Two central characters who never meet (or only do so eventually)

Question

There was a TV series in the UK a year or so back, a light comedy-drama thing, which featured a couple who were ideal for each other but who never met. There was a lovely will-they-won't they feel about it, and the uncertainty was a brilliant hook for the series as a whole. The man and woman's stories hardly ever came within miles of each other: it was a very clever and entertaining bit of work: Love Soup written by David Renwick.

And it made me wonder if anyone's ever tried the same approach with a film, either climaxing with the meeting or ending on a sadder-but-still-hopeful note as the two don't in fact get together. Off the top of my head I can't think of a single example, or even something that comes close.

If drama is, as someone or other once said, making the audience want something very much, forcing them to wait, and then giving it to them, it's a structure that might actually be quite effective. Maybe.

Bert

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[nq:1]There was a TV series in the UK a year or so back, a light comedy-drama thing, which featured a couple who were ideal for each other but who never met. There was a lovely will-they-won't they feel about it, and the uncertainty was a brilliant hook for the series as a whole. The man and woman's stories hardly ever came within miles of each other: it was a very clever and entertaining bit of work: Love Soup written by David Renwick. And it made me wonder if anyone's ever tried the same approach with a film, either climaxing with the meeting or ending on a sadder-but-still-hopeful note as the two don't in fact get together. Off the top of my head I can't think of a single example, or even something that comes close. If drama is, as someone or other once said, making the audience want something very much, forcing them to wait, and then giving it to them, it's a structure that might actually be quite effective. Maybe.[/nq]
Sleepless in Seattle suggests itself. The Double Life of Veronique, somewhat less so.

Life Continues, Despite
Evidence to the Contrary
Steven

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[nq:1]Sleepless in Seattle suggests itself. The Double Life of Veronique, somewhat less so.[/nq]
Thanks for that. I've seen neither but the first at least sounds worth a look.
Bert

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[nq:1]There was a TV series in the UK a year or so back, a light comedy-drama thing, which featured a ... forcing them to wait, and then giving it to them, it's a structure that might actually be quite effective. Maybe.[/nq]
Sleepless in Seattle

"The easiest thing to do on earth is not write."
? William Goldman

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[nq:2]Sleepless in Seattle suggests itself. The Double Life of Veronique, somewhat less so.[/nq]
[nq:1]Thanks for that. I've seen neither but the first at least sounds worth a look.[/nq]
It's schmaltzy, but it works.

"The easiest thing to do on earth is not write."
? William Goldman

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[nq:1]There was a TV series in the UK a year or so back, a light comedy-drama thing, which featured a ... them to wait, and then giving it to them, it's a structure that might actually be quite effective. ï¿½Maybe. Bert[/nq]
This is making me crazy. I'm pretty sure that Claude LeLouch did a film about two destined-to-be-lovers who only (finally) met in the last scene. Can't remember the name of it for the life of me.

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[nq:1]There was a TV series in the UK a year or so back, a light comedy-drama thing, which featured a ... forcing them to wait, and then giving it to them, it's a structure that might actually be quite effective. Maybe.[/nq]
Sleepless in Seattle was sort of like that, wasn't it? I don't think I ever saw the whole thing, but don't Hanks and Ryan meet, finally, in the very last scene?Anyway, I think you're on to something, and it intersects with one of my core life principles, to whit: There are basically two kinds of people in the world there's the sort who, if you say you'll meet them someplace, and then you get there and realize that the meeting place is too vaguely defined, will stand in one spot, assuming it's the one obvious, right waiting spot at The Eiffel Tower (or Victoria Station, Red Square, Time Square, Piazza di Spagna, Trafalger Square, Provence, other large, ill-defined spaces...) where two people would meet.

The other sort of person arrives at the same destination, realizes that they didn't pin down the location precisely enough and decides that the only way to work it out is to wander every square inch of the vaguely-defined meeting place both looking for the other person and trying to be visible.

Now, neither of these people is really right or wrong, but one thing is sure: standers should never marry other standers. Wanderers might get along with other wanderers, especially if one is a clock-wise wanderer and the other one goes counter-clockwise. But the best combination for life partners is probably one stander and one wanderer.

I think that's the basis for a film, right there; the way your philosophy of life affects your chances of meeting your perfect mate.

Alan Brooks

A with an Underwood
'Ah, all things come to those who wait,'
(I say these words to make me glad),
But something answers soft and sad,
'They come, but often come too late.'
Violet Fane (1843-1905)
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Thanks to everyone who suggested Sleepless in Seattle. I've managed to get about halfway through it (struggling somewhat against the sentimentality, the ridiculously adult kid, the occasional whiff of improvisation, and the problem with believing that Tom Hanks' character would do anything as distasteful as discussing his private life on a radio show) and it does come fairly close to what I had in mind, except that there is some contact between the couple before they actually meet.
It's interesting that, so far at least, there have been very few direct visual or verbal links between the two sides of the story, the sort of thing where a Hanks scene ends with a line or a move that's immediately mirrored at the start of the following Ryan scene. This makes the links which are there all the more effective - I can see that it would be easy to go way over the top and gimmicky with that.
Any more examples of this separate-but-converging stories approach?

Bert

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[nq:1]Thanks to everyone who suggested Sleepless in Seattle. I've managed to get about halfway through it (struggling somewhat against the ... easy to go way over the top and gimmicky with that. Any more examples of this separate-but-converging stories approach? Bert[/nq]
Sleepless in Seattle is based on "An Affair To Remember" but in that film the couple does meet at the beginning and they agree to meet on top of the Empire State Building six months later and are kept apart by circumstances... so it doesn't really fit.

"The easiest thing to do on earth is not write."
? William Goldman

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[nq:1]Thanks to everyone who suggested Sleepless in Seattle. I've managed to get about halfway through it (struggling somewhat against the ... easy to go way over the top and gimmicky with that. Any more examples of this separate-but-converging stories approach? Bert[/nq]
There's a pretty decent article here:
http://www.storyispromise.com/wromance.htm
It talks about the art of writing romantic comedies and picks Sleepless apart. It probably won't tell you anything you don't already know, but it is pertinent.
I've just come to the end of the first draft of a romantic comedy I'm writing with my partner (entirely her premise, by the way) and a) I wish I'd read the article before not after, and b) I'm pretty sure we did what the author of the article prescribes it's not that I think we've been formulaic so much as painted within the lines of the conventions of the genre.

"The easiest thing to do on earth is not write."
? William Goldman

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[nq:1]Sleepless in Seattle is based on "An Affair To Remember"...[/nq]
It's a good time since I saw that, and I didn't pick up the parallels when Meg Ryan watches it on TV in Sleepless. From your description it sounds a bit like my idea but backwards.
Since I posted that comment about visual and verbal links at the junctions between the two strands, I've read the early version of the screenplay (dated May 10th 1992) that's available on the net. It's full of them: Hanks picks up a newspaper, we get a closeup of it and then pull back to reveal that it's Ryan who's holding it, that sort of thing. The film is much more sparing, and the better for it, I think.
Thanks for the link to that article; I'll take a look.

Bert

Two central characters who never meet (or only do so eventually)

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