As was shown in the previous section, an ideal episodic show:

1. is funny
2. features attractive actors and actresses
3. increases viewers’ prospects of professional success and romance

The CECS industry is exceedingly likely to be a leading creator of good jobs for U.S. residents in the coming years [20, 21].

An ideal episodic show for the U.S., then, is a reality-based situation comedy that is set at a markets-maker like OppTV, features attractive actors and actresses, and increases viewers’ prospects of romance.

An ideal show for the markets-maker will also deliver profits indirectly. In particular, an ideal ‘1.0′ show will showcase other media properties in the markets-maker’s portfolio.

As is shown below, the premise of Land of OpportuniTV hits all of these marks.

Land of OpportuniTV is set at a fictional TV network – OpportuniTV – and centers on the relationship between a boyfriend and girlfriend.

The boyfriend is a VP at the network, and is in charge of the network’s new division for launching the aforesaid markets, and for creating complementary media.

Attending ‘pitch meetings’ is a big part of the VP’s job.

Given the VP’s gender, show creators have their prospective lead actress perform (part of) their pitch.

Of course, the better the impression an actress makes on the VP, the more likely it is that he will green-light her show.

Ambitious actresses are eager consumers of innovations that enhance physical attractiveness. Because the actresses who pitch the VP work with smart marketing professionals (i.e., the show creators), these actresses also utilize innovations from the burgeoning sciences of persuasion (e.g., the psychology of enhancing desirability).

A good pitch meeting leads to more interaction between the actress and the VP, as the proposed show is more thoroughly considered.

Routinely, then, the VP is subjected to a steady diet of state-of-the-science temptations to cheat on his girlfriend.

This suggests that he should err on the side of caution when it comes to interacting with the actresses. But the VP does not exercise this caution. His reasoning:

The less he interacts with the actresses, the more likely he is to make casting mistakes.

These mistakes will compromise his efforts to give rise to the most popular markets of the aforesaid kinds.

Thereby compromising his efforts to make the global economy more inclusive and meritocratic.

Thereby compromising his efforts to make the world a more humane – and safer – place for his children (who are not yet conceived).

So the VP always interacts with an actress until he has reached his ‘temptation threshold’ (i.e., his limit for being exposed to temptations without succumbing).

Of course, identifying this threshold is an exceedingly tricky business.

So the VP spends a lot of time working to assess his temptation threshold (in cooperation with his girlfriend and relevant specialists), and to increase it.

In the pilot episode, the VP and his girlfriend decide to work together. (She is a popular actress who wants to be a producer.)

Thereafter, she is routinely set upon by actors.

Of course, the more favorable the impression an actor makes on her…

And she wants the same world for her not-yet-conceived children as the VP, so she does not want to err on the side of caution when interacting with actors…

So she also spends a lot of time working to assess and increase her temptation threshold (in cooperation with her boyfriend and relevant specialists).

All told, the couple’s romance can only thrive to the extent that they work together to expose it to ever-greater threats.

In an ‘Entourage meets The West Wing’ kind of setting, then, Land of OpportuniTV is a defining romantic comedy for our times.

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED (SCRIPT IS REGISTERED WITH THE WRITERS’ GUILD OF AMERICA)

(NOTE: The female lead is modeled after Jessica Simpson.  Soon I will ‘find and replace’ the below references to Kate Hudson.)

ACT ONE

SCENE 1: INT – A BALLROOM – NIGHT

Open on an interview with the PRESIDENT and FRANK RUSCICA, the VP of OppTV. The interview is being conducted by a television reporter. The group is standing in front of a stage. Behind them, on the stage, is a podium. Above and behind the podium, a banner reads:

Uncle Sam Wants the New U
Customized education and career services = MANY good U.S. jobs

INTERVIEWER
(addressing the President)

Now that people can no longer use their houses as ATMs, and the housing industry can no longer be expected to create the 40-plus percent of new jobs in America that it has over the past five years, OpportuniTV’s jobs story must be a welcome surprise.

PRESIDENT

Well, entrepreneurial companies traffic in pleasant surprise, so let’s say I’m not surprised that Frank’s network is surprising us this way. But I am surprised that he is not already on his way to meet KATE HUDSON, who he knows I want him to meet.

