a matter of perspective in screenwriting

March 27, 2006

In it, he explains that the most profound difference is a matter of perspective (which, you’ll find in Dramatica, comes up quite often!). The other gurus come from the perspective of an audience member seeking meaning. He explains that’s why their ideas always “feel” right.

Dramatica, on the other hand, comes from the perspective of an author trying to predict what story elements are needed and where to put them.

And because it’s a matter of perspective, you can’t hold both in your head at the same time (e.g., try to form an objective viewpoint of yourself!). Chris explains further…

I spent nearly sixteen years avoiding reading anything of substance by (Hollywood) story theorists such as Syd Field, John Truby, Christopher Vogler, Robert McKee and others. As co-creator of the Dramatica theory of story, I didn’t want to influence my development of Dramatica so I avoided direct interaction with competing theories. In 2006 I decided to lift my self-imposed ban. I figured my understanding of Dramatica was mature enough that I didn’t have to worry about “contaminating” it by exposure to the competing theories. It was past time that I figured out how other story theories are similar and dissimilar to Dramatica, why they are different (assuming they are), and what those similarities and differences mean. Originally written as a series of articles, I’ve reworked my findings into this single paper. I’ve divided the results into four major topics of comparison: Story Throughlines; Hero, Protagonist, and Main Character; Character Growth and Resolve; and Plot Structure. I’ve also included an overview of the source materials, some initial observations, and a summary at the end. I’ve tried to be as objective as I can and I’m always interested in feedback and notices of errors and omissions. Contact information is provided at the end. RESOURCE MATERIALS There are dozens of “how to” books on story structure, especially in the screenwriting field. I chose to compare the Dramatica theory of story with the story paradigms of six popular writing gurus: Syd Field, Michael Hauge, Robert McKee, Linda Seger, John Truby, and Christopher Vogler. Each has written books and lectured widely on the subject of story and story structure. The following describes my research for each author’s work with a few personal comments added. *SYD FIELD: I watched Syd Field’s video, “Screenwriting Workshop.” It’s well made for a talking head instructional video though the opening music is cheesy. Syd comes across as warm and authoritative. He gives good writing advice. *MICHAEL HAUGE: I watched the DVD, “The Hero’s 2 Journeys,” by Michael Hauge (Writing Screenplays That Sell) and Christopher Vogler (The Writer’s Journey). The production values of this DVD were fair. Having these two story guys working together was very interesting. Their story paradigms appear to be very different but are surprisingly compatible. Both Hauge and Vogler are good speakers and communicators. *ROBERT McKEE: I read Robert McKee’s book, “Story.” It’s a good book with lots of great story examples. His “Chinatown” example of writing from the inside out is brilliant (pp 154-176) and shows his writing technique to its best advantage. There is no question that McKee loves story, knows film and theatre intimately, writes well, understands screenwriting as a specialized form, and has a lifetime of experience to back up his writing advice. In many ways, “Story” is inspirational. I recommend reading this book, especially if you are a screenwriter. *LINDA SEGER: I read her seminal book, “Making A Good Script Great,” (Seger, 1984) and read sections of two of her other popular books, “Creating Unforgettable Characters” (Seger, 1990), and “Advanced Screenwriting: Raising your Script to the Academy Award Level” (Seger, 2003). Linda Seger’s greatest strengths are in her methods of getting to the heart of an author’s intent and her understanding of storytelling techniques—what a writer wants to say and how to express it effectively. She uses real world examples and has lots to say about writing, most specifically about writing screenplays. She is also one of the few well-known women in a predominantly male industry. *JOHN TRUBY: For John Truby, I read through my business partner’s class notes of Truby’s basic story structure and advanced screenwriting workshops. These were compiled into fifty-one typed pages. Truby’s workshops go far beyond story structure but the notes were more than sufficient for me to get the gist of Truby’s story paradigm. Truby has some great descriptions of storytelling conventions in various genres. *CHRISTOPHER VOGLER: I read Christopher Vogler’s book, “The Writer’s Journey” (2nd Edition). Chris Vogler has an engaging writing style and strong command of the English language. He goes out of his way to give credit where due and provides appropriate caveats for exceptions and rules. It seems honest, direct, and sincere. And, it goes into greater depth than the “The Hero’s 2 Journeys” DVD. The greatest area of expansion over the DVD is discussion of his character archetypes. *DRAMATICA: I used, “Dramatica: A New Theory of Story,” Special Tenth Anniversary Edition, by Melanie Anne Phillips and Chris Huntley (Write Brothers, 2004) as my source for most of the Dramatica material. As co-author of the book and co-creator of the Dramatica theory of story, I was familiar with the material already. INITIAL OBSERVATIONS Though the six non-Dramatica story paradigms I studied are different in their specifics, I was surprised to find that most more or less fit into one of two broad categories. The first category I call the post-Aristotelian story paradigm. This category finds its roots in the work of Lajos Egri (The Art of Dramatic Writing!) who significantly expanded the function of Character in story beyond Aristotle’s Poetics. Its adherents include Syd Field, Michael Hauge, and Robert McKee. The second category I call The Hero’s Journey story paradigm and finds its roots in adaptations of Joseph Campbell’s work (Hero with a Thousand Faces). Its devotees include John Truby and