Let’s talk about creating a compelling emotional “arc” for your screenplay’s hero. For Hollywood Readers, a satisfying hero’s arc means your protagonist has overcome his emotional shortcomings and learned his lesson by story’s end. Here are 3 TIPS in getting there:

Define the flaw

It’s essential that your hero’s flaw, AKA “internal problem,” is clearly evident by page 5. Simply put, the internal problem is the emotional or psycho-social defect preventing your hero from achieving happiness. In “Along Came Polly,” Ben Stiller’s character is afraid to take chances, and this thwarts his best intentions to find a healthy romantic partner. In “The Wizard of Oz,” Dorothy’s flaw is her failure to find peace within herself or her current circumstances. In “A Few Good Men,” Tom Cruise’s character avoids conflict, and this hinders his chances of being a successful trial attorney.

Create roadblocks

Your hero must face situations which challenge his obvious story objective (e.g. finding the girl, killing the bad guy, etc.) and his character defect as well. In “Fever Pitch,” Jimmy Fallon’s Red Sox-obsessed Ben is constantly in turmoil over whether to be with his new darling soul mate Lyndsey…or go to Red Sox games. He even turns down a trip to Paris with her because of his desire to be in Fenway - and SHOCKER - Lyndsey eventually breaks up with him. To get her back, Ben might just have to sell his season tickets…

Wrapping up

Always make sure that your hero’s internal struggle is directly tied to her practical, AKA “external goal.” Dorothy’s is to find the Wizard of Oz, someone she thinks can get her back to Kansas. Near the end of the story, however, Dorothy realizes she could go have gone home all along by simply clicking her ruby slippers. The moral here is that happiness is found within, and not “Over the Rainbow.” Dorothy clearly learns this lesson, waking up from her nightmare exclaiming, “There’s no place like home.” Bottom line: both Dorothy’s internal/emotional goal and external objective are neatly tied together for an extremely rewarding resolution.

Here are some pointers on writing great heroes:

History

Before getting started on your script, it’s often helpful to write full biographies on your leads, starting from birth. Fleshing out your main characters’ life stories will help you get to know them much better, which will translate into authenticity for your readers. Included in these sketches could be everything from first loves, to favorite foods, to family of origin issues, to aspirations and fears. I also think bios should include physical features, and major life events, such as graduations, winning the lottery, or getting married.

Likability

“Make sure your lead is likable.” I’m sure you’ve heard this one a thousand times, right? But what actually makes a character sympathetic? This is a difficult one to answer, because it’s quite hard to specifically define why we like something. We just do! But I believe there are some tricks for bringing across likability. One quality we tend to admire in people is self-sacrifice. As “Jesse” in “Breaking Bad” makes and deals drugs, he lets his parents think the pot they find in their house belongs to him, and not his much younger brother. Though it results in Jesse being kicked out of the house and becoming homeless yet again, he decides protecting his brother was worth it. We also usually admire folks who are self-effacing, honest, and moral. Lastly, I believe knowing exactly why characters are doing something (even if it’s a bad thing for a good reason), is especially crucial.

Right Action

Audiences tend to like people who learn to make the right choices through the course of the story. Take Oskar Schindler. In “Schindler’s List,” he starts out as a greedy capitalist opportunist who will do anything for a buck, even if it means sucking up to evil Nazis. But as Schindler begins to see their cruelty, he ends up losing all of his money to help keep as many Jews safe from murder as he can. And in the end, Schindler regrets not having done more for those who worked for him.

I hope this helps!

Here are some tips for becoming a TV writer:

Know the form

Before writing your TV script, you should probably learn the format. TV scripts differ greatly from features, but also amongst each other. For example, multi-camera sitcoms like “How I Met Your Mother” capitalize & double-space all action lines. Also, teleplays tend to be much more reliant on dialogue and lighter on description than feature scripts. To get a feel for the proper styling, we recommend reading several scripts from some current or recent shows. Thankfully, both SimplyScripts and Drew’s Script-O-Rama have free samples to check out!

Getting started

Networks, producers, and other TV buyers hardly ever purchase pilots from newbie writers.  Rather, writers trying to break in write original pilots to attract reps who’ll help get them staffed on existing shows. As such, your first goal should be landing a manager or agent, and each will be looking for two writing samples. These are: 1) an original pilot & 2) an episode of an existing show you might want to work for.  Before writing the latter, it’s smart to find episodes that have already been filmed, so that your formatting and script’s overall vibe are in sync with whatever series you’ve chosen. Also, be sure the two scripts you tackle are similar in genre, so that it’s easier for a rep to “brand” you down the road.

