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You will hear many writers tell you — and rightly so — that Act Three is the toughest. Finishing up what you started, finding the final solution for your characters, and also “letting them go” is a challenge for sure.
But to me, the trouble spots I see working with writers most are found in Act One.
Stories chart change. You begin with a hero who is one way, and by the end he is the opposite.
And yet for many reasons, we find it hard to take our heroes “all the way back” to where they need to be to show the biggest change, and the most sweeping arc.
Part of the problem, always, is we are our heroes. And if we need to show them in deficit, or even unlikeable at the beginning in order to show where they go by the end, we are wont to do so.
They’re us!
And we’re likeable! Why shouldn’t our hero be, too?
Sometimes too, we evolve our heroes too early. We show where they will be going at the start. That is also in part because the hero is us. We don’t want to see him (us) have to suffer! And we don’t want to admit that he (we) needs evolving.
But that’s what stories track. Change hurts. And forcing a hero to change means revealing him as embarrassingly unevolved at the start, and in need of an awakening — and the pain of changing.
Another big fix in most scripts I find is creating an Act One and an Act Two that are different worlds. I’ve used this example many times, but I was working with a writer whose logline was “A struggling artist fakes his death to raise the price of his work and hides out in the world of the homeless, only to discover that his agent is actually trying to kill him.” (a fear I’ve had for years)
Problem there is, the artist starts out poor, living in a cold water flat, so when he begins his adventure by faking his death and hides out with the homeless — what’s the difference? How are those two worlds wholly separate? The fix here was to keep the concept but change where he came from. We created an artist that is rich in Act One, living in a penthouse, known for these little stunts — and in need of a comeuppance this story will track. But it started by forcing the two worlds of Act One and Act Two to be different.
If your story doesn’t feel full enough, big enough, or quite on track, don’t check Act Three — think about Act One. If you aren’t engineering a change in the hero and his world that will be different…
Do.
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on January 20th, 2009 at 1:42 pm
You mean our hero can’t start out awesome and just get awesomer?
on January 20th, 2009 at 1:54 pm
Great post Blake.
In ‘Reflex’, I had this feeling that the real issues were with the first act, but what I realise now isn’t that the act needs a complete rewrite in and of itself, but rather his world needs to be more clearly defined - precisely so that when we hit act two, we can see the differences in a much bigger way!
Yet another momentary breakthrough, one of many that I’ve had whilst browsing this site and the forums.
on January 20th, 2009 at 9:37 pm
That’s why my main characters are always female. It’s very easy to figure out their faults and dig out several problems that need fixn’. I think writing fe– I gotta’ go my wife’s calling.
on January 20th, 2009 at 11:10 pm
My senior editor always calls the first three chapters — the vital first three chapters. It is absolutely imperative to get them right.
The other thing I have learnt is that if you are going to have a flawed hero who needs to be redeemed, you need to show he is capable of redemption. Sometimes, it is necessary to do this through a prologue set years before. For example, Sweet Home Alabama shows the hero and heroine together as children and particularly puts the hero in a good light. Sorry it was the movie I was watching when I had the epiphany. It is a Save the Cat moment when you know for the purposes of the story, the first glimpse of the hero or heroine will not necessarily be favourable.
on January 21st, 2009 at 2:50 am
Blake, did you try the “once-successful artist finds his career in decline following the reviews of an invidious art critic” route? It’s a nice set up and creates more opportunities for fun and games with another antagonist.
on January 21st, 2009 at 11:05 am
A very useful reminder for me. My current script will need major overhaul when I finish the first draft, and addressing this issue is part of that. As always, thanks for the insightful reminder of thes things! You rock!
on January 22nd, 2009 at 1:40 am
Throwing the spotlight, again, on key structural steps is so good - thanks, Blake!
The need to make the ‘world’ of Act One very different in so many aspects to that of Act Two (with its Fun & Games delivering the Promise of the Premise) also places the Protagonist at the beginning of the Transformation Arc, where he/she needs to change and, needing to evolve, is possibly unlikeable, as Blake says. How then might such a character feel like ’saving a cat’, and do so enough for us to start to be interested, even if not coming to like them? A constant creative question, of course, and I was wondering how some writers systematically play with that precise challenge.
On a separate theme: In the West Wing, were all the trademark walkies through the White House just ‘Pope in the Pool’ plays but work like for any office or corporate environment?
One other question, of specific interest to a story I’m writing: when protagonists who have been exiled from their normal worlds at the beginning of a story then are drawn to, or needed back in, their old world does that return - but on different terms, operating differently - equate to enough difference in the Act One and Act Two worlds? Of course, the exiled world of Act One will be terrible, crushing for them, and so Act Two sees sudden opportunity for a limited time only … Strike you as meeting the Act One/Two distinction?