I seem to be getting rather confessional lately. In part, it’s because I realize, as a school-teacher, that my screw-ups are often more helpful to students than my successes.
In my early days of writing (and as I hit a patch later on where I started to get a little over wordy) I was inclined to ignore how important grabbing the attention of the audience quickly was. It’s understandable, I guess. When you believe in your story, you believe the “good stuff” is worth the wait and you want to prepare the ground effectively for your audience.
Unfortunately, this belief and attitude were horribly mistaken and a sign, not only that I was a rank amateur, but that I had fundamentally misunderstood the audience I was trying to reach.
In a media-saturated world with ever more options for people’s attention and time, stories must grip hard and grip fast if they expect to earn a hearing.
One of my early mistakes was an over-reliance on a, usually, unnecessary story element: the prologue. Like with every general rule about writing, there are exceptions where this is not true, but generally speaking, prologues are bad and should be avoided for the following reasons…
The scene before everything starts
Prologues are often merely a scene that occurs before everything properly begins.
A scene that you create before you introduce your characters is nearly always a problem. Firstly, it confuses your audience since they inevitably conclude that the protagonist will be one of the first characters they encounter. If the opening scene doesn’t reveal your protagonist but instead focuses on someone else, the result is confusing but worse still, it tends to burn some of the good-will that the audience brings to your story and you run the risk that your listeners won’t invest in the story or trust you enough to invest in the protagonist when at last he/she is revealed.
There are exceptions of course. A murder-mystery story might open with a character being bumped off. An archaeological adventure might begin with the loss of a great treasure at some time in the past, etc. But generally speaking, unless your audience is already aware of, or able to recognize these conventions for what they are, this may not be the best way to open your play and might be better presented after your main characters have been introduced.
In all cases, we should aim to get the action started at the point of highest interest.
Compare this opening…
BILL: (SNORING LIGHTLY)
SOUND: PHONE RINGS ESTABLISH AND UNDER
BILL: (YAWNS) Who’s ringing me now?
SOUND: PHONE IS PICKED UP
BILL: Hello.
JERRY: Hi Bill. It’s Jerry. Your cat’s dead.
BILL: Huh? Do you know what time it is?
With this…
JERRY: (THROUGH TELEPHONE, FILTERED) Your cat’s dead.
BILL: (JUST WAKING UP) Huh? (BEAT) Do you know what time it is?
It’s hopefully pretty obvious that starting at the point where the dialog gets interesting is far more effective than filling the scene with unnecessary prologue. Likewise, the problem would be made even worse by writing a preliminary scene where we watch Bill go to bed after a long day. It adds nothing. If the real action begins with Jerry’s announcement that the cat is dead, then that’s where we should begin. And if it is important to know that Bill went to bed the night before, exhausted after a long day at work, then we can reveal this with a line of dialogue rather than devoting an entire scene to what is, ultimately, just supporting information.
The long introductory narration
Here’s another of my early mistakes. This example is taken from one of my published plays…
NARRATOR: The details related in the following audio drama were first uncovered in documents found in the attic of a tenement house in London in late 1985. They were the property of a well-to-do gentleman who had lived at the end of the nineteenth century — a doctor and soldier who had been invalided back to England after a tour in Afghanistan, later married, and had received the documents as a bequest. The contents of this property amounted to some sixty manuscripts of varying sizes, upon the pages of which were recorded, in a spidery hand, a good number of tales both fantastic and macabre. We do not make any claims regarding the veracity of this material — since there is much it contains that is frankly unbelievable. Nonetheless, its author most certainly believed that what was recorded was true, and we now make it available to you so you may attach your own verdict to it.
Did you find yourself wanting to skip over it? I don’t blame you.
In this case, I proceeded to make the situation worse by adding a further narration by the protagonist as an old man introducing the circumstances of the story.
Looking back, I’m honestly astonished that my editor didn’t kick the damned thing to the curb.
It is tempting, especially when dealing with fantasy or sci-fi settings, to think that there is a lot of back-story and world-building that must be explained before the story begins. This is another mistake. Audiences are quickly turned off by long introductory narrations. Far better to let your audience meet your characters and, as quickly as possible, learn their dilemma, than risk losing them entirely with an introduction that no-one, ultimately, will thank you for.
This is a particular weakness of mine that appeared all too regularly in my early plays. I often gave a narrator a long screed explaining the setting or backdrop of the story. Most listeners want to skip these opening narrations. Given that there is no easy way to skip forward in a recording, most listeners simply hit the off-switch.
The Star Wars opening crawl, while a fun nod to nostalgia (and a demonstration that this guideline does not apply in all instances), was not necessary to understanding the story. All of the information contained in it was ultimately revealed elsewhere – a technique discussed later in this article.
The (apparently) unconnected prologue
This is a little more subtle. This occurs where we create a scene, the significance of which will not be revealed until much later. The scene might be crucial to the correct understanding of a later event but, unfortunately, by front-loading it, we risk turning the audience off.