CUT TO:

The “fictional” Kate is giving an interview 20 feet away. Of course, she looks like the real Kate Hudson.

CUT TO:

The Interviewer, the President and Frank at the foot of the stage.

FRANK
(addressing the President)

I’m just thinking of her youngins-to-be. Because, of course, you can only fix me up with a lady who is perfect for me. Obviously. So she and I will never have a fight that leads to a period of time when she and I are not speaking to each other. And our children will never experience the thrill of realizing that, with a little attention to timing, they can double their allowance.

The interviewer laughs. In a friendly manner, the President gives Frank a “get going” look.

FRANK

Fine, fine.

(now with mock bravado)

But you and I both know you would never talk to me this way if my writers were here.

The interviewer and the President laugh. The interviewer starts writing down Frank’s remark.

FRANK
(to the interviewer)

That’s an old Jack Benny joke.

CUT TO:

Kate is still giving an interview. Frank approaches. As he comes within earshot, Kate delivers a joke to her interviewer that is designed to make her seem insubstantial, as she is often stereotyped to be.

The premise of the joke: In the context of supporting health care reform, KATE is making the rounds to promote her plan to eliminate secondary-smoke inhalation by making it mandatory to chain-smoke.

Frank grimaces, but with maximum restraint.

Kate sees Frank, excuses herself from the interview, and approaches Frank.

KATE

I want to help.

Frank understands that she means that she wants to help him to grow his company. He tries to rebuff her without upsetting her. Specifically, he tries to convince her that she will too busy, given that she will be able to do more good by maintaining a focus on health care reform.

FRANK

Take ambulance response times: a national tragedy. And the average response time just isn’t going to go down until, thanks to you, drivers can look forward to a big federally-funded bonus every time they run over someone.

Playing dumb, Kate agrees.

Frank grimaces and looks at the President, who is watching but is out of earshot. The President gives Frank the thumbs up. Kate sees.

KATE

Well, let’s shake hands, to show the President that we are parting amicably.

 

Frank extends his hand.

KATE
(loudly, projecting toward the President)

Why, I would LOVE to dance.

Frank sees that the President believes that Frank has asked Kate to dance. Frank is not happy, but he projects in a politic manner.

KATE
(whispering crisply in Frank’s ear, without a hint of ditsy-ness)

Branded entertainment programming is not the only way to avoid paying for marketing. There’s also free publicity.

Kate motions toward the reporters and photographers who are gathering around the periphery of the dance floor. The photographers begin snapping pictures. Frank catches on.

FRANK
(in a thinking-aloud cadence)

So the smoking joke, and not catching on to the ambulance joke…?

KATE
(playfully)

I’m not sure I like what you are insinuating. You know, you would never talk to me that way if my writers were here.

Frank lights up.

KATE

That’s an old Jack Benny joke.

Kate sees that Frank has warmed to her.

KATE
(playfully)

So we’ll dance a couple of dances, then part company…

Frank jokes that they have to see each other again, because 1) their dance equates to a novel kind of career service, and 2) given the two-person nature of the service, neither can hope to claim the intellectual property rights if s/he goes alone to the patent office.

As they dance, Frank makes eye contact with the President. The President smiles and points to the banner described above, indicating that he was anticipating this kind of outcome when he pushed Frank to meet Kate.

ACT TWO

SCENE 1: INT – A FEW OFFICES – DAY

Open at the office of a successful blogger.

Over the phone, the blogger reads Frank an excerpt from a newspaper article about counterparts of Frank’s (i.e., heads of Frank’s competitors) who suddenly have Kate-like girlfriends. The blogger asserts that Frank needs to maximize the “yield” from Kate ASAP. The blogger goes on to pitch Frank on a show wherein Kate stars in the role of a slightly fictionalized version of the blogger.

CUT TO:

Frank’s office.

Frank is sitting at his desk. With him is Rich, a VP of special projects at OppTV. Rich is standing by a white-board with columns reading Bloggers, Traders, Toolmakers, Advertisers.

Frank motions, and Rich puts another notch in the Bloggers column.

CUT TO:

The blogger’s office.

