{"id":2754,"date":"2021-05-13T08:00:22","date_gmt":"2021-05-13T07:00:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/writersrebel.com\/?p=2754"},"modified":"2021-06-17T12:20:08","modified_gmt":"2021-06-17T11:20:08","slug":"how-to-tell-a-story-to-save-the-world-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/writersrebel.com\/how-to-tell-a-story-to-save-the-world-2\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Tell a Story to Save the World 2<\/span>Toby Litt<\/span>"},"content":{"rendered":"

This time, I’m looking at two hugely influential screenwriting manuals – Syd Field’s Screenplay<\/em> and Christopher Vogler’s The Writer’s Journey<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Through the gap between them, we see the idea of heroism emerge and start to dominate the very idea of ‘a good story’.<\/p>\n

Like all film producers say, ‘The audience needs to knows who to root for.’<\/p>\n

(If you haven’t read part 1 of the book, which explains what I’m up to, it’s here<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SCREENPLAY:<\/u><\/p>\n

THE FOUNDATIONS OF SCREENWRITING<\/u><\/p>\n

SYD FIELD<\/p>\n

1979<\/p>\n

We\u2019re going back now \u2013 back to before the resurrection of the Hero. I hate to say it, but it is a more innocent age. It was an age when very few people knew very much about the business of film-making. And it was certainly an age when almost no-one would have expected to take life-advice from the person who wrote the lines for the actors on the TV.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s easy to see why Syd Field’s Screenplay<\/em> was so influential \u2013 perhaps \u201cformative\u201d would be more accurate \u2013 in its time, and just as easy to see why it has been so completely superseded.<\/p>\n

The screenwriting manuals that have followed seem to say a lot more, and they say it more get-atably, often more schematically. (Field is, in retrospect, almost comically light on diagrams, and his diagrams are comically simple.)<\/p>\n

John Yorke’s Into the Woods <\/em>contains the gist of Screenplay<\/em>, but it doesn\u2019t capture the attitude. Field\u2019s approach to writing a film is relaxed, unneurotic; you\u2019re not going to come away from Screenplay<\/em> angsting over having missed this mythological beat or not having inserted this emotional hook in the viewer. Field\u2019s view of writing is one of sincere application to the basic craft, rather than wily manipulation of the available means.<\/p>\n

I like Field. Not as much as I like Robert McKee \u2013 Field\u2019s a much more limited teacher than McKee \u2013 but I like him. He\u2019s an affable, slightly grouchy zen uncle-type \u2013 great<\/em> uncle, now.<\/p>\n

Field was a pioneer, an explorer of the territory, and shouldn\u2019t be sneered at by people who arrived in the landscape when it had paths and public conveniences. Even so, as a founding father, he had his limits. His eyesight was clear, but he was only interested in certain outstanding features. It\u2019s not that he got lost, or needed to be rescued, more that the map he brought back was fairly sketchy.<\/p>\n

Syd Field Mini-biog<\/strong><\/p>\n

Syd Field was born in 1935, in Hollywood, California. He took a B.A. in English Literature at University of California, Berkeley, in 1960. It was at the suggestion of the director Jean Renoir (Grand Illusion<\/em>, Le Regle du jour<\/em>), that he entered film school, also at the University of California. Here, he hung out with Jim Morrison and Ray Manzarek of The Doors. His early work in the film industry was for David Wolper Productions, the company later responsible for Roots<\/em>, The Thorn Birds<\/em> and Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory <\/em>(1971). Field became, in his own words, a jack-of-all trades. He published Screenplay<\/em> in 1979 \u2013 introducing the ideas of \u201cthree act structure\u201d and \u201cplot points\u201d.<\/strong><\/p>\n

If you were cynical, you might say that Field profited a great deal from of saying that stories have a beginning, a middle and an end. It shouldn\u2019t be ignored, though, that lots of wannabe screenwriters had and still have no idea what a screenplay looks like, what it should and shouldn\u2019t do. Field gave away that mystery of the craft. He let people see what the producers were arguing over when they were deciding whether or not to greenlight the project, what the actors had in their hands when they were learning their lines, and what the cinematographer and the gaffer were consulting while they were figuring out where to place the key light.<\/p>\n

Syd Field\u2019s book covers basics, and does them very well. You just always feel \u2013 at every juncture \u2013 that there is more to be said.<\/p>\n

Some of Field\u2019s virtues are negative. He\u2019s laid back rather than pushy; he\u2019s the Dude, not a Little Lebowski Urban Achiever. Screenplay<\/em> is pragmatic where Save the Cat!<\/em> is dogmatic.<\/p>\n

