it’s a lengthy process of getting better at this.

I like what Akiva Goldsman (I Am Legend, A Beautiful Mind) said at a rally during the WGA strike, about how people all his life told him he wasn’t a very good writer, and for most of the time, he wasn’t.  But eventually, because he just kept going despite that, he became “good.”

I personally think this is how it works for most of us.  And so the question is, how does one do what he did?  What are the resources needed to go from “not very good writer” with “little seeming talent” (which was definitely me when I started out) to a “professional” who obviously “has got it”?

I agree with Craig that there is no substitute for studying screenplays and movies, and doing one’s own internal self-learning through that.  But I also believe there is usually something of value to be found in most books, classes, and software like Dramatica — which are the product of people seriously studying what makes good scripts “good”.

I myself was always hungry for any information I could get (and still am) about how to do this well — because I find that it’s hard and rare to really succeed with something in this business.  It can be a lonely, cloudy path through the wilderness, and tough to quantify how far one’s work is from being marketable.  So I always appreciate when others have charted some course through the craft that can be useful to me, whether they themselves were successful writers or not.

But no matter how many workshops, classes, writers’ groups, books, software, etc. I paid for, starting out (and there weren’t that many, for budgetary reasons), at the end of the day, I desperately needed one-on-one feedback from professionals who could apply real knowledge about the craft to my individual work.  I think all writers need some form of this, including those who are already pros.

Of course, we all turn to friends and family for feedback, as well as other writers at our level of experience and success with whom we can barter free feedback —  where both parties get something of value in the exchange.  Maybe we also have a writing teacher or mentor of some sort who is willing to do some free reading and notes-giving, up to a point.

If we’re really fortunate, like I was when my career was first getting under way, we might have a manager or producer who is invested in our success — and partnered with us in such a way that giving ongoing feedback is part of their job.

But aside from those options, what are writers left with, if they want guidance from a professional who has a lot of experience and knowledge, but for whom the writer doesn’t have some kind of value exchange to offer?  If you want an experienced professional screenwriter, producer, executive, manager/agent, etc. to give you ongoing mentoring, how do you arrange that?

Obviously one option is to pay for it — if you can find someone offering such services who fits your criteria for a good “coach.”

The prices for this vary wildly.  At the low end, one can pay a “coverage service” to give a quick rating of how close your script comes to something that could move forward in the marketplace.  This will usually be from a junior-level reader/assistant who can afford to charge such a rate.

I think this can definitely be valuable, for that function — because part of what writers are hungry for is someone to tell them how well their script seems to stack up against others.  Some newer sites, like my friend Jason’ Scoggins’ “Spec Scout” or the newly revised “Black List” will “cover” your script, and also offer a chance for it to possibly be viewed by industry professionals who subscribe to their sites.

“Script consultants” tend to give deeper more extensive feedback to help the writer understand more about the craft, and improve their particular work.  The rates for this tend to be higher — with the highest being from people who have published multiple books on screenwriting.  (One of these particularly drew Craig Mazin’s ire, because of her lack of produced credits as a screenwriter herself).

Certainly it’s true that many writers who succeed never hired “script consultants”.  But I would say virtually all of those writers had access to their equivalents at some point, as I did — to augment their ardent self-study.

I do agree that it is possible to “get there” on the cheap, with only a minimal amount spent on classes, books, etc. — and nothing at all for writers groups, bartering of feedback, and one’s own immersion in understanding the craft from produced scripts.  I agree that screenwriting is, ultimately, free.  And that success in it, in theory, can also be free.  (And no “script consultant” should even hint at promising financial success, a sale, or a writing career.  If they do, I agree that you should run away from them.)

But in my experience, for most aspiring writers who are really serious about moving forward, the really cheap or free resources don’t seem to be enough.  And they don’t have access to free professional-level feedback on their work.  But they seem to benefit the most from that — where someone who has done it (professionally written, produced, etc.) applies all they’ve learned to a writer’s work in a detailed, ongoing, one-on-one way.

If a writer can afford to purchase such a service, I believe it can be the most helpful and efficient thing they can do to move forward.

That doesn’t mean all the “script consultants” out there are equally valuable, or equally worth whatever they charge.  Obviously there’s a “shopping around” component to this, and the buyer should “beware,” to some extent.

But I do think that most well-known script consultants do have something to offer.  And if the writer is really open, they can probably benefit from many of them — even if they haven’t succeeded as writers themselves, but have seriously studied the craft.  I find that most professional-level readers will have similar reactions to a piece of material from a writer, and similar reasons as to why they think it doesn’t work, or what it needs.  And if a writer is open to that, and willing and able to learn and develop, such a person can be an essential guide.

