Hey writers! I'm adapting a memoir into a screenplay - it's a work-for-hire - and I'm having a little trouble establishing the autonomy of the protagonist because she's only 4 years old when the inciting incident occurs, which launches her on her hero's journey. Both of her parents are killed when she's only 4 and none of the adults will tell her the truth. So the story, being told through the point of view of this small child who doesn't know what's going on, necessitates my writing the whole first act through her disjointed and confused point of view. It isn't until Act 2 that she begins to put the pieces together as she moves through an uncertain, and often cruel world. Just curious how you all would handle this writing predicament.
I submitted the first 10 pages for review on Stage32 and the feedback was pretty brutal, mostly because she couldn't figure out who the protagonist is. And again, the protagonist can't logically come into her own that early in the story because of her age and the unique circumstances. Thanks!
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Dan Guardino I was just talking to the client about this yesterday. I was trying to write it without VO, but the script is also coming in too long, so we talked about using VO to make the POV more clear and also to move the story along quicker. Thanks for the suggestion.
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@Viktor Bury, thank you! It's funny you should mention Christopher Nolan. As I was posting this, the film, "Memento" came to mind. Just like you mentioned, he throws you into this confusing, disjointed story and eventually, it all comes together and it's frigging brilliant! I actually downloaded that script, along with "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind." I also read the beginning of, "First They Killed My Father," which has a 5-year-old protagonist, to see how they did it. I have lots of dreams and flashbacks - nightmares, visits from the other side, in this script. I'm generally more linear in my story-telling, so this is really a challenge.
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I'd love to read it / happy to provide some ideas. Just message me.
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Hi Maureen, does the child have to be four? Is it possible to up the age a bit (not 10!). With VO, who's the narrator? Any time VO is used it's a story of memory. So the narrator can be the child as an adult looking back. This was used in Stand By Me and The Road Warrior (the feral boy is the narrator). With any good story look at how it ends, and do your backwards planning to get it going. Don't worry about length at this time. Write it out even if you crack 160 pages. Then you can start condensing, cutting, reworking. Since it's a memoir story, find the 10-15 key points of the story, and how they impacted, affected the protagonist. Is there anything in the 10-15 key points that can be divided so, for example, 3 in the first act, 8 in the second, and 4 in the third act? Don't forget to have self revelations along the way.
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Stephen Folker - that's so nice of you to offer! I'm still writing it. Do you want to see it when the first draft is done? Or are you proposing reading the unfinished draft?
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@Lindbergh E Hollingsworth - yes, she has to be 4. It's a true story, based on a book and I've been hired by the author to write the screenplay. If I do VO, she (the actress playing her) would be doing the narration. I love your suggestions about backwards planning and dividing the key points. I'll work on that tomorrow. One of the problems I'm having is that Act 2 has so many key points. I'm cutting stories and combining events to try and condense it. There will definitely be self revelations along the way. Thank you! I really appreciate the suggestions.
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With all due respect to people who lose their families in childhood. As one of them, I want to say that whatever role this little hero has, you should have a souvenir from her family, for example a necklace that gets energy when you look at it or touch it. Thank you.
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Hi Maureen, we hope you're doing well. A four-year-old's POV is limited but you will be able to use it. Who is her advocate? I would pull her advocate's POV in and log that pain. To Hamed's point, touchstones are wonderful at the beginning and at the end, any more than that, they lose their power, like using a certain word too often...
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If there is time, read the script -'The Pursuit of Happiness'.
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I forgot to mention, ask, are you writing a memoir or a biography? Biographies cover the entire life of a character, and focus on a few specific events. Biographies can feel a bit episodic if not careful. Memoirs are primarily focused on an event. Examples of solid memoirs: Milk, Capt Phillips, Imitation Game.
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Lindbergh E Hollingsworth - it's based on an autobiography, but she calls the book a memoir. It does cover most of her life, though. I don't want to limit the story to one event.
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@Matthew Kelcourse and @J. Austin Gentry - thanks for the recommendations. I'll check out those scripts. J. Austin - her advocate is her grandmother, but I feel I need to stick to one POV. @Hamed Taghiloyi, I'm sorry you lost your family in childhood. I feel for you. We do have a souvenir from her childhood. Her mother gives the main character's brother two rings (the mom's and the dad's) before she dies and tells him to sell them if they need to. They don't sell them, and they are revisited later in the story. Thanks for the input, everyone!
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It makes perfect sense that you'd be having trouble establishing the autonomy of your 4-year-old main character, especially if she remains that young- - or even quite a bit older-- for an extended period of time in your screenplay. My advice would be start your story much later, when she's an adult, and pick up any mandatory backstory later, very, very briefly. What you're calling the inciting incident may not be-- rather, it may go more toward the heroine's motivation and backstory, which is not the same as the inciting incident in a screenplay. A traumatic experience at age 4 (the death of her parents) may be an important part of what later motivates her as an adult, a formative experience that leads to her search for answers later on, but this is unlikely to be the inciting incident of your script-- even if her sole mission in life is to find out the truth about what happened to her parents many years earlier. And even if she's been looking for these answers every day since she was 4, which isn't possible to do effectively at that age, there has to be a specific trigger point during her adulthood when something else occurs that launches her on a quest to learn the truth (which might be the actual inciting incident, if that's what your story is about), and at a time when she is old enough to seek answers. It would answer the question: "Why now?" Your screenplay won't be about someone reminiscing about what happened to them at the age of four, the way the memoir/book might do. Almost every script I've read that starts with the childhood trauma of a character whom we will later meet as an adult, would have been much better had it started instead with the protagonist as an adult-- and with as few flashbacks as possible (preferably, none). Especially if the kid is as young as 4, she can't be a factor in driving her own story (unless they did something like killing their parents, which I gather didn't happen in this case). It may take some persuading, especially since this is the book author's own life story, but presumably she knows you know what you're doing, and will trust your judgment when you tell her that the screenplay must structured very differently from the book.