Notes on Michael Arndt's "Lessons Learned"

Michael Arndt, of Little Miss Sunshine and Toy Story 3 fame, created a 72 minute Lessons Learned video on the learning process he went through writing TS3. To bring home the we-are-always-learning motif, I want to emphasize that this was after Arndt won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay. As evidence that these are indeed really good lessons learned (or "Tools, not Rules", as he would say), let me point out that for writing TS3 he was nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay. To be clear, the video is excellent! It's best just to stop here and watch it, but for those that like a written preview here are my notes, hopefully without too many mistakes. BTW, my notes on his excellent Endings video are here.

In act 1, your protagonist needs a global goal. For example, after she's landed in Oz, Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz has the overall goal of going back home to Kansas. (By the way, GITS has a nice blog post on The Wizard of Oz.) It must be compelling and sympathetic, with deep negative emotional consequences for failure. Moreover, it should

- be the beginning of a journey or quest,

- show how the protagonist's desperately wants something,

- have maximum rooting interest,

- be an active, specific and clearly defined.

Your protagonist's expectations for the future must not be vague or subject to debate. Instead, they must be certain, clear, and specific. Before the end of act 1, the inciting incident must

- disrupt the protagonist's plans for the future,

- change their sense of self,

- change their sense of the future.

(If it's a problem figuring this out, Arndt suggests one way to approach this is to imagine the worst possible thing that can happen to your protagonist and work backwards.) In addition, the inciting incident must also be

- unforeseen,

- visceral,

- (hopefully) involve an action piece enacting this worst fear,

- involve the worst possible thing that can happen.

At the act 1 break, the protagonist has developed a short-term plan which will lead them to their global goal. It should be a

- clear, binary, pass/fail objective,

- seemingly easy to achieve,

- (hopefully) have a ticking clock attached.

For example, in The Wizard of Oz, Dorothy decides to go see the Wizard at the end of the yellow brick road, in hopes he can help her get back to Kansas. The midpoint should

- change direction,

- deepen the stakes,

- provide all exposition needed to solve the problem,

- recognize an new inner flaw,

- have new obstacles (because every change in direction requires a new set of obstacles),

- reversals in as close proximity as possible.

No treading water! The act 2 brake should

- achieve the short-term plan,

- there's a setback in the protagonist's global goal, and things look bad again,

- the protagonist must fail internally, externally, and philosophically.

The ugly truth cannot be avoided. For Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, she doesn't feel like her home in Kansas is where people love her. For example, she fights with a neighbor lady over Toto, but the people in her extended family (her parents are dead) don't seem to care. Her internal goal is she wants her extended family to be her real family. Her philosophical goal is to define herself as a maturing girl, adapting to the world out there. In some sense, it's a coming of age allegory. The failure of her philosophical girl is she doesn't know who she is, what's right, what's wrong, what's real and what's trickery.

The audience should not see anyway out of this internal-external-philosophical failure until the climax, which is late in act 3. Overcoming these failures is accomplished in what is called the epiphany. In the epiphany, the protagonist must face up to the viewpoint of the antagonist, confront it, and become a better person as a result. Dorothy epiphany occurs when she confronts the Wizard, who's really just a Professor hiding behind a curtain with some mechanical tricks.