A Story Idea Each Day for a Month — Day 6
This is the 12th year in a row I’ve run this series in April. Why a story idea each day for the month? Several reasons which I’ll work my…
This is the 12th year in a row I’ve run this series in April. Why a story idea each day for the month? Several reasons which I’ll work my through during this series of posts. Here’s another one:
Around 1990, writer Stephen Brill came up with this idea: “A self-centered lawyer is sentenced to community service coaching a rag tag youth hockey team.” That eventually became the movie The Mighty Ducks. That seemingly innocuous family comedy grossed $51M, not bad for a movie with a reported $10M budget.
Then came D2: The Mighty Ducks. Then D3: The Mighty Ducks. Then “Mighty Ducks”, a TV series. Then Mighty Ducks the Movie: The First Face-Off, a DTV animated movie. And then came this:
The Anaheim Ducks [formerly the Anaheim Mighty Ducks]. An NHL franchise. A professional franchise worth an estimated $188M.
All based on the fact that one day, a writer was walking around and came up with a story idea about a youth hockey team named the Mighty Ducks.
As I said… in Hollywood, story ideas are worth gold.
Today’s story idea: Whitmer kidnapping plot hearing live feed: Confidential FBI informant testifies.
A confidential FBI informant testified Friday in a Jackson court about being embedded for months alongside leaders of a group accused of plotting to kidnap Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.
The informant’s identity was concealed for his safety. Introduced only as “Dan,” an online video feed of Friday’s hearing was cut off during his testimony so court observers only could hear him.
Dan described learning of the group — known as the Wolverine Watchmen — through a Facebook algorithm that he believed made the suggestion based on his interactions with other Facebook pages that support the Second Amendment and firearms training.
“I was scrolling through Facebook one day and they popped up as a suggestion post,” Dan said. “I clicked on the page and it had a few questions to answer.”
After answering the questions satisfactorily, Dan, an Army veteran who described himself as a Libertarian, was admitted into the group and told to download an encrypted messaging app called Wire so he could communicate in secret with other members. The app prohibited screenshots and would periodically delete all messages.
Dan’s acceptance into the Facebook group was the beginning of his journey as a confidential FBI “human source” that took him to protests at the state Capitol and to rural training exercises with members of the group who expressed a desire to hurt and kill law enforcement officers and politicians. Dan testified he sometimes wore a wire and feared for his safety, eventually deciding to sell his house when his address became known.
Reading this story, movie associations spring to mind:
- Serpico (1973): An honest New York cop named Frank Serpico blows the whistle on rampant corruption in the force only to have his comrades turn against him.
- Betrayal (1988): An FBI agent posing as a combine driver becomes romantically involved with a Midwest farmer who lives a double life as a white supremacist.
- Donnie Brasco (1997): An FBI undercover agent infiltrates the mob and finds himself identifying more with the mafia life, at the expense of his regular one.
- BlacKkKlansman (2018): Ron Stallworth, an African American police officer from Colorado Springs, CO, successfully manages to infiltrate the local Ku Klux Klan branch with the help of a Jewish surrogate who eventually becomes its leader.
The role of an undercover character is rife with dramatic narrative potential because there is a ticking bomb throughout the story. At any point, the true identity of the character can be blown with dire consequences.
The one thing that jumped out to me about this real-life story cited in the news article: The guy U.S. law enforcement authorities used to infiltrate the ultra-right-wing militia is a civilian, not a trained professional.
Therein lies a “similar but different” story, similar to previous undercover / infiltrator movies, only this time, the Protagonist is a civilian. It’s akin to Judas and the Black Messiah (2021):
Bill O’Neal infiltrates the Black Panther Party per FBI Agent Mitchell and J. Edgar Hoover. As Party Chairman Fred Hampton ascends, falling for a fellow revolutionary en route, a battle wages for O’Neal’s soul.
Only in this story, the Protagonist infiltrates a radical right-wing white supremacist militia with a scheme to kidnap and assassinate public officials.
Imagine some blue collar guy living in rural Michigan, a Libertarian, stumbles upon a Facebook group, answers a few online questions…
Weeks later, he finds himself an undercover agent for the F.B.I. amidst a heavily armed militia group with a daring plan… and any second, his cover could be blown and he’d be toast.
There you go, my 6th story idea of the month. And it’s yours. Free! What would YOU do with it?
Each day in April, I invite you to join me in comments to do some brainstorming. Take each day’s story idea and see what it can become when we play around with it. These are valuable skills for a writer to develop.