This concise checklist of questions and examples helps writers, producers, editors, publishers, and development executives quickly zero in on key story problems. It reveals what’s missing in any problematic plot. Find what’s wrong and fix it fast!
Laurie Hutzler’s handy primer is the result of ten years of teaching at the UCLA Film School and consulting on stories across the globe – from Academy Award winning movies to hit television series and popular novels. Anyone who has to evaluate stories will want to keep it on their desk as a ready reference.
“This little book is so packed with story wisdom it is mind boggling.”
—Meg LeFauve, producer, screenwriter, former President of Jodie Foster’s Egg Pictures
Writing just one hour day can produce a new script in just 22 weeks, using The One Hour Screenwriter eCourse. That means you could complete two new scripts a year with weekends off and eight weeks of vacation time or time for rewrites. And that’s while holding a full-time job, meeting social and family obligations and all the other duties in a busy life.
What Is A Character Map?
The Character Map is a proven way to develop characters that have a rich compelling emotional journey and a dynamic set of internal and external personal conflicts. Use this tool to create characters that leap off the page in your screenplay or teleplay. Great screenwriting begins with great characters. Great characters with a compelling emotional journey make your script truly memorable.
These characters believe they are their brother’s keeper. They feel responsible for the greater good and for doing good. They wrestle with how far they should go in seeking justice and fairness for others, in exposing corruption and injustice or in standing up against evil or wrong-doing. They worry about with what is the higher duty and what exactly is required of them in response.
Power of Idealism characters believe that life and love should involve a grand passion or an heroic destiny. They see the world in terms of sweeping epic poetry or as a struggle of operatic proportions. Intensity of feeling (good or bad) makes this character’s life worth living.
Power of Idealism characters believe it is better to be in intense pain than to feel nothing at all or to be simply content or complacent. These characters are more than willing to suffer for their art, their iconoclasm or their noble or romantic gestures. They believe pain is necessary to living a life of passion. They embrace their pain and even tend to wallow in it.
Power of Idealism characters have high standards and seek excellence in whatever they do. They appreciate the finer things in life and special luxuries large and small. They strive for aesthetic perfection in all areas. They abhor anything they consider to be coarse, gross, common, ordinary, mediocre, inelegant or ungallant. They believe that what is perfect but unavailable or unattainable is infinitely more desirable than what is flawed but possible or achievable. They are always reaching for the unreachable star.
A character driven by the Power of Idealism wants to stand out from the crowd, to be extraordinary, unique and special. They are youthful rebels, Epic Heroes or lovers whose passion lives forever. In addition to the examples below, see the Power of Idealism blog posts for more examples.
Character Examples
Coming of Age characters like the title characters in Billy Elliot or Juno, “Jess” Kaur Bhamra in Bend It Like Beckham and Curt Henderson in American Graffiti are young people “finding themselves.” They don’t quite fit in and struggle to find their rightful place in the world. Learn how these characters lose their innocence but gain a more complex understanding of the adult world.
Epic Hero characters like Colonel Robert Shaw in Glory, King Leonides in 300 and William Wallace in Braveheart are warriors in a doomed but noble battle. These Epic Heroes fight courageously and sacrifice themselves for honor, glory and the immortality of story, song and legend. Learn how these characters lose their lives but live forever in our hearts.
Separated Lovers like Rick Blaine in Casablanca, Karen Blixen in Out of Africa and Zhivago in Doctor Zhivago are torn asunder from their lovers but their passion transcends time, distance or death. In Separated Lover stories learn how love becomes stronger than any other force on earth– even death.
Intense and sensitive Power of Idealism television characters include Meredith Grey in Grey’s Anatomy, Carrie Bradshaw inSex and the City, Ryan Atwood in The O.C. and Dawson Leery in Dawson’s Creek. Learn how these complex characters keep us enthralled week after week.
Power of Idealism eBook
The Power of Idealism Character Type eBook explains how these characters are alike and how each character is made individually distinct. It will help you develop unique, original, evocative and authentic Power of Idealism characters that fully explore all the contradictions, reversals and surprises of a fully formed human being.
