In an average life, most people have a very constricted time. Rarely is a person satisfied with as much sex, food, money and fun as he/she desires. Mostly, society (and health issues) enforce humans to lead somewhat disgruntled lives. Because the alternative, if everyone did exactly what their hearts desired and damn the consequences, would be anarchy and chaos. Plus obesity and death.

The thing inside us all, in our unconscious, that wants to be free, regardless of outcome, is what Freud named the id.

And it wants to play.

Seemingly, scriptwriters have discovered a method to let their id run free. In a script, they can allow their characters to indulge in any taboo behaviour. And with impunity to boot!

Freud said that every person in your dreams is you. And so logically, every character in a script is thus a facet of the scriptwriter. And when characters have sex, kill, and generally do whatever they want, it’s the scriptwriter’s id at work.

Often you’ll meet a scriptwriter and he/she will be bespeckled and timid. And then you’ll read their script and be astonished at what the scriptwriter has written.

You’ve probably heard these comments said about certain scripts…

“I couldn’t continue reading it after he ate his cat.”

“The fact your protagonist does that with his mother makes him unlikeable.”

“I had to look up coprophilia in the dictionary”

Unchecked by the Super Ego ( the disciplinarian part of the unconscious) the id can truly run free. And occasionally some scriptwriters fall prey to their unencumbered id ruining their script. A good example of this is Joe Eszterhas, the writer of BASIC INSTINCT. By the time Eszterhas wrote SHOWGIRLS, a famously bad film, his id had truly and uncontrollably run amok.

Jack Feldstein.

Previously:
PART 1 – THE AUTISTIC FANTASY THEORY
PART 2 – THE NARCISSISTIC THEORY
Next: PART 4 – THE EMPOWERMENT THEORY

Karel FG Segers

Karel Segers wrote his first produced screenplay at age 17. Today he is a story analyst with experience in acquisition, development and production. He has trained students worldwide, and worked with half a dozen Academy Award nominees. Karel speaks more European languages than he has fingers on his left hand, which he is still trying to find a use for in his hometown of Sydney, Australia. The languages, not the fingers.

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THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SCRIPTWRITING

Or: why a seemingly sane person sits in a room staring at a blank page.
By Jack Feldstein

Since almost the invention of writing in Sumeria, certain people have been compelled to sit, often alone, in a room (or a hut) and fabricate and record their stories.

Why?

I’m going to examine a few psychological explanations for why an apparently rational person might be compelled to undertake the arduous, and mostly thankless, task of writing a script.

PART 1: THE AUTISTIC FANTASY THEORY

An autistic fantasy is defined as a withdrawal into excessive daydreaming rather than taking proactive action in the world. Here the daydream is another term for the unconscious. Scriptwriting would be the act of recording the daydream (unconscious) in words.

A person, often feeling distressed and anxious in the real world, may retreat into their autistic fantasy inner terrain. This is their escape hatch. Here the person is king of the castle and master of all they survey. Which would certainly not be the case in the outside world if they are at the bottom of the pecking order.

Disappearing into an autistic fantasy is known to provide relief from external stress factors. And rather than face true challenges, the scriptwriter chooses to dream about a happy outcome.

Often we hear scriptwriters describing their autistic fantasy like this.

“ I have to get into the zone.”
“My characters have taken over the script.”
“I can only write after a scotch. Or a magic mushroom.”
( alcohol and drugs are well documented in their ability to alter inner psychic states)

A well-known case of extreme autistic fantasy writing is writer and scriptwriter, Virginia Woolf ( she wrote the play ORLANDO which was used almost unchanged to make the film ORLANDO by Sally Potter). Her stream-of-consciousness writing style can be explained by an autistic fantasy state.
Whether, however, that can be blamed for her eventual suicide remains a point of conjecture.

If we say there are two types of people in this world, the hunters (proactive) and the gatherers (passive). Then the scriptwriter lives the life of the safe passive gatherer but possesses the dangerous inner terrain of an active hunter.

And this is enacted in his/her autistic fantasy…

Which is then translated into a script.

Jack Feldstein.

Next week: The Psychology of Scriptwriting (2) – THE NARCISSISTIC THEORY

Karel FG Segers

Karel Segers wrote his first produced screenplay at age 17. Today he is a story analyst with experience in acquisition, development and production. He has trained students worldwide, and worked with half a dozen Academy Award nominees. Karel speaks more European languages than he has fingers on his left hand, which he is still trying to find a use for in his hometown of Sydney, Australia. The languages, not the fingers.

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When McKee talks about the conscious desire being a contradiction of the unconscious desire, would you relate this to the mid act 2 reversal / change in approach? Or would this be true from the very start of the story, script or life of the protagonist?

Answer:

Let’s start with quoting exactly what it is that McKee says:

“The PROTAGONIST may also have a self-contradictory unconscious desire(*).”

He goes on:

“Although these complex protagonists are unaware of their subconscious need, the audience senses it, perceiving in them an inner contradiction. The conscious and unconsious desires of a multidimensional protagonist contradict each other. What he believes he wants is the antithesis of what he actually but unwittingly wants.”

McKee makes a statement, then doesn’t really explain it. He doesn’t give an example either. But here is what I assume he means:

The conscious desire is what Michael Hauge calls the ‘visible goal, with a clearly defined end point’. In DIE HARD, John McClane wants to stop the gangsters and arrest them. In THE LIVES OF OTHERS, Wiesler wants to expose the theater director Dreyman. In JAWS, sheriff Brody wants to stop the shark from killing the people of Amity.

The subconscious desire is what John Truby calls the ‘need’, it is what the protagonist needs to become a more complete character, to overcome the flaw. This flaw often stops the protagonist from doing the right thing:

John McClane is a macho cop who can’t accept his wife to put her career first and Chief Brody can’t swim, so his fear of water keeps him initially from going out and kill the shark out on the sea. Wiesler wants to be a good man, but has only pursued this by following the stasi rule book.

Each of these have to overcome their flaw, before they can succeed in their outer objective: McClane makes a confession over the radio, Brody goes out on the open sea and Wiesler realises being a good man has nothing to do with justice fabricated by a totalitarian system. Sometimes this realisation happens at the mid-point, sometimes at the end of Act Two.

In each case, the inner need is in conflict with the outer ‘want’ from the start. Sometimes the mid-point causes the reversal, sometimes it is the Act Two turning point.

(*)From Robert McKee “STORY”, p.138

Karel FG Segers

Karel Segers wrote his first produced screenplay at age 17. Today he is a story analyst with experience in acquisition, development and production. He has trained students worldwide, and worked with half a dozen Academy Award nominees. Karel speaks more European languages than he has fingers on his left hand, which he is still trying to find a use for in his hometown of Sydney, Australia. The languages, not the fingers.

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