Sarah's Spiels: Screenwriting: Story Structure Paradigms and Beat Sheets

In class this week we examined a beat sheet, treatment and a draft script and talked about the differences between them. This also meant we could clearly see the development of the story and how plot points were carried across and developed further.

Beat Sheet:

Plotting out significant narrative plot points
Only really seen by writers- working document for personal use
Generally is the first step in the script development process
Rough, incoherent- not intended as a work of art
Repository for your creative ideas

Step Outline:

Ideally still a working document for personal use
Fleshed out plot ideas into coherent prose
Each paragraph is its own scene

Treatment:

Formatted- generally 12pt Courier/ Arial/ Times New Roman
Coherent prose. Descriptive
Consider to be the 'sales' document. Will be shown to stakeholders.

Synopsis

Sometimes called an 'Outline'
A summary/ overview of the story
Basic, bare-bones, story coverage

Scripts are usually developed in a logic process; from Beat Sheet, Step Outline, Treatment, Synopsis, Draft Screenplays -until they are finalized. As an exercise we attempted a basic Beat Sheet and Step Outline using our original character and basic story.

While we defined the beat sheet as a rough, bullet pointed summary of key ideas and plot points some screenwriters have different ideas about this and use a different approach to script development.

Two examples are Blake Synder's 'Save the Cat' and John Truby's '22 Building Blocks', which can be simplified to 7 Steps.

John Truby:

John Truby draws from Joesph Campbell (the Hero's Journey) to create the 22 Building Blocks, which loosely follows the 3-Act Script.

"A key concept of Truby’s technique is that plot is what the Character does while the Character is defined by his actions. Essentially, the plotline is the result of the Hero’s (Protagonist’s) actions movtivated by his internal need and an external desire or goal. It’s the classic story structure and in his works, Truby applies his structure to a number of successful classic films "

The Twenty-Two Building Blocks:

Act1

Self-Realization, Need, Desire
Ghost & Context
Problem/Need
Inciting Incident
Overall Desire (start low)
Ally/Allies
Opponent/Mystery
Opponent/Ally
1st Reversal & Decision: changed desire & motive

Act 2

Plan
Opponent’s Plan & 1st Counter Attack
Drive
Attack by Ally
Apparent Defeat
2nd Reversal & Decision: obsessive drive, changed desire & motive
Audience revelation about opponent-ally
3rd Reversal & Decision

Act 3

Gate, Gauntlet, Visit to Death
Battle
Self-Revelation/Thematic Revelation
Moral Decision
New Equilibrium

7 Steps:

While the Twenty-Two building blocks can be seen as the overall structure and format of the film, the seven steps can be seen as the characteristics within that story.

Truby claims that all stories have these seven characteristics:

Weakness and need: a hero with a weakness and a need
Desire: the backbone of the story that drives the hero …notice that the desire, the want, isn't the same as the “need”
Opponent: this character, often the antagonist, must go against the protagonist by wanting the same thing
Plan: heroes who want something need a plan of action
Battle: when the story boils to a crisis
Self-revelation: here the hero realizes what he wanted wasn't what he needed…..I want to say this again, The hero wants something but he realizes that what he wanted wasn't what he needs
New equilibrium: with the new knowledge the world changes for the character

Blake Snyder:
In Blake Snyder's book 'Save the Cat', he broke the 3 act script into a 'beat sheet' with 15 key story 'beats' (pivotal events that had to happen) and labelled these with a page number- specifying when in the film each should take place.

Project Title: Genre: Date:
1	Opening Image	The first thing you see; sets tone, style and mood of the movie
5	Theme Stated	A statement like “Love is more important than money”. Usually made by a character other than the hero. This is called the thematic premise.
1-10	Set-up	All character in the A story should be introduced within the first 10 or 12 pages. Indicate the character arc to come, what the hero wants or needs etc.
12	Catalyst	A life changing event that propels the hero out of the comfort zone and confronts him with the need to act in order to restore the balance
12-25	Debate	Sometimes the hero has a choice after the catalyst event, sometimes not. In any case, the pages between catalyst and break into act two should show how daunting the task ahead is, for example by having the hero struggle with the decision or show how he and/or others hesitate face the unavoidable.
25	Break into Two	Major changes take place on all level as the movie progresses from the ordinary world into the world of the adventure. At the heart of the change is the hero’s decision to act.
30	B Story	It’s not entirely clear what the B story is really. In most screenplays, Snyder says, it’s the love story. The B story gives the viewer a breather after the abrupt break into act two. Characters of the B story don’t necessarily appear in act one. Snyder says ‘the B story does a lot’, but not how it contributes to plot and character arcs. Anyway, it starts on page 30.
30-55	Fun and Games	The story begins to develop, based on the setup until here. This part is lighter in tone, because the heavy work of introducing characters and situations has been done. (Writing this part might be less fun than watching it, though.)
55	Midpoint	This can be an up-point where the hero is seemingly at his peak or a down-point where everything around him sees to crumble. However, both peak (victory) or low (defeat) will be false. The dynamics of the film change. Fun and games are over. It’s back to the story now. Matching beat: All Is Lost (75).
55-75	Bad Guys Close In	If the midpoint was a high (false victory) then the bad guys regroup. The book says nothing about the case that the midpoint was a low (false defeat) but it seems clear that the hero gathers new strength in this case while the bad guys consolidate and prepare for the final attack.
75	All Is Lost	The hero reached the end of her wits, often facing death in one way or another.
75-85	Dark Night of the Soul	Expands on the hero’s dilemma. How does he feel about it? How does he react? Will he accept the situation? Will he break? Is there a solution?
85	Break into Three	Based on all previous development in both A and B story a solution is found that now needs to be implemented.
85-110	Finale	The lessons learned are applied. The bad guys are defeated in ascending order. The finale ends with the hero’s triumph.
110	Final Image	The last thing you see. The opposite of the opening image, reflecting the development and outcome of the movie. proof of change.

My Thoughts:

When comparing the two paradigms there are quite a few differences between each approach. John Truby's 'Twenty-Two Building Blocks' are centered more around the character and the inner motivations and changes that character experiences. This paradigm builds from the characters need, desire or realization, and build from here through the actions and conflicts they encounter. This is made more obvious by the '7 Steps'- which all focus on character. The approach is less formulaic, while things are still arranged in terms of Act structures they are looser than the page by page breakdown that Blake Snyder suggests.

Blake Snyder's Beat Sheet seems more focused on a theme or lesson to be learnt (or forced upon) by the character than the character's own journey, and the story is moved along purely by this need, and the specific events that 'must' happen.

I probably don't respond so well to this format because is seems more like the structure is in place simply to push an agenda or moralistic lesson. It is a very formulaic approach, which can make things even more predictable. Putting my own response aside this is probably a useful tool but I think that it can easily be abused if people just try to shoehorn story ideas into this formula.

References:

"John Truby's 22 plot building blocks" (2011). http://iconoclasticwriter.com/john-trubys-22-plot-building-blocks/

"The seven key steps of story structure". (2010). https://markmcbride.wordpress.com/2010/05/07/the-seven-key-steps-of-story-structure/

P, Sunderman. (2013). "Save the movie". http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2013/07/hollywood_and_blake_snyder_s_screenwriting_book_save_the_cat.html

"3 acts or what?". (n.d.). http://www.trilane.com/texts/paradigms/paradigms.html