for our audio story, annelie and i decided to document her block in soho (sullivan street between spring and houston), which, even as the rest of the neighborhood gentrifies and becomes homogenous, seems to retain some of the charm of “old” new york. we interviewed three prominent members of the community — the pastor of the local church, a bakery owner who has been in the neighborhood for almost 20 years, and a longtime resident who just recently opened up a coffee shop on the block.
oh man. this week’s collective storytelling assignment was a real challenge.
we were asked to pick a form of media we love — television, book, movie, whatever — and write a short piece of fan fiction about it. i’ve never been part of the fan fiction world before, nor have i ever felt particularly inspired to write a piece of fan fiction. i’ve always felt uncomfortable with adding my own perspective to a story that’s been so well established in some other medium, which is why i thought that this assignment would be a good challenge for me.
it took me all of 2 minutes to figure out that i wanted to write a story about ABC’s “LOST,” one of my favorite television shows of all time. the thing about “LOST,” though, which was made even clearer after doing this week’s reading, was that throughout my time watching it, i treated it as something to be spoiled rather than a world i wanted to explore. 99% of the time, it was about figuring out the answers to questions, guessing what the solution to the mystery was, and speculating about what the hell the writers thought they were doing. it wasn’t really about the plot (although that’s what carried you through and was the device through which you found out what you needed to know); it was about unraveling the mystery of the island, which had been built up to an almost insurmountable level over the course of six seasons. clearly, the writers couldn’t solve ALL of the mysteries that they had put forth over the course of six years, and so many were disappointed when the series finale aired and their burning questions were left unanswered.
I struggle to find meaning behind your actions. It’s so hard to think of anything else. I hope that someday it will all make sense.
In his eyes, she saw a million stories. She counted herself lucky that she got the chance to hear even one. She wished she’d heard more.
As death approached, he reflected on his life. There were bad times, but happiness pervaded his memories. He smiled, knowing he’d lived to the fullest.
* * *
i decided to go with hint fiction’s 25-word format because i wanted to challenge myself to write something short, but 6 words felt like too little to me in order to adequately tell a story. i wanted a little more ability to go deeper, to have some kind of development in there (either of character or plot).
it’s a challenge for me to whittle my word count down (always has been the case, no matter what i write — my college thesis exceeded the recommended length by twenty-five pages!), so i was extremely conscious of what i was writing as i wrote it. i even scratched out a story i tried to write about a crowd surfer at a punk rock show because i couldn’t figure out how to appropriately shave it down from 30 words to 25. i tend to want to describe a lot and it was hard not to do that here, because i felt an instinctive pull to elaborate.
i think the second two examples here are successful (they might even be seen as parts one and two of the same series of stories), but i don’t know about the first. perhaps because it’s a story about an internal state of mind, i can’t seem to reconcile the fact that these words make up an actual narrative for a character because it seems too similar to what could potentially be going on inside my own head. according to this week’s reading, though, what i have in the first story is indeed enough to be a narrative; i guess it’s just not the kind of narrative i’m used to.
i’ve been working in film and tv for a long time, and am well versed in so-called “traditional” methods of storytelling. i know about story arcs, conflict, sympathetic and unsympathetic characters, and the concept of a character needing to go on a journey of some sorts in order to create an engaging narrative. the rules are pretty much the same in documentary as they are in fiction, which surprises a lot of people i’ve talked to about my old job — many of them seem to think that docs don’t need to follow those same guidelines, when in fact it might be even more crucial for a non-fiction creator to be aware of story and how important it is to create a meaningful one to keep your audience engaged.
my goal for collective storytelling, then, is to examine how people follow those guidelines in everyday life. more specifically, i’m really intrigued by the idea of user-generated content and how many different people from many different backgrounds can have similar “storylines” or “plot points” in their lives. i want to look at weaving the seemingly minute stories and details of individual experiences into an overarching narrative that could potentially have some kind of universal thematic relevance.
i’ve thought of a few ways i could potentially do this in the weeks leading up to class, but the most interesting thing to me is the idea of the confessional booth, as exemplified by the mtv show “the real world.” i’ve never been a real fan of the show, but have always been intrigued by the difference between what comes out of the confessional and what comes out of the professional, sit-down interviews included in the show as well. in contrast to the high production value of the rest of the show, the confessional booth’s footage is grainy, unmanned, and almost home-video like. it’s (supposedly) filmed by a constantly running camera in a small room, apart from the rest of the house, where the confessor doesn’t risk being heard as he/she pours his/her heart out.
it’s really interesting to me how people are so willing to confess to such personal things in such a public manner — through this kind of footage, or through diaries, blogs, or other content on the internet. i’m guilty of this myself; i used to write in a public livejournal (which has since been deleted), and wrote in a way in which i spun the daily minutiae of my life into big, epic stories that seemed like the most important things in the world. i often wonder if other people’s brains work in the same way — turning everyday events in their lives into narratives of giant proportions that influence how they behave, speak, and even think.
this started out as a joke, but i’d love to be able to put a confessional-style camera somewhere on the itp floor (the sound booth in room 20 has been suggested) for the semester, and track the universality of the population’s existence. who’s inclined to go in there and spill their guts? what do people talk about? do people feel the same things at the same point in the semester, and if not, what accounts for the difference? i think it would be fascinating to get footage of all of this, and knit it together chronologically to examine if the itp experience is the same for everyone, even though it feels so unique to every person enrolled or involved in this program.
i recently broke up with a long-term boyfriend and have been getting into the dating world for the first time in a few years. as i start to remember how many social constructs there are around dating, especially in the beginning of relationships, i am reminded by how much we are forced to obscure the truth in our day to day lives. when dating someone new, for instance, you are required to hide facets about yourself that may not be seen as attractive, even though they may be more representative of who you are; you lie about your plans, daily activities and whereabouts in order to make yourself seem more of less unavailable; and under no circumstances are you to EVER reveal how much you like the other person, lest you seem “crazy,” “desperate,” or both.
that got me to thinking about lying and honesty, not only in the context of dating, but as a fundamental instinct of how we operate socially. i’d like to do a documentary about the idea of honesty and what that means to different people. what makes a little white lie different from a major, unforgivable one? why are we so quick to dismiss lying as a fault but are reluctant to be completely honest with people when there are things they say or do that we don’t personally agree with? why do we build relationships around anything EXCEPT the whole truth? through interviews, research, and potentially interactive elements, i’d like to explore this idea and create a narrative that can hopefully explain why fudging the truth has become so vital to normal social interaction.
a little late, but here’s the fruits of sarah hallacher‘s and my labor in after effects. the whole thing is clearly an homage to gaspar noe’s enter the void.
the concept: an interactive, educational installation inside a mannequin. users will open doors and manipulate sensors inside the mannequin to control a flow of information about sexual and reproductive health, presented in processing.
i'm a former documentary tv producer interested in creating interactive, educational material that encourages social awareness and curiosity, in the form of public art pieces, exhibitions, and user-generated narratives. this blog documents my projects and assignments during my time at NYU's interactive telecommunications program.
