Crafting Short Screenplays That Connect, 2nd Edition

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Connecting to Self

There’s a depressing rumor going around that there’s nothing new under the sun. Every story’s been told. When you go to the movies, it’s easy to see how this rumor got started. Few films are fresh. Most are warmed-over versions of what we saw last year. We wander out of the theatre convinced that everything has been done. So how, my students ask, can their screenplays be unique?

The answer, I say, is …

Le Menu

Le what?

Le Menu. A cross-section of their concerns. Self-analysis lite, so to speak, like those low-cal frozen dinners (I jokingly called it Le Menu one day in class. The name stuck).

I ask them to take out a pencil or pen and a clean sheet of paper and divide it into ten columns labeled What I Love, What I Hate, ...