When writing any scene, look for the character whose life will change the most. Most of the time, that will be the hero or the villain, but in rare cases, that could be a secondary character.
The reason for focusing a scene on a secondary character is to emphasize the greatest change in that character’s life. First, let’s look at the most common type of scene where the hero undergoes the greatest change.
In “Yesterday”, the hero, a struggling musician, suddenly wakes up in a world where the Beatles never existed as a band and he’s the only one who can remember all of their music. When the hero plays the song, “Yesterday”, nobody else knows what he’s talking about when he says the song was written by Paul McCartney.
The hero starts the scene thinking he’s just going to play a song for his friends, and winds up upset that they don’t seem to know that he didn’t write it.
Another example of a scene that focuses on the hero appears in “Finding Nemo”. In this scene Marlin, the hero, wakes up after getting stung by jellyfish. That’s when he learns how the turtles trust their kids, which is something Marlin needs to learn to trust Nemo.
While most scenes focus on the hero’s change, sometimes scenes focus on a secondary character’s change because that secondary character undergoes the most emotional turmoil.
In “Moneyball”, the hero, Billy Beane, goes to talk to Scott Hatteberg, a catcher who has a damaged elbow, making it impossible for him to throw the ball well any more. If this scene focused on the hero (Billy Beane), it would start by showing Billy Beane arriving at Scott Hatteberg’s house, trying to convince him to play for his team, and then ending with Scott agreeing.
Yet that’s not where the greatest emotional change occurs. Instead, the scene starts out by showing Scott Hatteberg’s initial state where he thinks he’s washed out of baseball and has no future income any more. Life for Scott looks hopeless, especially as his wife struggles to pay bills they can’t afford.
Then Scott talks to Billy Beane, who tells him he wants Scott to play first base for the Oakland Athletics baseball team. Billy hands Scott a contract and walks away.
In that short scene, Billy went from not having a first baseman to having a former catcher agree to play first base. Yet the greater emotional change occurs with Scott Hatteberg when he starts the scene thinking he’s washed out of baseball and ends the scene with a guaranteed contract to play.
So when writing scenes in your own screenplay, look for the character who experiences the greatest change in their life and that’s the character you want the scene to focus on. Most often that character will be your hero but in rare cases, it could be a secondary character who comes into contact with the hero, such as in the “Moneyball” scene between Billy Beane and Scott Hatteberg.
The key is that each scene should tell a story where someone’s life drastically changes from the start of the scene to the end. Look for the character whose life changes the most and that’s the right character to emphasize in that scene.
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