Christopher Vogler. Linda Seger falls mostly into the first category, but acknowledges and incorporates the concepts of the hero’s journey as one of several “myth” forms a story may use. By contrast, Dramatica does not fall neatly into either category. It appears to be a much broader story paradigm—one that encompasses elements from both categories and then some. Another generalization is that each of the non-Dramatica story paradigms assumes your story has a Main Character (or Hero) who Changes and is also the Protagonist in a story with a happy ending (Success/Good). With Seger the exception, lip service was given to the idea of steadfast main characters. These structural elements seemed somewhat rigid and overly specific. I assumed that there was more to their understanding of story, so I dug further. While reading “The Writer’s Journey,” I was surprised that many of Vogler’s observations about character and the hero’s journey “felt” right. Specifically, Vogler discussed the “meaning” of certain archetypes or events in the story and how they correlate to “meaning” in the real world. So much of it sounded good and useful, but I also saw all the conditions where those observations didn’t hold up—places where too many assumptions are made, such as the nature of a Hero. Vogler bends over backwards to illustrate exceptions to the Hero definition. So many that they seem to void any sense of “rules” to go by. But that’s not what really bothered me. What bugged me was that there seemed to be some “Truth” to his observations about character and plot. These truths didn’t contradict Dramatica so much as suggest deficiencies in the Dramatica theory. It wasn’t until I was talking this over with someone that I had an “aha” moment of clarity. I related how Vogler talked about what elements in a story meant. That’s when it clicked. An early axiom determined in the development of the Dramatica theory was this: If you look for meaning in your story, you cannot predict how to put your story together. If you want to predict how to put your story together, you cannot know what your choices will mean. In other words, you can try to find meaning in a work OR you can predict how to put it together—but not at the same time from within the same context. Why? The short answer is that we use one as the given in order to evaluate the other. When looking for meaning, we assume a particular story structure. When looking for structure, we assume a particular meaning (author’s intent). It’s tied to the same reason we can see light as particles and waves, just not at the same time within a single context. One aspect defines the basis for the other. Story structure provides the basis for seeing meaning in the story. Meaning provides the basis for understanding and manipulating structure in a story. In other words, meaning is tied to the audience’s experience of the story while structure is tied to the author’s perspective of the story. The audience perspective allows a synthesis of the underlying story elements to discover its “meaning.” The author’s perspective assumes a given meaning (author’s intent) and allows manipulation of the arrangement of the story’s structure and dynamics. Using the appropriate context is important. For example, Robert McKee approaches story from the audience’s perspective whereas Dramatica approaches it from the author’s perspective. McKee speaks of author and audience but always with an eye on the story’s meaning—a view only available to someone looking at story from the inside. This view is great for understanding audience reception but limited when trying to fix story structure problems. In this regard McKee is in the same boat as Syd Field, Christopher Vogler, Michael Hauge, Lajos Egri and probably most all other story mages. One major difference between Dramatica and more traditional story theories seems to be this: *Dramatica works with story from the objective author’s view that allows writers to clearly manipulate elements of a story’s structure. From this author’s perspective, it is difficult to find the meaning of specific author’s choices. *Many other story theories work with story from the subjective audience’s view that allows writers to see the meaning of flow and elements of the story. From this audience’s perspective, it is difficult to predict which story elements are essential and how they should go together. In retrospect this seems obvious. I’ve known that many story gurus developed their ideas from examining lots and lots of stories. I know Dramatica WASN’T created that way—we developed the theory by identifying the underlying story rules and elements existing in all stories (the Dramatica theory posits that stories are models of human psychology, specifically metaphors for the mechanisms of a mind attempting to resolve an inequity). All it took was recognizing the difference in perspective (audience vs. author) and the difference in intent (meaning vs. prediction) to understand how Dramatica is fundamentally unlike the other story paradigms. My new understanding of the differences in how Dramatica looks at story differently than others gave me an insight into something we call, “the Dramatica effect.” In a nutshell, the Dramatica effect is an “aha” moment that many writers have approximately two weeks after exposure to Dramatica’s “Twelve Essential Questions.” These are the eight story dynamics questions and identifying the Overall Story’s Domain, Concern, Issue, and Problem. If a writer’s exposure to these concepts is more than cursory, the effect is likely to hit him two weeks later. Suddenly the writer “gets” Dramatica in some fundamental way that escaped him earlier. My insight into the “Dramatica effect” possibly explains what the effect is. I think that the “aha” comes from a writer going from seeing story from the subjective, audience perspective in which he has been trained to the more objective author’s perspective offered by Dramatica. It’s probably less a “switch” than a broadening of his horizons. It’s a brief glimpse into the possibilities that Dramatica offers. I’ve yet to choose the next guru’s book to read but I look forward to it.