The Back Story
This is normally defined as a significantly important event that happens before page 1 to your main character, some moment in their life that makes them the person they are when you write FADE IN: .
In the first drafts of Secret Society, I didn't really focus too much on the Hand, so it was a McGuffin. I've now decided that making the Hand and the kids' interaction with it will make the script more fun. Now there's more of an idea of what's at stake if Rodney fails and Klingsmann gets the Hand in his evil grasp.
So since the Hand is basically now a character in my script, time to get to work on her backstory. The main questions I need to answer are :
- What is it?
- Where is it from?
- What are its limitations?
- Can it be destroyed?
- Why does it negatively affect some people but not others?
The thing with the backstory is that much of it never makes it into your script, it just helps give your characters more dimension so that they will seem like real people with real problems and real issues. This will be the same with the Hand. I think of all those questions, the only ones that will be directly addressed in the screenplay are #3 and #4. The other ones I'll give clues to without coming right out and saying it. It'll be interested to have each of the characters extrapolate their own conclusions based on where they are coming from.
In the first drafts of Secret Society, I didn't really focus too much on the Hand, so it was a McGuffin. I've now decided that making the Hand and the kids' interaction with it will make the script more fun. Now there's more of an idea of what's at stake if Rodney fails and Klingsmann gets the Hand in his evil grasp.
So since the Hand is basically now a character in my script, time to get to work on her backstory. The main questions I need to answer are :
- What is it?
- Where is it from?
- What are its limitations?
- Can it be destroyed?
- Why does it negatively affect some people but not others?
The thing with the backstory is that much of it never makes it into your script, it just helps give your characters more dimension so that they will seem like real people with real problems and real issues. This will be the same with the Hand. I think of all those questions, the only ones that will be directly addressed in the screenplay are #3 and #4. The other ones I'll give clues to without coming right out and saying it. It'll be interested to have each of the characters extrapolate their own conclusions based on where they are coming from.
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