Jim Mercurio

Let’s say you are writing an action-comedy like Mr. & Mrs. Smith, in which two lovers are also enemies.

Do you still hate me?” and the response is “I do.” Your intention was to create a double entendre of “I do” because of its association with wedding vows. The text is “I hate you,” but the subtext is “I love you and will be with you forever.”

What if your spouse is the only one who gets the joke? Are you going to explain it away in the script, essentially killing the punch line? Sit with the situation and apply your conscious mind to what you wrote subconsciously. Can you create the necessary setup for the audience to understand it?

Maybe your spouse understood it because you were married under a gazebo. A gazebo can be a romantic setting for a wedding, so decorate your location with white ribbons and flowers. In fact, let’s just make it a wedding that is in progress

Depending on the tone, let them land in the cake. Do you need a wide-eyed preacher to have just finished the line, “Do you take this woman to be your lawfully wedded wife?” Probably overkill, maybe not.

Note that this is different from explaining the joke. It is setting up context. The irony of the romantic and harmonious images provides a sharp contrast to their animosity, while also effortlessly clarifying the double entendre of the “I do.”

When the stakes are life and death, it might seem easier to create strong clear-cut beats. E

however, the goal is to find beats that have personal meaning to the characters.

Relaying a fact” and “giving information” are nonbeats.

scene from Once Upon a Time in the West,