How to Write Exposition Without Boring Your Readers
A Lesson from "Save the Cat" by Blake Snyder
Exposition - Backstory or details of the plot that must be told to the reader in order for them to understand what happens next.
Writing exposition is an essential skill for any storyteller, but it can be a delicate balancing act.
Too much information dumped on your readers at once can be overwhelming and lead to disengagement.
Enter the "Pope in the Pool" technique, a valuable lesson from Blake Snyder's book, Save the Cat.
What Is It?
The technique derives its name from the script for The Plot to Kill the Pope by George Englund. It contains a scene with heavy exposition that is written in a way that holds the reader’s attention.
Instead of merely divulging the necessary details of the plot through dialogue alone, the scene takes place at the Vatican pool where the Pope swims laps back and forth.
The reader isn’t left bored while the dialogue unfolds, but is instead thinking:
“I didn’t know the Vatican had a swimming pool?!”
“And look, the Pope’s not wearing his Pope clothes… he’s… he’s… in his bathing suit!”
The goal of the “Pope in the Pool” technique is to add to add an element to any exposition-laden scene that holds the reader’s attention.
Drips Example:
Save the Cat author Blake Snyder gives another example of the “Pope in the Pool” technique from his Drips script.
The two main characters have an ice-tea drinking competition right before the exposition-heavy scene where the Bad Guy lays out the plot of the film.
By the time the scene begins, the two main characters really need to go to the bathroom. The reader is engaged by the humor that comes from the two characters sitting there, legs crossed, trying to concentrate on the Bad Guy’s speech while the world around them ratchets up their need to hit the bathroom.
A girl pours a tall glass of iced tea…
Sprinklers turn on outside the window…
A neighbor’s dog pees in a bush…
The exposition gets across to the reader… and the scene is hilarious.
The Da Vinci Code Example:
I noticed the “Pope in the Pool” technique while reading The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown. It occurs in chapter 37 (page 205 in my copy), when Robert Langdon must divulge his knowledge of the Priory of Sion.
The scene takes place in a car, so Dan Brown could have conveyed the essential plot details through basic dialogue. But he makes things much more interesting. The characters take a turn into a forested park in Paris called the Bois de Boulogne, also known as “the Garden of Earthly Delights.”
Ahead, two topless teenage girls shot smoldering gazes into the taxi. Beyond them, a well-oiled black man in a G-string turned and flexed his buttocks. Beside him, a gorgeous blond woman lifted her miniskirt to reveal that she was not, in fact, a woman.
Heaven help me! Langdon turned his gaze back inside the cab and took a deep breath.
“Tell me about the Priory of Sion,” Sophie said.
Langdon nodded, unable to imagine a less congruous backdrop for the legend he was about to tell.
(p. 206)
The eccentric setting of the scene holds the reader’s attention while the exposition is given. You never know what the characters will see in the park as they look out the car windows.
This was a lesson from Save the Cat by Blake Snyder.
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