Act One: Unconscious Incompetence

Act One is all about showing the character(s) in a state of unconscious incompetence relative to their flaws.  If you haven't found a way to demonstrate their flawed status quo in the very beginning, you'd better do it quick, or audiences are going to miss out on your story argument and character arc.

Another great place to demonstrate (or further develop) your character's flawed status quo is in Blake Snyder's Save the Cat scene (an idea first fleshed out in this book).  This is the scene that gets the audience to identify or sympathize with your protagonist, or at least root for them in some way.  We achieve this by showing the character doing something honorable, likable, or sympathetic--for example, saving a cat that's stuck in a tree.

A lot of times, the Save the Cat scene can be part of your story's beginning.  We're rooting for Indy from the moment we see him bravely charge into the haunted temple, leaving his guides quaking with fear.  We're rooting for Daniel Hillard the moment we see him quit a job because it advocated unhealthy habits for kids.

Sometimes, however, we have to wait a little while for the character to save the cat.  In Independence Day, there's a good bit of set up before we really get to sit down with the characters.  But before long, we see President Whitmore waking up with his adorable daughter, and Steve Hiller being a good father figure to his girlfriend's son, and David Levinson playing chess with his blunt, but charming father. (funny, I never thought about it until writing that sentence, but fathers are a minor theme in that movie...)

A lot of writing mentors will tell you you need an Inciting Event at the beginning of Act One.  But I concur with K.M. Weiland's distinction between the Inciting Event and the Key Event, as well as her appraisal that either event can go virtually anywhere in Act One.

Simply stated, the Inciting Event is what sets the main conflict in motion.  The Key Event is what draws the character into that conflict.

Sometimes, these two are the same event: in disaster flicks, the disaster typically begins the conflict and pulls the characters into it simultaneously.  It's kind of hard to refuse to participate in an earthquake.

Sometimes these events happen in quick succession: In many detective stories, the murder will occur in once scene, and the pushy dame shows up in the detective's office in the next.  Detective stories might also use another scene that creates a special relationship between the Inciting and Key Events.  I call it The Refused Call to Action scene.  When the detective turns down the pushy dame's case, he refuses to get involved with the story.  This usually happens as a result of his flaw.  But then the Key Event (which frequently syncs up with the first Turning Point in these stories) forces him into the story.

Sometimes, the Inciting Event occurs before the story begins.  In a story about POWs escaping a prison camp in Vietnam, the onset of the war might be the Inciting Event, even if it's not discussed in the story.  After all, the characters wouldn't be there if the war never started, and the Vietnamese wouldn't have even built camps to contain American prisoners.  The Key Event in a story like that, might be the characters' capture by the Viet Cong.  If the story begins with them already imprisoned, their capture might be the Inciting Event, and the Key Event might be their decision to mount an escape.

Whatever the relationship between the Inciting and Key Events, they both need to happen in Act One.  The sooner we see one of them, the better, and we had better see both by the first Turning Point.

A lot of times, the Turning Point itself is what pulls the protagonist into the story, so the Turning Point and the Key Event are the same.  But that's the longest you can wait, and you would be taking a very big risk if you also held the Inciting Event off that long.  Readers need some sense of forward direction early in a story, or they quit reading it.  The Inciting Event and Key Event provide and sustain that momentum.

Another thing you need to do in Act One is provide the protagonist's Argument Against Transformation.  This scene might be built into another.  There are several spots where it could fit, the Refused Call to Action being an obvious point.  But however you achieve it, you need to show the protagonist's reasoning for sticking with--and remaining ignorant of--their flawed status quo.

Sometimes you do this through the mouth of the character: When Dr. Alan Grant says he thinks kids are annoying and smelly, he presents his Argument Against Transformation.  Other times, you achieve this through the voice of another character, or by placing the character in a situation where their flaws are apparent to the audience, if not the character themselves.

Act One is also the ideal time to get any detailed exposition out of the way.  I don't advocate going overboard with description, but readers do like it when you paint a picture of your story world.  You don't want to waste their time doing it though, so it's better to get it out of the way near the beginning.  Once the story is moving at a good clip, ain't nobody got time for that.  If you can do your exposition with scenes instead of boring passages of narrative, that's the ideal situation.  (For more on how to develop and present settings, check out my articles on General Setting and Specific Setting)

With all these pieces in place, you will be in good shape heading into your first Turning Point.