Screenplay<\/em> observes:<\/p>\n

When you are writing your screenplay, the plot points become signposts, holding the story together and moving it forward.[1]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Save the Cat!<\/em> gives you a direct order:<\/p>\n

Page 12 \u2013 Catalyst. Do it.[2]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And:<\/p>\n

The B story begins on page 30.[3]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It\u2019s noticeable that Field isn\u2019t ideologically pushy, either. Screenplay<\/em> wasn\u2019t written in Mao\u2019s China, but it\u2019s no a hymn to unfettered individualism \u2013 as are The Writer\u2019s Journey<\/em> and Save the Cat!<\/em><\/p>\n

Field gives practical advice about the writing life:<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re a housewife and have a family, you may want to write when everyone\u2019s gone for the day, either midmorning or midafternoon.[4]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And collaboration:<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re married and want to collaborate with your spouse, other factors are involved. When things get difficult, for example, you can\u2019t simply walk away from the collaboration. It\u2019s part of the marriage. If the marriage is in trouble, your collaboration will only magnify what\u2019s wrong with it.[5]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

He\u2019s wry:<\/p>\n

Many of my married women students tell me their husbands threaten to leave them unless they stop writing; their children turn into \u201canimals\u201d.[6]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But, as far as pushing the viewer towards individualism, Field isn\u2019t a culprit. Field doesn\u2019t deal in Heroes and Heroines. In the whole book, the word \u201cHero\u201d isn\u2019t used. Instead, Field writes about \u201cmain characters\u201d.<\/p>\n

What does your main character want? What is his or her need?[7]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

He writes declaratively:<\/p>\n

Without conflict there is no drama. Without need, there is no character. Without character, there is no action. \u201cAction is character.\u201d F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote in The Last Tycoon<\/em>. What a person does<\/em> is what he is<\/em>, not what he says<\/em>.[8]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

However, Screenplay<\/em> is still mostly about writing films with a single strong main character. Field doesn\u2019t really deal with ensemble pictures \u2013 or he dodges dealing with them. Even so, his examples are better than those of Vogler and Snyder:<\/p>\n

What about Nashville<\/em>? Is that an exception? Let\u2019s take a look. First, who\u2019s the main character of the film? Lily Tomlin? Ronee Blakley? Ned Beatty? Keith Carradine?\u2026 Joan Tewkesbury\u2026 the screenwriter\u2026 realised the main character of the film \u2013 that is, who the movie is about \u2013 is the city of Nashville. It<\/em> is the main character.[9]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Then he says:<\/p>\n

There are several main characters in the film and they all move the action forward.[10]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

He says the same of Network<\/em> (1976).<\/p>\n

The \u201cnetwork\u201d is the main character. It feeds everything, like a system; the people are parts of the whole, replaceable parts, at that. Network continues on, indestructible; people come and go. Just like life.[11]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Although he doesn\u2019t require Heroes, Field does want main characters who make stuff happen. The world, at least in his cinematic version of it, moves forwards because of individual dilemmas and decisions:<\/p>\n

Many new or inexperienced writers have things happening to their characters, and they are always reacting<\/em> to their situation, rather than acting<\/em> in terms of dramatic need. The essence of character is action<\/em>; your character must act, not react.[12]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Screenplay<\/em> doesn\u2019t seem anything like a get rich quick manual. The sale is important, but it contains nothing about pitching. Field\u2019s engagement with money is more from the moviegoer\u2019s perspective:<\/p>\n

After the lights fade, and the movie begins, how long does it take you to make a decision, either consciously or unconsciously, about whether the movie was worth the price of admission?[13]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Field includes some pages from one of his own screenplays, for an unmade film \u201cThe Run\u201d. It is sadly expository and uninspiring. I expect it encouraged some writers by being obviously out-doable.<\/p>\n

Nearing the end of the book, I felt that Field had held it together. Although he hadn\u2019t written a manual for writing pluralistic stories, he hadn\u2019t ruled them out. He was handing out the tools like a benign foreman. It was all going so well. If not anticapitalist then not rabidly pro-.<\/p>\n

And then, at the very end of the book, quite bizarrely, Field quotes a poster produced by the McDonald\u2019s Corporation entitled \u201cPress On\u201d:<\/p>\n

