Everything Everywhere All at Once PART 2: The Opening Sequence

Welcome to Part 2 of my Everything Everywhere All at Once podcast. In Part 1, we talked about how Everything Everywhere All at Once was built, the link between Evelyn’s journey in Everything Everywhere All at Once and the writer’s journey in finding the structure of a screenplay, and the character driven elements that underlie the structure of nearly every screenplay or TV show, regardless of the genre.

In today’s episode, we’ll do a detailed breakdown and script analysis of the opening sequence of Everything Everywhere All at Once, to show you how this scene lays the groundwork for everything to come in this remarkably ambitious, Academy Award-winning script.

 

As you can see if you take a look at this early draft of Everything Everywhere All, the Daniels did not begin with a perfect understanding of all the elements of the simple character driven drama that would hold together their crazy Kung Fu concept. 

 

What the Daniels began with was a twist on The Matrix, a question about the immigrant experience, some personal experiences with Daniel Kwan’s own immigrant family, a love for Kung Fu movies, the insane desire to tell a Kung Fu movie about empathy, and a curiosity about the multiverse and the idea that there might be multiple universes happening at the same time. 

And by pushing on all those ideas, they eventually figured out the character driven drama that would tie it all together, and created the incredible introductory scene that we are about to watch and analyze together. 

I’m going to show you how all the magic of Everything Everywhere All at Once actually builds out of the simple twelve minute scene that begins the movie.

This is the very first sequence of Everything Everywhere All at Once.


We begin with this image in the mirror of this family all together. It’s doubtful whether a scene ever actually existed in these characters’ lives, but what we know is that this is Evelyn’s dream of what her family was supposed to be, if she had been living the best version of herself. 

 

What’s important to understand is this is not the family that we end up with at the end

 

Just like your screenplay is not going to be the vision that you have at the beginning, this image is the false belief driving Evelyn of what it is supposed to be, rather than the acceptance of what it is that she (and we) will arrive at by the end of the movie.

 

We push in, and suddenly that mirror is blank. 

 

If you look at the early draft above, you won’t see this image in it, because the Daniels didn’t know this image yet. This image is something they found, when they realized that we need to know what Evelyn’s vision was, so that we can understand what’s been lost. 

 

What follows is the movie in a microcosm. We push in through that mirror and we find Evelyn at– to speak metaphorically– her “writer’s desk,” completely overwhelmed. 

 

Waymond’s face is reflected in the mirror behind her, but Evelyn doesn’t see it, because she is buried in her paperwork– all those piles of different possibilities of what her life could have been or was supposed to be. 

 

Behind her, on the security camera, there are all these different views of the room. All these different camera angles, these fractured little universes. 

 

As we push in, you may also notice the googly eyes on the laundry, but that’s just a sweet little detail. Really, we’re seeing an overwhelming room, one that already has everything happening, everywhere, all at once. 

Waymond’s first action in Everything Everywhere All at Once  is to grab the piece of paper from his wife. He is trying to get her out of her head, to get her to simply pay attention to him for a moment.

 

And what Evelyn says to Waymond is what every writer probably thinks when I try to get them to play instead of being so darn serious about their writing! 

 

“Stop playing, we don’t have time. I don’t have time. I’ve got to get to the end. I gotta get through this scene.” 

 

As alluded to in the last episode, like Evelyn, it’s easy for us to end up forgetting our sense of play as writers. Even though that sense of play is actually the only route by which we can discover the spark of our writing, what the scene actually wants to be. 

 

We end up missing what’s in front of us, just like Evelyn, because we’re so busy trying to catch up.

 

Waymond says to Evelyn, “I know you’re too busy, you won’t let me help. But can we talk about something else?” And she says, “I’m listening. Talk.” 

 

But she’s not listening.

 

What’s actually happening is we’re having a wonderful little visual game happening with this piece paper which captures the nature of their relationship. Waymond takes Evelyn’s paper. He hands her his paper. She takes the paper, and then he grabs it back– we’re having a game of action around this object that gives us a simple drum beat to follow through the chaos of the scene.

