{"id":859,"date":"2012-01-25T20:04:43","date_gmt":"2012-01-26T02:04:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/elizabethshack.com\/blog\/?p=859"},"modified":"2012-01-25T20:04:43","modified_gmt":"2012-01-26T02:04:43","slug":"a-storytelling-lesson-from-airplane-and-zero-hour","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/elizabethshack.com\/blog\/2012\/01\/25\/a-storytelling-lesson-from-airplane-and-zero-hour\/","title":{"rendered":"A storytelling lesson from Airplane! and Zero Hour!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today’s post is late because we saw Swan Lake last\u00c2\u00a0night. \u00c2\u00a0I\u00c2\u00a0spent\u00c2\u00a0much of\u00c2\u00a0the\u00c2\u00a0ballet\u00c2\u00a0thinking\u00c2\u00a0about\u00c2\u00a0what\u00c2\u00a0led\u00c2\u00a0the\u00c2\u00a0evil\u00c2\u00a0sorcerer\u00c2\u00a0to\u00c2\u00a0turn\u00c2\u00a0Odette\u00c2\u00a0and\u00c2\u00a0friends\u00c2\u00a0into\u00c2\u00a0swans\u00c2\u00a0in the\u00c2\u00a0first\u00c2\u00a0place,\u00c2\u00a0and\u00c2\u00a0what\u00c2\u00a0parts\u00c2\u00a0of\u00c2\u00a0the\u00c2\u00a0story\u00c2\u00a0would\u00c2\u00a0have\u00c2\u00a0to\u00c2\u00a0change\u00c2\u00a0to\u00c2\u00a0tell\u00c2\u00a0it\u00c2\u00a0from\u00c2\u00a0his\u00c2\u00a0perspective.\u00c2\u00a0
\n\u00c2\u00a0
\nWhich reminded me I’d meant to talk about Zero Hour!<\/a> My brother discovered this movie\u00c2\u00a0and brought a DVD over while I was home for Christmas. Zero Hour! is a 1957 disaster movie in which food poisoning strikes the\u00c2\u00a0 crew of an aircraft.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0Passenger and former military pilot\u00c2\u00a0Ted Stryker has to overcome his PTSD and land the plane safely in time to get everyone to the hospital.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sound familiar?
\n\u00c2\u00a0
\nThe guys who made Airplane!<\/a> bought the rights to Zero Hour! Not\u00c2\u00a0only\u00c2\u00a0is\u00c2\u00a0the\u00c2\u00a0plot\u00c2\u00a0the\u00c2\u00a0same,\u00c2\u00a0but\u00c2\u00a0they\u00c2\u00a0kept\u00c2\u00a0many\u00c2\u00a0of\u00c2\u00a0the\u00c2\u00a0same lines of\u00c2\u00a0dialog (“A hospital! What is it?”). The\u00c2\u00a0result\u00c2\u00a0is\u00c2\u00a0that Zero Hour!,\u00c2\u00a0a\u00c2\u00a0completely\u00c2\u00a0serious\u00c2\u00a0film,\u00c2\u00a0is\u00c2\u00a0now\u00c2\u00a0hilarious.\u00c2\u00a0Sort\u00c2\u00a0of\u00c2\u00a0like\u00c2\u00a0a\u00c2\u00a0karaoke\u00c2\u00a0version\u00c2\u00a0of Airplane! where\u00c2\u00a0you\u00c2\u00a0fill in\u00c2\u00a0the\u00c2\u00a0jokes\u00c2\u00a0yourself.\u00c2\u00a0(Actor:\u00c2\u00a0“I\u00c2\u00a0am\u00c2\u00a0serious.”\u00c2\u00a0My family:\u00c2\u00a0“And\u00c2\u00a0don’t call\u00c2\u00a0me\u00c2\u00a0Shirley!”)
\n\u00c2\u00a0
\nIt was really interesting to see the changes that were made to turn it from drama to comedy. Some of it is delivery, some of it is the addition of the jokes (“I picked the wrong week to give up sniffing glue” was not in Zero Hour!), some of it is context (aside from clunkiness, there’s nothing funny about “our only hope us to find someone who can not only fly this plane, but who\u00c2\u00a0didn’t have the fish for dinner” in Zero Hour!, but in Airplane!, I’m already primed to find things funny).<\/p>\n

I enjoy the exercise of figuring out how to take one story and turn it into\u00c2\u00a0another. And I’m now writing a story abut swans…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today’s post is late because we saw Swan Lake last\u00c2\u00a0night. \u00c2\u00a0I\u00c2\u00a0spent\u00c2\u00a0much of\u00c2\u00a0the\u00c2\u00a0ballet\u00c2\u00a0thinking\u00c2\u00a0about\u00c2\u00a0what\u00c2\u00a0led\u00c2\u00a0the\u00c2\u00a0evil\u00c2\u00a0sorcerer\u00c2\u00a0to\u00c2\u00a0turn\u00c2\u00a0Odette\u00c2\u00a0and\u00c2\u00a0friends\u00c2\u00a0into\u00c2\u00a0swans\u00c2\u00a0in the\u00c2\u00a0first\u00c2\u00a0place,\u00c2\u00a0and\u00c2\u00a0what\u00c2\u00a0parts\u00c2\u00a0of\u00c2\u00a0the\u00c2\u00a0story\u00c2\u00a0would\u00c2\u00a0have\u00c2\u00a0to\u00c2\u00a0change\u00c2\u00a0to\u00c2\u00a0tell\u00c2\u00a0it\u00c2\u00a0from\u00c2\u00a0his\u00c2\u00a0perspective.\u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 Which reminded me I’d meant to talk about Zero Hour! My brother discovered this movie\u00c2\u00a0and brought a DVD over while I was home for Christmas. Zero … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-859","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-writing"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/elizabethshack.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/859","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/elizabethshack.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/elizabethshack.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elizabethshack.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elizabethshack.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=859"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/elizabethshack.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/859\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/elizabethshack.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=859"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elizabethshack.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=859"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elizabethshack.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=859"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}