Allow Your Lead to Lead
I had the opportunity this week to see The Birds on a big screen in a full theater. Because I have seen this movie so often I decided to do two things, to study the film and to study the audience. Hitchcock always talked about what he was trying to do to the audience with his films. I never understood this until now.
Average movie audience these days talk and chatter and check their phones. In other words they are rude. They believe they are at home. For the first thirty minutes of this movie that is how this audience was and then the ride began to grind into motion. That roller coaster Hitchcock would talk about started up. The next hour and twenty minutes was dead silence except when Hitchcock wanted his audience to react.
Hitchcock along with his screenwriter Evan Hunter achieved this in many ways. The way that I want to look at today is through the lead character of the screenplay.
Melanie Daniels, played by Tippi Hedren, is the first character that we meet. We learn about her through her actions and by the reputation that she had built up over time in the tabloids. She is on the screen for over 90 percent of the time. She becomes our gateway into this world that is being revealed. She becomes our gateway into the lives that she comes in contact with. Let’s face it they call this character the lead because that is what he or she does. They lead us through the story. What they fear we grow to fear. Who they love we grow to love. If you got a good one then they will make your story so much easier to tell.
If you have a poor lead or worst you do not know who the lead is then you are probably having a problem with your script. They take you places that you do not wish to go or they talk too much or worst they have nothing to say.
How do we solve this problem?
Start over?
Switch leads?
Do a rewrite?
Many of us have done all the above. The advice that you are going to get from me is sit down with your lead character and ask him or her what is it that they want. What is it that they need? Keep asking questions until you run out of them and if at that time you are still interested in them then and only then should you continue with them as the lead of your story.
“What if their answers are simple?”
That would be great. What do you want? To stop these shark attacks, the sheriff in Jaws. What do you want? To get my daughter back, the father in Taken. What do you want? To survive these Bird attacks, Melanie in the Birds.
What do most characters want? In one way or another it comes down to getting back to normal. The abnormal or strange has changed their world and they want to go back to the world that they knew.
Allow your lead character to lead you to where they want to go. Part of the problem that many of us have with our scripts is that we try to lead rather than allowing our characters to lead. We have a plot and we must follow that plot even if our lead is not a willing traveler.
I will end by putting it in sports terms. You have a superstar on your team. In who’s hands do you want the ball? Do you want to give the ball to the kicker? Why would you? His job is to give it back to the other team. Your lead is your point guard. Your lead is your quarterback. Your lead is your Ace pitcher. You are the coach, but they are the ones who execute the game plan. Allow them to do it. Encourage them to do it.
In the Birds Hitchcock keeps the character of Melanie Daniels on the field into she has to be carried off. Battered, beaten up and pecked half to death she did her job. She got the ball across the goal line again and again until the it reached historic levels. Watch the end scenes of the Birds. She left it all on the field. There is nothing more that this character can do and better still nothing left that she has to do.
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I had the opportunity this week to see The Birds on a big screen in a full theater. Because I have seen this movie so often I decided to do two things, to study the film and to study the audience. Hitchcock always talked about what he was trying to do to the audience with his films. I never understood this until now.
Average movie audience these days talk and chatter and check their phones. In other words they are rude. They believe they are at home. For the first thirty minutes of this movie that is how this audience was and then the ride began to grind into motion. That roller coaster Hitchcock would talk about started up. The next hour and twenty minutes was dead silence except when Hitchcock wanted his audience to react.
Hitchcock along with his screenwriter Evan Hunter achieved this in many ways. The way that I want to look at today is through the lead character of the screenplay.
Melanie Daniels, played by Tippi Hedren, is the first character that we meet. We learn about her through her actions and by the reputation that she had built up over time in the tabloids. She is on the screen for over 90 percent of the time. She becomes our gateway into this world that is being revealed. She becomes our gateway into the lives that she comes in contact with. Let’s face it they call this character the lead because that is what he or she does. They lead us through the story. What they fear we grow to fear. Who they love we grow to love. If you got a good one then they will make your story so much easier to tell.
If you have a poor lead or worst you do not know who the lead is then you are probably having a problem with your script. They take you places that you do not wish to go or they talk too much or worst they have nothing to say.
How do we solve this problem?
Start over?
Switch leads?
Do a rewrite?
Many of us have done all the above. The advice that you are going to get from me is sit down with your lead character and ask him or her what is it that they want. What is it that they need? Keep asking questions until you run out of them and if at that time you are still interested in them then and only then should you continue with them as the lead of your story.
“What if their answers are simple?”
That would be great. What do you want? To stop these shark attacks, the sheriff in Jaws. What do you want? To get my daughter back, the father in Taken. What do you want? To survive these Bird attacks, Melanie in the Birds.
What do most characters want? In one way or another it comes down to getting back to normal. The abnormal or strange has changed their world and they want to go back to the world that they knew.
Allow your lead character to lead you to where they want to go. Part of the problem that many of us have with our scripts is that we try to lead rather than allowing our characters to lead. We have a plot and we must follow that plot even if our lead is not a willing traveler.
I will end by putting it in sports terms. You have a superstar on your team. In who’s hands do you want the ball? Do you want to give the ball to the kicker? Why would you? His job is to give it back to the other team. Your lead is your point guard. Your lead is your quarterback. Your lead is your Ace pitcher. You are the coach, but they are the ones who execute the game plan. Allow them to do it. Encourage them to do it.
In the Birds Hitchcock keeps the character of Melanie Daniels on the field into she has to be carried off. Battered, beaten up and pecked half to death she did her job. She got the ball across the goal line again and again until the it reached historic levels. Watch the end scenes of the Birds. She left it all on the field. There is nothing more that this character can do and better still nothing left that she has to do.
Thank you for visiting. Please tell a friend about this site. Add us to your Google Plus and Stumble us on Stumbleupon.
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