Hot Dog! It's a Wonderful Life: Finding the heart of your story

by K. Allen McNamara

Sometimes you just need to give your character what they want. Sometimes it’s the only way to find the heart of your story. Case in point, George Bailey in It’s a Wonderful Life. (Spoiler alert if you haven’t seen it - you should and this is your warning).

The Run-Down:

Frank Capra’s film It’s a Wonder Life has become a holiday classic. The protagonist, George Bailey is an all around good guy. He always dreamed of leaving his little town, Bedford Falls, his birthplace, but circumstances find him staying, marrying a local young woman, and settling down to run the Bedford Falls Savings & Loan. It’s not the life he dreamed of but he’s happy. Then the unthinkable happens - the crooked, miser, Mr. Potter (every small town has one, the rich Bully) sees $8000 left unguarded by George’s bumbling, lovable, Uncle Billy. Mr. Potter takes the money. To a Mr. Potter is the owner of the Bank. Mr. Potter notifies the bank examiner that all might not be right with George’s Savings & Loan. It’s Christmas eve and everything that George has built is about to be ruined because the examiner is counting all the money at the Savings & Loan. They will be $8000 short which means jail for George. George begins to think his family and Bedford Falls would be better off without him. Melancholy and seriously thinking of jumping from the Bedford Falls bridge, George stands on the precipice (quite literally - he’s on a bridge after all) of eliminating himself from this Life. Clarence, the angel tasked with helping George with his decision, decides to give George precisely what George claims to want. If Clarence saves George he will become a real angel and all the prayers sent by the people of Bedford Falls will be answered.

What George claims he wants:

George believes everyone would be better off if he had never been born. Clarence then begins to show George all the events in Bedford Falls, all the lives that would have been changed for the worst because he, George, was not there to affect a different outcome. His brother would have drowned, the grief stricken pharmacist would have given the wrong prescription and caused a death, his brother wouldn’t have been the war hero who saved so many lives… and Mary Hatch Bailey, his wife, would be a spinster librarian. and his children would be non-existent.

Clarence gives George what George wants. As an exercise: Do this with your characters - give them exactly what they want. And then see what happens.

Finding the heart:

George wishes he had never been born; he wants to believe his family and Bedford Falls would be better off without him. But when he is given the chance to have exactly what he wants he realizes that isn’t what he wanted all along. What George really wanted, truly wanted, was to know that the sacrifices he made throughout his life time actually mattered. And Clarence lets George see this. George chooses not to end his life; he chooses to live. The real want - the true heart - of George’s story is learning or understanding HE has mattered, does matter.

Kurt Vonnegut famously said: “Make your characters want something right away even if it's only a glass of water. Characters paralyzed by the meaninglessness of modern life still have to drink water from time to time.”

The heart of your story may be found by Giving your character precisely what you think or what they think, they want. You might be surprised what happens even if all they want is only a just a glass of water.

Hot Dog! It’s a Wonderful Life!

PS. To find out if Clarence gets his wings and how George escapes jail time, well, you’ll just have to watch the movie.