On the phone with Frank, the blogger enumerates how the proposed show will benefit OppTV (e.g., the audience of the proposed show will learn how a blogger can 1) use OppTV’s prediction markets to prove subject-matter expertise, 2) parlay this expert status by selling the ad spaces on his blog for a higher rate at OppTV’s ad-space market, and 3) parlay 1 & 2 to do brisk business as a supplier in OppTV’s online market for customized education and career services (CECS)).

CUT TO:

Frank’s office.

FRANK
(knowingly, into the phone)

Of course, the show will need a script consultant…

VOICE OVER OF BLOGGER

Hey, except for that English teacher who sold $2M worth of video lectures in the Korean market, who’s doing bigger business in these markets then me?

Frank receives another call.

CUT TO:

The office of a successful trader of ad spaces in OppTV’s market.

Atop the trader’s desk is the same newspaper article that the blogger read part of to Frank.

On the phone with Frank, the trader pitches a show wherein Kate plays a fictionalized version of the trader. The trader enumerates the benefits of the show for OppTV (e.g., the audience learns how a trader can amass a track record of profitable trades, first with OppTV’s barter currency, then with cash, and how the trader is then sought out by media buyers offering lucrative jobs.)

CUT TO:

Frank’s office.

Frank smiles, nods knowingly. On the white board, Rich adds another notch under the Trader column.

CUT TO:

The blogger’s office.

BLOGGER
(on the phone with Frank)

No, no, no! OpportuniTV already does much more for traders than for media creators.

VOICE OVER OF FRANK

But the traders attract advertisers, which helps you.

BLOGGER

Traders make money from selling ads on their blogs, and from teaching, just like us, and the media-buying gigs they get are a stepping stone to becoming a producer of branded media. A producer! Which means girls galore. And who knows better than you how much branded entertainment is going to be produced in the coming years!?

The blogger finishes by alluding to the fact that male producers are often propositioned by actresses who want a part in a production.

CUT TO:

Frank’s office.

FRANK
(to Rich)

File an intent to patent the king- and/or queen-size desk.

CUT TO:

The trader’s office.

TRADER
(on phone)

No, no, no! OpportuniTV already hooks up the hardcore bloggers way more than traders. These bloggers are online brands, and all the companies doing branded entertainment online always want to work with these bloggers. These blogs are stepping stones for creating a show! Or shows! Which means actresses galore!

The trader finishes by alluding to the fact that male show creators are often propositioned by actresses who want a part in a production.

CUT TO:

Frank’s office.

Frank makes another joke that highlights the opportunities for entrepreneurship that will take shape as traders and bloggers become media producers/creators and are set upon by actresses.

SCENE TWO: INT – A CONFERENCE ROOM AT THE CORPORATE HEADQUARTERS OF A SUPERCUTS-LIKE FRANCHISOR (SUPERCUTS IS A HAIR SALON FRANCHISE) – DAY

A wall-mounted screen shows a logo for The Adprentice, a show that Frank is pitching as a sponsorship opportunity to executives from the franchisor. Alongside the screen is the white-board denoting all of the participants in OppTV’s markets who pitched Frank a show for Kate to star in. Rich is in the room also.

FRANK
(pointing to the white-board)

So obviously, how we leverage Kate is of interest to the young and upwardly mobile — who are, of course, advertisers’ favorite demographic.

 

And many sponsors have already done a lot of repeat business with The Apprentice, to the tune of $2 million an episode.

So we should be able to attract sponsors.

The question is: who has most to lose from not sponsoring us?

Frank shows a slide of Donald Trump. Trump’s infamous hair is in particularly poor form.

SCENE THREE: INT – THE SET OF THE ADPRENTICE – DAY

The boardroom (i.e., final) segment of the episode is in progress. Signage makes it plain that the SuperCuts-like company is a sponsor. Rich and Frank are two of the three judges.

RICH
(to Frank)

You must be sweating after team one’s presentation.

Frank replies with a joke that references Trump’s hairstyle, and the SuperCuts-like sponsor.

Then Frank motions, and team two’s presenter (T2P) begins his presentation.

T2P hurries through his early slides. We learn/infer that team one presented same the information that is on T2P’s early slides.

As T2P hurries through:

We see a slide of an illustrated cross-section of the human brain.

