Another Story narration

In another story, a young woman went to an institution where she joined an all-male laboratory group soon after the departure of another woman who had become pregnant and left the laboratory under emotional conditions. It appears that the men in her group felt that women achieved their ends by means that were inappropriate in the workplace. The narrator of this story was determined not to behave that way, but finally, after months of unsupportive treatment she asked, What do you think you are doing anyhow and the answer was, We are just treating you like one of the guys. ... 

The narrator may be onscreen, like the grandmother in Lisa Shapiro s Another Story (the script is reprinted in Appendix B). Or the narrator may be offscreen, a guide or interpreter for the story. The actual dramatic needs of the story will determine whether the narration will be interior or exterior. 

The first important element to the structure is the presence of a narrator, someone who will tell the story. In Lisa Shapiro s Another Story, it is the grandmother. In Juan Carlos Martinez-Zaldivar s The Story of a Red Rose, it is a narrator-storyteller who is not visible but acts as the aural guide to the story. 

Several of the previously mentioned docudramas use narrators. It is by no means mandatory that there be a narrator however, the device, borrowed from documentary, is commonly used in docudrama. Very often that narrator assumes the journalistic role of reporter, and so the structure proceeds as a piece of reportage (Culloden). Another approach to the narrator is to use a diarist. In Loach s Land and Freedom, the letters of the main character document the story. 

Except in films where the filmmaker s investigation, at least in part, drives the film, narration is generally not the best way to contradict an interviewee. The subject says, "No one knew about those documents," and a disembodied voice interrupts, No one knew It seemed unlikely. So how do you contradict people on screen You find another interviewee to offer a rebuttal, or you film scenes that contain evidence contradicting the interviewee s statement. Let the individuals, facts, and story speak for themselves, and trust that audience members can decide the tmth for themselves. 

Szilard pursued one version or another of his Bund throughout his life. It appears as late as 1961, by then suitably disguised, in his popular story The Voice of the Dolphins a tankful of dolphins at a Vienna Institute begin to impart their compelling wisdom to the world through their keepers and interpreters, who are U.S. and Russian scientists the narrator slyly implies that the keepers may be the real source of wisdom, exploiting mankind s fascination with superhuman saviors to save it... 

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