How Character Creates Plot - Alan Watt [Founder of L.A. Writers' Lab]

In this Film Courage video interview, we ask Alan Watt about how character creates plot. We also delve into the movie When Harry Met Sally using the two main characters as examples.
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Alan Watt is an LA Times bestselling author and winner of France's Prix Printemps for best foreign novel. He is the writer/director of the feature film, Eddie, Kill the President. which won 4 Best Feature awards at US Film Festivals, and the Filmmaker Visionary award at The Boston Film Festival. He founded L.A. Writers' Lab in 2002 where he teaches his process of marrying the wildness of your imagination to the rigor of story structure in his online 90-Day workshops for novel, memoir and screenplay, to writers around the world. His book, The 90-Day Novel is a national bestseller and was Amazon's #1 book on writing for five months. He has taught his method everywhere from maximum security prisons to Stanford University. His students run the gamut from first-time writers to A-list screenwriters and Pulitzer prize-winning journalists. His motto is, start where you are, trust the process, and let the thrill of creation be your reward.
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[@ckrug32]

This is a gold mine. "In any well-told story, both characters are right. The story is the argument between these opposing viewpoints, and the storyteller's job is to play both sides with equal integrity. The third act is about synthesis, or integration of both sides of the argument." Thank you Alan and Film Courage!

[@matthewpaul6904]

Or to look at it like the 3 sides of every story: yours, theirs and the truth and nobody is lying. And as the writer, you are searching for the truth.

[@dragonmasterchief]

Excellent. A protagonist's desire is not what changes, their relationship to that desire is what changes from scene to scene, or act to act. Very helpful tip, thank you!

[@filmcourage]

Was this helpful?

[@mitrapatterson6568]

Within the first few seconds. YES! I'm getting unstuck 😅 thanks so much

[@sky.the.infinite]

@@mitrapatterson6568AGREED!

[@TheJadedFilmMaker]

awesome. thanks 🙏

[@Blackmuseops]

Always

[@R.S.NYC05]

Yes miss, it was. It makes me wanna see full video. 😉😊

[@DaGRAV3]

Great video and interview! I took away a lot from this that’s def going to help my writing. Keep these awesome interviews coming!

[@neildavidvandenbergh5422]

Wow, what a new and profound way to look at story. This guy's incredible, and also seems very laid back, down to earth, and is easy to listen to. Very helpful Thanks so much for posting! 🙏🏼❤️👏🏼

[@katpaints]

This was explained so clearly! I have struggled putting this into practice and this was great! Now to bookmark and watch it again!

[@starwing2814]

Perfect timing!!!!!

[@filmcourage]

Perfect!

[@leebishop7591]

This was deep on many levels. Thanx...🙏🏽

[@filmcourage]

Thanks Lee! We appreciate you watching this one!

[@JW_Steed]

This was very helpful, thank yoU!

[@filmcourage]

Glad it was helpful!

[@wexwuthor1776]

This guy gets it.

[@RichArtLove]

Brilliant!

[@ryanhowell4492]

Love this

[@filmcourage]

Cheers Ryan!

[@ryanhowell4492]

@@filmcourage I plan create Horror Movieto get ahead of this year’s halloween

[@MegaTkls]

Good advice. But he doesn't really get into detail about how character creates plot, or how you can try to go about doing that.

[@BarsimonR]

2 people raking in a room isn't a plot...but this explains many bad movies...characters are there to engage the audience in interacting with the story...and the story must spring from outside character...the 3 act structure and character Co exist as mutually dependent pathways to story, entertainment etc

[@hailberseker5387]

It's true for a genre with a weak world building in my opinion, but not really for one who has a high concept lore

[@Andreopimentel]

Dune contradicts your whole point

[@DandelionScribe]

A bit of an unfortunate name

[@wexwuthor1776]

Great name. He even talks about hippydippy metaphysics like the original. He just missing the S.