Find a rep

These days, many writers have both managers and agents. The basic difference? Managers can take producing credit on shows their clients are hired on, whereas agents are prohibited by law from doing so. Also, agents traditionally negotiate deals for their clients, though managers often set them up. All the technical info aside, know it’s generally easier to find a manager first, who can then help you land an agent. Either way, after you’ve written your samples, you must get a rep to read them…which means you’ll need a great query letter & Hollywood access.

Hope to read some of your TV specs!

Every so often all of us experience writer’s block. Below are three ways to overcome it:

Change the scenery

If you’re having difficulty coming up with ideas for your latest story, try writing in a new spot for a day. Sometimes just switching locations can be enough to untangle the knot. Why? One possible reason is that your brain is associating your workplace with your current block. By virtue of its difference, a novel location can very well “trick” your mind into exciting action.

Journal

Sometimes just writing about your day or your personal thoughts and feelings can kick-start your imagination, especially if you don’t judge yourself or your words while you’re writing. Indeed, writing without the pressure to perform can be quite fun. Free association is also helpful here. Not needing to know exactly where you’re heading – as with a script’s plot - can be extremely liberating…thus priming the pump for fresh ideas.

Watch, read, listen

Watching a favorite film can often be inspiring enough to get your fingers typing again. It’s like, “Heck yeah, this is why I wanted to write screenplays!” Of course, you’ll have to turn off the remote to get back to business - but a renewed purpose can be strikingly invigorating.  I think the same type of thing can occur after reading an especially cherished book or listening to some favorite songs. Sometimes just a healthy break can make all the difference.

I hope this helps!

I can’t say that 2010 was a great year for movies. In fact, I found it a struggle just to come up with my top 5. That being said, below are ones I truly thought were outstanding works.

#1. “Animal Kingdom” - By far, my favorite film of 2010. I thought this coming-of-age/underworld crime story set in Australia was both captivating and haunting.

#2. “Winter’s Bone” - This crime tale set in backwoods USA was both beautifully bleak and surprisingly fulfilling.

#3. “Please Give” - An honest and entertaining look at a couple long past the “love haze” and their relationship with sex and family.

#4. “Greenberg” - I loved this film’s quiet, quirky humor and fresh characters.

#5. “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” – An engaging and edgy who-done-it with very interesting heroes and villains.

Have a great Holiday everyone!              

As a producer, writer, and busy script consultant, what I have come to believe is that for a screenplay to be successful, the script reader must be able to answer “yes” to the following seven questions:

Is the premise commercial and believable?
Can you “see” the poster? 
Is the genre clear?
Is there a clear protagonist?
Is the protagonist likable?
Does the protagonist have a clear goal and is it defined early enough?
Are the stakes for the protagonist high enough?

We call these the “ScriptCoach Seven,” and provide feedback for each of these questions to our writer clients on every script we work on together. I would love to hear your thoughts on these!

Here are the ten films I enjoyed the most in 2009 with two runner-ups as well: 

“500 Days of Summer” – I liked this film because it was a love story told from a young man’s perspective.

“The Hurt Locker” – I loved everything about this movie, especially the scene where the soldiers get so hot and tired from having to stay in one position for hours.

“Taken” – I think this action movie moved extremely well.

 “I Love You Man” – I thought this one managed to turn a sort of non-problem (not having any male friends) into a pretty engaging premise.

“Sugar” – I thought this was an authentic and fairly compelling look at the minor leagues.

“The Taking of Pelham 123” – I thought Denzel Washington and John Travolta were both awesome in this tense suspense film.

“Bruno” – Not as funny for me as “Borat,” but I feel it’s worth the rental if you haven’t seen it yet.

“The Proposal” – I came in with low expectations and laughed throughout this film.

“Paranormal Activity” – I’m a sucker for most anything paranormal and this was no exception.

“The Blind Side” – I cried like fifty times during this movie.

Runner-ups:

“Last Chance Harvey” – I thought this was a very well-acted and cute little romance.
“Defiance” – I was engaged from start to finish on this one.

Please let me know what you think via twitter at www.twitter.com/dkzproductions.  Thanks!