 

This is craft: you always want to root your characters in action. The characters aren’t just sitting there talking, they’re playing a little game around a piece of paper. She’s trying to focus on her task. He’s trying to get her to look at something and have a conversation. 

 

Finally, Waymond realizes it’s not going to work. Evelyn just won the scene. 

 

“I know you aren’t listening,” he says. “Let’s talk later when we have time.” 

 

Waymond has just given up on his plan. Evelyn’s won with her distraction.

 

The scene moves on, and once again Evelyn is doing everything everywhere all at once. 

She’s having a conversation with Waymond. The rice cooker’s just gone off so she’s taking care of the rice. She wants to paint over the water stain on the ceiling. She wants to cook the noodles…

 

And Waymond starts a new strategy: He tries to help her with the other tasks. He’s already painted the ceiling. He’s now stirring the noodles. But he hasn’t given up on his plan. He wants to talk later. He’s trying to set a time for the two of them to talk. 

 

So we have a character who’s desperate to talk and a character who’s desperate to deal with everything else. 

 

(With the noodles, by the way, they’re setting up something that ended up getting cut from the final movie: a noodle universe that ended up getting cut in favor of the hot dog universe).

 

Instead of answering Waymond, instead of saying “yes, we can talk later” or “no, we can’t,” Evelyn just talks about the noodles. She is looking at everything except what is right in front of her: what her husband actually wants and needs from her.

 

You can see that the multiverse is already happening in this first few minutes of Everything Everywhere All at Once: these two characters are already in different movies. 

 

Evelyn is in the movie about everything she needs to take care of before Gong Gong’s party. 


Meanwhile, Waymond is in the movie about needing to serve his wife with divorce papers so that she will actually talk to him. 

 

Within those two universes, there are a dozen other universes: the paint, the noodles, the rice cooker, the tax papers. There is the universe of what Evelyn is planning for Gong Gong’s party. The multiverse is already here. These characters are already living in half a dozen different universes at the same time. 

 

Everything is already happening everywhere, all at once. 

 

And we see Waymond do his special kind of fighting: his fighting through empathy. He says,

“Evelyn, calm down. I know you want everything to be perfect for your dad’s party. He’s going to be proud of you. He’s going to see you’ve nurtured a happy family and a successful business.”

 

This is a precursor to the scene with the rocks. This is Evelyn’s husband trying to say “if you will just let things go a little bit quiet, you will see all the beauty that is around you.” 

 

This is her husband fighting through empathy. 

 

And Evelyn is not ready for that. “You’re crazy,” She says. “You know that’s not what my father’s gonna see.”

 

And we have this beautiful moment where the two of them look at each other, he turns her around towards him, and he says, “But it’s what you and I see, right?” 

 

And Evelyn just turns away, and we get this unbelievable shot through the doorway of what she actually sees: this overwhelming apartment, plugged with too much stuff. 

 

What she sees is what we feel so often in our lives, and what we feel so often as writers: more stuff than we can possibly balance or make sense of. And all she needs to do at this moment is turn towards Waymond and see what he sees, allow it to simplify down to the relationships in front of her, but she’s still too distracted by all the things around her.

 

Of course, then she gets interrupted by another character: Gong Gong. And bang, she’s back in a dozen more multiverses: the table needs to be set. Gong Gong needs to be taken care of. She’s out the door. And she’s completely missed the opportunity to communicate, to see and recognize the beauty. She’s so trapped in all the things she thinks she’s supposed to do. 

 

Waymond says, “We’ll talk later,” but the door shuts in his face. She’s not even aware of what he’s been asking.

 

It’s this moment that we get exposed to what Waymond’s actually been trying to do. Up until now, we just knew he wanted to talk, but now we see the divorce papers. We see them at the same moment that he’s looking at them. He’s contemplating them. He has completely failed in his mission.

 

We first meet Joy in Everything Everywhere All at Once staring into the depth of the spinning dryer. And you might notice that the dryer is “the bagel.” It’s a riff on the same image we’re going to see later when the bagel is revealed.

