Dormant protagonists.

Every story, Frank Daniel theorizes, is about someone who wants something badly, but has trouble getting it.

That “someone” is called a protagonist, and what he wants is called an objective. The story ends when the protagonist either succeeds or fails to achieve the objective, and we’re satisfied with the result.

David Howard and Edward Mabley add that “protagonist and objective are so closely identified in our minds that it is impossible to consider one without the other.”

Their relationship is symbiotic because of us. We know Dorothy Gale because, in the Wizard of Oz, she wants to return to Kansas.

From her perspective, sure, returning to Kansas is important, but it’s only one of a billion goals she’ll have in her lifetime. Maybe she aspires to overturn Roe v. Wade. It’s not impossible--she’s from a red state. But if it’s true, we wouldn’t know it, because it doesn’t affect her objective, so we don’t even think to ask.

That’s how important the bond between the protagonist and the objective is. We like watching someone rise to a challenge so much that we’re willing to ignore everything else. The more ardently a protagonist pursues her objective, the more invested we are in the story.

In the Wizard of Oz, the protagonist and her objective are inextricable. If Dorothy isn’t in the story, we can’t root for her to get back to Kansas, and if Dorothy doesn’t care about getting back to Kansas, then we don’t care either, and there’s no reason to watch the movie.

But the link between a protagonist and his objective doesn’t have to be so straightforward. While a protagonist cannot exist without an objective, an objective can exist without its protagonist.

Not for too long, of course. If the protagonist is missing for most of the story, then he doesn’t really care about achieving his objective, and we’re likely to get bored. But if a protagonist goes dormant, another character can pursue the objective in his place.

There are three effective ways of transferring the objective between a dormant protagonist and his surrogate.

At this point...

...I've spent most of my fucking life writing a screenplay called Awestruck.

It's a buddy comedy between God and a skeptic. This will be my last draft, for better or worse.

I'd like to share the backstory with you. Let's start at the beginning, shall we?

A deleted scene.

I'm re-writing my thesis script.

It's a buddy comedy between God and a skeptic.

The twist is that God's a dumb guy who happens to be omnipotent. He realizes what a shitty job he's done, creating an uncertain universe and whatnot, and he wants to commit suicide.

Unfortunately, if God commits suicide, the Universe will die with him. So Harry the skeptic must convince him that there's a Meaning of Life.

Here's a scene from the first draft. I love it, but it won't be in the new draft.

Where we are in the story: the roles have changed. Harry the skeptic is now suicidal, and God wants to keep his buddy alive.

I've found a nice process!

I'm re-writing my first screenplay (the one about the rats who are trying to evolve into birds).

Every day, I:

print out the script,

re-re-re-write the existing scenes,

write new scenes,

plan for later sequences,

type it all up,

sleep,

and repeat.

I'll be immodest and say that the first eleven pages are tighter than a virgin's doughnut. They're among the best work I've ever done.

It's amazing how much confidence this instills in my work...

...and even more amazing that every single professor at USC discouraged us from re-visiting old scenes. They would have lynched me for following this process.

You'd think that a writing program would emphasize 'finding a writing process that suits you,' instead of 'loathing your work and yourself.'

But I guess that's important...they probably have a lot of screenwriting students who are too well-balanced.

The Creation of the Pyramid.

A new sketch!

Broken Freezer.

A new sketch!

Andrew's idea for a movie I (could / would / should) write.

It's like "the Frog Prince," but instead of being turned into a frog, the prince is turned into a virus. He infects the heroine, who must come to truly love her disease in order to set him free.

But then the twist is, since he's a virus, when "he" is turned back into a prince, it's actually millions of identical princes who come bursting forth out of the heroine's cells, thereby tearing her body to shreds.

The Muppets Go Home!

Tonight I outlined a speculative Muppet movie. Broadly:

On the same day that Kermit gets fired from his cubicle job, a producer lambasts his independent film. Left without dreams or finances, all Kermit wants to do is move back to the swamp, but Los Angeles won't let him go that easily...

I'm too fucking excited to write this. And I want to make it. It should be shot on mini-DV, and apart from the cost of puppets and performers, the budget shouldn't exceed 'six dollars.'