How to Write Groundhog Day

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How to Write Groundhog Day

by L.A. Zvirbulis

1 – The Inspiration. Pick a holiday that doesn’t have its own movie yet. Got one? Cool.

2 – The Genre. Take your vague yet thought-provoking “what if you repeated the same day over and over again?” idea and make it have something to do with this holiday you just picked. Fill it in with details of that neglected holiday. Make it take place in a funny sounding town that famously celebrates the holiday. Name your main character after the only animal that celebrates the holiday. Give that character the same weather-predicting job as that animal and send him to the funny town to join in all the celebrations. This is a holiday movie, after all.

3 – The Complications. What’s the worst that could happen? This time it’s not death. Usually threatening the main character’s life is considered “high stakes” but not if your character can’t die because he is repeating the same day over and over again as some sort of lesson to find happiness. Turns out the worst thing that can happen is not getting Andie MacDowell to fall in love with you.

4 – The Fun Stuff. It gets really fun once Bill Murray figures out there are no consequences in tomorrow to what he does today. Just think of all the things an unrestrained Bill Murray could do, like drunk driving, multiple suicides, and getting random women to sleep with him. Also put Bill Murray in your movie.

5 – The Device. A groundhog. No. A clock? Maybe. A song. Yes! How do you indicate that we are starting the same day over again? Sonny and Cher, no less. Hearing a pair of ex-lovers sing “I Got You, Babe” is a great way to start the day and we won’t mind hearing it over and over again.

6 – The Phil. Put Bill Murray in your movie as Phil but don’t expect him to remain friends with the director after filming, no matter how many good movies they made together before this. Also don’t expect the groundhogs acting in the movie to like Bill Murray, either, so make sure he gets tetanus shots. And definitely don’t think that you can actually cast the real Punxsutawney Phil as the groundhog because you aren’t filming in Pennsylvania for tax reasons and the town isn’t pleased.

7 – The Jokes. The comedy isn’t in one-off jokes. The comedy is in seeing our main character in the same situations but doing them differently each time. Just ask Ned Ryerson. Audiences love repetition, because it sets up some sort of familiarity. Audiences love repetition, it makes things easier to remember. Audiences love repetition, but not too much, unless, of course, the entire premise of your movie is repetition.

8 – The Title. It’s easiest if you just stick to the name of the holiday. That’s why you picked a holiday that doesn’t have its own movie.

9 – The Ending. Phil sleeps with Andie MacDowell, but he loves her so it’s okay.

10 – The Heart. “Is there anything I can do for you today?” You guys, Phil stops seeing his shadow and starts seeing the light inside of himself. Whoa. Phil finds happiness by learning how to treat others well and changes his attitude on life. People will write articles about how there are religious truths in this silly comedy that you wrote about a neglected holiday. Maybe we do all just repeat the same day…

*L.A. Zvirbulis did not write Groundhog Day. David Rubin and Harold Ramis did.

**Here’s an article about interpretations of the movie Groundhog Day – http://mentalfloss.com/article/55243/8-creative-interpretations-groundhog-day

How to Write Jaws

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How to Write Jaws

by L.A. Zvirbulis

1 – The Inspiration. Read a book called Jaws by Peter Benchley. Or at least kind of look at the plot synopsis if you get a chance. There are some dudes and a shark and it’s New England in the 1970s. It’s fine, we write most of the script on set anyway and we are sending copies of the book to major influencers who won’t read the book either but will help get it on the bestsellers list.

2 – The Genre. Chief Brody is already scared of the water. But do you know what is scarier than water? Sharks in the water. Oooooh. Wouldn’t it be fun to make rational humans terrified of the ocean? Let’s invest in hotel pools because people at beach front resorts won’t go in the water after watching this movie. Let’s also figure out why a guy who is scared of the water would get a job on a small island. It’s also kind of based on true stories. Scary stuff.

3 – The Complications. What’s the worst that could happen? A shark kills you and your family and everyone vacationing at a summer resort town and that cute dog Pippin. There’s also a Mayor that won’t close the beaches and won’t tell Alex Kintner’s mother there’s a hungry shark out there, because you know, profits.

4 – The Fun Stuff. Shark attacks. More shark attacks. Like, the most shark attacks ever. Just think of all the cool things you can do on screen because we are using a mechanical shark and not a real one. We really want to see a lot of this shark.

5 – The Device. Write more land-based scenes because our mechanical shark doesn’t work. What else could be a shark? Barrels. Yeah, use barrels to indicate that a shark is there. How about sound? Use music to indicate that a shark is there. But we don’t have a huge budget so maybe only two notes and a basic beat? Thanks. Let’s film in the editor’s pool so we can get one last scare – just of Hooper seeing a dead guy, not a shark. People are also scared of dead guys. Just don’t let anyone know we don’t have much footage of the shark. Oh the shark works now? Great! Oh wait it sunk to the bottom of the Atlantic? No one needs to know. What else could be a shark?

6 – The Hunter. Quint can be a villain. He’s old and probably smells like fish and can scare an entire room with his fingernails and a chalkboard. Yeah, Quint is the shark now. Also the Mayor sucks.

