Taking Characters Seriously

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'The character I'm creating is coming from me, has been nourished in whatever I am. And I would assume -- I hope -- there's a plethora of them, thousands of them in there. And I want them to be as totally whoever they are -- as young men, or old men, or young girls, or whomever -- as they can be. But they've got to know that they came out of some female soil.'

-- Ntozake Shange

It doesn't matter if you're writing the gloomiest tragedy or the wackiest off-the-wall farce. Take your characters so seriously that part of you goes into each of them. Drop any character you can't do this with.

If you can't take your characters seriously, you'll end up making fun of them or creating little more than stick-figures. When that happens, Subtext vanishes and the forward movement of the play feels like molasses on a cold day.

And half the audience starts thinking about how much they're paying the baby-sitter.

Taking characters seriously also is a great way to insure that you're developing complex characters -- the kind contemporary plays thrive on. This is what Modern Drama's all about. Technically, here's what it means . . .

What's Modern in Modern Drama

Contemporary playwrights don't often share much in common with the authors of creative writing manuals when it comes to methods of figuring out who your characters are. The manuals -- and a few playwrights -- are high on churning out pages of character biographies before you start writing dialogue. That's certainly one way to do it, but the results can be as deadly as outlining.

When you're starting out in this business, try making a few very brief notes -- on paper or in your head -- about your two or three most important characters . . .

How they sound when they speak
What they look like
Any quirks of speech or dress
A mental attitude that's out of the ordinary
And how you'd describe them on your Character Page

One key feature is often all you'll need for each of these. But trust your fingers on the keyboard to tell you the rest . . .

Most playwrights rely on their characters to tell them who they are through what they say in dialogue on the page. They're willing to risk having to write most of a draft before understanding the backgrounds, secrets, and mental baggage of their creations. But when they start over again, they have rich and complex characters who have revealed themselves rather than having been mechanically constructed.

You'll have to live with these folks for as long as it takes to write 90 pages or more. And do revisions. And several more drafts. And -- if all goes well -- sit through 3 or 4 weeks of rehearsals. Moving quickly, all of this will take at least 18 months. So make sure your characters can keep your interest for the long haul.

That's one of the reasons Character Names matter. Like it or not, they're going to be your family. It's through them -- and particularly your central characters -- that you'll be telling the story. And that determines your . . .

Point of View

And then there's always the question of . . .

Language, Foul And Otherwise

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