Writing for Stage and Screen : Creating a Perception Shift in the Audience (Paperback)

List of Illustrations 1. Works of Art Teach Us How to Read Them First We Must Find a Way to See The World in Front of Us There is an Old Saying in the Theatre: The First 20 Minutes Are Free A Closer Look at The First 20 Minutes Some Advice About the First 20 Minutes Tone There is Always a Clock EXERCISE: Spend Some Time With Structured Time Attention 2. The Perception Shift Insight: The Eureka Moment Attention and Insight The Power of a Moment's Newness How Newness Drives Insight A Joke is a Small Play The Perception Shift in Three Plays: Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, The Beauty Queen of Leenane, A Streetcar Named Desire EXERCISE: Experience a Small Perception Shift in the Comfort of Your Own Home Hiding in Plain Sight 3. Theatre Is a Rhyme For Life Certainty, Meaning, and Maybe Dramatic Doubleness The Bone Violin The Bone Violin: A Fugue for Five Actors EXERCISE: Track Doubling in The Bone Violin Doubleness is Our Most Elegant Tool The Three Surfaces of Doubleness in Three Plays : A Streetcar Named Desire, Betrayal, The Beauty Queen of Leenane Systems EXERCISE: Pleats Systems and Theme EXERCISE: Tracking Systems In A Streetcar Named Desire The Ends of Plays Tend to Mirror Their Beginnings Empathy and Doubleness 4. Story and Plot Sequence = Meaning EXERCISE: Order Makes Meaning Breadcrumbs Story Is Another Word for Time How the Plot Organizes Itself Outside of Story Futurity The Double Track of Time (Non-linear plays) Plot and Story are Two Different Things Anti-Climax EXERCISE: How Your Plot Uses Story Conveniences To Sum Up Story and Plot So Here We are, Ready to Talk About the Enchantment That Is Story Vertical and Horizontal Vertical vs. Horizontal EXERCISE: Draw Two Sets 5. Choice and Consequence Why Choice Matters to the Audience The God Who Loves You - Carl Dennis EXERCISE: Tracking Character Desire The And Then, The So Then, and The What If EXERCISE: The And Then, The So Then Repeatability WRITING EXERCISE: A Five Minute Scene About Choice Choice vs. Reveal WRITING EXERCISE: Adapt A Family Story Alternative History WRITING EXERCISE: An Alternative History Play Choice and Tragedy A Tragedy is like Going Down a River There are Two Forks of the River The Sun has to Shine Breaking Bad Right vs. Right Tragedy is the Art Form of Change Tragedy is Made Out of Hope Hope as Strategy WRITING EXERCISE: The Nodes Tragedy is a Clash of Values What is it Worth? vs. What does it Mean? In-Itself Value and the Evolution of the Art Form Tragedy Is Not Simply Sad Why Do We Take Pleasure in Tragedy Characters Don't Change No Matter How Much They Want To. No Matter How Much We Hope They Will. In Comedy, People Change It's a Form of Magic The Magic of Changing Without Changing EXERCISE: Find Comedies Where People Change But it Feels Like Someone Changes in Plays That Aren't Comedies. Are You Sure Someone Doesn't Change? But If People Can't Change How Do We Change? WRITING EXERCISE: Write Three Monologues About the Same Choice from Three Different Character's Point of View 6. In Retrospect, Inevitable In Retrospect Inevitable Outcomes Not In Retrospect Inevitable Outcomes EXERCISE: Write the Last Moment of Your Play As a Sonnet Pointers Pointers are Lies that Tell the Truth The Attributes of Pointers: Systems and Pointers, Forwards and Pointers How Pointers Announce Themselves How to Write Pointers On Purpose The Atomic Throw Is an Uncertain Kitchen Foreshadowing and Misdirection Titles EXERCISE: Finding Your Title Running Gags A Play Tells the Truth, But It Enjoys Using a Lie To Tell It EXERCISE: Lies Spoilers EXERCISE: Identifying Pointers EXERCISE: Identify Pointers In Your Own Play 7. Convergence It's Never a Single Moment EXERCISE: The End and The Beginning Is Saying That Convergence is Everywhere in A Great Work of Timebound Art The Same Thing as Saying That a Great Work of Timebound Art is All Convergence? To Be Human Is To Confuse a Satisfying Story With a Meaningful One EXERCISE: Noticing Perception Shifts The Turn The Prestige Reveal and Choice Enlarging the Idea of Dramatic Event EXERCISE: The Dramatic Future The Difference Between What Happens on Stage and What Happens in the Audience EXERCISE: The Last 45 Seconds Again. Endings as Different Genres Why a Perception Shift Makes Things Weightless How Coincidence is a Form of Rhyme Open Endings Mysteries are Almost All Writers' Favorite Genre for a Reason A Small Play To Fill Us With Wonder Structure is Just What Happens in the End EXERCISE: Adapt the Climax/Convergence of a Song Hope is at the Heart of Everything in the Theatre EXERCISE: Tracking Hope Once Again: The Duck Rabbit Index