Guest Appearance on the Story Makers Podcast!

Hi guys, I’m almost ready with new material, but in the meantime, check me out on the Story Makers podcast, which has no overlap with my last podcast appearance, so it’s worth a listen. We talk about “A Game of Thrones” a lot and the reader’s experience of “pleasurable masochism” while reading it. We also range over lots of fun topics, like irony and why we tell each other stories. I also mention the next book we’ll be doing (though I think it won’t actually be next.)

Interview on the "On Grit" Podcast

Hi guys, let’s delay the post that was going to go up today until tomorrow, because we have something neat instead. I don’t consider myself to be a particularly gritty guy, but Rigel Patterson at the podcast “On Grit” read my book and wanted to talk to me about my advice and my experiences. I talk too fast and I’m (as always) too negative about some things, but Rigel’s a good interviewer and we have some good discussions. Give it a listen.

The Narrative Breakdown Podcast: The Archive

Here's another one that never made it into the sidebar for some reason, so it’ll be new to a lot of you. Hey guys, did you know that before I had my own podcast, I was a semi-regular guest on the Narrative Breakdown podcast with James Monohan and Cheryl Klein? We covered a lot of good stuff over the years, and here I am archiving it for the first time. Enjoy! (And once you’re done listening to these, go back and listen to all the others!)

Unfortunately, these links aren’t working anymore, but you can still subscribe to the podcast on iTunes and find each of these episodes there:

• Episode 7: Scene Construction 1: Character Expectations and Tactics
• Episode 10: Generating Characters for an Ensemble Cast
• Episode 15: The Power of Irony
• Episode 18: Subtext
• Episode 24: Thriller Types and Tropes
• Episode 31: Flip-Side Strengths
• Episode 39: Character Goals and Philosophies
• Episode 46: When Stories Lie
• Episode 50: Screenplays of 2014
• Episode 58: Strong Episodic Concepts
• Episode 65: Misunderstood Characters

Podcast Episode 4: Disputatious Dialogue

The Secrets of Story Podcast · Episode 4: Disputatious Dialogue

If you subscribe to The Secrets of Story Podcast on your phone, you may notice that episode 4 appeared today! If not, you can stream it or download it above.

James and I wind up discussing two “Star Trek” scenes. First we discuss the one I transcribed and criticized here, in which Bones and Kirk celebrate Kirk’s birthday in Star Trek Beyond but then James points out that this is a knock-off of a very similar scene in Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan, so we take a look at that one to contrast it. I play the audio of it, but you can watch the video below:
Here are the two crazy things about this discussion:

1. On the night we recorded it, it was the eve of James’s birthday, and we wound up drinking past midnight, so we were doing the same thing they’re doing.
2. Someone on Facebook mentioned that today, the day I’m posting it, just happens to be James T. Kirk’s birthday! (But I’m sure you already knew that.)

All that and James has a story idea that you might want to take! I think it’s a pretty good episode! Give it a listen…

Podcast Episode 2: The Easy Way

The Secrets of Story Podcast · Episode 2: The Easy Way

Well, folks, it’s been a month since Episode 1, but life got in the way. We first recorded this on the night before the election, but we ran out of time and decided to meet again to finish it later. Then disaster struck. Afterwards, we decided to re-record it for a post-Trump world, and did so, but the dour Trump-themed version was too depressing, so then we decided to splice just the end of the later recording onto the first recording. So most of this episode is a relic of a happier world, before evil triumphed (and the end bit doesn’t acknowledge the new post-apocalyptic reality.)

You can stream it here, or, even better, subscribe to us on iTunes, then like us and review us!

At the end of this episode, we have a surprise for you, so I won’t spoil it here, but it involves a download, so here’s that link!

(Once again, the music is from FreeMusicArchive.com. It’s “Lucky Me” by Scott Holmes, with an Attribution/NonCommercial license.) 

