A handful of subscribers asked me to write about storytelling. I’ll do this in a few weeks, but first, we should look at scripting. I’ve been doing these video calls with subscribers. Quite a few of the calls focus on reviewing written scripts. Some advice I’ve said a few times to these talented magicians is simply…

Show, don’t tell.

When you sit down to write a script, in any capacity, it’s pretty easy to end up packing the dialogue full of exposition and action. It’s okay; even the best Hollywood movie writers include exposition and action in dialogue. Your goal should be only to do this when absolutely necessary or when it enhances the performance.

An audience is not always full of morons. You don’t always need to spell out precisely what you’re doing or why you’re doing it. Besides, it’s more engaging to have to figure things out as an audience. You get a sense of comfort, reassurance and smugness when you figure out what’s happening or what’s going to happen.

Teller teaches that the best lie is the one you tell yourself. And I’m teaching you today that the best story is sometimes the one you tell yourself too.

Let’s break down the basics quickly…

Exposition: a statement that explains something clearly.

Action: a thing or process carried out.

You’ll hear exposition in dialogue when watching any action movie ever. There’s usually quite a geeky character who says something like:

“Once the missiles launch, you’ll only have seven minutes to get off the island, Bond.”

You’ll hear actions described a little less often in your favourite films because it’s rare that a character needs to explain what they’re doing as they’re doing it. Though, sometimes, they might need to:

“I’m hacking into the mainframe now, installing the vector code and boom, we now have access to every traffic light in Italy.”

You’ll tend to find action features in dialogue in places where the action is not easy to follow, like hacking computers, cracking a safe or when an action is out of view, like keyhole surgery. You’ll rarely see James Bond say anything like this…

“I’m punching you in the face, and now I’m throwing you to the ground, and now I’m going to bang-bang shoot you.”

Then why is it that we often hear magicians say things like this…

“I’m placing your card back into the pack, squaring up the deck, and if I snap my fingers just like this, your card will jump to the top.”

I assure you that the magicians who do this do not have an answer for you.

But the truth is they could have good answers — there are some occasions when employing action and exposition as dialogue are essential. Let’s take a closer look.

Exposition

If you cannot show the reason, stakes or goal of your trick or feel it is necessary, exposition is okay. You might be reading this thinking, well, you’re always going to need to have verbal exposition, because how the hell will you be able to do this non-verbally, Rory?! Well, chill out.

Which do you feel will create a more significant impact on an audience?

1. Explain to them that the nail in the woodblock is real and that slamming your hand down onto it will really hurt and land you in hospital.

2. Stabbing the nail with an apple to prove it’s real, then playing a video of magicians failing at the trick, causing horrific injury to themselves.

But sometimes, you really do need exposition. An audience won’t naturally calculate the chances of you getting a prediction correct. Perhaps explaining the numbers to them will make the trick more impressive. If you want to predict something on a gold medallion, you might need to tell a backstory to give the medallion some justification and emotional kick.

Action

Actions can only be included in your dialogue if and only if you plan to callback to it later, if the action is unable to be shown (due to its size or level of technicality) or when you need to burn the action into an audience’s memory.

Which do you feel will create a more robust impact on an audience?

1. Telling the audience that you’re going to place their card in the middle of the deck, snap your fingers and bring it to the top.

2. Place their card into the middle of the pack carefully, nudging out some of the cards around it, squaring up the pack, pausing and snapping your fingers, then gesturing for them to turn over the top card.

But sometimes, you do need to include actions in dialogue. Maybe the entire audience cannot see something that you are doing. Perhaps it’s relevant to a prediction later in the show. Perhaps you need to say, “I’m going to place your Rubiks cube here,” to lock in the idea that it still is their Rubiks cube and not a duplicate you switched in.

Start with nothing and work your way up.

I’ll cover different exercises one at a time over the coming months. But let’s talk about one fun and valuable exercise today, and two simple habits you can start putting into play today.

The first is to stand up. Stop writing scripts at your desk, stand up and speak them aloud. Walk through your performance. Heck, have a friend walk through it with you. The fastest way to stop yourself from including too much exposition and action in your scripting is to stand up. It really is that simple.

The second habit to start today is to separate dialogue and action in your scripts. It’s an immediate way to ensure that you’re not just unnecessarily saying what you’re doing. Place it separately in your script and describe actions minimally.

Anyway, on with the exercise…

The Caveman Exercise

It will feel silly. Perform the routine with as few words as possible. That’s right; you’re going to sound like someone from the stone age. It’s an incredibly useful writers/rehearsal room exercise because it forces you to make critical decisions about what is necessary to include within a trick’s dialogue. And in boiling your script down to its absolute necessities, you can eliminate waste, including unnecessary action and exposition, and build back better.

When you’re satisfied that your script includes as few words as possible while providing a substantial impact on an audience. You can then make that script sound far less stone-aged by gift wrapping those handfuls of words with complete sentences.

To be sure there’s no confusion. I am not recommending your final script should be as minimal as possible. I’m simply saying start with nothing and work your way up such that you guarantee your final script does not feature unnecessary action and exposition.

Keep reminding yourself: Show, don’t tell.

This was quite a theory intensive post today so here’s a puppy and some pizza: