Not "What If...?"

Instead, when developing a story ask yourself "What would it be like if...?"

I just stumbled onto this. Like a gift from the Muse, or something.

I was revising the horror screenplay I'm currently working on, and this concept just sort of popped into my head. And the approach suddenly showed me the difference between a great story and a "and then this happened, and then this happened..." type of story.

It might seem like mere semantics at first, but I'll explain:

"What If...?" gets that creative ball rolling, gives us a scenario to explore. But "What If...?" is about actions, stuff happening. I love the Friday the 13th movies (well... Parts 1-4, 6 and X), but I wouldn't call them great movies. "What if Tommy goes to Jason's grave to make sure he's really dead, but accidentally brings Jason back to life?!" Great idea and very fun movie. But Poltregiest and The Exorcist are both better films and a hell of a lot scarrier.

And I believe the reason for that is because Friday the 13th Part 6: Jason Lives answers the question "What if...?" well enough, but fails to answer the question "What would it be like if...?"

"What would it be like if your daughter were possessed by a demon?" It would be like The Exorcist. "What would it be like if your house were inhabited by violent spirits?" It would be like Poltregeist.

"What Would It Be Like If...?" seems to inherently draw the writer into the visceral experience of his scenario. And I would argue that this is what effective stories do, too.

And it makes sense that professional writers wouldn't think to make this distinction when talking to novice writers. They're pros! They know how to tell an effective story. That's why we're asking for their advice!

But as an amateur writer I'm still examining what works and why, and why some of the stuff I write doesn't work.

So I look at the collection of interesting and more-or-less effective unfolding events of my screenplay, and they're obviously well crafted. (To my mind, at least.) But I wonder why I'm not as into my story as I might be a story crafted by King or Crichton or Elliot & Rossio or Koepp.

Then this approach -- "What Would It Be Like If...?" -- hits me, and my movie instantly gets 20% better! I'm more drawn into the world I've created; I'm not watching someone else play a videogame, I have my hands on the controller and I'm the one dodging bolders and shooting zombies! It's no longer a series of actions happening, it's now a story! :)

"What If...?" is "What events might unfold if...?" But "What Would It Be Like If...?" is a question about how people would feel in said situation. What would they think about? And the realistic subjective experience of characters in unlikely or fantastic situations is really what an audience is looking for. According to Robert McKee, that's why humans are story-junkies: We're looking to have precarious experiences.

So now when I'm developing a story I will ask myself "What Would It Be Like If...?" in hopes of creating characters and a world that feels emersive, for myself as well as anyone who reads the story, rather than simply creating a succession of events that might or might not interest a reader.

Challenge: What was the last novel you read or movie you watched that really just didn't impress you? Not blatantly bad, really. Just... not really good. My guess that if you thought about it, you could probably track down a "What If...?" scenario nthat might have inspired the writer, but book/flick couldn't answer the question "What would it be like if...?"

I'm guessing this because I've read/watched some really, really interesting stories that I want to really love (I'm thinking of a particular series of sci-fi novels at the moment), but they just don't really draw me into the world, into the lives of the characters. I'm just watching stuff happen, but I'm not really invested emotionally in any of it.

Hopefully, "What Would It Be Like If...?" will help us craft tales that readers will become emotionally invested in.

"Cracking" Sorkin...

I was reading the Wikipedia entry on Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip when I realized something that may have helped my in developing future stories (particularly features)...

It is possible to imagine that perhaps Aaron Sorkin begins developing his stories by figuring out the backstory, then throwing us (the audience) in at the Inciting Incident and moving on from there.

Here's what I mean:

His first hit, the play -- and then movie -- that made him famous, is A Few Good Men. It is, in essence, a mystery: Did PFC Downey and LCpl Dawson murder PFC Santiago? Or were they simply following orders from their superiors, and therefore did the superiors (in essence) murder PFC Santiago?

The story then unearths facts, doling out bits of backstory which lead LTJG Kaffee and LCDR Galloway to take action until the issue is resolved.

In The American President we meet the president and watch him fall in love with Syney Ellen Wade and deal with his re-election issues... But in dealing with his re-election we learn a great deal about his past as a president, and the romance reveals more about his past as well as Miss Wade's past.

This trend of learning more and more about characters' pasts continues with The West Wing and Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip. (I'm not familiar with Sports Night, but a writer friend of mine who is confirmed that this criteria applies there, as well.)

So my proposal:

We get an idea for a movie we want to make: A character/the tone/genre/basic premise, just whatever it is that makes us go "I want to write this movie", then we do enough research (I'm talking about a day, maybe, not a month or a year) and come up with the backstory for the situation. Just the relevant events that lead up to the Catalyst or Inciting Incident.

The benefit?

We learn (a) who the major players are and (b) what unresolved character issues they have going into the story.

Blake Snyder mentions in his Save the Cat! books the "6 Things That Need To Be Fixed" as a tool for setting up Act I and keeping Acts II and III from getting boring. If you know the important history of the main characters of your movie, you can more easily figure out what 6 things might need to be fixed over the course of the next 120 pages.

Mind you, I'm not talking about painstakingly crafting an intricate history that takes 120 pages or more to write. I'm talking about 1-3 pages of highlights that sort of fleshes out the world in our minds. Not a TV series bible, but something that can be written in a day.

Take a look at the history of the fictitious Studio 60 and see what I mean.

Now, if you've seen the series you see how those basic building blocks blossomed into 22 episodes. You also see how Sorkin doesn't lay it all out in the pilot episode, but casually doles out bits of it, tantalizing us with arguments and conversations between characters that we have to figure out for ourselves (one of Sorkin's brilliant techniques). Several episodes in he might actually show us some of these key events through flashback, but the story moves forward based on the backstory, even if we aren't given the whole picture just yet.

I have no idea if Sorkin does this intentionally.

But perhaps we might! :)

I haven't tried this yet, but it seems entirely possible to develop a film this way:

1. Get the idea for the movie (however detailed or sparse that idea comes to us).
2. Do enough research on the topic to inspire a 1-3 page backstory. (The more I research Sorkin's work, the more I get the impression that a lot of his research actually goes into his stories, barely altered, if at all.)
3. Begin moving the story forward from the point of our Inciting Incident, having our characters act on the events that the audience is not yet aware to solve the problem that started the movie off.
4. Move the characters forward through the story while revealing the most important aspects of the backstory simultaneously.
5. Lather, rinse, repeat until the problem is solved.

The reason I think this approach might work better than simply coming up with the Inciting Incident and trying to create the story from there is that creating the backstory allows the creative part of the brain to do its thing unrestricted. If you're trying to create the frontstory, the pressure's on. But if all you're doing is tinkering with the backstory, then you're just playing.

Then once you have the backstory, you look at what you've created (or "lifted from reality" as the case may be) and see what shape that suggests for the frontstory. What issues exist? What events would have to occur to resolve those issues? How do the preexisting biases created from those past events jade and color the characters in the Present? What possible deeper pasts may be inferred from the events of the backstory?

As always, this is just another possible tool I have unearthed in hopes of making screenwriting easier. Maybe it works for you, maybe it doesn't.

I hope it helps a little, anyway. :)