Mythic Structure in Almost Famous
During the 1990’s, screenwriters forced mythic structure into their creations. There was a revival of Joseph Campbell’s The Hero with a Thousand Faces and additional complimentary works such as Christopher Vogler’s wonderful book, The Writer’s Journey: Mythic Structure for Storytellers and Screenwriters. Writing guru John Truby workshops and programs aid screenwriters in mythic structure. Melanie Anne Phillips created the amazing Dramatica Theory of Story along with the Dramatica computer program. The result was a forced mythic form fraught with endless rewrites. Hollywood’s quest for myth resulted from the triumph of Star Wars and its mythic story structure.
Cameron Crowe’s Almost Famous is the most successful and entertaining story I’ve recently experienced. Crowe’s film achieved excellent mythic structure. An entire college course could be created to focus just on analyzing Almost Famous.
For this article, I’ll refer to both the screenplay published by Faber and Faber and the DVD version of the movie. There are differences between the two and sometimes I’ll comment on those. There is no draft number included on the published screenplay. Cameron Crowe indicates that his script was 172 pages which he shot and edited to 120 minutes for the theatrical release.
When I first saw the film I didn’t immediately recognize all elements of mythic structure. This is one of the secrets of good writing. Most attempts at mythic structure allow the structure to be so obvious that it overwhelms the viewing experience. The audience is paying attention to the technique of writing rather than the movie experience.
Joseph Campbell defines mythic structure as having the following structural elements:
- Ordinary World
- Call to Adventure
- Refusal of the Call
- Meeting the Mentor (Wise Old Man or Woman)
- Crossing the First Threshold
- Test, Allies, Enemies
- Approach to the Inmost Cave
- Supreme Ordeal
- Reward (Seizing the Sword)
- The Road Back
- Resurrection
- Return with the Elixir
When the film opens, we see the boy, William Miller, living in a very ordinary world. We hear Alvin and the Chipmonks singing a Christmas song. How much more ordinary could William’s world be? In some ways it’s more than ordinary as his mother has put him two grades ahead and lied about his age to him. The rules and stages of myth structure don’t need to be followed precisely. In fact, allegiance to rules is what kills many screenplays.
William gets his “call to adventure” when his sister leaves home and whispers “look under your bed, it’ll set you free.” Under his bed he finds a great stack of ‘60’s rock and roll albums. He opens Tommy by the Who and finds a note from his sister. It reads “listen to Tommy with a candle burning and you will see your entire future…” We then see him lighting a candle. We then see his future in the next shot when he’s four years older and in a high school journalism class in 1973.
We first see his mentor, Lester Bangs, in a wild interview in a radio studio. Lester is a rock and roll critic. After the radio interview, William gets the opportunity to meet Lester. It turns out that William has already sent Lester some articles he’s written on rock and roll. Lester gives advice throughout the film, which sets up and defines the moral dilemma for William’s journey. He tells him that he’ll be bought drinks by artists, meet girls and be offered drugs. He then points out these people (the rock and roll stars) are not his friends. He later tells him he needs to build his reputation by “being honest… and unmerciful.” Lester, the Mentor, gives William his first assignment on his journey to the “under world.”
William’s mother later drives him to his first assignment at a concert where he will eventually confront the first “threshold guardian.” His mother cynically observes the concertgoers arriving and comments, “an entire generation of Cinderella’s and there’s no slipper coming.” The first time I viewed the film I was so deeply involved in the characters that I didn’t notice these lines echoing the mythic structure. His mother delivers him near the entrance to “the underworld” which turns out to be the backstage entrance ramp. It is equipped with an official “gate keeper” (a bouncer) who first rejects his desire to enter the backstage world of rock and roll. Our fifteen-year-old William holds his copy of Creem Magazine and tells Freddy the security man that he is there to cover the Black Sabbath concert. Freddy checks his guest list and tells him he’s not on the list and to go back up the ramp with the rest of the girls. One of the girls, who call themselves “Band Aids”, turns out to become an ally on his eventual quest. She calls herself Penny Lane. Eventually William uses cunning to get past the gate keeper’s watch with the aid of a band called STILLWATER.
As the story continues, William gets an assignment from Rolling Stone Magazine to write an article on STILLWATER. He calls his mentor and ally, Lester to ask for advice. He says not to make friends with people who are trying to use you “to further big business desire to glorify worthless rock stars like Stillwater. And don’t let those swill merchants rewrite you.” Again, Lester has defined William’s moral dilemma. The published script has a scene where William’s journalism teacher enlist as his ally to try to convince his mom that he should go on the road with the band. This scene was omitted from the final film. Other allies include Penny Lane, Darryl (his sister’s boyfriend but omitted as an ally in the movie), his mother, the other Band Aids, and finally, his sister. His major test is to get the interview with Russell (the leader of Stillwater) and complete his 3,000-word cover page article for Rolling Stone. Russell puts off the interview time after time.
Much happens on the road while William pursues his goal. Penny attempts to kill herself at one point. In effect, William saves her life. Eventually William experiences a resurrection after he gives up and returns home. The final story he presents to Rolling Stone is first enthusiastically accepted even though he never got the real heart to heart interview with Russell. His story is instead a real expose’ on behind-the-scenes road life. When Rolling Stone asks band members, especially Russell, to confirm the story, Russell denies everything.
Penny Lane helps instigate the resurrection by causing Russell to interview with William. Surprisingly, Russell travels to Williams home and is greeted by mom who actually says there is still hope for him. We learn that Russell has contacted Rolling Stone and vouched for the credibility of William’s article. The film ends with William turning on his recorder and asking Russell the questions he’d wanted to ask. William, Penny and Russell have all survived the journey and are better for it.