Last night was my Masters Presentation (similar to a Thesis Defense). In that presentation, I discussed the feature film project that I've been developing over the last year. Once I was finished, the panel grilled me with questions about the project and from those questions I've gained a few insights into how to tell a story about a story...if that makes sense.
The film is a heavy drama about a widower and his autistic daughter. And while there are many difficult struggles and sad moments, it is also balanced out with a fair amount of humor. That said, in the presentation, time is limited and I had to choose which pieces of information to cover. Unfortunately, the main points in the story are all downers and I failed to mention the humor that balances it all out. The members on the panel were great at pointing that out and showing me how better to tell a story about a story (since that's what a presentation is all about anyway).
This got me thinking about all the times I, as a storyteller (not just a filmmaker), have found myself telling stories about stories. Some times I'm pitching a movie idea or a novel, other times I'm chatting with friends, and every once in a while I'm telling my story about a story to the wall just so I can hear it for myself. Even now, I'm writing a story about a story in this blog. And far too often, I'm beginning see, I leave things out in the telling that shouldn't be forgotten.
Returning to my film, pancakes play an important role in the father-daughter relationship. However, in the presentation, I failed to stress it sufficiently so that when the moment came for the pancakes to have their big moment, it failed to impress the panel as much as I'd hoped. Now, there's a delicate balance between seeding the story about a story with information, and blatantly giving things away. Subtlety is an art form unto itself that a good story teller must master. Far too often, I'm finding, when I'm telling a story I find subtlety comes easily to me, but when I need to tell a story about a story, my subtlety fades.
I believe this is a common fault in many story tellers. When we craft a story, we're focused, balancing drama with humor, planting seeds, and building tension in anticipation of the grand finale. But when we're telling stories about that story, we forget. Something in our minds believes that our listener knows what we know and so we only hit the main points, leaving out the little bits in between that makes our story great.
While I am not yet a master at this form of story telling, since I've only come to recognize it since last night, I'll refrain from getting preachy about how to fix this problem. I offer only this simple advice, tell the story. That's the whole reason whoever we're telling our story to is listening to us, so give them what they want.
I'm still learning and growing as a story teller, and while my presentation was not perfect, members of the panel still cried when I intended for them to cry, they laughed when I wanted them to laugh, and they asked the questions I wanted them to ask when I wanted them to ask them. We can, all of us story tellers, improve, but along the way don't forget to cherish your accomplishments and success'.
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