T2P

The nucleus accumbens mediates psychological addiction…

The next slide shows that the nucleus accumbens is stimulated by:

1. increased prospects of money and/or romance
2. beauty
3. comedy

T2P reads the key words aloud.

The next slides show that the U.S. is ideally suited to be the Silicon Valley of CECS, so the CECS industry is likely to create many good jobs for U.S. residents.

The next slide asserts that the ideal show for American TV is a romantic comedy that is set at OpportuniTV. and that centers on Frank’s comic plight as a boyfriend who is also a producer of media properties designed to popularize OpportuniTV’s markets, and hence, who is routinely set upon by actresses.

T2P

But sadly for team one, their analysis stopped here. Because Frank’s comic plight is so much worse.

T2P goes on to point out that:

1)A sustainable markets-maker has to introduce a loan program for CECS consumers ASAP
2)Good looks translate into a salary premium

Given 1), OpportuniTV needs to develop lending skills ASAP

Given 2), OpportuniTV should get into business of providing loans for cosmetic surgery, and for leveraging the science of enhancing desirability more generally.

T2P goes on to describe the feedback dynamic that will result: providing loans for enhancing desirability will worsen Frank’s comic plight, which will deliver more media success, which will deliver more profits, which will enable OpportuniTV to provide more loans, which will increase the supply of desirability-enhancing innovations, which will further worsen Frank’s comic plight, and so on.

As the scene ends, we see Frank and Kate react to the news that their attempt to couple will play out atop the mother of all relationship banana peels.

ACT THREE

SCENE 1: INT – FRANK’S APARTMENT – NIGHT

The screen shows ‘THREE WEEKS EARLIER’, and then ‘THE DAY FRANK SECURED SPONSORSHIP FOR THE ADPRENTICE’.

Kate and Frank are eating dinner.

KATE

So when do we get to the part about how I can help?

FRANK

Well, I only bring this up because the morning after we met, I did the requisite Googling and learned that you want to produce, and because once the Adprentice premieres, my hoodlum competitors will try to leapfrog me by having the boyfriend and girlfriend in their sitcoms be co-producers…

Kate catches on. She points out that making such a commitment would cost her a fortune in acting paydays.

Frank explains that the parent TV network of OpportuniTV will pay Kate huge money to sign on as a co-producer, because:

OpportuniTV stands to profit obscenely by owning the most popular markets of the aforesaid kinds.

Kate’s affiliation will go a looong way toward establishing OpportuniTV as the early leader, not least because she can guest-star in her co-productions (e.g., the sitcom).

Kate moves on to the additional risks that their relationship will face if they work together as co-producers.

Frank suggests their plight is a blessing in disguise: walking the walk is infinitely more convincing than idle talk, so each will be able to really know how committed the other is to the relationship.

Kate makes it plain that she is 100% rooting for their relationship, and then conjures a “worst case” scenario, wherein Frank loses both Kate and his job. In particular, her scenario dramatizes exposition about the fun of working at a markets-making media company like OpportuniTV, because the scenario depicts ambitious actresses seeking to make favorable impressions on OpportuniTV employees at all levels of the company.

Frank concedes the risk, and points out that Kate could be undone similarly.

Kate explains the science that makes men more vulnerable to this kind of temptation.

Frank counters by pointing out that Kate is 26 (i.e., this character is 26), and the part of the brain that mediates impulse control doesn’t mature until a person’s mid-20s (so Kate may have significantly less impulse control than Frank, who is 40). Frank goes on to point out that the risks can be minimized (e.g., by working with specialists who can help the couple avoid succumbing to temptation).

Summarily, Frank and Kate concede that some risk will remain.

FRANK

In the grand scheme of things, though…

He gestures to a wall covered with framed pictures of people who have shown great courage while working to expand educational and economic opportunity (e.g., American civil rights activists of the 1960s, American soldiers on D-Day, Ghandi, Nelson Mandela, FDR, Abraham Lincoln).

FRANK

And on the huuuge upside, with increasingly ubiquitous wireless Internet access, and the $100 laptop becoming available, and open source software, and now our markets, and soon loan programs galore, we are getting really close.

(beat)

Kate smiles.

