Posts Tagged ‘Teaching’

The Smart Page-Turner Reloaded!

Posted: July 2, 2017 in Grub Street Boston, Master Class in Popular Fiction, Publishing, Screen & Stage to the Page, Screen and Stage to the Page, Smart Page-Turner, Teaching, Writing
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WAIT! Can it be? A fourth class in the wildly popular series of Grub Street classes that combine the best of literary fiction techniques with the punch of genre storytelling? Yes, IT IS! In this newest instalment of Michael Marano’s “Smart Page-Turner” sequence taught at Boston’s Grub Street, you will receive serious hands-on instruction from a multi-award-winning novelist and nationally syndicated critic that will not only infuse your genre fiction with literary gravitas, but that will also infuse your literary fiction with the readability and popular appeal of fiction genres such as thrillers, mysteries, Science Fiction and Fantasy, erotica, adventure, etc. Classes will include writing exercises and workshopping of students’ fiction. Specific topics are outlined below on a week-by-week basis. This class expands on topics covered in Grub’s “Writing the Smart-Page Turner”, “The Smart Page-Turner Strikes Back!” and “Revenge of the Smart Page-Turner”, but is open to all. Recommended for those with previous workshop experience.

Where? At Grub Street’s Downtown Boston HQ, right by Park Street Station on the Red Line and Downtown Crossing, 162 Boylston St #5, Boston, MA 02116

Who?   https://grubstreet.org/about/who-we-are/faculty/#MichaelMarano

Michael Marano is a horror and dark science fiction writer whose first novel, Dawn Song, won the Bram Stoker and International Horror Guild Awards. Stories From the Plague Years, a collection of Marano’s new and reprinted short fiction, was named one of the Top Ten Horror Publications of 2011 by Booklist. His supernatural crime novella “Displacement” was nominated for a 2011 Shirley Jackson Award. Stories From the Plague Years was reprinted in 2012 by ChiZine Publications of Toronto, who also reprinted Dawn Song in 2014, which will be followed by two sequels, A Choir of Exiles and Winter Requiem.

Since 1990, he has also been reviewing movies for the Public Radio Satellite System program Movie Magazine International. Mike’s pop culture commentary has appeared in many national publications. Marano is also a beginning circus performer, developing and choreographing narrative aerial pieces for the trapeze and lyra based on the works of J.G. Ballard and Philip K. Dick.

 

When? 10 Thursdays from 10:30am-1:30pm, starting September 7th, 2017

How? Enroll here! SCHOLARSHIPS ARE AVAILABLE! https://grubstreet.org/findaclass/class/the-smart-page-turner-reloaded/

OUTLINE OF THE CLASS

Week 1. Creating Suspense and Tension

What the hell is suspense? What the hell is tension? How are they different? How do they compliment each other? What are their components? We’ll dive in and examine strategies for creating suspense and tension in genre and non-genre contexts.

Materials: Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca; Tracy Letts’ play Killer Joe; one of Lee Child’s Jack Reacher novels.

Week 2. Using All Five Senses

Ever read something that’s just blah, because the author is only using sight and sound to tell a story? You have FIVE senses… so why not harness them all for your fiction?

Materials: Patrick Süskind, Perfume; Elizabeth Kata, A Patch of Blue.

Week 3.  Stealing the Storytelling Techniques of Writers for Stage, Screen and TV, Part 1–“Tapping Real Life”

Some of the best storytelling created today is being written for performed media. We’ll look at how these techniques can be applied to prose fiction. First up, creating “Slice of Life” moments…when there’s this thing that happened… and you really want to write about it in a dramatic way. How do you take a “slice of life” that everybody can relate to, and still make it interesting and compelling? How do you avoid the dreaded, “Yeah, so?”

