"This is a Southern story, full of lies and fabrications, but truer for their inclusion." - Big Fish
Then talk about how it was originally a novel by Daniel Wallace which was then adapted to a screenplay by John August and then adapted to a movie by a crew of directors and producers. ( Use the highlighted excerpts from "History of Big Fish" by John August to reinforce the concepts of interpretation and adaptation.)
Next hand out copies of "Big Fish Outline", "Big Fish: Sequence Outline 3/31/00", and the screenplay Big Fish and ask students to stack them in a row on their desk. Ask students to comment on what they notice about the three documents sitting side by side. The drastic differences in the lengths of these three versions should be enough to elicit a reaction to the visual to the difference between each version of the adaptation.
After discussing the visual turn the students attention to the two outlines. Break the class into groups of 4-5 students and have them take about 10 minutes to look over these two documents and look for similarities and differences in the narrative structure presented in each outline. Is anything in the 1st but left out in the 2nd? Is anything new added in the 2nd? How might these changes effect the narrative? What about the format of the two outlines? Do you see signs of growth between the two documents?
Spend the last few minutes of class asking a representative from each group to share their group's observations.