KATE
(in a thinking-aloud sort of cadence)

So, if this was a scene in the sitcom and I was co-producing, I would first want to show the audience that you are a great bet to remain faithful to me.

 

Now, since we’ve already established that you will all but surely lose your job if you cheat on me, showing that you are a great bet to remain faithful equates to showing how important your work is to you.

So you could start to assure me that you are a good bet, and then I could cut you off and say: “I know.” Then you would want to know how I know. Then I would play a video of the start of the speech you gave on the night we met.

Kate plays a video of the start of Frank’s speech.

ON-VIDEO FRANK

When I was a younger man, to paraphrase a verse from the Langston Hughes poem Freedom Train, I heard about this Promised Land.

 

And like so many others who first learned of the Promised Land by hearing Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. speak of it — in my case, by way of a recording — I liked the way it sounded.

So I set out to check up on this Promised Land.

I learned that the Promised Land is a place where all people are evaluated justly. From which I came to understand that the Promised Land must be a place where all people enjoy every opportunity to bring to life all of their best, as one cannot hope to be evaluated justly until all of one’s best can be made manifest for consideration, and until all of one’s would-be competitors can have their chance.

I also learned that the human community does not yet dwell in the Promised Land.

But from time immemorial to the present day, countless many have worked so hard – and, when necessary, dared everything – to make the institutions of the human community more inclusive and meritocratic.

Due to the efforts of these great spirits, I humbly submit that the day when the human community will dwell in the Promised Land need not be long now.

FRANK

Just to be sure, you’re not saying that the words alone…

KATE

You never once looked at the teleprompter.

 

(beat)

Which, of course, my camera angles would make unmistakable.

Frank nods and smiles, delighted with her producing savvy.

KATE

Which leaves having the ‘sitcom me’ show her commitment to these values.

Kate starts fiddling with the remote control of the video recorder.

FRANK

Are you going to fast…

Kate begins fast-forwarding the video.

FRANK
(stunned)

It was all a dream…

Kate plays the closing of Frank’s speech. As the excerpt plays, she speaks the words contemporaneously. She emphasizes the words about children.

ON-VIDEO FRANK

So, for what it is worth, I say: for our parents, and for our parent’s parents, and for untold generations of our ancestors, all of whose legacy in no small part we are; and for our angel children, and our angel children’s angel children, and for all of the beautiful ones who are not yet born, all of whose destiny in no small part we are, let’s get on the move now. And let’s not let anybody turn us around. Next stop, the Promised Land.

After the speech ends, KATE and Frank fix on each other.

THE END

The Design Of The Pilot Episode

Story: Substance, Structure, Style, and the Principles of Screenwriting, by Robert McKee, is generally regarded by entertainment professionals as the authoritative guide to screenwriting [36].

McKee writes:

"A story can be told in two acts: two major reversals and its over. But again it must be relatively brief: the sitcom [is one example]."

Elsewhere:

"An act is a series of [scenes] that peaks in a climactic scene which causes a major reversal of values."

Elsewhere:

"Story values are the universal qualities of human experience that may shift from positive to negative, or negative to positive [e.g. love/hate, loyalty/betrayal]."

A then-student at the University of Chicago performed an extensive structural analysis of sitcom episodes and found that a sitcom episode’s climax induces/completes a shift from negative to positive. From an article about his work:

"’As I was thinking about story formats for Hammond’s course — and watching a little TV — I kept thinking about the predictability and structure of sitcoms. They follow very specific rules: They’re always 30 minutes long, they always include commercials at precise plot points, and they always conclude with a nice, neat resolution. I decided to make a sitcom plot engine that would generate, analyze and predict the outcomes of sitcom plots. I watched and took notes on hundreds of sitcoms and read the plot summaries of even more. I ended up with a representational language for characterizing sitcom plots and used it as the backbone for my computer program, which I named Structuralist Gilligan.’

…’Basically, there are four elements to any given plot and only about 15 types of plots in all,’ Goldstein said. ‘In every sitcom the status quo is upset, the characters try to re-establish it, and in the end they always do. Perhaps it’s this swing back from a tangled situation to harmony that keeps people around the world watching sitcoms day after day.’"

