Words in Action
Page 3
6David Mamet, in a memo written for the screenwriting staff of the series The Unit, cited on Movieline.com,
7Robert McKee, Story: Substance, Structure, Style, and the Principle of Screenwriting, Harper Collins, New York 1997.
8A powerful summary of the differences between theater and cinema can be found in Armando Fumagalli, I vestiti nuovi del narratore. L’adattamento da letteratura a cinema, Il Castoro, Milan 2004, chap. 5.
9On the importance of dialogue in the creation of a believable storyworld, see Jill Nelmes, Realism and screenplay dialogue, in Idem (ed.), Analysing the Screenplay, Routledge, London and New York 2011, pp. 216-233.
10Ibidem, p. 144.
11Cfr. Linda Seger, The Art of Adaptation: Turning Fact and Fiction into Film, Henry Holt and Company, New York 1992, p. 37.
12Fumagalli, I vestiti nuovi del narratore, cit., p. 160.
13For other examples, see Armando Fumagalli, Paolo Braga (eds.), Di scena in scena, monographic issue of Comunicazioni Sociali. Journal of Media, Performing Arts and Cultural Studies, n.3 (2011), Vita e Pensiero, Milan.
14Cfr. Extra content on the special edition of the film (Sony Pictures, Home Entertainment, 2005), especially the brief documentary From Stage to Screen.
15Cfr. Jeff Goldsmith, audio interview: “Peter Morgan - Frost/Nixon Q&A”,
16Peter Morgan, Frost/Nixon, Faber & Faber, London 2006, p. 82.
17Another and different ending for the film was shot. Even if the preview audiences liked it, in the end, Ron Howard rejected it. This different ending was just as visual and dramatic as the ending finally chosen. In this other film ending, Nixon puts on the loafers. The last image on screen gives so a radically different meaning than the image in the ending approved in the end. The rejected image would have said that Nixon’s apologies for Watergate healed him.
18Sarah Kozloff, Overhearing Film Dialogue, University of California Press, Berkeley and Los Angeles 2000. Kozloff teaches cultural studies and cinema genres courses at Vassar College in Arlington, NY.
19Cfr. the introduction of the essay (Kozloff, Overhearing Film Dialogue, cit., pp. 1-29).
20The tendency to make dialogue essential and quicken the plot by increasing the dosage of events within the unit of time and, more generally, the emancipation from the theater model has been a historical evolution. It is thus probable that Kozloff’s position was conditioned by her analyses of mostly very old films. Regarding the specific topic of the reciprocal influence of literature and cinema, see Keith Cohen, Film and Fiction. The Dynamics of Exchange, Yale University Press, New Heaven 1979.
21These functions are common even in dialogue for theater. In fact, manuals of screenwriting and manuals of playwriting for theater unite on these functions. For the reasons expressed above, however, film dialogue acquires these three functions in order to fulfill them in a more persuasive and accentuated way. Basically, these three functions are used more intensely in film than in theater. On how to write dialogue for theater, see for instance: Louis E. Catron, The Elements of Playwriting, Waveland Press, Inc., Long Grove, Illinois 1993; Jeffrey Hatcher, The Art and Craft of Playwriting, Story Press, Cincinnati, Ohio 1996; William Missouri Downs, Robin U. Russin, Naked Playwriting. The Art, the Craft, and the Life Laid Bare, Silman-James Press, Los Angeles 2004. Some interesting observations can also be found in Michael Shurtleff, Audition, Walker & Co., New York 1978.
22In the book Overhearing Film Dialogue, the words “conflict”, “subtext”, and “exposition” are not mentioned even once. See index, pp. 311-323.
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Chapter 1
Dialogue and conflict
Drama is the engine of a screenplay. The same is true of action and dialogue, both of which live on conflict. The formula that explains the movement of a good plot along its narrative arch is identical to the one that explains the development of good dialogue. In both cases, the same principal dynamic is true – “someone reaches towards an objective, but someone else, or something else, gets in the way”. Thus, we have a protagonist, an objective that triggers action, an antagonist and obstacles that come in between, allowing tension to rise and the character to mature.
In dialogue, this model is carried out through the characters’ words and not their actions. The model, which could easily be accomplished through a simple action, takes the partial or complete form of a problematic conversation, in the general sense of the word. A character thus tries to obtain something through words, but the other speaker’s words pull in the opposite direction. For example, one character could give unexpected information, forcing the other to change his strategy, or he could unintentionally re-open an old wound. Finally, one character’s words could clearly and blatantly contest the other character.
In any case, action and dialogue are fueled by opposing forces. From this point of view, “scene” and “dialogue” are interchangeable in meaning. In the metonymic sense, since dialogue is a component of a scene, which is the minimum unit of action in the plot, dialogue is dramatic.
The qualities of a good scene are thus the same as for a good dialogue23.
