How to Cultivate Great Story Ideas

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By: Minda Burr

How do you develop an idea? Where do you even begin if you don’t know what you want to write next? So, I am going to ask you SIX KEY questions, and I want you to answer them from your from your heart and soul – from your gut – instead of from your conscious mind, because that is where you have access to your own unique ‘authentic voice’.

  1. The most obvious question – What do you feel passionate about? What is genuinely interesting to you? And if you’re writing a screenplay, novel or stage play — what characters would you like to dive into, live inside, talk like and behave like for awhile? You are going on an adventure and a personal journey with these characters, so you might as well enjoy yourself. What we are emotionally connected to, we are much more committed to. Obviously Nora Ephron was intrigued by the dance of Love between charming, intelligent and witty characters for example, in “When Harry Met Sally” and “Sleepless in Seattle” – while the Cohen Brothers preferred to swim in dark waters with deviant characters in “Fargo” and No Country for Old Men”. What water do YOU want to swim in??
  2. Are you a great observer of life and the “human condition”? Does it fascinate you to the point that you start conjuring up scenarios about where Life might be going? Suzanne Collins did a brilliant job of that in the “Hunger Games.” She took two somewhat disturbing trends in our society today and exaggerated them in the future in a fascinating way: First, she takes the ever widening gap in our society of the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer, and catapults us into a future where the rich are now living outrageously opulent and SELF-indulgent lives in separate cities! They now live far, FAR AWAY from the deprived poor who live in concentration camps and are forced to hunt for their own food to survive. In the second current trend, she highlights our society’s obsession with ‘reality shows’ and takes us into a future where the most popular entertainment for the rich is watching the poor people stalk and kill each other. Then the victors become media sensations just like the Kardashians are today! Fascinating.

    QUESTION: Is there something that YOU see in the future that could be the natural outcome of what the way we are living now?

  3. Are you FUNNY? Do people think you are witty and they laugh a lot when they are your presence? If you can do it in person, you can put it on paper. If you are funny that is GOLD – do not squander your talent. And you have SO many arenas in which to cultivate it.
  4. Are you able to laugh at the ironies of life and how incredibly idiotic we are sometimes as members of the human race? Nobody does that better than Larry David did with “Seinfeld” and now “Curb Your Enthusiasm”. He has such a UNIQUE and interesting slant on everyday reality and he writes such flawed characters in mundane and sometimes ridiculous circumstances, that he allows us to laugh at ourselves for being human. If you have that gift, SHARE it.
  5. What knowledge or EXPERTISE do you have that is worth entertaining other people with? Look at what a Law career did for John Grisham and his series of best-selling books that became big movies, like “The Firm” and “A Time to Kill?” What expertise do you have that could be the foundation for a great idea?? It doesn’t matter if you’re a former bronco bull rider or a reformed sex addict – there could be ‘Gold in them there hills.’
  6. “Seemingly” OUT OF NOWHERE GEMS. What ideas have popped into your head out of nowhere and made you think, “This would be a great story or topic!” Pay attention to those! Those ideas out of nowhere are your heart and soul talking to you. They can also come from the Collective UN-conscious. Which means, that if you don’t write about, it someone else WILL. When those moments of inspiration happen – write them down immediately or call yourself and leave a detailed message. Or get one of those recording devices. Don’t assume you’re going to remember it because you most likely won’t. Inspiration comes in a FLASH – and is often gone like a puff of smoke if you don’t record it.

Four Resources Available To Actors Part 2 – Observation

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Observation

One of the things I have observed over the years are the various processes American Actors and British Actors use to becoming/creating a character. The Americans tend to work from the inside out and the Brits often work from the outside in. I believe we must use everything we can to bring a character to Life for a performance.

I’d like to introduce Observation as a way of Life for any Actor of any Age. Specifically Kids and Teens, because the sooner a young actor begins to approach the work in this way, the more natural it becomes as they grow into full fledged actors and conscious human beings. Awareness must become a way of Life for the Actor.

We have exercises in our classes for younger child actors to do outside of class that are simple and fun. They begin to take on observation as a natural part of their daily lives, illuminating human behavior. One of the things younger actors can do is this.

Choose three people to study, and make sure you take notes, but don’t tell the people you are examining that you are doing this. It can be anyone, and it needs to be three completely different types. For example, a child actor can observe a teacher, a parent, sibling, the grocery store man, a homeless person, someone at Church or a Bus Stop. Ask yourself the following:

How does this person look? What do they wear? What are they doing?

How do they speak, eat, write, and walk?

