TV in movies
I just finished writing a scene where a television news report was playing in the background and it reminded me how hard it is to get these moments right. Unless you’re literally having the characters stare at the TV set, you’re basically dividing the audience’s attention between two planes of information. If you don’t do it carefully, the audience won’t know where to look, and the scene will be a disaster.
Off the top of my head, here are four (hopefully) helpful guidelines:
The TV can only tell you one thing. It can say the big snowstorm is coming, but it can’t also say that mobster Carmine DeSomethingorother has escaped from custody.
Use the naturally empty moments of the scene. If there’s information that’s important for the audience, but not necessarily the characters, start on the TV and let the characters enter the scene where it’s playing. If a character’s waiting on hold, or is looking for dijon mustard in the fridge, that’s another moment you could cut to the TV.
Get the rhythm right. TV news in particular has a cadence, and you can’t just shove your exposition in to make it fit. Always think how the reporter would actually report the story and balance his goals with your goals.
Don’t make it too convenient. Don’t have a character flip on the TV, only to find exactly the story about them — unless it really is reasonable that there’s 24-hour coverage about the situation. Perhaps the only thing worse than this cliché is when a character rushes in, saying, “You’ve got to see this!” before grabbing the remote.
On the whole though, it’s amazing how little television people watch in movies as opposed to real life.
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March 21st, 2007 at 3:46 pm
Good tips. I think the advent of 24-hour cable news channels really helped with the “too convenient” thing. Older movies had to roll out the old “we interrupt this broadcast to bring you this story” line. Now, as you say, you can have CNN prattling away in the background while you look for the dijon mustard.
March 21st, 2007 at 4:16 pm
I want a scene where someone is watching TV, and then a friend rushes in and says “You’ve got to see this!” before grabbing the remote. The friend turns the channel to Lost, which is then interrupted with breaking news.
March 21st, 2007 at 7:12 pm
Hi. My job is to edit and play back the video pieces that play on the TVs. Thank you so much for taking this seriously and thinking about the way TV news actually works. One suggestion I’d add: write what goes on before and after the ‘important’ piece of exposition so that there is something on the TV long enough to cover the scene. So many times we get a piece of playback prepared without our input that is only the hero paragraph, leaving us no choice but to turn off the TV in the middle of the scene. And if the reporter is gonna say “In other news,” there should be some other news.
And when you shoot it, frame the newscasters with room for graphics and lower thirds.And does it play back on a widescreen TV, or 4×3? And shoot some B-roll to cover the dialogue or buy some stock footage. And use a teleprompter or at least cue cards for the talent. And hire real talent, preferably a local newscaster. And use an experienced video cameraman and a real mic. And light it for video, not film. And…I’ll shut up now.
Seriously, thanks.
March 21st, 2007 at 8:14 pm
Yeah, I’m not a huge fan of the “That’s it! This television program makes it all fall into place!” type scenarios. I think TV works very well as a foreshadowing tool, even for serious or comedic purposes. Such as “And now the weather – be prepared for some light rain.” Later in the film, it’s literally pouring with rain. Bastard weather man!
March 21st, 2007 at 9:50 pm
I have used the “too convenient” story on the news in a script once, but it was an attempt at a comedic effect. Just after the main character tells his wife that he disposed of a dead body where no one will ever find it, the news report of the police finding the dead body comes across on the television.
I thought it was funny anyway.
March 21st, 2007 at 10:46 pm
I know its a very bare bones kind of question, but I would really like to know; how did you come to realize that you wanted to be a screenwriter?
March 21st, 2007 at 11:41 pm
One of my favorite examples of this is from “The Game”, when Daniel Schorr addresses Michael Douglas’ character directly from the television.
Having the character watch the same news program in a prior scene helped set the stage as the audience has established that the program is real (in the universe of the movie).
March 22nd, 2007 at 1:40 am
Well, “The Game” is an awesome movie, period.
I like method #2. I just like the vibe of the character doing something unrelated in the room, but the audience hears the TV and knows something’s up.
March 22nd, 2007 at 6:06 am
I was writing a scene involving a television shortly before reading this. Thanks for the guidelines. I plan to give the scene another look to be sure it is working.
March 22nd, 2007 at 7:19 am
Look at how the radio / tv reports were done on “Dawn of the Dead (2004). The protagonists kept turning off the braodcasts right before the important information. It was like the entire audience knew the bad news, but the characters didn’t!
March 22nd, 2007 at 7:19 am
“On the whole though, it’s amazing how little television people watch in movies as opposed to real life.”