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Dramatic dialogue and its features
Dialogue is action
A scene is good when the action in the scene develops conflict. Even if dialogue replaces visible action in developing conflict, a scene can still be good. In other words, when a scene with dialogue is good, dialogue is the action24. For example, a character can prove their love for someone who has refused them by “doing” or “saying” something that is difficult for them, such as sharing a painful experience that was never shared with anyone before in order to make the other person feel unique and special (“It’s the first time I’ve ever told anyone this…”).
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Dialogue pushes the story forward
A scene is useless when it does not involve the conflict the film is based on. A scene is useless when action does not lead a character to a new phase of opposition with the antagonist and with his own personal development. The same is true for useless dialogue. For example, a fight between a husband and wife (one that happens time and time again) that does not reach a breaking point or serve in re-establishing peace is probably superfluous.
Dialogue is dynamic
A good scene, like good dialogue, is “rough” on the inside. It’s not monotonous or dull and it doesn’t arrive at its goal through a direct and foreseeable route. Action encounters unexpected reactions that force it to gradually take shape and, in more extreme cases, when action stumbles upon something totally unexpected, to completely re-mold itself. All this is necessary for a character to “grow”. A character must not limit himself to what he is at the onset, but push himself to find new resources within himself as he matures. If action and dialogue head down paths that are unfamiliar to the character, then the character is forced to find what he needs to adapt to these new conditions within himself.
Each time a character within a scene is forced to re-shape his own line of action, or the thread of his own conversation, it is said that one “beat” ends and another begins. A beat is the minimum unit of action and of dialogue in a screenplay, the “phase” of verbal confrontation between two characters25. For example, we can imagine an interrogation scene made up of three beats.
← 21 | 22 → PHASE 1: a cop tries to get a criminal to speak by making him a promise. If he collaborates, he’ll make sure he’s given special treatment.
PHASE 2: the criminal goes from not saying anything to provoking the cop. The cop warns him that the consequences of this will be severe.
PHASE 3: the cop unexpectedly ends up having
to plead with the criminal after the criminal makes it clear he has some “disagreeable” information about the cop’s past.
McKee gives the most concise and complete definition of a beat, defining it as a single pattern of action and reaction26. The cop tries to negotiate a confession (action), the criminal refuses to negotiate (reaction). This is a beat. The criminal provokes (new action), the cop threatens (reaction). This is another beat. The criminal blackmails (new action), the cop pleads (reaction). Another beat.
Dialogue has deep implications
Characters need to be pushed to face their inner needs, or rather, their personal problems, attaining a solution that can be realized, ultimately fulfilling their humanness. For example, in the hypothetical situation mentioned above, the devious words of the criminal touch a chord, affecting the cop’s deepest need of atoning for his past so that he may truly begin a new life.
If the overt objective pursued in the dialogue and in the plot twists that create obstacles to the achievement of this objective have repercussions on this need (creating pressure on the protagonist’s and/or speaker’s inner need), the conflict automatically becomes much more intense in the eyes of the audience. The audience empathizes with the ← 22 | 23 → protagonist’s need because “moral needs” are human questions of universal importance, personified in the character’s specific description and in the peculiarity of what is happening to him.
This point can also be expressed in other ways. For example, dialogue should have thematic resonance. It should both originate from and be inspired by the theme and by the character’s need of finding his true self.
Dialogue has structure
A good scene flows well, but at the same time, it is articulated into beats. Good dialogue is the same.
Action and verbal confrontation flow well when each beat is motivated and convincing. The audience, however, must also be able to understand “when” an exchange between characters moves things in a new direction. The beginning of each beat that makes up a scene is, thus, very important.
The script, hence, the writing, is responsible for making the work of the actor and the director easier. The actor and director are needed for emphasis, to make the changes in the beats clearer and more relevant. In a scene, the lines that prompt a new beat should be strong enough to make the turning point clear. Ideally, their impact should justify a character or speaker’s pause for reflection, in order to decide how to react. The term “beat” also means “pause” and can indicate just that, after which the relationship between the two characters in the scene changes27. The tables turn, so to speak. The weak become strong and the strong become weak.
← 23 | 24 → When the actors prepare to act out a dialogue, they agree on how to organize this change in attitude and how to make it discernible through gestures and different tones of voice. All this is obviously agreed on with the director as well, who knows how he must stress each beat (i.e. by changing the camera angle or adding close-ups). Both the actors’ and director’s actions, however, are based on the script, where new beats may be indicated (“pause, then the policeman responds…”) or suggested by a particular action (“the policeman stands and begins pacing back and forth, then…”).
Dialogue is succinct
The audience craves beats. A scene made up of multiple beats can be quite lengthy at times, even longer than the desired maximum of a page and a half (one and a half minutes), as long as the twists fuel one’s attention span.
The same is true for dialogue, but it needs to be emphasized that the audience craves beats, not words. If more words than those absolutely necessary to create conflict are used in the exchange (the concatenation of beats), the audience’s attention is thrown off. The audience expends more mental energy than it receives processing conflict and the film becomes slow and difficult to sit through.
McKee observes that, from a dramatic point of view, two speakers with many lines can bring everything to a standstill because, under the surface of the words, the same beat is being repeated. A new beat begins only when, through words, one of the speakers “does” something different than what he has done up until now, producing a different reaction from the other character than produced by his words up until now28. ← 24 | 25 → When all is said and done, scenes and dialogue have a natural inclination to be concise. Writing dialogue is an exercise in succinctness, having characters say what they must in the least amount of lines and words possible.
Dialogue has a climax
The motivation behind a scene can be found in its ending, where conflict has risen to a point in which the character sees both a new side to himself and others. The reason behind writing a scene is, thus, the creation of new balance, so that the story enters into a new stage and the drama reaches a new, higher, level of intensity. A good scene and its dialogue are written to rise towards a climax through which action is brought forward and carries the viewer into the next scene.
When a screenwriter prepares to write a scene, his imagination begins with the climax, the key event needed to bridge the previous and following scenes. In order to make this happen, the screenwriter steps back from the event and imagines the phases of dialogue that, beginning with an inferior dramatic level, could lead to the climax.
In the previous example with the cop, the screenwriter starts off with the third beat (Phase 3) − he knows this scene, through the dialogue, must end with the criminal blackmailing the cop that was initially interrogating him. He, thus, plans to get from phase one to phase three by starting with a phase of good disposition. The cop promises less jail time in exchange for his collaboration (Phase 1). From here, the author proceeds to the next phase, the more unforgiving phase of falling under threat. This is when the criminal becomes arrogant, forcing the cop to point out just how terrible the prison is that the criminal will soon be sent to (Phase 2). But the roles in this power relationship are completely reversed at the ← 25 | 26 → predetermined climax of tension. The criminal unexpectedly reveals the secret information he has on the cop and that he will make public if the cop doesn’t find a way to let him go (Phase 3: climax).
A scene does not necessarily have to continuously rise in intensity, as in the case described (the cop’s promise creates little conflict, the cop’s threat creates some more and the criminal’s blackmailing brings it to a height). A screenwriter can decide the upward or downward course conflict takes in a situation that, in any case, is headed towards a dramatic climax. Lines that are less intense are often preparation for the moment conflict picks up again. If, in our cop and criminal example, the cop had begun by threatening and continued by promising, thus inverting the first two beats, the third beat (the criminal’s threat of blackmail) would arrive at the moment the cop had let down his guard and would have been even more effective.
Dialogue changes the fate of the character
Rising action in a scene can only mean two things ‒ either the protagonist’s situation is getting better or it’s getting worse. The bigger the gap between these good and bad situations, the more dynamic the scene is to the audience. The ideal scene, and dialogue, produce a clear reversal of fortune. The protagonist who suffers hardship at the beginning of a scene should leave as a winner. The protagonist who is at an advantage should leave as a loser.
The last lines of a dialogue are, thus, of prime importance since the relations of power between the speakers are momentarily sealed.
Two general rules can be applied here.
First, “have the last word”. Setting the last beat in motion by making it difficult for the speaker to react means the character will be stronger at the end of the scene.
Secondly, the shorter the key line is, the more it stands out and rings in the minds of the audience29.
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Dialogue surprises
A new beat can be a surprise that originates from the unexpected reaction of the speaker. Screenwriting handbooks observe that, in the typical evolution of a scene, there are two types of turning
points in particular that catch both the protagonist and the audience completely off-guard.
The first point is the turning point that triggers the conflict. This is where the dialogue takes on a different direction from the one suggested by initial circumstances.
The second point is the climax, which sets the relations between the speakers in a state that would have never been initially imagined.
In these two situations, the reversal has the ability to soar to the highest level possible, a surprise, in every sense of the word. In these cases, one of the characters reveals something totally unknown, a secret, to the other.
Dialogue tends to follow a set pattern
The ideal scene portrayed in screenwriting handbooks is developed according to an ideal sequence of phases. In conclusion, and to summarize this introduction, these phases are indicated below30:
Bridging in
Very brief to keep dramatic tension alive. The dialogue must begin as soon as possible. The preparation phase, that brings us towards conflict, is reduced to a minimum.
← 27 | 28 → Professional screenwriters often advise cutting the first few lines of each scene in the first draft of a screenplay. More often than not, the lines that remain are more than enough to set up conflict and those that were cut were inessential and would have caused the initial elements of conflict to lose momentum.
Screenwriters also suggest keeping the character who is about to speak busy doing something, even if it is unintentional (the eye of the audience loves movement), to prevent the beginning of the scene from becoming static. What’s more, a character engaging in a task has more visual impact and the circumstances around him become more complex and interesting.