Comedy and Alejandro González Iñárritu’s Digger

One of the precepts of comedy is that as absurd as the scene gets, the actor cannot laugh. A comedic scene develops through the development of absurd and humorous elements, stacking on top of each other. These elements build, bringing tension, and can only be diffused through laughing. Laughing brings the catharsis. If the actor laughs then it takes away the pressure on the audience to laugh.

On Godard, on what would have been his 95th birthday

As a film student/aspiring screenwriter, Jean-Luc Godard’s films were hugely important to me. I’m hardly the first aspiring screenwriter or film student to have been inspired by his works. There are plenty of terrible student films trying to pull off the same magic.

Beyond his films, it was his creativity at finding solutions to problems that has stuck with me.

Experimenting with Structure

When you give away what you think you should be hiding, the story becomes something else. Sometimes the structure falls apart. You need to have things happen in a particular order. But sometimes changing it takes away the scaffolding that was just there to build the important structure. It’s worth experimenting.

J KennyJuly 30, 2024story structure, creative process, screenplay structure, writing a book

Adaptation For The Page

When talking about adapting a book, the term usually concerns whether a book can be adapted to the screen. The concept is broader. Essentially, all writing is adapting.