I may be biased (and of course, self-serving), but I do think other writers are probably in the best position — if they are also good teachers — to help a writer actually do this.  Because I have some well-known produced credits and a long-ish ongoing career doing it professionally, perhaps I’d fall into the small category of “script consultants” Craig Mazin would recommend, if pressed to recommend one.

But my larger point is that it can be a worthwhile exchange for serious aspiring writers to pay for objective feedback on their work from someone with a real background in the creative side of the business.  Of course, there are no guarantees.  And depending on what a writer does with that information, it might end up being a “waste,” in terms of dollars and cents.  Especially given that so few writers, proportionally, ever do end up selling their work, or being employed in the industry.

But for those that do finally break through, “script consultants” can be a tool that helped them get there.

The post Script Consultants: A Waste? appeared first on flying wrestler.

The movie that first made me think of “screenwriting” as a future career pursuit was The World According to Garp, adapted by Steve Tesich from the John Irving novel, and directed by George Roy Hill.

This was a film about an aspiring (and eventually successful) writer, who is also a wrestler.  T.S. Garp (played by Robin Williams) dreams of flying, like his father — who he never met.

I’ve re-watched this movie several times over the years, each time thinking it might not hold up for me anymore.  After all, I was in high school — in the theatre with a bunch of teenage friends — when I first saw it.

But each time, I’m moved and entertained by it again.

When it came time to pick a quirky/clever name for my blog about screenwriting, my thoughts returned to my favorite movie — and the term “flying wrestler” came to mind.

It’s also, I think, a nice metaphor for what we writers do.  It’s hard work, wrestling with ideas and material and the business.  And sometimes we feel like the guy on the left, below.

But there’s also a transcendent element to it — and a sense, at its best, of taking flight, to somewhere higher and better.  Where we feel victorious.

And so the name stuck.

The post Why “Flying Wrestler”? appeared first on flying wrestler.

My January 9 webinar for The Writers Store on “What Makes a Great Scene” is now available online through their store, for $79.

Similar to the webinars I offered on “True Stories” and “Creating Series Ideas and Writing Spec Pilots“, it’s a Powerpoint/audio program with a few questions I answered at the end — from students who were there live.

Among other things, I shared what I’ve come to understand about how to create a compelling and entertaining story from the “macro” level of concept, genre and structure, down to the “micro” level of scene – that basic unit of storytelling of which all scripts are entirely composed – which determines the level and type of emotional impact the audience will experience.

What you’ll learn:

• How “outer problems” drive stories and scenes more than “inner journeys”
• How good scenes focus on strong desires which meet unexpected conflict
• What Jerry Maguire, Pretty Woman, and The Godfather have in common
• The importance of understanding “what the audience wants to happen”
• How every scene should “change the game” of the main story problem(s)
• Why it’s best to make your main character’s thoughts and plans clear
• How Save the Cat’s genres, beat sheet and scene-card process can help
• How to describe emotional states that put the reader inside your character
• Techniques for communicating information without being “expositional”
• What great subtext in dialogue looks like, and how it improves scenes

The post “Great Scenes” webinar appeared first on flying wrestler.

An article has been posted about a talk I gave in Cleveland last month.  It even has photos!!

The post “Art of Story” in Cleveland appeared first on flying wrestler.

Script Magazine online published my article about ARGO’s use of creative license today.  Here’s how it begins:

Having adapted a number of true stories for the screen, I found myself wondering, as I watched Argo, which moments might have been created for the movie.

I guess I’m something of an apologist for Hollywood, in that I see a need to do more fictionalizing and authorial shaping of history than aspiring screenwriters usually tend to do (or lay people tend to understand).

I have found this necessary – to give true events the kind of coherent and compelling emotional build for an audience that “real life” rarely provides. In my view, audiences tend to need us writers to do this, if they are going to be as invested, engaged, and yes, entertained, as we would like them to be.

Of course, you can never tell “only truth,” in that it’s impossible to know what people actually said and did, at the microscopic level necessary for a screenplay.

But it’s also usually necessary to do significant shaping of the material as an author, if you want to grab and hold viewers. Especially when you consider they’re not showing up to see a documentary.  They want to get caught up in the emotions as if they are there, experiencing the events themselves…  Read the full article.

The post ARGO and creative license appeared first on flying wrestler.