Materials: Emmy winners Judd Apatow and Michael White’s teleplays for the high school comedy/drama Freaks and Geeks and parts of renowned theater director Peter Brook’s essay “The Open Door.” A short story or two by Bonnie Jo Campbell

Week 4. Stealing the Storytelling Techniques of Writers for Stage, Screen and TV, Part 2– “Using Place and Time to Define Drama”

Drama and conflict and personal growth can’t exist in a vacuum. We’ll look at the specific ways the time and place of your story can and maybe should define its emotional impact and arc.

Materials: Emmy-winners Matthew Weiner & Robin Veith’s teleplay for the Mad Men episode, “THE WHEEL” and either Greg Mottola’s Independent Spirit Award-nominated script for Adventureland.

Week 5. Stealing the Storytelling Techniques of Writers for Stage, Screen and TV, Part 3–“Creating Personal Conflicts”

 Ever find yourself amazed at how some playwrights can just have a few people in a room, and the emotional results are like a UFC Cage Match? We’ll breakdown how they do that.

Materials:  Nobel-winner Harold Pinter’s play, The Homecoming and Pulitzer Prize-winner Jason Miller’s play, That Championship Season.

Week 6. Using Stanislavsky to Create Characters

Actors have a whole bunch of great tools to get into character’s heads. So… why can’t authors use those tools, too?

Materials: Kazuo Ishiguro, Remains of the Day or Never Let Me Go; Thomas Harris, Silence of the Lambs

Week 7. Using Setting, Part 1, The City

To really use an urban setting, even to in a work of realism, you have to tap a really unique sense of the unreal. Poets like Baudelaire and TS Eliot figured this out. And so have a few really great prose authors.

Peter Straub, “A Short Guide to the City”; Hubert Selby, Last Exit to Brooklyn or The Demon, Vera Caspary, Laura, Dorothy B. Hughes, In a Lonely Place

Week 8. Using Setting, Part 2, The Wilderness.

When you have characters in the wilderness, the real struggle isn’t always with the external wilderness, but the inner one. We’ll look at ways to tap that struggle.

Robert B. Parker, Wilderness; Bonnie Jo Campbell “Bringing Home the Bones”

Week 9. Satire and Hyperbole

When you take something emotionally real and blow it up, you’re using the same tool that humorists use, even when you’re not writing about something particularly funny. We’ll look at the ways that satire and hyperbole can be used to be funny and tragic.

Rod Serling and Michael Wilson, Planet of the Apes; Evelyn Waugh, The Loved One; a short story by P. G. Wodehouse; John Le Carre, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy;

Week 10. Catch Up, Loose Ends and Review

 

Screen and Stage… to the Page! My New Class at Boston’s Grub Street!

Posted: November 16, 2011 in Books, Grub Street Boston, Publishing, Screen and Stage to the Page, Smart Page-Turner, Teaching, Writing
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Hey everybody! I’d like to announce my new class, Screen and Stage…to the Page! Using the Techniques of Playwrights and Screenwriters to Write Prose Fiction. It’s a 10-week class that will meet Wednesday nights from 6:00 to 9: 00 at Grub Street HQ in downtown Boston starting September 12, 2012. Here’s the official class description:

Some of the best writing being done today, in terms of theme, character, dialogue and plot, is being done by playwrights, screenwriters and teleplay writers. In this class, a nationally syndicated film critic and multi-award-winning novelist will show students how to use the tools of Pulitzer Prize-winning playwrights and Oscar-winning screenwriters for their prose fiction stories and novels. Topics covered will include: ways to re-write real-life incidents into tight and compelling drama; how to streamline exposition so it doesn’t stop your narrative dead; how to crystallize character-defining moments into a scene and how to use the context of specific settings to amp drama. Classes will consist of analysis of plays, teleplays and scripts and some prose source materials, group watching of films and TV episodes, and in-class workshopping of students’ short fiction and novel excerpts with special emphasis on how the tools of screen and stage writers can be applied to these works. All genres and kinds of fiction writers are welcome.

So, how will that breakdown? Here’s a tentative syllabus of the topics I’ll be covering and the materials we’ll be looking at.

