Script whisperer Pilar Alessandra shares how to write a female lead who will put audiences in seats. Of late, we’ve seen massive studio franchises produce female-driven films to huge box office success ( and Star Wars: Rogue One come to mind), and yet the scarcity of female protagonists in cinema remains significant. Studios continue to favor male leads and pass on those that feature women. If you're a screenwriter, the time is ripe to ask yourself “what can I do to address the under-representation and under-development of female characters?” In her masterclass on female character development at IFP, screenwriting guru and author of The Coffee Break Screenwriter, Pilar Alessandra, elucidated the frequently uncomfortable reasons why Hollywood seems disinterested in diversifying its star power—and how to address them. Neglecting these factors can create an unrealistic or unlikable character that your audience can’t imagine existing in reality, and thus can't sympathize with. If you want to write a female-driven script that sells, take a look at some of Alessandra’s tricks of the trade.

Know what makes a real strong female lead Having started her career off as a Senior Story Analyst at DreamWorks SKG and now working as a consultant for screenwriters, Alessandra reads a ton of scripts (at least two a day), many of which feature a female lead who either lacks substance or is utterly uninteresting. She identified two tendencies that screenwriters frequently fall into that result in an uncompelling leading lady: the screenplay has either fallen victim to the laziness of Hollywood by recycling tried and true female archetypes (e.g. The cop, lawyer or doctor) or, in an effort to avoid these studio go-tos, the screenwriter avoids female stereotypes or the reality of the female experience altogether, rendering their character one dimensional and unrealistic. Lucy Liu as a cop in 'Southland' Some of the most common female leads we see on screen today are the “boss ladies” of the world, usually a doctor, lawyer or cop, or alternatively, strippers, nannies, and maids for whom we feel great sympathy because they’re grappling with a challenging past. Needless to say, this leaves a large portion of the female population massively under-represented.

Learn more The best place to download ESSAY WRITING FOR ENGLISH TESTS (PDF) and other highly selected cover letter writer IELTS materials free. 92 Coffee break. Compare and contrast essay starters persuasive essays for elementary students youtube Liam: French essay pdf essays english. Coffee Break Screenwriter: Writing Your Script Ten Minutes at a Time - Kindle edition by Pilar Alessandra. Download it once and read it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets. Trilead Vm Explorer Pro Edition Keygenguru. Use features like bookmarks, note taking and highlighting while reading Coffee Break Screenwriter: Writing Your Script Ten Minutes at a Time.

On the other hand, screenwriters that try to ignore female stereotypes often lose sight of the everyday obstacles women are faced with simply because of their gender. Neglecting these factors can create an unrealistic or unlikable character that your audience can’t imagine existing in reality, and thus can't sympathize with. If you’re confused, Alessandra recommends turning to her leading lady litmus test.

A strong female lead: • Moves the story • Makes her own decisions • Has skills and flaws • Is interesting to watch and relatable to both genders • Appears in more than one scene However antithetical your female character may be to Hollywood archetypes, she can’t escape being perceived as a female. Twist stereotypes to your advantage Character development is all about adding layers to what is inherently there to begin with or, in other words, what is immediately recognizable at surface level. Gender exists for your female protagonist as soon as she begins to interact with her world, both on and off screen.

However antithetical your female character may be to Hollywood archetypes, she can’t escape being perceived as a female. Don’t forget that the audience is bringing its own set of assumptions about and experiences with women to the table and that your female protagonist will ultimately be interpreted through a lens that is organized, at least to some degree around what is considered “inherently female.” In 'Nurse Jackie,' Edie Falco plays a realistic female lead with both skills and flaws. Screenwriters tend to address negative female stereotypes by developing a character that embodies its opposite, so as not to run the risk of being labeled “emotional” or “bitchy”. Rather than ignore these stereotypes, use them as an opportunity to challenge the assumptions associated with them. More often than not, embedded within a stereotype is an actual skill set that gets mislabeled as a negative or undesirable trait, simply because a woman embodies it. For example, if you take two employees, one male and one female, but both equally passionate about their job and assertive in their actions, the female employee runs the risk of being labeled overly emotional rather than passionate, or abrasive rather than assertive.

By taking a negative female stereotype and turning it into a crucial skill, you challenge the assumptions of your audience and have the makings of a more interesting, strong female character. 'You could take the most hackneyed, archetypically female story, and still come up with something fresh.' Create a new reality for your characters If one way to challenge assumptions is to reframe stereotypical personality traits into positive skills, another way is by throwing out the assumptions entirely. Under these circumstances, you could take the most hackneyed, archetypically female story, and still come up with something fresh. Take for example, a pregnant teenager movie and consider the assumptions that are made about the female lead and supporting characters, which might include her parents, classmates, and the baby daddy. In the script reality of, say, an after-school special designed to drive home the idea that teenagers, under no circumstances, should be getting pregnant, the characters might look something like this: • Pregnant teen is undereducated, promiscuous, irresponsible, and scared • The child’s father is absent, abusive, and uncaring • Her parents, if even in the picture, shame her and are unsupportive • Her classmate, the high school cheerleader, bullies and embarrasses her Ellen Page cracks cliches as 'Juno' in 'Juno,' with Michael Cera. Then consider Juno, a film that follows the usual trappings of a “girl gets pregnant, gives her baby to the right mother” type story, but with an entirely new script reality for the characters.