ABSTRACT
Further analysis of the script should reveal the writer’s structure. As directors we are essentially storytellers using the recreation of human behavior in order to tell our tale. In the case of the play form, the structure is most often conventional. It is a one-act, twoact, or three-act form, with the more period pieces usually written in three acts and the more contemporary work using the two-act structure. However, many of the more contemporary playwrights have chosen to break that mold. Their free-form, sometimes stream of consciousness style mimics rock music; they play at a certain intensity until they’ve come to the end at which point they seem to simply fade away. Most screenwriting classes also address the development of a script with a kind of three-act sensibility: first act, the set-up and introduction of characters; second act, the development of plot; and third act, climax and resolution. And yet here too there are ways to break the convention, either in the way the script is written or in the way it is ultimately edited for the finished product. For example, the quirky structure of the screenplay for the 2003 film 21 Grams written by Guillermo Arriage was faithfully preserved by director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu.