We come in on the dryer, and then we see Joy staring, depressed into it: this thing just going round and round and round. The laundry that’s going to need to get done again and again and again. The meaninglessness and the pointlessness of all of this when nobody can see you or hear you.

 

And Joy’s depressed mirroring of her mother’s state gets interrupted by empathy: by actually being seen, by her girlfriend’s kiss.

 

We get the resistant Joy, the depressed Joy, who’s living out the same patterns that her mother lives out, just as Evelyn’s living out the same patterns that Gong Gong lived out. And we get Becky, the person who, like Waymond, actually sees her.

 

Something amazing happens here. Joy finds her joy in that moment of connection!

Unlike her mother, she sees the person in front of her. But like her mother, rather than accepting Becky, she starts to roll up Becky’s sleeves to cover her tattoos. Just like Evelyn doesn’t want to show the truth to Gong Gong, Joy doesn’t want to show the truth to her mom. 

 

We also have a beautiful little setup here: 

 

Joy is aware of her mother’s inability to communicate. As Becky puts it, “I thought you said when she says shit like that, it means she cares.”

This line is such a brilliant example of the craft of screenwriting. We’re building to a moment (around 11:04 in the movie) when Evelyn will try to share how she really feels toward her daughter… and instead will tell her “you have to eat healthier, you’re getting fat.” 


Becky’s line here gives us, the audience, the ability to interpet Evelyn’s subtext in the pivotal scene that’s going to take place eight minutes later. We know now that when Evelyn says nasty stuff, it’s really her attempt to show love. And we know that Joy understands that too. Which will give us a much deeper understanding of Joy’s psychology as well:

Joy has insight to decode her mother’s subtext in Everything Everywhere All at Once, but she still feels unseen. In other words, like Jobu, Joy sees what’s going on. She sees everything. It just all starts to feel meaningless and hopeless to her, and that leaves her in a place of self destruction.

 

Becky’s line also shines light on the next lovely little moment: Becky tries to impress Evelyn. And Evelyn responds “I only cooked enough food for three people. Now I have to cook more.” We get another little rejection– but we also have an understanding that even under this line is a subtext of Evelyn’s repressed desire to show love. 

 

Joy and Becky come into the apartment, and we get the strongly contrasting relationship between Waymond and Becky. We understand the difference between Waymond, the guy who can see the person in front of him, and Evelyn, the woman who cannot, the guy who can communicate his emotions, and the woman who cannot.

 

We get this beautiful moment with the noodles. And Evelyn mixing up “he” and “she” in English– which obviously has a metaphorical level to it as well. 

 

Evelyn is not just struggling to understand the language, she’s struggling to understand her daughter’s relationship. 

 

And this is actually a precursor: one of the ways she’s going to figure out her daughter’s relationship is by imagining herself in a lesbian-hotdog-finger-relationship with Dierdre!

This whole thread is just a metaphorical expression of how Evelyn feels, of what she would consider the unnaturalness of her daughter’s relationship. All that happens in the hotdog finger sequences in Everything Everywhere All at Once is that those internal feelings get pulled out of her. 

 

Those feelings get extrapolated out of the naturalistic, dramatic world and into the expressionistic world, and we get to see what it feels like for Evelyn. 

 

We get to see her reject her own lesbian relationship. And then we get to watch her find love in something that felt disgusting for her, to find beauty, to find connection with someone she never imagined she could connect to. 

 

This is all suggested in that mix-up over the noodles and Evelyn’s linguistic struggle with pronouns: the whole idea of the multiverse, and “he” and “she” being mixed up, that there’s not just a binary relationship here, that this is all happening at once. It’s all being laid down in this opening sequence, which is not an opening sequence you could write into your first draft. This is an opening sequence you can only write once you understand what your movie really is.

 

The opening sequence continues, and once again, Becky wants to help. She wants to help out with and understand Gong Gong. Evelyn wants to protect Gong Gong, and herself, from Gong Gong finding out who Becky is. 

