Stephen J. Cannell Quotes

The conventional Aristotelian plot proceeds by means of a protagonist, an antagonist, and a series of events comprising a rising action, climax and denouement.

I guess I would say that most of what I've learned about storytelling derives from novels and short stories. I cannot think of a novel or story, or a novelist or story writer, who thinks in terms of three-act structure.

Good stories are driven by conflict, tension, and high stakes.

My conception of it was that in a normal film you have a story with different movements that program, develop, go a little bit off the trunk, come back, and end.

With a mini series you can give the story a proper sense of pacing, a proper sense of closure.

The great thing about a trilogy is that it feels like you've got a beginning, a middle, and an end.

If you have a beautiful story, it has to have conflict. If you don't have conflict, it can't be a good story.

I'm not much of a plotter. I start off with an inciting incident, and in classic crime fiction what happens is that all the action flows from that incident. It's very comfy when it all ties up and feels like a complete universe, but my stuff doesn't always work that way.

Certainly, 3rd acts of any movie are hard. It's always hard to have something that will give you the promises from the beginning of the movie. That's true for all movies.

The mystery form was very helpful for me as a beginning writer because mystery novels and suspense novels have a beginning, a middle and an end.

I don't like plots. I don't know what a plot means. I can't stand the idea of anything that starts in the beginning - you know, 'beginning, middle and end.'

Plot is what happens in your story. Every story needs structure, just as every body needs a skeleton. It is how you 'flesh out and clothe' your structure that makes each story unique.

I began to be impressed by what made a good book-how you needed to have a sensible story, a plot that developed, with a beginning, a middle, and an end that would tie everything together.

I started as a playwright. Any sort of scriptwriting you do helps you hone your story. You have the same demands of creating a plot, developing relatable characters and keeping your audience invested in your story. My books are basically structured like three-act plays.

It's nice to know when you're a part of a story, it's nice to know at least something about the beginning, middle, and end.

An action movie should, like any other, follow the narrative traditions of literature. That means there should be subtlety, a slow build and a gradual bringing together of all the separate threads of the plot. To see all of it coming together slowly is very rewarding for the audience.

The hero is never the star of the story.

It's always good to have a story arch.

A story really isn't truly a story until it reaches its climax and conclusion.

In most shows, there's usually a hero or a protagonist, and even if there are multiple heroes or protagonists, most shows try and make it so you really always know who's the good guy and who's the bad guy.

In order to have a plot, you have to have a conflict, something bad has to happen.

Look at Austen. In her novels, you get a dance, followed by an encounter, followed by a letter, then a period of solitude. No flashbacks and no backstory. Let's have no more back story!

When you learn about stories in school, you get it backward. You start to think 'Oh, the reason these things are in stories is because a book said I need to put these things in there.' You need a death, as my husband says, and you need a little sidekick with a saying like 'Skivel-dee-doo!'

The thing should have plot and character, beginning, middle and end. Arouse pity and then have a catharsis. Those were the best principles I was ever taught.

I think predictability is built into any good novel in some way - you begin reading Anna Karenina and you know pretty much what's going to happen at the end. But that doesn't mean you know what's going to happen in the middle. For me, it's that sense of what happens in the middle that's important.