What are their quirks, idiosyncrasy’s, or patterns? Do they smile easily, laugh, frown, scowl or grin a lot? Do they hide or show their teeth?

Do they twitch or have nervous eyes, hands feet or mannerisms? Do they fidget or are they calm, cool and collected? Are they direct or do they avert their gaze when addressing people? Are they confident or shy?

Do they seem happy or sad? What is their general vibe? Do they walk or run funny or normally or do they limp, use a can, wheelchair or crutches? Do they have nervous speaking patterns or are they articulate? Do they have a large vocabulary or are they limited in their communications?

Once you have observed people, I recommend taking notes and keeping a file on various types of people. You can give each different person a file title like, The cute guy in Spanish class, The nerd at the pharmacy, the Queen, the President of the U.S., the popular cheerleader, the jock. My Mom, my Rabbi, my little brother, the ditzy girl, my favorite cousin, my Grandpa, my Aunt at my Uncle’s funeral. You get the picture.

Now that you have a catalogue of characters to draw from and you find a role that you will be playing, you now have observations to help you begin to create a character that has layers. People watching is fun, creative work. We aren’t paid to guess, we are paid to make playable choices and deliver magic that is believable.

Much of what we play will be ourselves, that is always the most accurate, but for those characters that are not like us, we must look outside of ourselves, go on task, and use your Observation Files. Not only will you have wonderful details to use in your study of the human condition, you will be come a much more expanded person along the way. What a wonderful quality. This really is sacred work we are doing and it is so much fun!

Chatting With The Casting Director…Do You Have Any Questions?

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by: Holly Powell

You made it into the audition room successfully without tripping and are focused and ready to go with your choices. And then…(a) the Casting Director decides to chat a bit; (b) no one looks up at you; (c) they ask, “Do you have any questions?”

So many actors in my classes tell me how focused they are when walking into the audition room, sure of their choices, and then the whole thing unravels because of something the Casting Director, Director or Producer say or do. First, if the Casting Director, Director or Producer starts to chat with you, this is a good thing! But a lot of actors get unfocused while chatting is going on and when the Casting Director decides chat time is over and says, “Are you ready to start?”…looking at their watch… the actor feels rushed with the need to hurry up and begin.

When chat time is deemed over, make sure you take 5 to 10 seconds to get back into your mental focus and remind yourself of your choices. Don’t ASK if you can have a moment to adjust (they could say, “No, let’s go we’re late”)…just take it! The asking gives your power away. YOU take control of the room, it’s YOUR audition time, it’s YOUR 3 minutes.

If you walk into the audition room and no one is making eye contact with you, just make sure you are trying to make eye contact with them. In that moment when they do finally glance up, they want to see an actor who is focused and ready to go. But, the biggest thing that can rattle an actor after walking into the audition room is that age-old habit the Casting Director says automatically… “Do you have any questions?”

My best advice to the asking of this question is: “No, I’m good, thanks!” See, you’ve already made your choices, right? And if you think you SHOULD ask a question and the answer you get back completely contradicts your choices, you will spend the entire audition trying to make the adjustment on the spot. Honestly, Casting Directors would rather see what unique choices you have made and how prepared you are…and THEN give you direction. They would rather see an audition where the choices might be “wrong” in their opinion, than watch an audition where the actor is struggling to adjust.

So, skip the asking of questions unless you really have no idea what the relationship is in the scene or have no idea what is going on in the scene. Those are probably OK questions!

Four Resources for Actors, Part 1

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Stop Apologizing to Get What You Want

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by: Christina Shipp

I am always shocked how much I hear people apologize these days. Frequently, for things they have no need to be sorry over. Frequently, just for being who they are. And I stand by and think to myself, why on earth are these people giving their power away?

Here’s the deal, business lovers: no one is going to give you power unless you claim it for yourself. So why not embrace the Tiger within you? This is what Peter Arnell means in his book “Shift” when he talks about Embracing the Tiger within. He uses Chris Rock’s bold stand-up to illustrate his point. A while ago there was a lot of media buzz over a trained circus tiger that “went crazy” and bit his trainer causing severe arterial damage. Chris Rock made a valid point in his routine, saying: “That tiger didn’t go crazy! That tiger went Tiger!” The idea is this: that tiger only did what was in his nature to do: to dominate and to be king of his domain.

So how can YOU go Tiger? How can you fully embrace the nature and essence inside of YOU? How can you honor who you are and your strengths? Unapologetically so, with confidence and power?

Bottom line – figure out who you are, uniquely, at your core and name it. Name it, define it and own it. Be consistently and authentically YOU. Be your own Tiger. Because you’ll never have to be sorry about that.