Nothing in the world can take the place<\/p>\n

Of persistence.<\/p>\n

Talent will not, nothing is more common<\/p>\n

Thank unsuccessful men with talent.<\/p>\n

Genius will not; unrewarded genius<\/p>\n

Is almost a proverb.<\/p>\n

Education will not;<\/p>\n

The world is full of educated derelicts.<\/p>\n

Persistence and determination alone<\/p>\n

Are omnipotence.[14]<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

WTF?<\/p>\n

In one leap, we go from humble craftsperson to divine being \u2013 simply by not losing heart between the seventh and eighth drafts?<\/p>\n

Even in his wildest moments of mythologizing, Vogler doesn\u2019t suggest the screenwriter will become a god.<\/p>\n

But, as we\u2019ll see in the next chapter, Vogler has a pretty high idea of himself.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THE WRITER\u2019S JOURNEY:<\/u><\/p>\n

MYTHIC STRUCTURE FOR STORYTELLERS AND SCREENWRITERS<\/u><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/u><\/p>\n

CHRISTOPHER VOGLER<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/u><\/p>\n

1992<\/p>\n

but also:<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A PRACTICAL GUIDE TO JOSEPH CAMPBELL\u2019S<\/u><\/p>\n

THE HERO WITH A THOUSAND FACES<\/u><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/u><\/p>\n

CHRISTOPHER VOGLER<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/u><\/p>\n

1985<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Re-enter the Hero.<\/p>\n

The theme of the hero myth is universal, occurring in every culture, in every time…[15]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In 1985, Vogler resurrected Campbell\u2019s The Hero With a Thousand Faces<\/em>. He did this in a famous seven-page memo.<\/p>\n

Vogler tells the story in a pdf he shared on his website:<\/p>\n

It was written in the mid-1980s when I was working as a story consultant for Walt Disney Pictures, but I had discovered the work of mythologist Joseph Campbell a few years earlier while studying cinema at the University of Southern California. I was sure I saw Campbell\u2019s ideas being put to work in the first of the Star Wars movies and wrote a term paper for a class in which I attempted to identify the mythic patterns that made that film such a huge success. The research and writing for that paper inflamed my imagination and later, when I started working as a story analyst at Fox and other Hollywood studios, I showed the paper to a few colleagues, writers and executives to stimulate some discussion of Campbell\u2019s ideas which I found to be of unlimited value for creating mass entertainment. I was certainly making profitable use of them, applying them to every script and novel I considered in my job.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The language here is that of the mid-eighties \u2013 \u201cunlimited value\u201d and \u201cprofitable\u201d.<\/p>\n

In 1992, Vogler expanded his memo into what is probably the single most influential screenwriting manual, The Writer\u2019s Journey: Mythic Structure for Storytellers and Screenwriters<\/em>. Since then it has gone through three distinct editions, and has just been published in a fourth \u2013 the 25th Anniversary Edition. Each new iteration looked more authoritative, and chi-chi, and more like a guide to tarot reading, than its predecessor. Each has also made greater claims for itself as a work not just for writers but for everyone seeking meaning in their life.<\/p>\n

The 2nd edition contains a Preface that walks back a number of claims made by the 1st edition. Here you can find Vogler\u2019s answers to some of the world\u2019s questions (and mine). He directly takes on the charges of \u2018Cultural Imperialism\u2019 and \u2018Gender Problems\u2019 (Sexism). But he does so in a spirit of deflect or assimilate.<\/p>\n

However, it was the 1st edition, and the 7-page memo that birthed it, that were the most influential versions of the Hero\u2019s Journey \u2013 and they are unrepentant in their championing of individualism. (Rugged American optional.)<\/p>\n

Here is where Syd Field\u2019s \u201cmain character\u201d is replaced by \u201cthe Hero\u201d capital H. Vogler doesn\u2019t write anything about ensemble pictures. The films Field chose \u2013 Nashville<\/em>, Network<\/em> \u2013 to talk about collective stories don\u2019t appear in Vogler\u2019s world-view. The implication must be that these kind of movies are outliers \u2013 a minority interest. The closest he gets to dealing with non-Heroic movies is to talk about \u201cGroup-Oriented\u201d Heroes.<\/p>\n

They are part of a society at the beginning of the story, and their journey takes them to an unknown land far from home. When we first meet them, they are part of a clan, tribe, village, town, or family. Their story is one of separation from that group (Act One); lone adventure in the wilderness away from the group (Act Two); and usually, eventual reintegration with the group (Act Three).[16]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The clear implication here is this \u2013 no separation, no story; no aloneness, no adventure.<\/p>\n

Vogler is consistently helpful, and useful, but he is always pointing you down the same narrow track: the Hero\u2019s Journey.[17]<\/a><\/p>\n