Hmm, The Simpsons do watch a lot of television. – But they’re not “in movies”. Not yet. The Fishers from SFU also watch a lot of TV. Is this a TV thing? Maybe ’self-referencing’ would be the keyword here. How clever. Wikipedia has a nice article about self-reference btw (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-reference), which references two books and the Wikipedia article about self-reference. I’m confused.
I think the reason for the absence of TV in film is because watching the tube isn’t action, only activity. And a great many of films are about actions, aren’t they?
Nice Preview function, btw.
March 22nd, 2007 at 10:46 am
Interesting points. I watched Cache (Hidden) a few months back and the use of television news reports seemed to play an important role. Unfortunately, the movie was in subtitles and the background news reports were not translated. I felt that I was missing a piece of the narrative by not having known what relevance the background news casts played in the story.
March 22nd, 2007 at 10:49 am
I write for TV news, and it’s always crystal clear which screenwriters either have a background in the business — or have become good students of the craft.
Not only is there a cadence, but good TV news writers write to the pictures, too. You rarely see that done in news reports in movies.
March 22nd, 2007 at 3:34 pm
Close Encounters has a great scene where a TV newsreport is on in the foreground, and Roy Neary is arguing with his wife in the background. It’s a long take and perfectly timed.
March 22nd, 2007 at 3:53 pm
SIGNS used television as a window into the world. The movie is about aliens invading earth – and yet it is entirely set on a farm. The TV is the only (story) device that makes us feel there is a global event occuring. One character is glued to the TV for half the film. And even in the climax it is the (turned off!) television set that reveals the creature. A sign-? I thinks YES!
March 23rd, 2007 at 4:47 pm
I like the Blake Synder rule of keeping Press out of the story.
March 23rd, 2007 at 4:51 pm
I think “Sean of the Dead” made effective use of TV news reporting not only because the newscasts felt real but they gave the characters information that they needed without making it seem cliched.
March 23rd, 2007 at 8:31 pm
Pretty unrelated to this entry (although I did need this article today for a screenplay I am currently writing, so thanks for the kismet): Today’s my first day reading your blog, and I’m enjoying it!
March 26th, 2007 at 7:41 am
I made a lot of mistakes with this the first time I tried to use TV to explain something. By the time I made it to a third draft, and finally realized what a stupid coincidence it was for the one time someone turns on the news that it’s relevant to them, I felt like a real dope.
March 28th, 2007 at 7:44 am
And if the reporter is gonna say “In other news,� there should be some other news.
Jim, you made me remember Wargames.
The scene is early in the film, and Matthew Broderick arrives home. It’s a pretty straightforward entrance: he’ll enter the door then go to the stairs (frame right). The TV is on, and the anchor (a real anchor from a local Seattle affiliate) after finishing the story-relevant business, says…
ANCHOR (ON TV): … In other news, a fire at a prophylactic recycling facility – -
I don’t know whether it was scripted, or an ad lib. (I haven’t read Walter Parkes’ screenplay. I’m gonna say ad lib; that they shot longer to allow for more choice in when to cut out of the shot.)
There you have it. An occasion when they actually continued to “other news.”
(Not sure if this is pointed out on the DVD, since I saw it years ago on VHS.)
March 28th, 2007 at 12:07 pm
You also see the use (and mis-use) of journalistic narrative in many novels, particularly crime thrillers and mysteries. Often they’ll include an excerpt from a newspaper story. As a former newspaper reporter, most of these make me wince. They usually get everything wrong, from tone to the logical dissemination of facts. You don’t need to go to J-school to learn this — as with TV news, these are standard journalism tools anyone can pick up by simply paying attention.
March 28th, 2007 at 6:18 pm
I actually just broke rule #4 and wouldn’t have thought twice about it. The information delivered via television is pivotal to the conclusion of my film but I’m not sure what would work better. Reading it in a newspaper seems too cliched as well. How does my character find the news out through TV or another medium without readers cringing and saying, “damn that’s obvious!”
March 30th, 2007 at 12:41 am
It’s a hard task, because not only are you writing two simultaneous events, but you’re editing the film here as well. You could have easily written the two events on separate sheets of paper and told the editor “you’re on your own,” but this is a screenplay, not a kinder surprise.
You’re eliminating decision-making that the film’s editor would have had to do, because the shots and their sequence is implied in the script. It’s cool because although it’s difficult, writing it all out gives you the ability to influence the dramatic pacing of the scene, before it even gets to the director.