 

So, the universe just shifted a little bit. It was supposed to be a universe where Joy came to help with Dierdre. Now the two of them have to stay behind, and Evelyn and Waymond have to bring Gong Gong to the meeting. 

 

We just had another little split between Evelyn’s expectations of how things are “supposed” to be and the way the universe is actually going.

 

We have another level of multiverse, another fracture that gets dropped in here when Waymond says, “Does your dad even know you’re being audited?” So there’s another level of reality: what Gong Gong is being told versus what is actually happening. 

 

What I’m trying to suggest to you is that the multiverse in Everything Everywhere All at Once is not some external thing that these writers boiled up: the multiverse is a representation of the feeling of overwhelm that already exists in the character-driven drama of Evelyn’s life.




The opening sequence continues: now customers show up. We get a mirror of the same conversation that Waymond with Evelyn– except now it’s Joy chasing mom, trying to get her attention, and Evelyn once again being pulled by the multiverse, by one more layer of , everywhere, all at once– and not understanding the needs of the person right in front of her.

 

This is how we often feel as writers. We feel overwhelmed. We’re doing everything all at once. We’re thinking about what it’s supposed to be. We’re saying, I’m gonna have time to sit and listen to my characters later. I’m gonna have time to sit and find the beauty in front of me later.

 

Or maybe we’re even saying, “I’ll to find the time to write later.” 

 

But really, we’re distracted by all the things in the world around us. We’re distracted from the things that actually matter to us. We’re putting off for later the things that need to happen now. 

 

I know you have writing days like that.

 

As the opening scene of Everything Everywhere All at Once continues, we see these googly eyes appearing on the washing machine: a symbol of seeing each other, and of seeing ourselves. 

 

We’re watching a mom not be able to see her daughter, and not be able to see that she’s not seeing her daughter: literally removing the eyes from the washing machine. She does not want to see.

 

Evelyn is dealing with the shoes in the washer, but not her daughter’s needs. It’s just one other distraction in the multiverse.

 

You can also see in this clip yet another layer to the multiverse: Evelyn’s fear for the future. Her fear that Gong Gong might die. 

And now we get introduced to the next element: we’ll just call her “Big Nose,” as Evelyn does. She is going to appear later, in the fight sequence, and in fact, she’s the one who has the headset in her ear, that’s going to be so essential to the magic of this world. This is where that element gets laid in. 

 

You can see that these characters are in two different scenes as well. “Big Nose” is in a conversation with her boyfriend on her headset. She’s in a different universe. She’s having two conversations at once. It’s just one more fragmentation of the world. And there’s the little dog that, as we know, is going to become a weapon later. 

 

Everything is being set up in this sequence.

 

The next element of the opening sequence of Everything Everywhere All at Once worth discussing is a really subtle element– a little “action” sequence in which Evelyn slides a stool into place with remarkable dexterity. In all this foot action with the stool, we see the beginning of the Kung Fu we’re about to experience. 

 

Evelyn already has some abilities that she– and we– are not aware of. And the Daniels are subtly paving the way for that here.

 

We then get the next element of the multiverse: the perfume the bearded guy mentions when he hits on Evelyn.

Later, during Evelyn’s Kung Fu love sequence, she turns his grenade into perfume, sprays him with it, and it changes his life. 

 

Everything is being set up here. 

 

We’ve got the Lunar New Year party and Evelyn’s desire for everyone to come: the guy who’s been kind of hitting on her, and later, Big Nose as well.

 

We also are starting to get Waymond’s view of empathy laid in here. A bag of clothes are missing… and it turns out Waymond was trying to help. He claims “the clothes are happier upstairs.” 

 

There’s empathy everywhere, even for clothes (even for rocks). But Evelyn only feels disdain for her husband’s choices. She doesn’t see the beauty of her husband, his trying to help, his fighting for love, his empathy. Instead of seeing all those things, Evelyn is just seeing him as another thing in the way of all the things she has to deal with.

 

Becky tries to calm poor Joy down. But Joy is not getting anything she wants. Just like always, her mom is not able to hear her, and her attempts to connect just make her feel more hopeless, more in despair. 

