What's Modern in Modern Drama

THE PLAYWRITING SEMINARS > CONTENT > CHARACTERS > MODERN >

'A multitude of messages of the contemporary imagination, specifically those that are channeled through the mass entertainment media, assure us, over and over, that there is an easy, even facile, comforting, answer to most of our problems. Such an aesthetic strategy seems to me not only to falsify and disdain human experience but in the case of Chile or of any country that is coming out of a period of enormous conflict and pain, it turns out to be counterproductive for the community, freezing its maturity and growth.'

-- Ariel Dorfman

Technically, the major shift in character development that marks most interesting plays since the turn of the century, is buried in the question . . .

Where's the villain?

In the kinds of new plays the regional theatres do, you can't find one to save your soul. But they're there. Embedded in the innards of the central characters.

And that, technically, is what's modern about modern drama: the internalized villain. This critter skulks within each character, or at least the central characters. That's Hedda, Stockman, Mrs. Alving, Nora . . . and all their descendants.

In the good old days, when things were simpler for playwrights, the conflict nearly always hinged on a triangular relationship between three characters: the absolutely good Hero, the absolutely-purely-good Heroine, and the absolutely villainous Villain. Nobody had flaws. Nobody had doubts. And they all wore their Subtext on their sleeves.

But now, with internalized villains, the Hero and Heroine are gone. They've been replaced by ordinary folks who are their own worst enemies. So they -- and you -- don't need villains anymore.

But they haven't vanished. Like vampires and werewoolves, they never die. They've just moved 'round the block to Film and Television. And contemporary playwrights don't seem to miss them. Not surprisingly, the only exception -- other than dinner-theatre murder mysteries -- is the No-Subtext Play.

One of the most visible results of banishing villains to Hollywood comes the approach of contemporary playwrights to . . .

Character Names

RETURN TO: | Content | Seminar Homepage |