Practical plot construction one-day workshop

(max 12 participants)*

Participants in a group work to invent an episode of a commercial sitcom. Suitable for emerging screen professionals of all kinds, particularly writers but also creative producers, story development executives. Of assistance in learning how to plot all kinds of drama

* This session is not always available. This is part because it involves only a limited number of participants but also because it replicates a story conference or writers' table. This is very demanding on Linda since she is simultaneously acting as head writer/show runner (trying to create an episode of a world class sitcom with a group of writers in a day) and as teacher, responding to the individual training needs of all the participants .

Getting ideas for film and TV drama is relatively easy. Turning those ideas into a compelling causal plot with rising interest and drama with exactly the right number of steps to fill a specific number of minutes on the screen (whether the screen is on a cell phone or in an IMAX center) is very difficult. The good news is that plot construction, particularly to a formula like a TV series, is a learnt skill and there are tricks of the trade (like how to condense plots, how to combine several storylines in one scene, how to reduce costs without sacrificing drama content and so on) that can be taught, particularly in the process of writing for television. The bad news is that while tuition in practical plotting for TV used to be provided on the job in production houses and station network drama departments by experienced writers who showed newcomers the ropes, these days, this training is often unavailable because TV drama providers tend to use storyliners to create plotlines (because it’s cheaper), with individual writers simply inserting the dialogue and details of each scene. Hence, in many places, writers are rarely taught how to construct an entire TV episode with intermingled plotlines (wonderful training for all kinds of screenwriting). While they may become wonderful at dramatizing individual scenes, they are not being trained in story structure.

To address the problem, Linda Aronson has created ‘Practical Plot Construction’, a day-long workshop developed out of her wide experience in TV writing and international teaching to provide participants with intensive practical, experience in plotting stories to order under pressure while also getting teaching feedback.

Practical plot construction is a combination of lecture and monitored practice, where, in a supportive environment the plotting room experience (with all of its frustrations and panic that the job will never get done) is replicated as closely as possible, with participants actually plotting an episode of TV drama and struggling, as even professional writers do, to create a powerful plot under pressure, while Linda provides helpful teaching instruction.

How it works

After an hour of lecture and group exercises on techniques of plotting, the class will split into small groups ( maximum 4 groups, 3 people per group). Over the rest of the day, with Linda acting as Head Writer/Show Runner, the class takes on the task of plotting a completely new episode of the comedy Seinfeld, devised by the group. Seinfeld has been chosen partly because its format and characters are well-known, partly because it is only half an hour long (so therefore is reasonably ‘do-able’ within the time constraints of the workshop) and partly because it is out of production so there can be no worries about the group-devised episode being sold or plagiarised.

Each group plots in turn

So as to give each participant as much practical experience as possible, the four groups will take it in turns to plot for half an hour at a time under Linda’s supervision, while the other groups observe in silence. During the plotting sessions, Linda will combine the job of head writer (leading the discussion and making the executive choices about plot) and teacher (commenting on problems the group or individuals are having). At the end of the day there is a summing up and consolidation section.

How far the episode gets depends on the class

Because the episode is genuinely plotted from scratch out of ideas that come from the class, how far to completion the episode is plotted will depend on the abilities of the class. Sometime a class gets a long way, sometimes it struggles. Either way, the workshop is a very powerful learning experience and indeed, a major point of the workshop is to put people in a situation where they struggle with plot, so that they learn practical techniques to get themselves out of difficulty.