#8120

Irish Setter Crayon Box. Here you guys can see a selection of colorways the staple Irish Setter was available in in the past. From the top left to the bottom right: 8120 in the dark brown Java Muleskinner, 8125 in the Blueberry Muleskinner, 9877 in the Golden Sequoia, 879 in the Hawthorne Muleskinner, and the 4558 in the Oro Russet leather. Which deadstock style would you like to get your hands on? www.redwingberlin.com 

The source is Robert McKee. 

Creative Cow tells me: in a screenplay a beat is an exchange in action/reaction in character behaviour, which turns and builds a scene. 

Wikipedia tells me: it’s the timing and movement in a play or film. 

From a writer’s point of view, a quick blog survey suggests ‘it’s an identifiable moment of change.’ (blogs Story Grid; Screen Writer to Screen Writer). 

But this short Google session confirms that Robert McKee’s our best source for understanding what a ‘beat’ is.

Here’s McKee in a Guardian article (Lott, T. 10 Sep 2016. A creative writing lesson from the ‘God of Story’). While it doesn’t specifically mention beats (we’ll have to check his 1996 book Story for that), it gives us a useable feel for what’s meant by ‘beat’ in the story telling process:

“Story design means choices – boiling down from life, far more material [than] you could ever use. A story is a series of events that have been chosen then composed. Like composing music.