Podcast Episode 1: Channeling Master Thespian

So for the last two weeks, we’ve had videos, and there are more to come, but today I thought I’d launch into yet another new multimedia venture: My very own podcast!

You guys have heard me as a guest many times on the “Narrative Breakdown” Podcast, but in honor of the launch of the book, I thought it would be fun to start my very own, or rather our very own, because I’m co-hosting with longtime friend-of-the-blog, James Kennedy, author of  “The Order of Odd Fish”!

You guys know that James frequently makes his objections known in the comments, so I thought it might be fun to let him pick at me in person, forcing me to defend stuff I’ve said here. For the first episode, we start with my post from a few weeks ago: Beware of Master Thespian. James disagrees, and we have it out, hopefully in an amusing way. We then try out a second feature: Free Story Ideas. I’ll let you listen to discover what that’s all about.

Will we have more episodes? Who knows! It depends on the reaction and how lazy we are. Let us know what you think!

UPDATE: The Podcast is now on iTunes and you can stream it here or download it by clicking on the title below and going to the SoundCloud page.

The Secrets of Story Podcast · Episode 1: Channel Master Thespian

New Podcast: Misunderstood Characters

Hi guys, I did a new episode of the Narrative Breakdown podcast with Cheryl Klein and James Monohan!  This time we discuss misunderstood heroes.
And check out lots of other podcast appearances here!

New Podcast on TV Concepts is up!

Hi guys!  I have a checklist all ready to go, but that “Narrative Breakdown” episode on TV concepts just went up, so I thought I would hold off a day and let you enjoy that instead.  We discuss “Mad Men”, “24”, “Breaking Bad”, and one of my all-time favorites, “Slings and Arrows”.

New Oscar Podcast

Hey guys, there’s a new Narrative Breakdown podcast up about 2014 movies just ahead of tomorrow’s Oscar ceremony. We start with Selma, and I say the pretty much the same things I said here on the blog, but after that we cover…

• Nightcrawler
• Whiplash
• Snowpiercer
• Boyhood

…and most of my thoughts on those movies go far beyond what I said on the blog, so check it out. We also discuss Edge of Tomorrow, which I’ll discuss here on the blog next week, so you’ll get a preview of that.

I think that this is the best one we’ve done. I’m working on my presentation skills so I pictured Tyler Perry from Gone Girl throwing a peanut at me every time I was about to revert to my verbal tics, and that helped!

New Narrative Breakdown Podcast on Unreliable Narratives!

Hi guys, long time no see.  New content still isn’t ready, but I guest-hosted once again on The Narrative Breakdown with James Monohan and Cheryl Klein.  This time we’re discussing unreliable narrators in film and prose. Alas, I sound a little frazzled in this one (It was the end of a long day!) but James and Cheryl carry my weight ably, so it’s well-worth a listen!

Podcasting and Procreating

Just look at that little guy! He makes Little Debbie look like a pile of puke! One week old and already smiling and robust. But the kid is on his own now (being raised by wolves somewhere, I presume) so I’m ready to jump back in soon.

In the meantime, I’ve made another appearance on the Narrative Breakdown podcast, this time discussing false goals, true goals, false philosophies, and true philosophies. We also range far afield, discussing a lot of last year’s Oscar nominees and whether or not you want the subject to be involved in the making of his or her own bio-pic.

Podcast AND Storyteller's Rulebook #200: Don’t Ignore the Irony Inherent in Your Premise

A two-fer today!  First we have a new Podcast: I was once again a guest on James Monohan’s Narrative Breakdown podcast, and this time we talk about flaws and flip-side strengths!  But of course we don’t want to slow down our 13-part series either, so let’s also do:
All-Too-Common Flaw #4 

A few years ago, Denzel Washington directed a highly-fictionalized “true story” about a debate team at an all-black college that gets to challenge the Harvard team in the 1930s. As it happens, the team gets assigned to defend the proposition that blacks should have equal rights. They do a good job with that and win. Yay.

