The Idea: The Seven Elements of a Viable Story for Screen, Stage, or Fiction

I have come to believe that 60 percent or more of what makes a film or TV project potentially successful (or not) is the core idea that could be communicated in a short synopsis of a few sentences up to a single page. And this is all that industry professionals will generally be willing to look at to consider whether they want to read further.

Think of it: 60 percent of what’s most important to our chances as a writer is what is contained in that mini-pitch of our basic idea. It’s mostly not about all those months of outlining, writing, rewriting, and getting feedback—that’s not the most important part. The most important part is what comes before all that.

But the work in coming up with that basic idea is not easy. It can take a lot of time and much trial and error to arrive at one that could garner the interest of professionals. Most of us don’t want to spend that much time questioning our core story premise. But the reality is that “the business” will question it, and will usually dismiss it—and all our hard work—unless we have an idea they see as viable.

Many if not most writers never come up with a story idea that solidly addresses the criteria I’m about to present, despite years of pursuing the craft. And this is a big part of the reason most never end up selling anything or becoming professionally employed. They might focus on bringing their scene writing and narrative structure up to professional quality, but not on their understanding of what makes a viable idea. Which is arguably the most important thing.

If there’s nothing else you take from this book, please take this “60 percent” figure and reconfigure your efforts toward “basic idea” development accordingly. Spend more time and energy on ideas. Make it your number one goal as a writer to learn what makes a great one and to get better at generating them.

Once you have an idea that really works, and you feel reasonably sure (because you’ve vetted it thoroughly with others), then, and only then, does it make sense to turn to the other 40 percent of the process.

What does that consist of?

To me, 30 percent of what’s important in a project’s success lies in the structural choices, the decisions about what will happen, scene by scene, in a story—or what you’d see in an outline.

That means only 10 percent is about the actual words on the page—the description and dialogue that people will read in the finished product. The actual scene writing—that’s the last 10 percent.

This seems shocking to many beginning writers. Ninety percent of what matters is what’s behind those written pages—what the writer worked on before they ever fired up any script-formatting software.

I’m not saying the writing doesn’t have to be really top-notch for a script to advance a writer’s career and move forward in some way. Of course it’s best if your scene writing is memorably great, and your structure and outlining choices are very strong, too. I’m just saying those two things are not the key factors that determine a project’s success. And in fact, those two things usually are never even considered or seen, because the project’s chances die at the earlier idea stage.

And when they die, it’s for one simple reason: the idea struck whoever read it as insufficient in one or more of the seven elements that this book will focus on—elements that are universally understood as key, even if different readers would use different terminology to describe them (or might not even be conscious of the fact that these are what they look for and respond best to).

So without further ado, here’s what they are . . .

THE "PROBLEM"
 
At the heart of any story is a problem that takes the whole story to solve. It’s a challenge that the story’s main character is actively engaged with, which consumes their attention, energy, and emotion—and that of the audience. It usually starts by about 10 percent into the story and continues until essentially the very end (having built and become worse and more difficult along the way), when it’s finally solved.

An idea for a story really is that central problem. It’s about what the main character is faced with and/or trying to achieve—its difficulty, its importance, what’s in their way, and what they do to try to resolve it.

These are the things that professionals want to understand from any logline and/or synopsis. Until they can see the problem in this way, and until they think it sounds really viable and intriguing, they won’t want to read anything else.

So what makes a “problem” (i.e., your basic story idea) viable?

It needs to have the following seven essential characteristics, the first letters of which form the acronym PROBLEM:
 
1.    Punishing

Not only does it take the whole story to solve the problem, but the main character spends virtually every scene trying to solve it. But they can’t, because it is so vexing and complicated—and it generally only gets more so as they try to address it. If it didn’t, it wouldn’t take a whole “story” to overcome. The problem defies resolution and besieges the main character as they grapple with it.


2.    Relatable

The main character of a story—and what they’re dealing with and why it matters—is easy to identify with on a human level. Because of this, we in the audience are able to strongly care that they reach their desired outcome, making us want to stay with the story. We even put ourselves in their shoes, such that it feels like their problem is our problem. We stay invested because they do. They remain active, and they keep trying to address whatever it is, despite all the slings and arrows that come at them in the process. If they didn’t, it would feel like things weren’t moving forward in a compelling way, and our interest would slacken.


3.    Original

Something about the premise of the story and its approach is fresh and brand-new—even though it also fits within the conventions of good storytelling and genre. There is a spark of uniqueness to the idea, and preferably to the writer’s voice, as well.


4.    Believable

It’s easy for someone hearing or reading the basic idea to understand and buy into it, even if it requires taking a leap and suspending disbelief, in some clearly defined way. In other words, it all feels real. The characters seem driven by identifiable human wants, needs, and behavior. It all sounds like it adds up, makes sense, and doesn’t leave people asking any “why” questions or being skeptical or confused about anything.


5.    Life-Altering

The “mission” to rise to the central story challenge is of huge importance to characters the audience has come to care about. If it doesn’t get solved, life will be unthinkably worse for them. Something in their outer life circumstances, on a primal level, is at stake. And if they solve their problem, things will be so much better than they are. All will be right with the world. In addition, the process of going through this challenge may alter them internally, in a hugely important way. But it’s the external stakes that come first.

6.    Entertaining

The process of trying to solve the story problem is fun to watch or read, consistent with its genre. Whether it’s comedy, action, suspense, etc., the material creates desired emotional experiences in the audience, of the kind that they came to the project hoping to have. So it becomes like candy to them—something they want more and more of, something they really enjoy and would spend time and money on.

7.    Meaningful

The audience comes away feeling that value has been added to their life—that something worthwhile has been explored, which has resonance beyond the time they spent watching/reading it. It was really about something more than just its surface plot—something meaningful to them.
 
Sounds simple, and even obvious, right? Fulfill these seven characteristics with your idea, and you’ll have a piece of material that could get you the interest of a manager, agent, editor, or producer.

Or maybe it doesn’t sound so simple. Maybe it sounds impossible to do all these things at once. If you’re a little overwhelmed by the task, then you’re probably recognizing what a big job it really is.

There’s a reason such a tiny percentage of aspiring writers succeed, and why those who do are so handsomely rewarded. It’s rare to successfully achieve all of this in a script or in an idea for one.

When we look at our favorite stories, they probably do it so effortlessly that we didn’t even notice. These criteria are so basic to our experience of consuming good stories, that they might seem to be self-evident. But that doesn’t mean they’re easy to pull off. It it takes a lot of work to create what might appear effortless. And we writers often don’t instinctively get what it takes to achieve this.