The Genesis Of Ideas

I recently heard that Hollywood is running out of ideas. I'm sure you've heard something along those lines too. With the plethora of re-makes, re-imaginings, and sequels, you have to wonder if there's not some element of truth to it.

But I digress.

As a writer myself, I’ve always got my eyes open and ears to the ground for stories and situations that might kick start a journey to a new musical or song or narrative. New ideas are exciting, thrilling and just a little bit scary. They can take you on a complete journey, or they can lead to a dead end. Regardless, ideas are things I always grab hold of when they appear. I have an artist's sketch book where I put down random ideas that jump into my head. Some I use. Some I don't. Some aren't ready for me to pursue.

Ideas can come from all sorts of places.

One source for my Genesis Ideas is real life. Real life is full of fantastic stories, and as we’ve often heard, they can be far more interesting that anything that could be made up. My musical Somewhere To Fight For is an example of this. It’s about a real town (Wickliffe in Western Victoria, Australia) with a real-world problem (trying to get people to stay in the area) searching for a true-to-life solution. I remember being inspired by the sparseness of the town, and how you could see the old buildings still standing, but completely empty. It left me wondering about the forgotten stories and histories of towns like Wickliffe, and how we could possibly preserve them for future generations to discover.

A few weeks ago, I was in a certain playground with my kids, just hanging out, when I read a series of signs about why that particular area was built. In fact, the whole playground had been fashioned to reflect an event that occurred there. The background information on those signs grabbed my creative attention, and I felt a buzz inside me that told me it might be something cool to build on. The signs told a story that was completely unique to the area, and one that would be hard to believe if it wasn't totally true.

I’ve already done a little more research and my mind is now churning through a myriad of development possibilities. Will anything come of it? Who knows? For me, if the idea sticks around for a bit, then it generally grows in my subconscious and a more solid story begins to form. If the idea disappears, then there probably wasn’t enough for me to go on — for the time being, anyway.

Another way that I develop my Genesis Ideas is based around he simple concept of asking “What if…?” We've all done this before, but the “What if…?” question is all about thinking outside of the box, yet also keeping things simple and focussed. It’s certainly not a new way of approaching things by any means, but it’s a powerful way to develop new ideas and stories. My musical The Tree Of Life was created from a simple What If: that being, what if every human life was tied to a tree - whatever happened to the tree happened to you. From there, the whole musical snowballed into one of my most successful.

I once attended a workshop on the Pixar way of developing stories. It was absolutely amazing, and also very affirming. Pixar has a specific way of forming and developing their stories, with key steps that they follow. The first thing they do is to come up with a Key Premise for their new story: and that premise is to simply ask “What if…?” If you consider most of Pixar’s films, you can bring them down to a basic “What if…?” premise. And when I looked back at the musicals I had written, I was already asking that key question. The funny thing is, I didn’t really know I was doing it until it was pointed out to me!

Ideas don’t have to be convoluted or complex. Often, the simple stories are the best. Sometimes we don’t realise that even the little stories are important. I read online about a guy in cafe who tweeted a conversation between two co-workers where one had a crush on the other. Right there is a great story. There’s hope, romance, drama, tension and a happy ending (not that you have to always have a happy ending - but I'm a romantic!). Its beauty is in its simplicity and reality.

And even if a single idea isn’t enough, it could well be part of a larger idea — an element that, with other smaller ideas, makes up a larger story.

The last thing to acknowledge is that no idea is silly or stupid. When I’m teaching Drama classes, I’m constantly telling my students not to negate the ideas they have — no matter how ridiculous they might be. After all, if the Wright brothers hadn’t dreamed that people could fly, we wouldn’t have the travel we have today. They were told their idea was crazy, yet they still believed in it to follow it through. They're not the only ones who had to face nay-sayers. There are many examples throughout history where an idea has been expressed, and the disbelievers have gone to town on it, only to have those who dreamed it in the first place to succeed.

No idea is insignificant.

No idea is ridiculous.

When it comes to creating something new, we must let our imagination take over, allow ourselves to dream wildly, and let the ideas flow, uninhibited by what others might think.

Don’t short-circuit them before they have a chance to blossom.

Until next time,

Drew