Write the Damn Thing! DAY 21

Welcome back, friends.

I wanted to take these first few sentences of the day to ask you a favor. Are you enjoying the content here? Are you? Great. Then you might want to give us a “clap” or a share on your social media. A little push goes a long, long, way.

Now that that’s out of the way, we can focus on the content of the day.

Key aspect of screenwriting: Breaking into ACT 3

What? Are we already at the end? No, we are not. This is the middle of your pilot. It’s the ACT 3 because we divided the pilot into 4 Acts.

In the 3rd Act (Or 2nd Act-B) things shouldn’t be too different, structurally speaking, from the 2nd Act. The only thing that should change is your characters approach to the problem at hand. The stakes should be higher too.

This is where things turn darker for your character. ‘The bad guys close in’. We still have to put obstacles in his way, and he still needs to solve them, but the consequences should feel direr.

Have you ever seen Collateral? It’s a great film, you should watch it. In Collateral there is a clear break in the middle of the second act. Jamie Fox’s character becomes a lot more active and driven. He’s not being pushed around by Tom Cruise anymore, now he is becoming a force to be reckoned with.

The 3rd Act is the 2nd Act with higher stakes. There’s no way I can put it any more simple than that.

We’re deep into our stories now, you should all be proud of the work you’re doing. It’s not easy, believe me, I know.

DAY 21 task:

Start writing your 3rd Act. Remember, we just came from a big cliffhanger at the end of the 2nd Act. Use that dramatic energy to push onward with your story. Let’s do 2 or 3 pages.

This is going to be all for today folks. I hope the concepts are clear.

As always, happy writing!

See ya’ tomorrow.

Yoy can see the last post here.