Discover the Power of Idealism character’s specific goals, unique emotional obstacles and very distinct responses and reactions to any opportunity, challenge or threat. Create this character’s Immediate Tactics, Long-term Orientation and Strategic Approach in a way that is recognizably “true” at every step of the story and during every moment of screen time. The audience will instantaneously recognize and relate to your character because your character is complex, three-dimensional and “feels real.”
This eBook is thorough analysis of the Power of Idealism Character Type in his or her many guises and roles as a protagonist or a member of a larger ensemble. It is packed with numerous examples from film, television and even real life! Examples from scores of scenes and dozens of quotes from film and television characters clearly illustrate this character’s motivations and psychological dynamics in a story.
Comprehensive Analysis
The Power of Idealism Character Type eBook illustrates exactly how to create and differentiate this character based on his or her:
(1.) World View (beliefs about how the world works) What are the essential core beliefs that motivate a Power of Idealism character’s ordinary actions?
(2.) Role or Function (position in the story or role in the ensemble) What do the other players look to a Power of Idealism character to do or provide in the story?
(3.) Values in Conflict (competing values that push the character to extremes) What opposing choices or goals establish the Power of Idealism character’s moral code? What is this character willing to fight, sacrifice or die for? And why?
(4.) Story Questions (emotional journey in the story) What personal issues, dilemmas and internal conflicts does a Power of Idealism character wrestle with over the course of the story? What does this character ask of him or her self? What is this character’s Leap of Faith in an emotionally satisfying story?
(5.) Story Paradox (emotional dilemma) What is the duality or the contradiction at the heart of a Power of Idealism character’s story struggle? How is the character’s internal conflict expressed in actions.
(6.) Life Lessons (how to complete the emotional journey) What must a Power of Idealism character learn over the course of the story to make a clear, satisfying personal transformation? What actions lead to this character’s emotional salvation?
(7.) Dark Side (this character as a predator or villain) What happens when a Power of Idealism character’s actions are driven entirely by fear? How might or how does the story end in tragedy?
(8.) Leadership Style (what defines and qualifies this character as a leader) How does a Power of Idealism character convince others to follow? How does this character act to take charge and command?
(9.) Film Examples (the Power of Idealism character as a protagonist)
(10.) Television Examples (the Power of Idealism character as central to an ensemble)
(11.) Real Life Examples (historical Power of Idealism figures on the world stage)
These characters are usually an agent of chaos. Their rakish push-the- envelop devil-may-care attitude inevitably shakes things up in a story. But their charm, ready wit and natural talent as an escape artist or improvisor often saves the day.
“Fear is static that prevents me from hearing myself.” Samuel Butler (English novelist, essayist and critic). Truer words were never spoken. A character’s fear is the greatest burden he or she carries. It is the constant “static” the character cannot escape.
These characters take what they want, fight for every inch of turf, refuse to show any weakness themselves and pounce decisively on the weakness of others. They have a kill or be killed framework for everything. They believe absolutely in the Law of the Jungle.
These characters don’t believe in getting personally involved or emotionally entangled in any issue. They always try to maintain a sense of cool detachment and personal objectivity.
These characters are the naifs, innocents and eccentrics, seemingly the last person anyone would think of as a hero. They are, in fact, the classic mythic hero or the reluctant hero that Joseph Campbell and Chris Vogler describe.
These characters want the reassurance of the visible, tangible evidence of their outward success or status. The definition and meaning of “success” is at the heart of a Power of Ambition character’s story. Is success truly measured from the outside or from the inside?
These characters believe the world is filled with hidden dangers, secretive enemies and concealed pitfalls. This character’s philosophy might be stated: “Things are never what they seem.” “Trust no one.” “Question everything.” “Watch out for secret agendas and hidden pitfalls.”
The endings of The Taking of Pelham 123 and Duplicity left me shrugging and saying “Huh?” Both were box office duds. The lesson from both films is “earn your ending.”