 

We see the googly eyes again on the missing sack of laundry. And those googly eyes are going to pay off in so many different ways: when the bullet turns into a googly eye, when the googly eye becomes the third eye on Evelyn. You’ll also notice that the googly eye as a third eye for Evelyn is a mirror for the circle that Dierde staples onto her own forehead, which is also a mirror the circling of the receipts that Evelyn is doing in this sequence, and that Dierdre will do during their first meeting.

Everyone in Everything Everywhere All at Once is trying to open their third eye in some way, but nobody quite knows how to see until that moment where the bullet transforms and the googly eye gets placed on Evelyn’s forehead toward the end of the film.

 

What we’re actually watching in Evelyn’s arc is simply a woman changing, both literally and metaphorically, from removing googly eyes to actually seeing. 

 

And that is all getting set up in this sequence– even the rock with the googly eyes in that incredibly moving sequences is just a subtle visual translation of the laundry bag with the googly eyes.

 

You can see that all of these characters are on a journey toward seeing, but they’re all in different movies. Evelyn is in 72 movies, with all the tasks that she has to do. Joy is in the movie about needing to talk to her mom about Becky, and Waymond is in the movie about needing to talk to his wife about their marriage.

 

Even when Joy just tries to get a simple answer, “can Becky come tonight?” mom switches to another multiverse. “Stop changing the subject,” she says, changing the subject. For Joy, Becky has been the subject the whole time. But Evelyn’s mentally gone– she’s at the tax office, talking about Dierdre preying on immigrants. She’s in so many different multiverses she can’t see the one that she’s in.

 

 

Up until this point, despite all the elements being laid in for the future, we’re still experiencing Everything Everywhere All at Once mostly as a naturalistic drama. But we need to know that we’re in an action movie or as people who came for a Kung Fu movie, we’re going to tune out. 

 

So that’s what starts to happen here. We get other split in the universe.

 

We talked about those nine little security screens in the background. We’re now going to see something happening that they’re not seeing. 

 

Again, they’re missing a whole part of the universe. 

 

We see Alpha Waymond, who we don’t even know is Alpha Waymond– we just think he’s Waymond– doing all kinds of crazy Kung Fu moves on the screens in the background, while mom and Joy fail to communicate with each other.

 

And then we cut back and it’s a completely different Waymond! It’s Waymond playing around with the guy who was hitting on Evelyn earlier. 

 

And that keeps on getting “yes… and-ed” and played with, and by the time this sequence is over, the two of them are dancing together. And Evelyn looks at that with disdain: She doesn’t see that this is her husband’s way of fighting, fighting with empathy, fighting with love. 

 

She says, “Sometimes I wonder how he would have survived without me.” But later, we realize that the two of them really need each other to survive, and that he is going to be the key to her realizing who she really needs to become.

 

Now, as Waymond and the guy with the beard play with their wonderful little game together, we’re gonna see this musical– this “The King and I” type musical that is playing on the TV in the background– which is later going to transform into the hot dog fingers musical. You can see, again, the many many different layers of what is being set up: everywhere we’re going in the whole movie is growing out of this sequence.

 

We see Evelyn watching that musical, which is the expression of that kind of idealized love that she was supposed to have, that she didn’t get. 

Evelyn’s watching the magical love story happening on the screen. And behind her, unseen, we’re watching her husband dance around. And that image is telling us that the musical, the love, is already there. It’s just not in the shape Evelyn is expecting. 

 

So instead, when she finally turns around, instead of seeing the beauty, she gives the laundry to her husband and tells him to give it to “Big Nose.” 

 

Once again, Evelyn is missing everything that’s happening in front of her, because every universe is interrupting every other universe. 

 

Meanwhile, Joy and Becky are having their own conversation, which Evelyn is overhearing and which she doesn’t like very much at all. “Either you come with me, and he dies, or you don’t come with me and he still dies,” Joy says to Becky about Gong Gong. 

