Marilyn Horowitz

Screenwriting Classes, Coaching, and Resources

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Write Who You Know/FridayFunny Issue #8

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Happy Friday!

I’m excited to introduce the eighth episode of your Your Friday Funny!

This weekend I am heading off to a tango Festival in Miami. While it’s true that I am writing a book that concerns tango, it’s 70 plus degrees down there and I hope to get a little beach time in between tangos.

This week, I worked with three students on different projects and found that all the challenges they were facing were about one thing:  How to create compelling characters who can drive a movie or a TV series.  A famous writer wrote, “We all know how to tell stories, until we sit down have to write one.” I’m developing a new comedy series myself and am wrestling with that same challenge.
Why is this so hard? One reason is that in order for us writers to be convincing and write original characters is we must be willing to dig into our own experiences and find a way to use what we’ve experienced to create new stories with memorable characters.That’s where the goldmine of originality lies.

This exploration of our own identities is hard enough when we undertake self-improvement things like therapy, but to actually accept that our life experiences are the basic materials that will create the fabulous original jewelry of our characters and plots is a hard truth.

The application once you accept this truth is simple, but not easy: Write WHO you know.

How do you know who you know would form the basis for a great character? Try out my simple character development system. The paradigm is that there are three basic personality types, the first is the Passive type, the second is the Noble type, and the third, the Aggressive type. This character type classification implies both a basic outlook and how each one is going to respond to conflict, and the basic filter of their moment by moment experience.

Here’s an exercise that can help make this difficult process more fun.

  1. Set a timer for 10 minutes.
  2. Select a main character or obstacle.
  3. Decide which of the three types best describes them.
  4. Write for ten minutes about how they feel about great meal they had recently, the people they were with, and their experience with the servers through the filter of Passive, Noble or Aggressive.
  5. Make sure to describe how each event felt. Avoid lengthy descriptions.
  6. Put the work away when you’re done for a while.
  7. When you reread, ask yourself who this character reminds you of in your own life, and rewrite the exercise to reflect the real person.

I have found this fusion of  real and imaginary characters very helpful because the characters feel “alive,” yet I’m not emotionally involved so I can be objective about them. Not judging your characters is critical.

Enjoy your weekend!

Here’s to your successful writing,

Professor Marilyn Horowitz