1. Tapping Real Life

So, there’s this thing that happened… and you really want to write about it in a dramatic way. How do you take a “slice of life” that everybody can relate to, and still make it interesting and compelling? How do you avoid the dreaded, “Yeah, so?”

Materials:  Emmy winners Judd Apatow and Michael White’s teleplays for the high school comedy/drama Freaks and Geeks  and parts of renowned theater director Peter Brook’s essay “The Open Door.”

2. Awesome Exposition and Action

So, there’s all this stuff… background information… that the reader needs to know about in order for the plot to move forward. But to give that information to the reader, you can wind up stopping the plot dead in its tracks. Which can be close-the-book boring. We’ll look at ways to give the audience/readers the information they need while still making your narrative interesting and full of dramatic punch.

Materials:  Oscar-winner Paul Haggis’s screenplay for the James Bond movie Casino Royale,  with some comparison to Ian Fleming’s original novel. David Koepp’s screenplay for Jurassic Park with some comparison to Michael Crichton’s original novel.

3. Point of View and Emotional Development

OK… point of view is vitally important to telling a story. So’s character development. How does your main character’s emotional arc affect how you use POV?

Materials:  BAFTA winners Joel and Ethan Coen’s screenplay for True Grit, with some comparison to Charles Portis‘ original novel .

4. The Scope of Time and Space and Hitting Emotional Beats

Let’s say you got a story that takes place over a long period of time, over a lot of geographic space. How do you keep a solid emotional core to something that takes place, well… all over the place, and for a long period of time? How do you pace out the emotional beats to keep that story going strong?

Materials:  James Vanderbilt’s WGA-nominated screenplay for the David Fincher movie Zodiac.

5. Creating Tension, Apprehension and Dissension

Ever find yourself amazed at how some playwrights can just have a few people in a room, and the emotional results are like a UFC Cage Match? We’ll breakdown how they do that.

Materials:  Nobel-winner Harold Pinter’s play, The Homecoming and Pulitzer Prize-winner Jason Miller’s play, That Championship Season.

6. Adding Dramatic Layers of Meaning to Your Dialogue

Wait! Did that person really just say that? Wait! Did that really mean what I think it meant? We’ll look at ways to load your scenes with different meanings and different emotional notes.

Materials:  John Patrick Shanley’s Pulitzer-winning stage play (and screenplay for) Doubt.

7. Using Place and Time to Define Drama

Drama and conflict and personal growth can’t exist in a vacuum. We’ll look at the specific ways the time and place of your story can and maybe should define its emotional impact and arc.

Materials:  Emmy-winners Matthew Weiner & Robin Veith’s teleplay for the Mad Men episode, “THE WHEEL” and either Greg Mottola’s Independent Spirit Award-nominated script for Adventureland or Alfred Sole and Rosemary Ritvo’s screenplay for Alice, Sweet Alice.

8. Putting Crystallizing Emotional Moments in a Scene

Sometimes, a dramatic moment can occur in a story that rips open a character so you can look deep inside to see what makes them tick. We’ll dissect a few of those scenes, to see how they can work in prose.

Materials:  Jenny Lumet’s screenplay for Rachel Getting Married  and Tony-winner Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

9. Adding Details to Make a Story Pop

The effect of little things can be huge in a story. We’ll look at ways to choose the right things to get the most dramatic bang.

Materials:  Brian Helgeland’s Oscar-nominated screenplay for Mystic River, with some comparison to Dennis Lehane’s original novel.

10. Mining Simple Conflict into Complex Drama

Sometimes, a really simple situation can be a really deep and profound exploration of the human condition. We’ll look at ways to use simple situations and conflicts to load stories with heavy emotional punch.

Materials:   J.P. Miller’s teleplay Rabbit Trap and Paddy Chayefsky’s teleplay Marty .

To enroll, click here: http://tinyurl.com/3ctj92f  E-mail me at profmike AT mindspring DOT com if you have any specific questions or want any further information. Please note that scholarships are available for greatly reduced tuition. For more information on scholarships, please refer to the Grub Street page here.