In a romantic comedy, the ‘positive charge’ that is reversed and then restored in each episode can only be the well-being of the relationship.

Of course, the pilot differs from subsequent episodes in that the couple must first be established, along with their comic plight.

McKee writes:

"Once the [story’s] Climax is in hand…we must work back from the ending to make certain that by Idea and Counter-Idea every image, beat, action or line of dialogue sets up this grand payoff."

The climax of the pilot episode of Land of OpportuniTV, then, must establish that the couple is committed to making their relationship work, despite what they have learned about their comic plight.

Of course, it is also important for the pilot to showcase the markets-maker.

The best showcase will preview the (future) benefits the markets-maker is designed to deliver, and will give viewers confidence that the company has the ability to deliver.

An important indicator of a company’s ability to deliver is its leader’s commitment.

In no small part, a business leader’s commitment can be inferred from the extent to which he equates the well-being of the company with the creation of the kind of world he wants for his children, and for all people.

So an ideal climax for the pilot episode will also dramatize this exposition. As seen above, the pilot climaxes precisely this way.

Again, the episode’s climax must be the culmination of a second reversal (i.e., negative-to-positive), which must establish that the couple remains committed to each other despite what they have learned about their comic plight.

The first reversal (i.e., positive-to-negative), then, must derive from the couple’s comic plight becoming known to them.

As seen above, it is precisely this reversal that comprises the second of the pilot’s three acts.

The pilot’s first act, then, must culminate with the establishment of the initial positive charge: the couple’s shared realization that they are a great match.

From McKee:

"Ideally, every scene becomes a Turning Point in which the values at stake swing from the positive to the negative or the negative to the positive."

And elsewhere:

"The second most difficult scene to write is the Central Plot’s Inciting Incident [e.g., the climax of this pilot’s first act]. So here are some questions to ask…What is the worst possible thing that could happen to my protagonist? How could that turn out to be the best possible thing that could happen to him?"

Because the VP’s future girlfriend is already interested in him when they meet (because of what she hears during his speech, and about the VP from the President), showing that the couple is a great match equates to showing the VP become attracted to her during the first act’s climactic scene (i.e., during the act’s final negative-to-positive transition).

A lady who is a great match for the VP is a lady who is willing and able to help his markets-maker, because, as seen above, the VP’s conception of being a great father is inseparable from his role as the markets-maker’s VP.

Given the markets-maker’s business plan, an ideal lady will be able to help him to run marketing as a profit center, and will make the VP’s personal life a source of free publicity for the company.

Hence:

The female lead is a smart entertainment professional who is of interest to journalists.

The journalists’ interest is established during the first act by having photographers snap pictures of the couple.

Of course, the more free publicity the pictures can generate, the better.

Hence:

The climax of the first act is set at a high-profile post-speech event, attended by photographers, where the VP and the lady dance in a ballroom.

The couple’s poses are suggestive of budding romance.

Again, this climax should be reached via a negative-to-positive progression.

The most negative development that could take shape in this context would be the VP’s perception that the lady is willing but unable to help his markets-maker, as this would mean that her efforts can only cause problems.

The VP would think she is unable to help if he thinks she isn’t smart.

Hence the female lead in the pilot is well-known actress who is thought to be insubstantial, and the negative-to-positive progression derives from her showing that the common perception of her is mistaken.

What remains, then, is to establish the positive that sets up the first positive-to-negative transition.

For the VP, a good relationship with the President of the United States is enormously important, not least because public policies can have a HUGE impact on OpportuniTV’s markets.

Hence the episode opens by showing that the President and the VP are getting along well.

This positive then turns negative (from the VP’s point-of-view) because:

1. the President wants to fix-up the VP and the lady
2. the President indicates that he will be disappointed if the match doesn’t work out

Inspection will make it plain that the second and third acts are designed the same way (i.e., with the same attention to making every scene "a Turning Point in which the values at stake swing from the positive to the negative or the negative to the positive").

Moreover, the pilot dramatizes exposition in keeping with McKee’s principle: "convert exposition to ammunition."

McKee’s amplification:

"Your characters know their world, their history, each other, and themselves. Let them use what they know in their struggle to get what they want."

Next (i.e., Step 6) >>