Terminator Salvation is a solid satisfying summer hit. It’s also a great illustration of the difference between a Power of Idealism character, Marcus Wright (played by Sam Worthington) and a Power of Conscience character, John Connor (played by Christian Bale). Although both men (and both Character Types) are honorable, how each views honor is different. Each man’s emotional journey therefore is distinct.
We first meet a morose Marcus Wright on death row. Dr Serena Kogan (played by Helena Bonham Carter), a researcher who is dying of cancer, makes a passionate appeal to him to be part of a larger project or greater vision. Marcus agrees to “sell” his body to science for a kiss. He kisses Dr. Kogan deeply and says, “So that’s what death tastes like.” This doomed romantic moment is exactly what appeals to and defines a Power of Idealism character.
When Marcus awakes decades later, he finds himself in a post-apocalyptic world overrun by a vicious, relentless, red-eyed mechanical army churning through the remains of human-kind. Marcus begins a long tortuous journey to discover who and what he is and how he fits into this horrifying new world.
Power of Idealism characters are most deeply concerned about authenticity, personal identity and the individual vs. society. These characters strive to find their place in the world— Who am I and where do I fit in?— while being acknowledged as unique, special and one-of-a-kind.
When Marcus discovers his extraordinary but horrific nature, he rebels. Dr. Kogan tells him he was designed for a unique purpose and that there is only one of him. He is indeed one-of-a-kind. Marcus refuses to be defined by his circumstance or situation. He will not submit to a larger crushing authority or an inescapable technological imperative. He will define himself.
In true Power of Idealism fashion, Marcus defines himself and becomes the stuff of legend through sacrifice. What makes him human is his heart— both metaphorically and literally. He sacrifices his heart so that the Resistance might live. It reminded me of one of the Psalms: “I am poured out like water, And all my bones are out of joint; My heart is like wax; It is melted within me.” Marcus Wright’s heart melts and he pours his life into John Connor and the hope of the Resistance.
We meet John Connor as the voice and moral authority of those fighting against the machines. At the climax of the movie, the larger Resistance leadership argues to strike a death blow against Skynet when Skynet’s defenses are down. John refuses to do so because such an attack would result in the deaths of masses of human prisoners trapped inside Skynet’s fortress city. John argues that if the Resistance fights with the same cold calculation as the machines– they are no better than machines.
Power of Conscience characters are most deeply concerned about rightness, fairness and the higher duty involved in anything they do. Although he wants desperately to end the war, John is not willing to do so at the expense of what he believes is mankind’s higher value of respecting human life. No one is expendable. All human life is precious. He tells those under his command to stand down. They respect John’s moral vision and choose to obey.
Power of Conscience characters believe they are their brother’s keeper. They feel responsible for the greater good and for doing good. These characters wrestle with how far they should go in seeking justice and fairness for others or in standing up against evil. They worry about and struggle with what is the higher duty and what exactly is required of them in response.
The big summer hit, Star Trek, is a great opportunity to see the Character Types in action. Character consistency is a crucial reason why the film has played so well with new audiences and long-time fans of the venerable franchise.
The film Revolutionary Road tells the story of Frank and April Wheeler (Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet), two Power of Idealism characters who feel trapped in the bonds of a mundane suburban lifestyle.
Randy’s tragedy is he finds magic only in the empty choreographed illusions of the ring. He compulsively plays the spray-tanned bleached blond hero to dwindling numbers of cheering strangers.
I discovered a great website that discusses how various writers and artists approach their work and organize their day. Below is a discussion of the simple method Anthony Trollope used to write forty-nine novels in thirty-five years!
“I pressed the button on the phone and the first sound I heard in the headset was a child sobbing. She was barely able to speak, kept saying the same thing over and over…”I just want it to stop.” It was Monday morning 7.30 am. My very first call as a ChildLine volunteer counselor.
What Is A Character Map?
Personality
Terminator Salvation is a solid satisfying summer hit. It’s also a great illustration of the difference between a Power of Idealism character, Marcus Wright (played by Sam Worthington) and a Power of Conscience character, John Connor (played by Christian Bale). Although both men (and both Character Types) are honorable, how each views honor is different. Each man’s emotional journey therefore is distinct.