It takes me a long time to learn the basic idea of ‘Premise’ but good thing is now i am getting a little bit sense of it. In lay terms if we say then – ‘ A Premise is ” a character in a situation”. lets make it more cinematic – a interesting character in an interesting situation’. Now lets explore it a little bit more.

Usually premise should have three elements in it – Set up / Main Conflict / Resolution. Well nothing new is in it. we all know that. SO lets try to see it in a different way.

A Premise is something which talks about ACT 1 and ACT 3. It gives just a snap shot of ACT 2. Give me some time to explain it, so that it can make some sense.

Actually every story starts with an idea only. A idea could be anything but for a cinematic story, it must have something to say, some message or some thought. This message becomes Theme of the story. Now to develop a story from it, we have to think such situations and characters which should be supportive to the premise.

Why dose Premise become so important for a story ?

well despite reading a lot of about it.I couldn’t get so much sense of it until i myself didn’t realize the need of an static premise.

Writing is a very unpredictable process. You just don’t know next moment what you are going to write.Once you start writing ,things starts popping up from no where. It becomes a difficult job to control the flow of various ideas.All seems good and workable.

And you know when it happens the most ? in ACT 2 . Yes ! right after setting up the story , now requirement comes to make in interesting, to make it engaging. ACT 2 is the part which deals with it. That’s why ‘in writer’s bay , it is called the most difficult part.’

And this is the where we need someone to guide us so that we can achieve our goal. Goal of the story. and in a story nothing else but only Premise is the guiding torch.

I think most of the armature writers get stuck when they start developing ACT 2. why ?

Because they work too much in second act , to make it interesting that they almost forget the initial point of the story and thats Premise. they do all kind of experiment and when they reaches at ACT 3, they feel something..something.. must have gone wrong.
They go back and find …ohh.. its not the premise actually…its not the message ..they were willing to convey. Act 2 is good ..but its not like as it should be.

What is the Purpose of ACT 2 ?

For me.. it is there to enhance the idea of premise. It is there so that you can touch the border of ACT 3 in a unique way. For that ACT 2 should not be unique. The whole story should be Unique. We should go back and think about he basic elements of premise. It fixes ACT 1 & ACT 3. You know from where you have to start and where you have to go.

ACT 2 is just a road, you have to travel .It could be a straight line or a zig zag road. It could be a tunnel, passage underwater or through free sky. But is it really matter for you when you are so much determined to go somewhere that by which means you are going ? Definitely not . And a massage can be conveyed only if you have that kind of determination in you.

That’s why ACT 2 .. should be the most interesting part of the story but not the leading part of the story.