The Great Debaters commits the cardinal sin of all hokey period pieces: It irons out the irony. What makes this so frustrating is that there is a ton of irony inherent in that premise. Here’s why college debate teams are interesting: you don’t get to choose which side you argue. That gets randomly assigned. So what if the black team had been assigned the anti-civil rights side of the argument? Then you would have one hell of an ironic movie!
It would be super hard to want to do, of course, and they would balk, but then, after a few stern speeches from Washington, they would realize that this was their big opportunity. They would have to create devastating anti-integration arguments, proving that blacks weren’t the equal of whites...but the more they proved that blacks weren’t equal in theory the more their eloquence would prove that they were equal in reality!

At that point you could end the movie either way and it would still be powerfully ironic. With that ending in doubt, the whole movie would come alive. Instead, with the version they made, we know the whole time that there’s only one way to end it, unless they want to make it look like this whole integration business was a big mistake.

Pacific Rim has a similar problem. People control giant robots to fight giant monsters...What kind of people? Well, our hero is big strong meathead who’s pretty good at beating people up even without the world’s biggest pair of brass knuckles. Where’s the irony in that? (This is like Green Lantern, where the power of flight was granted to someone who already had the power of flight.)
So who should have been the hero of Pacific Rim? Well, you don’t have to look far. Every time Charlie Hunnam is on screen, the whole movie falls asleep, but the big subplot stars a cocky little tattooed geek-scientist played by Charlie Day, and every time he appears the movie suddenly comes alive. It shouldn’t take a genius to figure out that he should have been the hero: After all, the whole point is that it takes a lot of brain power to run the robots...so why not choose a little genius with a huge personality?
This would have made that misleading tagline come true: “To Fight Monsters, We Created Monsters.” In this version, we watch the power go to the head of this little dynamo now that he can finally kick ass for the first time, then we see him gradually realize that real combat requires military discipline and true humility! That sounds like a much better movie to me.

Narrative Breakdown Podcast on Character Flaws

Here we are again, folks, I’ve co-hosted another episode of James Monohan and Cheryl Klein’s storytelling podcast “The Narrative Breakdown”.

This time, we’re talking about character flaws, and I think we came to some excellent conclusions by mixing together out different perspectives. And guess what, there’s a lot more “Breaking Bad” talk, in case you haven’t heard enough of that!

(Including talk of the dear, departed Gale, who manages to cook meth in a much less flawed way.)

Here are some past posts on flaws that I touch on: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.

Download it here or subscribe on iTunes here!

Also, this is awesome:
 
"El Paso" scene in Breaking Bad plus the rest of it from Bonnie Rose on Vimeo.

Narrative Breakdown Podcast on Plotting Thrillers

Hello everyone!  

How’s your summer?  Mine’s good.  I just finished the second draft of the book, but I still have a ton of work to do to get it into shape.  I may not have it done by September, but that’s okay, because I’m generating a new checklist, which means more roadtests, so that’s a month of entries right there.  Expect to see some of that after Labor Day.

So no, the summer hiatus isn’t over yet, but I’m checking in today to say that there’s a new podcast up!  Once again, I’m a guest on “The Narrative Breakdown”, and today we’re discussing plotting, thrillers, and the writing lessons of “Breaking Bad”, in honor of its return this evening.  Download it here or subscribe on iTunes here!

Enjoy, and have a good rest-of-summer!

Narrative Breakdown Podcast on Subtext!

Hi everybody!  Well, you might as well just subscribe to the Narrative Breakdown podcast, because James and Cheryl are posting every week at this point and they’re all worth listening to.  This week, I’m back as their co-host for a show about sub-text, based in part on this post.  Give it a listen!

Subscribe on iTunes here...

...Or download it from the website here!

Narrative Breakdown Podcast on Irony

Hey guys, the Narrative Breakdown podcast is back with a run of new episodes, and they were nice enough to ask me to drop by again.

