This script landed at number 15 on the 2018 Black-List.
The story follows ATTICS ARCHER. He's a bag-man for Auburn University football team. He's responsible for 'convincing' the most promising new athletes graduating from High School to sign up at Auburn.
His methods are nefarious at best. He is a master manipulator. Capable of coercing anyone and every one to his will.
The story starts with him manipulating a young star quarterback (Ricky Patterson) into signing with Auburn. Ricky is the number one prospect in the country, he had already promised to sign with Alabama university, but Atticus leaks an email thread between the star QB's father and a manager, which is a suspendable offense at this stage of the QB's career.
Ricky has no choice but to sign with Auburn.
Just when it looks like Atticus is about to quit the world of being an NCAA bag-man, he sees footage of a new star athlete defensive linesman. This guy is huge, powerful, fast, agile, he steamrolls whoever is stupid enough to come up against him.
Atticus has promised his wife that he will quit his career and concentrate on their retirement - after he has landed this last white whale.
The NCAA sends a low-level paper pusher (Thomas Kendrick) to investigate how it came to be that Ricky Patterson signed with Auburn at the last minute.
Thomas is an ex-pro-baller who lives for a battle on or off the field. He's a dog with a bone and his investigation unravels Atticus's world. He learns of the bribes and the underhand dealings, he learns of the way that Atticus operates, that he has no moral compass, no line in the sand that he will not cross.
The story becomes a battle between Atticus and Thomas, where there can be only one winner.
I loved this script. This has to be one of my favorites from the 2018 blacklist.
There's so much that this screenplay does well.
WHAT THIS SCRIPT DOES RIGHT...
The number one thing this script nails are REAL LIFE CHARACTERS.
There were a hell of a lot of main players in this script and every one of them shone brightly. Every one of them was extremely well written.
I normally advise people to steer clear of writing an ensemble film as they tend not to do well at the box office. Ensemble films (being a film with more than one main character) do well in TV format, not film format.
While there are a lot of characters here - the story is still very centrally focused on Atticus. The entire story is focused on Atticus' dealings and the trouble that he gets into.
Here's the first writing tip from this screenplay - if you are writing a story with multiple points of view, make sure that the story is centered around ONE MAIN CHARACTER.
Every character here was focused on what Atticus was doing. There really is only one storyline here. Having only one storyline keeps your story focused.
I recall doing coverage on another screenplay recently where there was the main storyline, then there was a secondary storyline that was the romance. The thing is, there was no real connection between storyline A and storyline B.
A better-written story would have had the love interest be a part of the A storyline. But instead it was completely separate - and consequently, the story felt disjointed. Like it had two different focuses.
The second major thing we can learn from this screenplay is the importance of developing each character fully.
A major mistake I see in a lot of screenplays is that the main character is very well written and developed, with great nuance and back story. But then every other supporting character is poorly written.
Writing a successful screenplay is all about creating a believable world. When ALL your characters have backstory, and nuance, and unique personality traits, then your story will feel three dimensional.
The best thing to do is to avoid cliches. Make sure that you're not writing in tropes. What's a trope? It's the high school jock, it's the hot annoying bitchy girl, it's the drunk, it's the Emo kid in school, it's the high powered wall street executive.
Anytime you create a character try to write the opposite of cliche. Why can't the hot girl at school be really clever, really interesting, why can't the hot girl be the outcast for some interesting reason? Why can't the high school jock not want to play sports? Take the cliche and flip it on its head.
It's interesting writing the summary of this story. Some story summaries are really easy to write and others are difficult. I found summarising this screenplay more difficult than others as there are so many layers.
You'll hear this in LA often - producers want a screenplay that has LAYERS.
Layers come about when your story feels well woven. When you have multiple storylines all flowing together.
MAKE SURE EVERY SCENE COUNTS.
A great test I often suggest for your screenplay is to see just how relevant every scene is.
Go through your script and delete a random scene. Now, read the screenplay. If the story still makes perfect sense, then odds are you didn't need that scene.
I'm currently reading a new script at the moment that I'll review soon - but this new script suffers badly from unnecessary scenes. I'm sure that almost every other scene could be deleted and the story would still make sense.
That was not the case in Bag-Man. Almost every scene was relevant to another scene. I call them sister scenes.
You write a scene early on in your script that sets up a pay-off that will come later on. Without the setup, the pay off wouldn't make sense.
FLAW
This screenplay nails the flaw perfectly. Atticus is a man obsessed. His obsession is the next great recruit. His life would be pointless if he isn't wheeling and dealing and manipulating people.
His obsession is his downfall.
This script makes reference to Moby Dick. It is an accurate metaphor. In Moby Dick, Ahab is obsessed with capturing a giant white whale. It is his obsession that is his undoing.
The same happens here. Atticus is obsessed to the point of self detriment. It's not until he has hit rock bottom that he comes to see the errors of his ways and then makes amends and tries to do something about it.
This is the essence of flaw and structure in storytelling.
Give your hero a flaw - give them a personality trait that pulls them down. Make sure that the flaw is relatable.
An unreliable flaw will mean your audience isn't connecting with your story.
Atticus' flaw is obsession. It doesn't matter what the obsession is for or about, it is the human nature of pursuing something with neglect to everything else in your life that is a relatable flaw here.
Start small and work your way up. At first, Atticus' dealings don't seem that bad. Sure, he's manipulating people, but it seems like ultimately the end justifies the means.
But as the story progresses, and as Atticus faces the prospect of losing control we soon learn that he has no moral compass what so ever and is willing to do anything to achieve his goal.
When writing a screenplay I always try to show the hero's flaw in every scene. Constantly remind your audience that your hero is flawed, show us that they have this detrimental personality trait that is causing problems in their life and show us their struggle with trying to overcome that flaw.
This is the essence of good storytelling and Bag-Man nails it.
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