I’m pretty sure it all started with Perrier. You see, I’m old enough to remember the good old days when you could sit down at a restaurant and were just given tap water instead of having to know if you want tap, flat, bottled, sparkling, and with or without ice.

It’s been reported that Anxiety disorders are on the rise, so much so, that we can all now watch a show on A & E about OCD (“Obsessed”) because there’s so many of us who have it.  But I don’t believe it’s because the economy’s down, or because we have “issues.” Rather, I think it’s because we have too many choices in just making what used to be simple decisions, and instead, are constantly bombarded with never-ending possibilities all the time.

My grandfather used to say “We hat wahl, der hat knal,” which in German, means something like “whoever has choices, has discomfort.” And there are Buddhist priests who believe that having too many alternatives is the cause of all sorts of trouble. And let’s not forget the theory that fascism makes people feel comfortable precisely because their freedom is limited. Now before you go all Rush Limbaugh on me, I’m in no way advocating for a change in our system of government. I’m just making an observation that those of us who are ADD or what-have-you are so because the world has too many things to do in it.

Let’s take music. It used to be that if you wanted to listen to music that you could turn on your car radio, play a tape, a record, or maybe listen to your walkman. Now there are MP3 players, cds, limewire, about ten different kinds of I-pods, cell phones, youtube, free radio (the kind that still plays the baseball games), internet radio, and satellite radio (the kind that costs money but that we hear when we go to the salon).

And then there’s TV. We don’t just have bunny ears, basic cable, or super-duper cable; now we have DirectTV and gadgets that somehow record your show while the show is playing so that you can pause it and then continue watching it—live. And let’s not forget that before we can watch anything, we have to pick the right remote control.

I don’t even know what to do now if I want to talk to a friend about things like this. As most of us have both a cell phone and a landline, I first need to remember when I should call each one. Then I need to figure out whether or not to call my showbiz friends by the names they were actually born with, or their stage ones. Then there’s emailing (and most of my people have several of these addresses), texting, instant messaging, leaving a message, not leaving a message, twittering, myspaceing and facebooking. I feel bad if I actually have to call someone. And sometimes when I feel sad because I’ve made the mistake of calling one of my friends and bothering them, I want to eat. But then I have to decide if the food I’m eating is actually good for me, and if I want something called “organic” food or not (By the way, what was I eating, before I was eating organic food?).

And what happens if I make something to eat and then want to throw the food and its packaging out? Before I do, I have to somehow figure out what colored bin my trash is supposed to go into. I could just go to a restaurant and avoid the whole taking out the trash thing, but if I use a credit card and later want to pay the bill, I have to remember my online username and password. I guess I could go back to writing checks, but then I’d feel guilty about wasting paper. And speaking of trees, now I can’t figure out if I should actually buy a book I want to read at a bookstore, or just download it.

I hope bringing up the multitude of the once simple daily choices we all have hasn’t made you too anxious. If it has, maybe get up and take a drink of water. Tap.

Here are some things I hope to never see in scripts again:

1) Characters named Slade, Jake, or Cassidy.

2) Spelling and grammar errors.

3) Page counts over 120.

4) Thick cover and back sheets.

5) Title pages with WGA registration info and/or copywrite info.

6) Brads that aren’t 1 1/4 inches.

7) Stories that involve a middle-eastern terrorist.

8) Scenes that belong in movies rated “X.”

9) Flashbacks seen by characters who never saw the flashbacks in “present” time.

10) Artwork on cover pages.

Dear Writers,

Here are are some recent VPF news items:

-VPF client Michael Eging’s script “Song of Roland” was recently optioned by VPF’s Cine L.A.

-Rebel Entertainment is now seeking scripts with a built-in, existing market, and those with mass commercial potential for 16-24-year-olds.

-Spring Creek Productions has added “Blood Diamond” and “Recount” to their list of recent credits.

-Seth Lockhart Presents has changed their name to “Cinematic Instinct.”

-Velocity Management is in development on John Grisham’s “The Partner,” and are now looking for Comedies, Thrillers, and TV projects.

-VPF has added both WhiteBread Films and NYC Entertainment to its list of Producers.

-VPF client Nevada Grey has launched a funny web-series called “The Other Normal.” You can view episodes of the show on:

http://www.youtube.com/user/NevadaGrey2010. Check them out!

Good luck pitching!