Comedy

comedy

  • Crafting the RomCom Bellamy

    March 17, 2020 /
    Picture of DESK SET
    A jealous Gig Young finding Katharine Hepburn entertaining Spencer Tracy

    Here are some tips for crafting the RomCom Bellamy.

    First, what’s a RomCom Bellamy?

    That’s the Wrong Guy or Girl.

    As Billy Mernit explains in Writing the Romantic Comedy,

    In the screwball era, Ralph Bellamy was the prime rejected suitor of choice, playing the earnest stodgy fellow who didn’t get the joke or the girl. . . . Solid and dependable, Bellamy represents the qualities his heroines have been unable to secure in their desired heros–in both cases, played by the charmingly tricky and unreliable Cary Grant.”

    Writing the Romantic Comedy, Billy Mernit, at p.131-132

    Take THE AWFUL TRUTH.

    Crafting the RomCom Bellamy based on Ralph Bellamy
    Ralph Bellamy is in the middle between Cary Grant and Irene Dunne.

    How is Ralph Bellamy wrong for Irene Dunne?

    • seems a bit stodgy
    • is visiting New York with his MOTHER, to whom he seems quite attached
    • is from Oklahoma, where Irene Dunne does not want to live. In one scene, Cary Grant repeatedly says how much Irene Dunne will love living in Oklahoma and Irene Dunne winces every time.
    • does dance enthusiastically, but not in a way that fits NY society. He’s country dancing in a sophisticated New York nightclub. (Personally, I give him points for that.)

    Crafting the RomCom Bellamy in DESK SET

    Or take DESK SET, one of my favorite movies. (Fun fact: The screenplay for DESK SET was written by Nora Ephron’s parents.) The Bellamy there is her office crush. How do we know he’s the Wrong Guy?

    • she is very uncertain of their relationship even though they have been dating for YEARS
    • he asks her for help checking over his numbers (using her)
    • he doesn’t recognize how smart she is

    What is important to remember is that the Bellamy “helps define who the protagonist is and isn’t.” Writing the Romantic Comedy, at 132.

    It also helps to highlight the qualities of the Right Man. So in DESK SET, Spencer Tracy

    • recognizes immediately how smart she is after their lunch date and is very impressed with her (another one of my favorite scenes);
    • seems romantically interested; flirts with her; compliments her
    • Has a good sense of humor

    Benefits of the Bellamy

    Comedy: My favorite part of the Bellamy is that it enables you to set up a triangle comedy “set piece” where this is displayed, as, for example, in DESK SET when Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn are having dinner and Gig Young, the guy she has been dating for years, arrives and is upset to find Spencer Tracy there. Bridget Jones also does this with Colin Firth and Hugh Grant. Remember when she is having her birthday dinner with Colin Firth and her friends, and Hugh Grant shows up.

    Tension: If you do it right, you may create genuine mystery as to who will be The One. For example, in HOW I MET YOUR MOTHER, I think there’s genuine tension as to which girlfriend becomes her mother.

    “The most effective Bellamy is one who poses a genuine threat to your central romance, meaning: for maximum triangle tension, design a Mr. or Ms. Wrong who we can believe could actually be a viable mate for your protagonist.”

    Writing the Romantic Comedy, Billy Mernit at p. 134

    In my WIP, Partner Pursuit, I tried to do this, but I worry that I made my Bellamy too desirable, which took away some of the comedy and made my beta readers feel bad for him. But if I made him less likable, I took away some of the tension that she would end up with him. So, I think there’s a trade-off. I think for comedy, you need to make him less likable.

    Let’s Talk

    Do you like movies or books with a Bellamy? What are some of your favorite books or scenes in movies? Why do you like them? Next time, I will look at the Bellamy in ALWAYS BE MY MAYBE–a more current movies 🙂

    Unless now that my kids are home from school and I am home-schooling, I come up with some good ideas to share. I did find Lunch Doodles with Mo Willems, so, since we love Mo Willems, we will try to incorporate lunch doodling into our schedule.