If I present a scene at the beginning of the story that reveals that a character we do not meet until 2/3 of the way through was abused as a child, I might think I am providing crucial information that will help the audience understand the character when they do turn up, but in reality, most listeners will have forgotten all about it and, as a result, will need to be reminded of the information later (making the prologue redundant).
Worse, because the actual introduction of the character is going to come so late in the story, the listener will be left wondering what connection, if any, the scene had to the plot. Chances are they will feel confused, tune out, and switch the play off.
At least, here, the solution is simple. If the scene is necessary for what comes later, then move it to the point in the play where it becomes relevant.
It is all too easy to front-load a scene that we believe is interesting and attention-grabbing, on the grounds that it makes a great opening scene, without connecting it to our story effectively. It doesn’t matter how attention-grabbing the scene is if it fails to connect to our story. We might think we are creating a sense of mystery (and sometimes, perhaps, we are) but it is more likely we are simply creating confusion.
The late introduction of your main character
From the moment your story begins, the audience is attempting to identify the protagonist; that character that they are supposed to find fascinating, identify with, or support (even if the protagonist is an anti-hero or overall unpleasant individual).
Take the following (bad) example of dialog. Here, a group is sitting down at a restaurant deciding what to order. Who is the protagonist?
SOUND: BUSY RESTAURANT. PLATES AND CUTLERY. MURMUR OF PATRONS – ESTABLISH AND UNDER
WAITER: So what I can I get you, folks?
GEORGE: (ANNOYED)What? Is that the way you talk to customers?
MICHAEL: (TIRED OF GEORGE ALREADY) George…
GEORGE: No, he should know better. We’ve barely sat down. Mary’s not even got her menu open.
MARY: If I don’t mind, why should you get so…?
GEORGE: It’s the principle of the thing. Nobody cares about customer service anymore.
WAITER: I’ll come back after you’ve had a moment to think about it then, shall I?
GEORGE: (AFFRONTED) You cheeky bugger. I want to talk to your manager.
MICHAEL: Oh, for God’s sake George, do we have to go through this every time we go to a restaurant?
GEORGE: We aren’t even all here yet. Look, Shelley’s chair is still empty!
If the protagonist is the waiter or George, this scene isn’t so bad. But if the protagonist is Shelley, we have a problem. The audience will be trying to figure out who the protagonist is. Maybe they’ll stick around if the conflict between George and the waiter is interesting enough (and if the action moves quickly to the introduction of Shelley), but it is likely they will feel more than a little confused when the story turns out to be about someone who isn’t even at the table yet and doesn’t turn up until the next scene.
And all of this is by way of saying that the creation of a prelude scene is risky, but not that it never works or that there aren’t specific techniques available to us to overcome the problems.
Beginning the story
The most important thing to determine at the outset of a play is when to begin the story. Everything that occurs before the story begins is prelude. So, how do we identify the beginning?
The answer is deceptively simple. We need to begin at the point of change or transition. In a character-driven story, this moment is the call to change. In a plot-driven story, this moment is the inciting incident. Where both are running together (generally my favorite kind of story), the two should coincide (an incident should occur that demands the protagonist make some kind of change).
Introducing backstory
What about establishing what life was like for the character previously in order to help the audience understand where the character has come from and where they will be going? After all, the demonstration of life “before change” is part of nearly every published model of a character arc or plot outline.
The thing is, though, that a large amount of backstory (that takes place before the story really begins) is unnecessary.
I’ve learned this the hard way. In a play I recently wrote, intended to be part of a serialized story, I spent multiple scenes establishing the characters in their pre-existing lifestyles, prior to the inciting incident and calls to change that would upset the balance of their lives. What resulted was some great (in my view) writing that turned my audience away before the action even had a chance to begin. Big “oops”.
If we’ve done our job right, we’ll have constructed, in our heads, the “before change”/”normal life” part of our story as one of comfortable routine, where a significant flaw in our character is openly on display and obvious, but isn’t unduly disturbing the character’s comfortable routine.
To establish this “ordinary, but flawed, life” for our readers, with one or more complete and lengthy scenes, however, is wasteful and dull. The story actually begins at the point at which this “normal, routine-driven” life is disrupted. As such, we should be aiming to introduce the disruption immediately, revealing only just enough of the background to give the event context. In short, a demonstration of the character’s flaw and normal habits, while important, should be no more than supporting detail in the presentation of the inciting incident and call-to-change.
This radically shortens the opening act (when understood as the lead up to and introduction of the inciting incident and/or call to change). It can reduce it to a single scene (which, itself, can be a very short scene).
Let’s say our character suffers from obsessive-compulsive disorder. We could spend a few leisurely scenes demonstrating how they function day to day, following a strict routine, often mildly disrupting and disregarding the lifestyle and needs of others in order to maintain that routine. It’s a different way of living and experiencing life, so it might prove interesting to an audience, right? But if our story is about how this character is forced to cope when they are taken hostage in a bank robbery, we would do much better to get to the point fast.
A better approach would be to demonstrate how the character disrupts and inconveniences others while in the queue at the bank just as the robbery begins.