Christopher Vogler mini-biog<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong>A self-described \u2018farm boy from Missouri,\u2019 Vogler was born in 1949. He studied filmmaking at the University of Southern California School of Cinema-Television, the alma mater of George Lucas. It was here he encountered Campbell\u2019s Hero with a Thousand Faces<\/em>. \u2018There it was \u2013 the answer to what I was looking for: the unwritten rules, the super-outline that all stories appear to be connected by.\u2019 Vogler turned this into his famous memo. Since then, he has worked for Disney studios, Fox 2000 pictures, and Warner Bros. He has a moustache and looks like a weather-beaten walrus.<\/strong><\/p>\n

As with most gurus, the biggest trouble is with the followers, not the guru themselves. Many movies since Vogler\u2019s seven-page memo have been a reduction of what was already a reduction.<\/p>\n

Though Vogler is a sincere evangelist for Campbell\u2019s ideas, he seems more widely open. He wants to ask all the right questions:<\/p>\n

Where do stories come from? How do they work? What do they tell us about ourselves? What do they mean? Why do we need them? How can we use them to improve the world?[18]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

He wants to help the wannabe writer \u2013 more than that, he wants to give them the means to self-help.<\/p>\n

The Hero\u2019s Journey, I discovered, is more than just a description of the hidden patterns of mythology. It is a useful guide to life, especially the writer\u2019s life.[19]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Vogler goes quite a long way with this. He doesn\u2019t always resist the urge to present The Hero\u2019s Journey as a panacea, a cure-all. He also has an imperial urge to assimilation. This is illustrated by an anecdote he tells in the Preface to the 2nd edition.<\/p>\n

At the time Vogler\u2019s memo was becoming a force in Hollywood, \u201ctwo articles appeared in the Los Angeles Herald-Observer<\/em>\u201d. In these, an unnamed critic claimed the memo:<\/p>\n

had deeply influenced and corrupted Hollywood storytellers. According to him, lazy, illiterate studio executives, eager to find a quick-bucks formula, had seized upon the \u201cPractical Guide\u201d as a cure-all, and were busily stuffing it down the throats of writers\u2026[20]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Vogler\u2019s initial reaction was to be \u201cflattered\u201d but \u201cdevastated\u201d.<\/p>\n

I had thought about challenging the critic to a duel (laptops at twenty paces) but now reconsidered. With a slight change in attitude I could turn his hostility to my benefit. I contacted the critic and invited him to talk over our differences\u2026[21]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Taking this into Campbell\u2019s Heroic language:<\/p>\n

Instead of fighting my Threshold Guardian, I had absorbed him into my adventure.[22]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Vogler never claims to take Campbell on his own terms. The Writer\u2019s Journey <\/em>is a work of applied mythology; one in which mythological\/psychological insights are put to practical use (to help make movie scripts better so they please more people so they earn more money). For there to be a wider moral behind this would be, for Vogler, ludicrous. But the moral is there anyway:<\/p>\n

All must be assimilated.<\/strong><\/p>\n

There is one story, and the one story is the story of one man.<\/p>\n

The clan, tribe, village, town, or family is in need of the cure[23]<\/a> which the Hero goes off to seek. The tribe cannot cure itself, with its own means; the tribe cannot send off a scouting party, or travel en masse (as nomads would) in order to be healed. It is only the lone Hero who can succeed \u2013 according to Campbell, according to Vogler, according to Hollywood.<\/p>\n

When this is put together with the basic Hollywood screenwriting advice to improve the scene by reinforcing the conflict[24]<\/a>, it is easy to see how the depiction of any group will tend to show them as dysfunctional. If there are more than three characters on-screen, two of them must disagree \u2013 often violently. If there six or seven, they must start bickering and fighting while time runs down. If there are a hundred or two hundred, they are likely to be a panorama of sleepwalking drones, an applauding crowd, an army of obedient slaves or a rampaging mob. The Hero, meanwhile, detaches from them to sort things out. If he didn\u2019t detach, things wouldn\u2019t be sorted out.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not difficult to see how ideological this is. In a profitably individualistic age, we are given stories of individuals. Instead of \u201cThe meek shall inherit the earth\u201d or \u201cWorkers of the World Unite\u201d we are told \u201cJust Do It\u201d and \u201cBecause You\u2019re Worth It\u201d.<\/p>\n

For Vogler, the Hero\u2019s Journey is secular. Where it inevitably tends is towards self-realisation not self-annihilation, not \u2018at-one-ment\u2019. There is no mention of the void. The cure brought back to the ailing community is not a spiritual boon, but the solution to a social problem (even if that problem is so total as to become existential).<\/p>\n