 

You can actually see this is a precursor for where we’re going with this story: Evelyn can either fail to communicate and lose her daughter, or communicate and lose her daughter. One way or another, she is going to have to let go. 

 

Joy finally gets Evelyn’s attention– and there’s Gong Gong. And you can see this is exactly what’s going to happen with Gong Gong in the magical action world. He is going to show up and he is going to be a danger to Evelyn– he’s going to be a threat to Joy.

 

 And Evelyn is eventually going to need to learn to stand up to him. 

 

When Evelyn finally does stand up to Gong gong, what’s really magical and really beautiful is that we’re gonna get to see the opposite of what we’ve been watching through all of the opening sequence of Everything Everywhere All at Once

 

Rather than watching the family fight with each other, we’re going to watch Evelyn, and Waymond, and even Gong Gong all fight to pull Joy back out of the bagel, out of the nothingness, back to what really matters.

 

All of the opening sequence has been building towards finally introducing Becky to Gong Gong. And this is what we get instead: Joy tries to introduce her girlfriend, but she doesn’t have the language. 

 

Just like Jobu, Joy actually doesn’t have the language to say what she wants to say. 

 

What Jobu will ultimately say is “Everything means nothing. And I’m overwhelmed. And I built the bagel to destroy myself.” 

 

But what Jobu really wants to say is, “I want you to save me, mom. I want you to see me. I want you to show me that there’s a different possibility.” 

 

So that’s where we’re going. But here, in the opening sequence, we’ve been building up to this big moment: Becky’s finally getting introduced. Joy tries to introduce her, but she (literally) runs out of language… 

 

You can see Gong Gong does the same thing Evelyn’s been doing when this happens.

 

Joy tries to communicate with Gong Gong, but she lacks the language. And Gong Gong responds, “your Chinese is getting worse every time we talk,” which is probably Gong Gong for “I love you,” just like Evelyn’s “you’re getting fat” is Evelyn for “I love you.”  

 

You may also notice– this actor is so good– that Gong Gong has his hand to his ear. Everybody’s trying to hear each other, but nobody’s actually listening.

 

Joy runs out of language, and mom jumps in– but instead of introducing Becky as Joy’s girlfriend, Evelyn introduces her as a “very good friend.” 

 

So in this beautiful moment, Evelyn fails to introduce Becky the way they agreed. 

 

Joy protests, “Mom!” Again she’s trying to communicate, but Evelyn gets pulled away by another multiverse. “Big Nose” just has to be invited to the party! This thing that seems so important, that makes Evelyn miss the thing that’s actually important. 

 

 

Now we get Evelyn trying to convince “Big Nose” to come to the party, and again, she’s not hearing “Big Nose” trying to communicate she doesn’t want to come. Evelyn’s only focused on the thing that seems so important.

 

Evelyn then runs after her daughter, because she wants to say “I’m sorry.” 

 

But what happens instead? She’s only able to say “you’re getting fat,” and that relationship is once again fragmented. 

 

You can see that this moment in the opening sequence of Everything Everywhere All at Once is actually Evelyn fighting for her daughter. She’s just fighting the wrong way. Just like she’s going fight with Kung Fu, but she’ll be fighting the wrong way. 

 

And these clues are going to keep on coming.

How does Evelyn have to defeat the “wrestler” Dierdre? She has to say, “I love you.” 

 

The key is empathy. The key is love. The key is being able to express our emotions. The key is being able to love somebody who feels different from you. 

 

That’s what these writers are actually saying. And that is what is being set up throughout this opening. 

 

 

Evelyn helps Gong Gong up the stairs and Joy drives away in tears. This is the precursor to Evelyn losing her daughter later in the film because she cannot stand up to her father. And this is the beginning point from which we are going to reach those multiple turns at the end of Everything Everywhere All at Once that we spoke about in Part 1 of this podcast.

 

Evelyn’s going to sit back again at her overwhelming table with piles of receipts– receipts that we will later learn don’t just represent the overwhelm of her life but also represent all the different possibilities of who she could have been. Who she did not become. Her “hobbies” that she “confuses” with her job, to use Waymond’s words to Dierdre.