    Keep safe and keep washing those hands!

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  • Analyzing the new OVERBOARD

    February 27, 2020 /
    Overboard movie poster

    So OVERBOARD (1987) with Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell is one of my favorite movies, but I still wanted to see the new OVERBOARD (2018) and to spend some time analyzing it. (It’s free right now on Amazon Prime). And I enjoyed it in the end, but on its own terms. Since I’m writing a romantic comedy, and since I love watching romantic comedies, I also love discussing and analyzing romantic comedies. And there were some interesting lessons.

    Analyzing the New OVERBOARD

    Here are some of mythoughts on the new OVERBOARD:

    • Still like the set-up of the scam
    • Shows how to make an unlikable love interest likable
    • Uses double entendre in comic scenes – based on the scene with the male buddies
    • Missing the chemistry of the original OVERBOARD

    The Comedy Scam

    According to John Truby, “the plan is always a scam in comedy.” So that’s the case in OVERBOARD, since Anna Faris’s character decides to pretend that Eugenio Derbez is her husband. This also brings in the “fake dating” romcom trope, which is one of my favorites. Only, OVERBOARD has a clever twist since only one of them is aware that they are “fake” married.

    P.S. I highly highly recommend John Truby’s course on Comedy. It is one of the best courses on comedy I have taken so far.

    Making an Unlikable Love Interest Likable

    I REALLY disliked Eugenio Derbez’s character initially. He was so so awful. He had to be awful so you sympathize with the Anna Faris character taking advantage of him. So I was impressed with the scriptwriting because I started to like him. BUT am I really that easy? He makes lunch for her and I’m like, okay, I guess you’re a good guy. I guess I am really that easy. His amnesia, though, also allowed the audience to give him a fresh start.

    My Favorite Scene in OVERBOARD

    My favorite scene was actually when Eugenio Derbez was hanging out with the guys and he says: “I don’t think this is my life. I don’t have sex with my wife.”

    The other guy says that the last time he had sex with his wife was 9 months before our daughter was born. And our daughter is now 2. (So there you have the set-up, the joke, and then the topper (and now our daughter is 2).) And that nobody thinks that this is their life.

    Eugenio says that he feels that he should be the guy owning the pool, not building the pool. And all the guys say that they think that.

    So it has the double entendre aspect because you know that this is not Eugenio’s life (and that in his former life, he did have sex all the time and was the guy owning the pool) and that makes that funny. But the conversation also has truth to it (everybody thinks that), which adds to the humor.

    Missing the Chemistry of the Original OVERBOARD

    I think that from a romantic point of view, it was missing the chemistry of the original OVERBOARD. Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell definitely had more chemistry. Maybe that’s because they have chemistry in real life, but I also think that the OVERBOARD (2018) script had less flirtatious banter between the leads. I’ll have to go watch the original again to see if my theory is correct. 🙂

    I remember that I wrote one scene in my draft novel where the male romantic lead was doing the dishes and my writing tutor in my Penguin UK Constructing a Novel Writer’s Academy course found this boring and said I needed to add more sparks. Meanwhile, as someone who hates doing dishes, I thought that the male romantic lead doing the dishes was sexy. Lol.

    Sexy man doing dishes

    But she was right and I did add more banter to the scene.

    Meme that I want you to want to do the dishes from The Break-Up

    Exactly. Why would anyone want to do the dishes?

    Three Take-Aways from Analyzing the New OVERBOARD

    • Use a scam in your comedy. Add a twist if you can.
    • Make sure there is flirtatious banter between the leads
    • Comic scenes that play with double entendres work.

    Let’s Talk

    Have you seen the 2018 OVERBOARD? Did you like it or hate it? What was your favorite scene? What was your favorite scene in the 1987 OVERBOARD?

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