Today, James Monahan and I discuss irony and our conversation pushes my thoughts on the subject into areas that I’ve never covered here on the blog, so you might want to give it a listen!

Check it out on the web here or subscribe on iTunes here!

And here are some of my previous posts on the topic:
Seven Types of Storytelling Irony.
All Good Stories Are Ironic.
Successes and Failures Should Be Ironic.
Misunderstandings Must Be Ironic (featuring The Apartment)
Lincoln vs. Amistad.
And my write-up of Margin Call.

Point of interest: Here on the blog, we were discussing motivation earlier this week and whether or not TV characters can have more complex motivations than movie characters.  I mentioned that I hated movies where detectives are supposedly motivated by the fact that the victim reminds them of someone they failed to save long ago...

...but in the podcast, I praise the long-running storyline on “Homicide” where precisely that dynamic comes to fuel the character of Det. Bayliss.  Again, the difference is time.  On the show, we see the orignal case fall apart, we recognize the picture of the girl in Baliss’s cubicle year after year, we share his frustration, we feel the resonance when he gets similar cases, years later.

When movies attempt this sort of long-distance motivation, it feels cheap and unearned, because they’re referring to an event that means nothing to us.  On TV, if they’re committed to the long haul, they can pull it off beautifully.

(Also, it’s worth noting that whenever a case reminded Bayliss of the unsolved Adena Watson case, that usually meant he was about to screw up. Complex motivations are more likely to lead to failure  than success!)

Another Podcast, The Wire and Dickens, and More Head Heart Gut to Come

It’s happened again, I’ve co-hosted another episode of James Monohan and Cheryl Klein’s storytelling podcast “The Narrative Breakdown”.  This episode is about creating ensembles. 

Inevitably, we talk quite a bit about my “head, heart, gut” theory, which began here and continued here, here, here, here, here and here, but keeps expanding in my mind, so come back tomorrow (and maybe longer) where I’ll try to integrate all those previous pieces for the first time, with some nifty visuals.  


Meanwhile, in the podcast, you’ll hear that we repeat the common wisdom that “The Wire” is Dickensian in nature.  As it turns out, shortly after we recorded this episode, Cheryl was amused to see that Salon’s book editor Laura Miller had apparently heard us and disagreed vociferously.  This was my response to Cheryl:

That’s funny, but I’m not sure I buy it.  She digs for traits that “The Wire” doesn’t have in common with Dickens, but none of these are traits that all Dickens novels have.  If you’re prepared to talk about “Dickens” as one body of work, then you’ve already accepted that you’re going to generalize. 

I would say that the heart of the comparison lies in shared traits she didn’t mention: 

• An impossibly large cast of resourceful-but-ultimately-tragic characters who are ground up by the wheels of institutional indifference, but find moments of happy transcendence in their everyday lives.  
• The lack of focus on immediate goals, replaced by the pleasure of visiting and re-visiting members of that cast as their fortunes rise and fall multiple times over many years. Just when you think you’re never going to see a character again, they pop back up in a different phase of their life.  
• Taking an anthropologist’s joy in replicating the strange and witty jargon of the streets.

My Podcast Debut

My friends James Monohan and Cheryl Klein are both story-masters: She’s a big-time book editor who worked on the Harry Potter books and runs the super-useful blog Brooklyn Arden.  James is a USC-trained video editor and screenwriter who has been developing a neat writing-app called The Storyometer. 

As if all that’s not enough, the two have recently started their own podcast: The Narrative Breakdown.  All seven episodes are well-worth a listen (True story: I was listening to the last one and missed my subway stop for first time in years) but I especially recommend the most recent, since their guest co-host is this guy right here! 

They had me out to their place in Brooklyn, where we discussed scene construction, drawing from this series and especially this piece.  I thought it went awfully well.  Luckily, my voice is no longer as squeaky as it was when I was a young rake.