Terrified of his parents suspicions, a freshly outed gay high school senior must get a girlfriend so his parents will think he is straight.
Categories: Comedy
Categories: Comedy
Perhaps the "outing" adds confusion.
Scared of his parents finding he is gay a high school senior must find a girl willing to go the prom with him.
Leave the "outing" for the story.
Nice story.
"Freshly outed," is an odd word combo. Maybe the way?the kid is outed (the missing event) leads to his choice to make arrangements for a "girlfriend." This suggest that he is outed at school or work and that his parents aren't aware of the outing. If he was outed in front of his parents, then the girlfriend idea would be pointless. Maybe he is outed in one place in the story and there is a sense that the news will be traveling to his parents over the course of a day. A time element (clicking rocks) is important in the latter half of the screenplay. "Getting a girlfriend" isn't believable either, it implies a random female is in the ready to act as the prop he suddenly needs to solve a problem. Maybe it is his boyfriends sister who agrees to step in while he figures out a way to properly come out to his parents. Perhaps, they depend on a confusion over names. Then, the parents meet the girl's family and they really like each other. Then in a double?family outing, they let the parents of the gay boy know what's really happening. The audience knows this is going to happen, so it will be very exciting to see how they tell them. Maybe they put on a family play and go back to the name confusion theme. I go in this direction because the logline as it stands implies that the solution and end of the story is to be okay with living a lie and to be unloyal to the parents. I think an end note of acceptance is better. How about: "When a?high school's?theatrical production leads to an unforeseen outing of the main star, the frightened student?reaches out to his boyfriend's family to find the best way to ease his family into his new lifestyle." The event should be emphasized - beyond just a random "outing." How it occurs can be part of what John Truby calls the "design principle" of the story. In Tootsie, the design principal is the use of a TV soap opera setting to play out the character development - it made sense because it was a world where people wore costumes, make-up, etc. It sounds like a wonderful beginning!
I'm not convinced this will work - not today, not in the west.
There is so much already dealing with LGBT subject matter that for a script to stand out (enough to catch a producer's attention) it would need to present seriously high stakes and or be based on a real story. This sounds like very low stakes and rather pedestrian. Coming out as gay in 2017 - no big deal. This is, unless, the MC lives in a very strict community of people who would react to him being gay - evangelical Christians, Muslims or neo nazis.
Even then I struggle to see how this is a story worthy problem and one that we haven't seen oh so many times before. I think you need to find a specific plot device that would raise the stakes beyond the socially awkward to real danger.