At the moment, with the Coronavirus, COVID-19, the world \u2013 collectively \u2013 is seeking a cure. There are Heroic individuals everywhere. They are not going off on individual journeys. Instead, they are working together to save as many lives as possible, to preserve the tribe, to manifest from their collective knowledge (rather than just head off and steal) the cure.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

In the next section, I look at how two more screenwriting manuals have changed our ideas of what it is to be an individual, to be a hero – and how that involves doing anything but really saving the world.<\/em><\/p>\n

You can cut to the chase here<\/em>.<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Footnotes<\/strong><\/p>\n

[1]<\/a> Screenplay<\/em>, p 122. Which doesn\u2019t work at all, as a metaphor, because signposts hold nothing together, except themselves, and move nothing forward \u2013 only point the direction something else should move or be moved. Screenplay<\/em> is a slackly written book.<\/p>\n

[2]<\/a> Save the Cat!<\/em>, p 77.<\/p>\n

[3]<\/a> Save the Cat!<\/em>, p 79.<\/p>\n

[4]<\/a> Screenplay,<\/em> p 169.<\/p>\n

[5]<\/a> Screenplay,<\/em> p 238.<\/p>\n

[6]<\/a> Screenplay,<\/em> p 170.<\/p>\n

[7]<\/a> Screenplay,<\/em> p 11.<\/p>\n

[8]<\/a> Screenplay,<\/em> p 25.<\/p>\n

[9]<\/a> Screenplay,<\/em> p 122-3.<\/p>\n

[10]<\/a> Screenplay,<\/em> p 123.<\/p>\n

[11]<\/a> Screenplay,<\/em> p 124.<\/p>\n

[12]<\/a> Screenplay,<\/em> p 161.<\/p>\n

[13]<\/a> Screenplay,<\/em> p 71.<\/p>\n

[14]<\/a> Screenplay<\/em>, p 256.<\/p>\n

[15]<\/a> “A Practical Guide to Joseph Campbell\u2019s The Hero with a Thousand Faces” by Christopher Vogler, pdf download, p 3.<\/p>\n

[16]<\/a> The Writer\u2019s Journey<\/em>, p 46.<\/p>\n

[17]<\/a> \u2018Down these mean streets a man must go who is not himself mean, who is neither tarnished nor afraid.\u2019 Raymond Chandler.<\/p>\n

[18]<\/a> The Writer\u2019s Journey<\/em>, p 3.<\/p>\n

[19]<\/a> The Writer\u2019s Journey<\/em>, p 3.<\/p>\n

[20]<\/a> The Writer\u2019s Guide<\/em>, p 4.<\/p>\n

[21]<\/a> The Writer\u2019s Guide<\/em>, p 4.<\/p>\n

[22]<\/a> The Writer\u2019s Guide<\/em>, p 5.<\/p>\n

[23]<\/a> Later on, we\u2019re going to be looking closely at World War Z<\/em>, as both book and movie. One of the reasons I chose it is because the cure in it is literal. At the climax of the film, the Hero (Gerry Lane) Brad Pitt returns with the cure. It\u2019s a lump-in-throat moment.<\/p>\n

[24]<\/a> \u201cJust as in every story a protagonist battles an antagonist in pursuit of a goal, so scenes replicate that structure\u2026 For drama to occur, a protagonist must be confronted with an equal and opposite desire. The goals of protagonist and antagonist in every scene are in direct conflict\u2026\u201d Into the Woods,<\/em> p 91.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Toby Litt<\/strong>\u00a0has published novels, short story collections and comics. His most recent book is\u00a0Patience<\/em>, a novel. He runs the Creative Writing MFA at Birkbeck College, and blogs at www.tobylitt.com. He is a member of English Pen. When he is not writing, he likes sitting doing nothing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This time, I’m looking at two hugely influential screenwriting manuals – Syd Field’s Screenplay and Christopher Vogler’s The Writer’s Journey. Through the gap between them, we see the idea of heroism emerge and start to dominate the very idea of ‘a good story’. Like all film producers say, ‘The audience needs to knows who to […]<\/p>\n

Read More… from How to Tell a Story to Save the World 2<\/span>Toby Litt<\/span><\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":2773,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[389,50,400,392,388,390,391,393],"yoast_head":"\nHow to Tell a Story to Save the World 2 - Writers Rebel<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/writersrebel.com\/how-to-tell-a-story-to-save-the-world-2\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How to Tell a Story to Save the World 2 - Writers Rebel\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"This time, I’m looking at two hugely influential screenwriting manuals – Syd Field’s Screenplay and Christopher Vogler’s The Writer’s Journey. 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