 

Waymond asks her, “Evelyn, what are you doing? What are you thinking about?” And then that supertitle tells us exactly what Evelyn is thinking about– Everything Everywhere All at Once

Now where does the idea for this opening sequence of Everything Everywhere All at Once actually come from? Believe it or not, it comes from Home Alone.

In Home Alone, every single window that the robbers are gonna fall out of, every set of stairs they’re gonna fall down and every trap they’re gonna fall into is established in that opening sequence. 

 

The Daniels are actually doing the exact same thing here! 

 

And this is not my analysis– this is literally what the Daniels have said. 

 

They’re stealing a little trick from a movie they love, and applying some craft. 

 

But what’s important for you to understand is that the Daniels didn’t know they needed to adapt Home Alone’s opening sequence in order to make their impossible little Kung Fu movie about empathy actually work until they had already written multiple drafts of the movie

 

They didn’t know what was happening here until they’d already found their way through a multiverse of possibilities, many of which happened in the script, many of which never found their way in. 

 

They did not know what they needed here until they had made order out of the chaos out of those beautiful specks of time where things actually made sense. 

 

So often we are taught as writers that we’re supposed to be setting things up, so we can pay them off later. But that is so rarely the case.

So rarely are we actually the master manipulators who understand everything we’re building and are carefully laying in the setup. What we’re actually doing, like Evelyn in Everything Everywhere All at Once, is going on a journey of discovery.

 

We’re often discovering that what we’re actually building is something very different than what we planned, getting overwhelmed by the possibilities, finding those beautiful moments of order, and then eventually allowing it to fall into place. 

 

Then, finally, we find ourselves in the place where we actually understand what we need to set up for our audience. What actually tends to happen is that we pay off, and then we set up, rather than the other way around. 

 

I would like to leave you with one last thought.

 

In your own life and in your writing, so often, it’s easy to feel that we have to set up stuff so that we can pay it off. 

 

We feel like we need to know where we’re going so we can do everything perfectly. 

 

We feel like we have to find the right time because we’re overwhelmed by all the demands upon us. 

 

The truth is, we all live in the multiverse, but navigating the multiverse is actually quite simple: Like Evelyn, we need to see the beauty in the characters around us. 

 

We need to let go of the vision that we have, both for our lives and for our projects. We have to let go of the idea that we’re living the worst or the best possible version of ourselves. 

 

Instead, we have to commit to the process where we sit in the present, sometimes in the quiet just like two rocks in a place of meditation, sometimes in the chaos of trying different things, and looking for those little beautiful specks of time where things actually make sense. 

 

We have to learn how to cherish those moments of beauty… and build structure from them. 

 

I hope that you enjoyed this podcast. If you are getting a lot out of it, come study with me! 

 

You can join my classes online from anywhere in the world. I have classes at every level from beginning foundation classes in Screenwriting and TV Writing to Master Classes for more experienced writers. And our Protrack Mentorship program that will pair you one on one with a professional writer who will meet with you every week or every other week and read every page and draft you write.