7 – The Jokes. Jokes? How about stories? Jokes are too short and we need to eat up more dry time. Let’s have Quint tell some scary story about sharks. That will work. Yeah. People go to shark movies to hear people tell stories about sharks. You don’t really have to write this part, that’s why we hire improvisers. We also kill improvisers on screen. Bye bye, Quint.

8 – The Title. It’s Jaws. We’re sticking with it. We’ve already got the poster.

9 – The Ending. Let Hooper live! Let Hooper live! Let Hooper live! (Hooper dies in the book). Also pretty sure that Chief Brody is still scared of the water after this. But hey, the shark dies in a glorious bloody explosion. Wait, where’s the director? Steven left the set? Is he scared of his crew or something? Hello?

10 – The Heart. Oh shit. This movie is fantastic and terrifying. Congratulations. No idea how you did it, but keep it up.

*L.A. Zvirbulis did not write Jaws. Peter Benchley wrote the novel and co-wrote the screenplay with Carl Gottlieb.

How to Write Back to the Future

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How to Write Back to the Future

by L.A. Zvirbulis

1 – The Inspiration. Go home to visit your parents. Snoop through their old stuff. Find your Dad’s high school yearbook and ask fun questions like, “Would I be friends with my Dad if we were the same age at the same time?” Good question. Good movie idea. Thanks, Dad.

2 – The Genre. The easiest way for a teenager to meet his parents as teenagers is to go back in time. Voila! A time travel movie with some comedy and cool special effects and maybe some incest if we are lucky. Now what?

3 – The Complications. What’s the worst that could happen? If you meet your parents before they are your parents – well, you may accidentally prevent them from becoming your parents, thus endangering your own existence. Whoopsies. And just to clear something up, make sure that Marty never “has the hots” for his Mom. It’s his teenage Mom that has the hots for her son! Get it right, comedians. And I’d rather sit in a car with my yet to be born teenage son than that bully Biff any day. Also, please remember you can name villains in your movie after people you don’t like in real life.

4 – The Fun Stuff. Skateboarding and Rock & Roll, baby. Have Marty invent things that eventually become popular but maybe let’s not be too culturally inappropriate (sorry, Chuck Berry). Where do you put the two most fun scenes? The midpoint and just before the climax (the climax being Marty actually going “Back to the Future”). Then you have to show that Marty knows how to skateboard and play the guitar in the 1980s, so add a couple set-up scenes. Wow, we have four scenes already!

5 – The Device. A refrigerator. No. A car. A cool car. A DeLorean. Yeah. Super cool. You can make stuff up like “the flux capacitor is what makes time travel possible” because you’re the writer and don’t have to explain it beyond that. Also make up some rules, like plutonium, 1.21 jigawatts, and 88 miles per hour. Make it leave flames in its tire tracks and fly at the end. Yeah.

6 – The Doc. Once we have Marty, his parents, and the time machine, now we need someone who can actually operate said time machine that is an adult in both time periods. Someone Marty can go to for help that isn’t family. Super convenient if the inventor of the time machine is also friends with modern Marty, and just so happens to have thought of the flux capacitor the day this strange Future Boy shows up in the past. That’s why Doc is so much older than Marty, people. It’s not weird. It’s efficient screenwriting.

7 – The Jokes. Even sci-fi period-piece family films need some comedy. Keep the jokes in the same “game”. For those of you who haven’t started Improv 201 yet, the game is the one weird, hopefully funny thing in a scene that gets played over and over again. In this case, it is generational differences. The future President used to be a B-List actor. Asking for a Pepsi Free is an insult when a tab wasn’t a Tab and the only drink without sugar was coffee. Saying “Daddy-O” is an easy way to cover up for accidentally calling your new teenage friend Dad. There are so many jokes in the “generational differences” game, so just keep ‘em coming, like reruns.

8 – The Title. You know exactly what happens from the title. Marty gets Back to the Future. It’s perfect and nobody cares that it gives away the ending. And while a studio exec might suggest the title “Spaceman From Pluto” by reminding us that Marty’s Dad is actually the protagonist who changed his life after being visited by an alien, stick to your wits. How can you go “Back” to the “Future”? Makes you think. Makes you spend money to go back to see the movie again.

9 – The Ending. Write what you will, but things will change when filming starts. The studio doesn’t care that you wrote the best ending of all time – a DeLorean driving into the mushroom cloud of an atomic bomb test site. It makes sense for the time period. It’s gonna look great on film. It’s going to be incredibly expensive. So when money must be saved, writers gotta change. Use some place you have for free, like the backlot of the studio that you’re already using. Perfect. Take an ending from a movie you wrote previously that no one really saw. Awesome. Put the inventor of time travel inside of a clock and then let a fortunately timed lightning strike be the hand of God that saves everything. Great.

10 – The Heart. Back to the Future is a movie about a teenager who learns how to like his parents. It answers the original inspiring question “Would I be friends with my Dad if we were the same age at the same time?” Yes. But only after fixing his life for him. Thanks, Dad, and you’re welcome.

*L.A. Zvirbulis did not write Back to the Future. Bob Gale and Robert Zemeckis did.