About

This one-day workshop is about the bones of narrative. Though this class focuses on the screenplay, most techniques included are equally applicable to other types of fiction, such as the novel.

While a well-plotted story has intrinsic value, what's less explored is the way that tight plotting aids more subtle stories which emphasize character or theme. Engaging the audience with a simmering want-to-know keeps them fully focused on whatever story you want to tell.

Using examples from your narratives and classic films, we will explore the reality beneath the catchphrases of large-scale plotting—Inciting Incident, Balance of Forces, the Problem and the Path, the Dark Night of the Soul, "the Page-75 Scene," Root Action, and of course, pinches, turns, breaks, and twists. We will also focus on the way plot operates within scenes, through the techniques of Expectation/Reality Gap and Win/Loss and the unique narrative power of the scene cut.

Understanding the levers of structure is the key to enlisting the audience in the construction of your narrative.

The lunch break will be a half-hour to forty-five minutes. We suggest you bring a sack lunch and enjoy the use of our Commons area.

Instructor: Christian Ford is a screenwriter with over twenty professional credits, an essayist, an occasional director, and an extremely slow boat-builder.  He has lived on Bainbridge Island since 2006.