Playwright Discovery Award Teacher's Guide - The John F. Kennedy ...

PLAYWRITING EXERCISE 3 : Postcards From
a Play—The Producer’s Version
This exercise introduces how to use a storyboard to create a narrative. What follows are possible
scenarios or stories for each image. All writers should feel free to create their own scenarios for
each postcard. A series of visual scenes or postcards and sound cues has been provided by the
Producer, who has hired the writer to come up with the narrative that accompanies the images and
sounds. There are five visual images and five soundscapes or physical indicators of a disruption that must
be used to inspire an active, dramatic story told in five short scenes or beats.
PART 1 Create a Scenario
Create a scenario for the five postcards and add a sound and physical indicator to each postcard. The
postcards appear without scenarios on page 73.
Postcard 1
Possible Story: John, middle school age, is seen rummaging through a school locker in a deserted
hallway. Peter, same age, who uses metal crutches for each arm and has a backpack over his shoulders,
has one hand on John’s arm, as if to stop him.
Disruptive Soundscape | Physical Indicator 1: The sound of a locker door popping open.
© 2010 E. Brown
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26 ACT II: PLAYWRITING