SOUND: CLOCK TICKING IN BACKGROUND – ESTABLISH AND UNDER
TOM: (IMPATIENT SIGHS AND HARUMPHS) Get on with it, will you?
FEMALE BANK CUSTOMER (FBC): Can you please step back, sir? You’re making me uncomfortable. And I got here first.
TOM: Just hurry up.
FBC: There’s a customer at the window. Look, there’s another that’s free, just over there. if you’re impatient, use that one.
TOM: This is my window and it’s nearly 10.00.
FBC: So what? You think you’re the only customer in this bank?
TELLER: Next.
TOM: Here, give me your purse.
FBC: What, no. Hey!
SOUND: PURSE BEING UPENDED.
TOM: By the time you’ve picked everything up, I’ll be done.
SOUND: TOM WALKS TO WINDOW (QUICK FEW STEPS) – LET IT FINISH.
TOM: (TO THE TELLER) Right, can you please cash this check? I’m in a hurry.
TELLER: You shouldn’t have done that, Mr. Oakdale. I’m going to have to call the manager.
SOUND: AT A DISTANCE – SHOTGUN COCKING – GUNSHOT INTO CEILING – SCREAMS – LET IT FINISH.
ROBBER #1: Don’t anybody move. This is a hold-up.
TOM: What the… Oh, this is all I need. (TO THE TELLER) Just cash the check.
TELLER: (SHOCKED) What?
All the pertinent information can be provided in a few lines of dialog and interaction before, or just as, the robbery is revealed. Other information about the character can be drip-fed to the audience in the telling of the story and its conflicts over time.
When it comes to backstory, it is better to assume it is unnecessary to the audience and that, if required, providing less and providing it later is a good guide.
One of the keys to setting ourselves free from the habit of providing boring “expositional data-dumps of backstory” to our audience (and I have yet to see an “expositional data-dump of backstory” that wasn’t boring) is to seed it throughout the play, revealing it only when it becomes relevant to the action taking place at the moment and revealing only that element that has a direct bearing on that moment.
Back story and exposition are best provided through dialog, but beware of the dreaded “as you know” sentence. Characters should never tell each other what they already know.
For example, the following is just awful…
TOM and the bank TELLER) have been taken hostage in the bank)
TOM: Tina, I’ve been coming to your window at the bank for the last three years, and as you know, I’m the ex-Secretary of Defense. These clowns have no idea what kind of storm they’ve created by taking me hostage.
Horrible, right?
Rewritten to have the conversation occur between strangers, this becomes much better.
TOM: (WHISPERING) These clowns have no idea the storm they’ve just created.
BANK CUSTOMER: (WHISPERING) Don’t I know you? You look familiar.
TOM: I used to be the Secretary of Defense.
BANK CUSTOMER: (WHISPERING) Oh, yeah. Didn’t you go nuts or something?
TOM: I was diagnosed OCD. It’s different.
BANK CUSTOMER: (UNCONVINCED) Right.
ROBBER #1: (YELLING AT A DISTANCE) Stop whispering over there! Unless you wanna see what color your insides are?
It’s only a snippet and needs some work, but it should be easy to see how much better it is than the first attempt.
If, after all this, you still feel that time spent in a prologue is essential to your story, then try to implement the following guidelines.
- Where possible, establish your character well, first.
- Make sure the prologue serves an important purpose.
- Double-check whether the prologue would be more effective as scene 2 of your script or if it can be integrated into the introduction of the protagonist.
- If you use it, keep narration short.
- Even if you don’t use narration, make the prologue as short as possible.
- Connect the prologue to the introduction of your protagonist as soon as possible.
Here’s an example that I think works better than most… Note how the second scene is directly connected to the prologue while introducing our protagonist.
SCENE 1: ANCIENT GREECE – CITY OF ALEXANDRIAN
NARRATOR: Alexandria, 256 B.C
SOUND: FADE IN – SCREAMS, FLAMES ETC – ESTABLISH AND UNDER.
DYING MAN: I’m not going to make it. Here, take the map and hide it. They’re torching the library. These barbarians must never be allowed to find Alexander’s great trove.
BOY: Yes, father. I promise.
DYING MAN: Good, now run. And stay out of sight.
MUSIC: SCENE ENDER
SCENE 2: PROFESSOR’S OFFICE
SOUND: RADIO PLAYING IN BACKGROUND – 30s BAND MUSIC – ESTABLISH AND UNDER
PROFESSOR TOM: So, where did you find this map?
WILLIS: On a dig in some caves in Alexandria, about twelve miles from the capital. It was lying in a jar beside the skeleton of a boy who appears to have died from a sword thrust to the ribs. He must have escaped his killer and crawled into the caves to die.
Well, that’s enough from me. If you’re new to scriptwriting, I hope you’ve enjoyed (and hopefully learned something useful from) this discussion of some of my early mistakes. And if you’re an old hand, I hope you’ve enjoyed this reminder that we all had to start somewhere.
Copyright Philip Craig Robotham © 2020 .