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  1. Course Participation.
    1. Admittance.  Your registration entitles you to admittance to the Course.  Any and all other costs associated with your attendance (including, without limitation, any travel or accommodation expenses) shall be borne solely by you and Company shall not be liable for any such costs.
    2. Media.  For good and valuable consideration, the receipt and sufficiency of which are hereby acknowledged, you grant Company the right to record, film, photograph or capture your likeness in connection with the Course, in any media now available and hereafter developed (“Course Footage”).  You further grant to Company in perpetuity the rights to use, license, edit, copy, distribute, publicly display and make derivative works of the Course Footage, including exploitation for marketing, advertising or merchandising related to the Course, throughout the universe.  You hereby waive any and all approval rights you may have over Company’s use of the Course Footage and acknowledge these rights are granted without any payment, including royalties or residuals, to you.
    3. Conduct.  You acknowledge that Company reserves the right to request your removal from the Course if Company, in its sole discretion, considers your presence or behavior to create a disruption or to hinder the Course or the enjoyment of the Course by other attendees or speakers.
  2. Fee(s).
    • Payment.  The payment of the applicable fee(s) for the Course is due upon registration or per your payment plan.  If such payment is insufficient or declined for any reason, you acknowledge that Company has the right and sole discretion to refuse your admission to the Course.
    •  
    • Taxes. The fee(s) may be subject sales tax, value added tax, or any other taxes and duties which, if applicable, will be charged to you in addition to the fee(s).
  3. Intellectual Property. All intellectual property rights, including trademarks, copyrights, trade secrets and patents, in and to the Course, the Course content and all materials distributed at or in connection with the Course (the “Course Materials”) are owned by Company. You may not use, license, copy, display, or make derivative works of the Course Materials without the prior written permission of Company.  For the avoidance of doubt, nothing in this agreement shall be deemed to vest in you any legal or beneficial right in or to any trademarks or other intellectual property rights owned or used under license by Company or grant to you any right or license to any other intellectual property rights of Company, all of which shall at all times remain the exclusive property of Company.
  4. Warranties; Limitation of Liability.
    • Other than to the extent required as a matter of law: (i) neither Company nor its employees, agents or affiliates (“Company Parties”) shall be liable for any direct, indirect, special, incidental, or consequential costs, damages or losses arising directly or indirectly from the Course or other aspect related thereto or in connection with this agreement.  The maximum aggregate liability of Company Parties for any claim in any way connected with therewith or this agreement whether in contract, tort or otherwise (including any negligent act or omission) shall be limited to the amount paid by you to Company under this agreement to attend the Course.
    • You represent and warrant that you have the full right and authority to grant Company the rights provided in this agreement and that you have made no commitments which conflict with this agreement or the rights granted herein.  You agree that your participation in the Course is entirely at your own risk and accept full responsibility for your decision to participate in the Course.  In no event shall you have the right to enjoin the development, production, exploitation or use of the Course and/or your Contributions to it. 
  5. Governing Law and Venue.  This agreement shall be governed by the laws of the State of New York without regard to its conflict of laws provisions.  The parties hereto agree to submit to personal and subject matter jurisdiction in the federal or state courts located in the City and State of New York, United States of America.
  6. Dispute Resolution.  All claims and disputes arising under or relating to this agreement are to be settled by binding arbitration in the state of New York or another location mutually agreeable to the parties.  The arbitration shall be conducted on a confidential basis pursuant to the Commercial Arbitration Rules of the American Arbitration Association.  Any decision or award as a result of any such arbitration proceeding shall be in writing and shall provide an explanation for all conclusions of law and fact and shall include the assessment of costs, expenses, and reasonable attorneys’ fees by the winner against the loser.  Any such arbitration shall include a written record of the arbitration hearing.  An award of arbitration may be confirmed in a court of competent jurisdiction.
  7. Miscellaneous.  Company may transfer and assign this agreement or all or any of its rights or privileges hereunder to any entity or individual without restriction.  This agreement shall be binding on all of your successors-in-interest, heirs and assigns.  This agreement sets forth the entire agreement between you and the Company in relation to the Course, and you acknowledge that in entering into it, you are not relying upon any promises or statements made by anyone about the nature of the Course or your Contributions or the identity of any other participants or persons involved with the Course.  This agreement may not be altered or amended except in writing signed by both parties.
  8. Prevention of “Zoom-Bomber” Disruptions; Unauthorized Publication of Class Videos. Company will record each class session, including your participation in the session, entitled “The Videos”. To prevent disruptions by “zoom-bombers” and provide Company and

    participants the legal standing to remove unauthorized content from platforms such as YouTube and social media sites, you agree that

    (1) you are prohibited from recording any portion of the Course;

    (2) in exchange for the opportunity to participate in the Course, you assign to Company your verbal contributions to the session discussions.

    To be clear, you assign to Company only your oral statements during recorded Course sessions. You retain all copyright to any and all written materials you submit to the class and the right to use them in any way you choose without permission from or compensation to the Company.

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