[Watch the video interview on Youtube here]
Film Courage: What are the three most important words for every screenwriter?
Andy Guerdat, Television Writer, Producer, Instructor, and Podcaster: What happens next. For every storyteller, what happens next. If the audience stops asking those three words, that three-word question, you are dead, you’re dead in the water. It’s surprising how often it happens that they do stop that and often it’s because they’re ahead of the story (probably usually it’s because they’re ahead of the story). The reason they’re ahead of the story often is because the screenwriter has been following a template that tells them I have to be here by page so- and-so. I have to be here by page so-and-so. The character must always do this, the villain must always do that and the audience instinctively knows it, they’ve seen the movies.
Most people by the time they’re in their 20s have seen hundreds, if not thousands, of movies or certainly thousands of TV shows, so they start to instinctively know when you’re following a formula, when the story is not surprising and delighting and amazing and interesting and they know it. They stop asking what happens next because they know…(Watch the video interview on Youtube here).
About:
Andy Guerdat has been a working writer/producer in film and television for the past 45 years, with hundreds of credits in movies, half-hour comedies, hour-long dramas, theater, and animation. He is currently a consultant at Disney TV Animation.
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