A Story Idea Each Day for a Month — Day 6
This is the third year in a row I’ve run this series in April. Why a story idea each day for the month? Several reasons which I’ll work my through during this series of posts. Here’s another one:
Story ideas are worth gold in Hollywood.
I’m just going to give you one example. Around 1990, writer Stephen Brill came up with this idea: “A self-centered lawyer is sentenced to community service coaching a rag tag youth hockey team.” That eventually became the movie The Mighty Ducks. That seemingly innocuous family comedy grossed $51M, not bad for a movie with a reported $10M budget.
Then came D2: The Mighty Ducks. Then D3: The Mighty Ducks. Then “Mighty Ducks”, a TV series. Then Mighty Ducks the Movie: The First Face-Off, a DTV animated movie.
And then came this:
The Anaheim Ducks [formerly the Anaheim Mighty Ducks]. An NHL franchise. A professional franchise worth an estimated $188M.
All based on the fact that one day, a writer was walking around and came up with a story idea about a youth hockey team named the Mighty Ducks.
As I said… in Hollywood, story ideas are worth gold.
Today’s story idea is a classic premise: Homeless Man Learns He’s Rich:
SALT LAKE CITY — A private investigator says he has tracked down a homeless Utah man and delivered some good news: He’s inherited a lot of money.
David Lundberg said he found Max Melitzer pushing a shopping cart filled with personal possessions in a Salt Lake City park Saturday afternoon.
Lundberg declined to disclose how much money Melitzer will be receiving, but said the man’s brother who died of cancer last year left him a “significant” amount in his will.
“He’ll no longer be living on the street or in abandoned storage sheds,” he told The Associated Press. “He’ll be able to have a normal life, and be able to have a home, provide for himself, and purchase clothing, food and health care.”
The story about Lundberg’s two-month search for Lundberg has been reported by the Deseret News and KSL of Salt Lake City.
Lundberg said he was hired by the family’s New York law firm to locate Melitzer, and some family members plan to meet Melitzer next week in Salt Lake City. He declined to identify them.
The easy route would be to focus on the homeless man and the changes that take place in his life after he comes into his inheritance. But I thought it was interesting to approach it from the perspective of the PI whose job it was to find the beneficiary. Then go one step further: Does this unlikely pair develop an odd friendship?
For example, the PI spends all of Act One trying to find the Homeless Guy. Not an easy task, filled with twists and turns, and taking the PI into a strange, even threatening subculture.
Perhaps the PI is a cynic. He’s tempted to give up the quixotic search, but maybe he’s got it in his head that in the midst of the screwed up world, if the PI can do this one good and decent thing, then that will make him feel better.
Lo and behold, he finds the Homeless Guy.
Now they’re feted around town, became media stars, interviewed together, the whole 15 minutes of fame thing.
The PI goes back to his life. Or so he thinks.
Knock-knock.
It’s the Homeless Guy. He’s having a hard time adjusting to life with money. Not used to sleeping in a bed. Could the PI help him? Maybe be his friend.
And there, my friends, you have multiple story paths: Comedy, Thriller, Action, Indie Drama.
What would you do with this story idea?
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