Storytelling. The Power of Settings in Place and Time

• Author: Philip N. Meyer
• Pages: 28-30

Iattended a showing of the lm

Downton Abbey at a local theater

before the COVID-19 pandemic

gripped the nation. The plot, cen-

tered around disruptions caused by the

king’s visit to an English estate in 1927,

was recycled from an episode of the

1970s British TV show Upstairs, Down-

stairs. The cast of characters was lifted

whole cloth from PBS’ more recent

television blockbuster Downton Abbey.

The audience was already intimately en-

meshed with the lives of the characters

inhabiting the abbey, both the upstairs

gentry and the faithful downstairs staff

who live to serve them. Every character

had one clear inner problem or major

contradiction that, just like the screen-

writing manuals suggest, was neatly

resolved at the end of the movie. There

was also some high drama thrown in

along the way—the foiled plot to assas-

sinate the visiting King George V.

It made me think about the impor-

tance of settings in place and time, and

the importance of imagery framing

scenes in legal storytelling practice

The simplications of narrative

elements (especially of plot and charac-

ter) allowed the true star of the movie,

edited by

BLAIR CHAVIS & LIANE JACKSON

blair.chavis@americanbar.org

liane.jackson@americanbar.org

Practice Matters

STORYTELLING

The Power of Settings

in Place and Time

Lawyers are the directors and set designers of their courtroom dramas

BY PHILIP N. MEYER

the vaunted Downton Abbey itself, to

fully emerge. The movie was about a

place—a setting—evoking nostalgia

for a return to a simpler time when the

tight bonds within an imagined commu-

nity called forth the highly structured

social order of a world where every-

one knew and accepted their places

and purposes.

Some moviegoers wore vintage

1920s dinner costumes, as if they were

attending a celebration. At the end of

the lm, the usually sedate Hanover,

New Hampshire, audience erupted into

spontaneous applause. The movie, like

the television series, embraced themes

such as the longing for lasting commu-

nity, the afrmation of family and a de-

sire for the return to an idealized time.

Downton Abbey also suggests nostal-

gic longing for the hierarchical social

order of the British artistocracy and the

monarchy, themes clearly at odds with

the egalitarian beliefs most Americans

purportedly hold so dear.

Photo illustration by Brenan Sharp/ABA Journal; HAL GARB/AFP via Getty Images; Bettmann/Contributor; Shutterstock

ABA JOURNAL | JUNE–JULY 2020

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