2026 > STRUCTURE AND PLOT POINTS AND NERDS, OH MY!
By Jason Long
11 Mar 2026
In the early 90’s I wanted to learn how to be a screenwriter so I went to a university. Yes, you can LOL me. No shade to uni-smart-edumacated peoples but I did not fare well in moving away from home to be stuck mostly in non-film courses. Learning moments happen everywhere, not always in the expected classrooms, so in the end, I say, it was still worth it. Toronto really did have excellent concerts, movies, and hot dog vendors.
In my actual screenwriting class, I got some stuff twisted early.
Namely, structure.
The professor said “structure” and “read Syd Field”. I heard “formula” and “go eat dry shredded wheat and jam” because I was really broke and that’s all I had that week.
Now for some reason I get paid to teach this stuff so lemme tell you what it is and how I was able to untwist it over time:
Structure just is.
Deal with it. Use it. Try as you might to be avant-garde and weird and rebellious and defiant and totally anti-structure, it’ll still be there. And it’s okay.
Because it’s not formula. It just is.
Structure is how your screen story moves from beginning to middle to end. Syd Field Save The Cat Then Save The Dog Too ‘Cuz Equality Save A Prayer Save The Day Savin’ Me By Nickleback all aside, that’s all it is. It need not get more complicated than that.
Local Calgary writer/showrunner legend Andrew Wreggitt once told me, when I asked him about structure and his process for writing features said, “About 9–12 big things will happen in your movie. Put them in order. There you go.”
So simple. So old school. So, pre-writing books and blogs and podcasts.
And Andrew is a man whose screenwriting career began as a university student in Vancouver who landed a gig writing the tv guide-style episode blurbs for The Beachcombers. That anecdote has nothing to do with my point whatsoever but it’s too cool not to mention and I wish the world still ran this way. Also, maybe I should have applied myself at university like Andrew did…my life…
Taika Waititi, in a BAFTA masterclass Q & A, said (add your own hip-ass accent in your mind), “I think about what’s a cool way to start a film. Then I think about a cool way to end the film. And then, over time, I just, lazily string it all together…” I mean, I know that’s not really it, not really…but it also is. That is it, that is true!
Hang onto your cool story that you love. And keep trusting that it’s cool. Try and stay in that high vibe feeling it gave you when you first thought of it.
Don’t let plot points and pinch points and where and how things are supposed to happen overtake your fun.
Use structure. Don’t let it use you.
Also, don’t get caught eating dry shredded wheat and jam six weeks into your first semester of university. Learn how to budget and make momma’s care package last longer.
Ready to enter one of the premier screenplay competitions in Canada?
Submissions are open for the 7th edition of the Canadian Short Screenplay Competition now until April 12th, 2026 via FilmFreeway , Stage 32 and Short Film Depot.
Submit your short script for your chance to get your film made and/or your already produced short film based on your words to get your work and creativity acknowledged and awarded!
2026 #WW Laureate
