All the King’s Women- When they become fed up with being one of the king’s many “fair maidens”, three wenches conspire to kill him, but when the queen dies and the king announces his plan to remarry, the three turn on each other as they vie to be the next lady of royalty.
dhastingsLogliner
All the King’s Women- When they become fed up with being one of the king’s many “fair maidens”, three wenches conspire to kill him, but when the queen dies and the king announces his plan to remarry, the three turn on each other as they vie to be the next lady of royalty.
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I like the premise, too. It evokes all manner of opportunities for comedy.
Here’s my reworking of the logline:
When the queen dies, three concubines conspiring ?to kill the king now compete to win his favor and become the next queen.
(23 words, 130 characters–it’s tweetable)
Good luck with your writing.
As a base for comedy this sound interesting, however, the wording is confusing. The conspiracy to kill the king adds confusion and seems unrelated to the ‘A’ plot.
I also think the conflict is unclear. Comedy, much like drama, needs conflict to work well. Perhaps best you pin all three concubines against each other.
My try:
After the queen dies, three concubines sabotage each other’s attempts to appeal to the king as his new wife.
One question though, would concubines be eligible to marry into royalty? If not, perhaps they could be three single dutchesses instead of concubines.
Thank you very much for the reviews! I’m not sure when I’ll get to work on this particular ?script. I’m still very new to screenwriting, and I’m trying to work on some of the basics right now. Creating interesting concepts and turning the ideas into intriguing loglines is one of those basics, so I really appreciate the reviews.
dpg beat me to it 🙂 I would go with his logline example, says the same thing with less words
I agree with dpg that the conflict is presented in the logline. However I think the logline might benefit from describing a clear visual action that the protagonists perform on screen to achieve their goal. In what manner do they compete? Do they play a game? Do they have a beauty contest? How is that three wenches are even able to catch the attention of the king?
>>>How is that three wenches are even able to catch the attention of the king?
That’s why I made them his concubines (formally, or mistresses (informally) to render that question moot.
>>In what matter do they compete??
By any one and all of the 1,001 strategies and moves in the female repertoire of seduction. ?That to me, is part of the appeal of the premise. ?Why narrow down to a beauty contest, or any single contest. ?I think it would be more ?interesting to see the 3 women deploy 3 distinct game plans to win over the king.
The story hook (for me anyway) is the reversal of the the women’s objective goal and their relationship. ?They start out as co-conspirators who want to kill the king, then turn into rivals trying to kill each other (eventually) as they fight to win his favor.
How do they go about it? ?Read the script.
fwiw
Well, sure, in your version you made them concubines, but in the post made by the author they are described as wenches. And the author hasn’t posted a revision or responded directly to your feedback so maybe he/she worked out that detail and doesn’t plan to change it.
To be honest, when I first read the concept I thought it was a drama, comedy didn’t even cross my mind. That may be because of my personal taste but still the original logline, and even your version don’t paint a picture of comedy in my head.
I did list specific examples, and it doesn’t necessarily need that I do think some a little more specific than “compete” or “vie” could help. Nir Shelter’s version more so paints a comedic picture in my mind. “Sabotage each others’ attempts” sounds like the type of situation a?comedy would present.
Even your description, “They start out as co-conspirators who want to kill the king, then turn into rivals trying to kill each other (eventually) as they fight to win his favor.” doesn’t paint a comedic situation to me. Not to say I immediately see a super-dark movie, but I don’t exactly see them cracking jokes or pulling off silly hijinks.
But that does bring up the question of what kind of tone, what kind of comedy?
Just my thoughts.
I will post a rewrite for this logline soon. Based on the initial logline, the tone of the film may be interpreted in different ways. I see it as a dark comedy/romance film. Specifically, it’s like a medieval John Tucker Must Die. ?My initial thought for the overall story is that each “wench” actually has a male suitor that they’ve been overlooking. All of them come up with elaborate, but also borderline ridiculous plans to get rid of each other that backfire. There’s a lot to flesh out still.
Once again, thank you for the reviews!
Whatever.
I’m just saying that the reversal the wenches undergo, from conspiring to killing the king, to vying to wed him, is a great way to boot up the story.
The ?dialectic, the yin /yang, ?the systole-diastole beat of all comedy and drama ?is reversal. ?Reversal of fortune. Reversal of intention. ?Reversal of relationship.
And this story sets up the strongest reversals possible — 180 degree whiplash-inducing reversals of fortune, intent and relationship. ?Properly executed, it s a winning combination of reversals.
Dpg I don’t disagree with you. My only suggestion was to be a little more specific and that may help better convey the tone of the story. Like I said naming a particular contest isn’t necessarily the way, but maybe something like:
After?the queen dies, three wenches stop conspiring ?to kill the king and?concoct elaborate plans to win his favor and become the next queen. (25)
I think something like that is more likely to bring a more comedic, ridiculous?situation to mind.
Dhasitngs, is there a reason the protagonists are described as wenches rather than another position which would more obviously give the king reason to notice them?
I hope this helps.