Screenwriting Lessons [Part 3]: Michael Arndt
A series featuring insights from the Little Miss Sunshine screenwriter.
![Screenwriting Lessons [Part 3]: Michael Arndt](https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/800/1*DP3m7OqSQB3mtenGmPJ4EQ.jpeg)
A series featuring insights from the Little Miss Sunshine screenwriter.
Over the years, I have featured screenwriter Michael Arndt numerous times. Two reasons. First, he is a terrific writer whose movie credits include Little Miss Sunshine (2006), Toy Story 3 (2010), and Star Wars: Episode VII — The Force Awakens. Second, evidently he has spent a good deal of time reflecting about the craft of screenwriting witness his 2009 appearance at the late, great Cody’s Bookstore in Berkeley, California:
Back in 2012, I ran a 5-part series of screenwriting lessons based on what Michael Arndt says and writes. Seeing as I’m deep into teaching a Pixar: Craft of Screenwriting class, I thought it would be worthwhile to revisit that series.
Here is Part 3 which focuses on story endings.
From Carpetbagger (NYT):
Michael Arndt won an original screenplay Oscar in 2007 for “Little Miss Sunshine” and now finds himself nominated again, for best adapted screenplay for “Toy Story 3.” But, as he said on Tuesday morning, writing remains a mysterious, difficult process. One of the few things that works for him: He starts by writing the end of the story and figuring out how he wants the audience to feel.
He starts by writing the end of the story. Knowing the end of your story is perhaps the most important key to prep-writing and breaking a story.
Yes, it’s all well and good to have this romanticized image of a writer, plunking down in front of a typewriter, inserting a blank piece of paper, typing FADE IN and off they go to God knows where, but they just know they’ll find their way (this is precisely how the last episode of “Californication” ended, by the way). That may work for you…
But if you’re serious about being a professional screenwriter or TV writer, that approach simply doesn’t fly. I’ve rarely met a writer with any sort of career in Hollywood who doesn’t break their story in prep.
And the most symbolic proof of that instinct is what Arndt suggests: Know the ending of your story first.
Amplifying this point, check out the opening comments Arndt made in the video above [transcript]:
This scene you’re about to see is the climax of the movie. And it’s really the thing I’m most proud of because as a writer, I’m a big believer in endings. I think that the ending of your story is when the meaning of your story is revealed. But I also think in setting up the story… a good story for me is for a character, right before the climax, taking a decisive action, making an important decision. And usually you’ve got to make that decision as difficult as possible.
So what I was trying to do here was push Olive into this corner where she has to decide if she’s going to go onstage or not. At that moment, she’s weighing two value systems. One is her dad who says there’s no sense in entering contest if you don’t think you’re going to win. She’s already overheard her dad go back and say, “There’s no way she’s going to win. I don’t want her going on.” Then on the other shoulder is her grandpa who’s said, “We’re gonna have fun tomorrow, we’re gonna tell them all to go to hell.” And also, “A real loser is someone who doesn’t win, it’s someone who doesn’t try.”
To be didactic about it, you’re trying to have your character make a meaningful decision and really push them into the corner. And I always thought when I started writing this, the external stakes of the story, which is whether Olive wins the contest or not, is about as low a set of stakes as you can possibly get: a child beauty pageant. But I wanted to try as a comic strategy to jack up the emotional stakes of the story and also the philosophical stakes of the story, so they were absolutely as high as possible. So that when she was sitting there trying to make this decision what she was going to do, you were like a hundred percent invested. What this little girl decided next was a really, really important decision, and that you wanted to see how it turned out.”
Here is Arndt’s brilliant description of Olive as she first starts her dance routine:
However, when the first verse begins, Olive turns and
strides up on the stage -- hands on hips, shoulders swinging
-- with an absolute and spectacular physical self-confidence.She rocks out, busting crazy moves this stage has never seen:
shakes, shimmies, twirls, dips, undulations -- a melange of
MTV rump shakin', Solid Gold Dancers re-runs, and
out-of-left-field inventions of her own. Other moves are
clearly drawn from Grandpa's sixty-year career of strip-bar
patronage.She dances with a total command -- an exuberant, even witty
mastery of her body, the music, the moves, everything.Most of all, she's doing it for herself -- for her own sense
of fun -- and the judges are instantly irrelevant.
And here is the scene from the movie:
Takeaway: A story’s ending is where its meaning reveals itself. It does so on three levels: External, Internal, Philosophical (or in my language system Psychological).
This frames a much larger discussion on the subject which we will explore tomorrow.
For Part 1 of the series on Michael Arndt, go here.
For Part 2, go here.