PLANNING FOR GROWTH IN YEARS OF RESTRICTED RESOURCES

mood, tempo, and intellect. The styles of writing action for the screen can beaggressive or passive. We may think of physical portrayals when we first think ofaction, however, action is not simply physical motion. Action that pierces our emotiondemonstrates the power action has as it moves the viewer across and toward a mentalpanorama based upon memories and aspirations. The screenwriter stirs the visualimagery by presenting the inherent intellectual actions associated with human conflict,achievement, passion, disappointment, mood and aspiration.Action is an event! Action can be a singular event, disconnected strung togetherevents, parallel events or a series of connected events. Action, singular or combined,leads to an emotional or physical replay of personal memories leading each audiencemember to an interpretive moment. The scriptwriter must come to realize thatpracticing “direct action” leads to improved director performance. Combining thesemoments may lead to an audience interpretation of meaning or may lead toconclusions reflected in the expression, “What’s next?”Simple terminology suggests that the physical events are how the story is seen as aphysical display. That is, action involving the physical display of body, property, andnonverbal cueing. Mental portrayals are how the story is interpreted. That is, emotionis presented through the dialogue and purpose of a scene. For example, for theaudience, mental depiction can be activated by technical manipulation of suspense orbetrayal themes by the scriptwriter and the director. Emotion may be activelyprojected to the audience through the use of dramatic devices implemented by thedirector. The scriptwriter uses dramatic devices to stimulate the director andconsequently through direction stimulate the audience interpretation of physical andemotion driven action. The desired result is the intellectual digestion of the storysuggestions as ingredients clarifying the abstractions found in the story. For example,scriptwriters use theme, mood, situation, and dialogue as technical devices. Directorsuse production techniques to point toward specific interpretations and to reveal pointsof view. These two simple facts lead to two dramatic conclusions regardingscreenwriting. First, how will action depict the intent of scene and story? Second,action takes the place of words. Action can be a physical portrayal or mental(emotional) blanks to be interpreted by each audience member. Students need topractice the development of action through revelation as part of storytelling andthrough gross physical action used to display emotion.The difficulty of teaching effective action writing is repeatedly noted by thedifficulties our students have writing singular action components. For the beginningscriptwriter and director difficulties are compounded by scenes connected by story.Students must learn to propose communicative action scenes (scriptwriting) and thenproduce those scenes (directing) before compounding their difficulties by writing anddirecting long form media. Students can obtain an appreciation for this relationship ifthey see how directors manipulate the original script to deliver a complete on screeninterpretation of the story elements. Teachers can best help students by providingpractice to facilitate this result.How does the audience get information from a scene? For the aspiring screenwriterand director a major concern is understanding and implementing the transformation ofstory information into storytelling for the screen.Can “action purpose” be the result of a sequence of physical examples, for example55Feedback September 2003 (Vol. 44, No. 4)