The Heart of It - Documentary Storytelling

by Monica Takushi Lee

We often tell people “There’s the film you write, the film you shoot, and the film you edit.”

This means that even with the best of planning, part of the magic of film production is that things can change along the way.

With documentaries this change (and magic!) is accentuated - especially when it comes to something you may not think about with documentaries: scripting.

Documentaries? Scripted???

Yes - many documentaries utilize scripts - but not in the same way narrative films do.

In narrative films, the screenwriter creates the story and dialogue, which the director and actors interpret.

In documentaries, the process is almost reversed: the writer (called "story producer" in documentary) shapes raw interviews and footage into a cohesive narrative - oftentimes a script.

By skillfully weaving candid testimonies and unscripted moments, these scripts provide compelling narrative structure, while staying true to the authentic voices and experiences of their subjects.

So how do you actually write a script using unscripted dialogue - and how does that script evolve into full-blown documentary?

Here’s a breakdown of what story producing looks like (at least to us!) during each phase of documentary production, using the Uptown episode from our show The 77: A City of Neighborhoods as a case study.

I chose to focus on the Uptown episode because even though our Humboldt Park episode won a gold Telly for writing - the Uptown episode challenged me the most since it required weaving many different stories and voices together, and this ultimately helped me grow into a better storyteller.

The Film You Write (Pre-Production)

This phase requires multiple conversations + additional research to find the story before the cameras are rolling.

In this process I’m trying to get to both the heart and the theme of the story, so that structurally, I know what we need to capture once we hit record.?

From this process comes a pre-script, which serves as a road-map for the filmed interviews.

Below is an excerpt from the Uptown pre-script. This was crafted based on conversations with neighborhood residents Hac, Jenn, and Ellen - written using their actual words from those conversations.

In this excerpt, we focus on the importance of Argyle in Uptown as a cultural enclave for Asian Americans, and the sensory memories from growing up there.

This provided a helpful roadmap for the interview so that we knew what we needed to capture when the cameras were rolling. We not only needed to capture these sensory bites, but we needed to make sure each bite could transition into the next - almost as if the three of them were taking turns telling a story.

The Film You Shoot (Production)

This leaves room for those tingly, magic moments on set - anecdotes or epiphanies that happen once our interviewee has had some time to work through their story - things they remember as they’re telling it again - things they feel more comfortable sharing now that we’ve built trust and rapport. For me, interviewing feels like a heart-to-heart by a campfire, or a makeshift therapy session. It's a meditative practice of active listening.

The Film You Edit (Post-Production) ?

Riding the high off of these magic moments - I’m able to use the pre-script + the raw interviews to craft the edit script.

Below you'll see an excerpt of the edit script for Uptown that corresponds with the pre-script above. Every time you see a "https://" that's me noting to the editor that there is a cut in the dialogue there.

You'll also see that we added another voice into this section - Dennis - a resident whom we didn't pre-interview, but because we already had the pre-script written, we knew what types of question to ask him to gracefully work his voice into the story.

The edit script provides the editors with a “base recipe” for their edit, a vital starting point.

This allows them to focus on the style, rhythm, and pace of the edit - rather than crafting the story.

The Result

The result is a documentary that (hopefully) captures the heart of the story, engages audiences, and resonates deeply with both viewers and those featured.

With a finely honed story structure and script, the director can focus on peoples delivery and performance, as well as the overall vision of the piece. And the cinematography and editing can truly enhance the storytelling, connecting us in a sensory way and making it an experiential journey.

Below is a side by side comparison of the edit script and the final video so you can see the full evolution from pre script to final video.

Why it matters

The power of a good story cannot be overstated.

At its best it's transformative: Good storytelling literally syncs up our brain waves with that of the storyteller - eliciting curiosity, empathy and understanding.

The power of that with a project like the 77 is that it can change peoples perceptions about Chicago - encouraging them to spend time exploring outside of their comfort zone.

“All human divisions, both within and between us, can begin to be healed through listening and sharing stories”― Mark Yaconelli, Between the Listening and the Telling: How Stories Can Save Us

Watch Uptown's episode in it's entirety below!