revelation on character and its relationship to drama

[nycineaste]

so Ive spent years studying Egri's "Art Of Dramatic Writing", and even have one of his lesser known books, "Art Of Creative Writing" which I highly recommend for understanding his material.

Lately Ive been on a new plateau with my writing and it makes so much sense now that it's ridiculously obvious:

in order to create dramatic situations you need dramatic characters that would create/get themselves into those situations. A weak character wont create a dramatic situation (or have the strength to endure one and stick around to be in the story). The only character that will do this is someone so INTENSE in what he or she wants, or so INTENSE in personality, that he or she will force and/or maintain a conflict (or fight to maintain a certain status quo if the story is about that) throughout the whole movie. Intense character is what makes the dramatic situation CONVINCING. Its like, of course Bruce Wayne is learning karate and dressing up and leaping from builidngs. His parents died, and his dad taught him to love Gotham. He's kind of nuts about it. IT MAKES SENSE Annie and Alvy don't get together. They are REALLY QUITE neurotic.

specifically Im talking about the necessity for crazed, militant, obsessed, freakishly focused characters in drama, or EXAGGERATION OF the characters main dramatic trait or desire.

anyways just sharing.

back to work.

 

[wcmartell]

Wrote an article in Script Magazine back in 2004 about this...

COMPULSIVE CHARACTERS

Characters can be good or bad, but they can’t be boring. An interesting character is driven. The very thing that would put you on medication in the real world is exactly what we’re looking for in characters in the *reel* world: we want them to be obsessed or compulsive. When your protagonist is placed in a situation where they can’t help but react, we get to see a glimpse of their true character. In *The Incredibles* Bob Paar is on the way to his wedding when he hears a call on his police scanner about a police pursuit in progress... and is compelled to don his superhero suit and become Mr. Incredible. On the way to capturing the armed badguys, he passes an old woman whose cat is stuck in a tree... and must help her get the cat out of the tree. Helping people is a compulsion for him! In the opening scene he manages to rescue the cat, stop the criminals, stop the mega-villain Bombvoyage from some fiendish scheme, capture a purse snatcher, save a commuter train full of people from running off a cliff and stop a suicidal man from jumping off the roof of a building. He just can’t help himself!

And that’s his downfall. The suicidal man sues him, which results in the government banning superheroes and sending all of the superfolks into the Superhero Relocation Program. Now Bob lives a typical suburban life and works for an insurance company where he constantly gets into trouble for helping customers collect on their claims even though it means the insurance company may lose money. He just can’t help himself - it’s his nature. His character. And he will end up losing his job because of his compulsion.

What is your characters obsession or compulsion? What drives them? What is that aspect of their character that they just can’t help doing?

Good characters are kind of crazy.

- Bill

 

[kevin baggott]

yeah the 2 egri books were bibles for me years back - now I just kind of write from my unconscious from feeling. All those paradigms are in us all. After all its just a beg/mid/end.
I guess everyone has their method.

 

[nycineaste]

After all its just a beg/mid/end.
I guess everyone has their method.

dude dont discount it. Egris ideas of premise for keeping a story focused is so powerful for getting your story on track and basically making sense, and avoiding the "so what?" factor, and I dont think ANYONE does it unconciooulsy, if so, my early scripts wouldnt be so rambling and confused.

also, the idea of intense, militant chaarcters (well articulated by wiliam, above) is the type of thing that SEEMS obvious, but beginners (like I did) always write wishy washy, unfocused, not-intense characters, by default.

screenwriting is a bizarre art form in that it seems like it should be easy and obvious (you think, "I watch movies" and "I know how people talk"), then when it comes to writing, your freinds read your first scripts and its like whoooaaaaa" im not sure i know whats going on wasnt that guy doing xyz why is he doing xyz now", and "i dont get it ", and "these people talk weird"....

screenwriting is FAR from instinctual for most.

 

[nycineaste]

i should add that I, like alot of others on this forum, am FIENDISHLY waiting for William to do another print run of his famed "Action Screenwriting" book.

I have your "Writing Indies" CD, William, and the notes I took while listening to it (repeatedly) are in my filmaking work journal. Its gold, and using the information (inc the number of locations, shoot days, pages etc) in the planning of my first feature. Ill be purchasing a batch of more CDs (likely the horror one) soon.

get his stuff folks its damn good nuts-and-bolts material.

 

[Randall_Oelerich]

i should add that I, like alot of others on this forum, am FIENDISHLY waiting for William to do another print run of his famed "Action Screenwriting" book. ....

nycineaste, that book has been out for some time, available now, go get it!
$9.99 kindle, and it is even expanded (quite a bit) over the older print version.
You can download it and have it in just a few minutes!

 

[Carla]

Wrote an article in Script Magazine back in 2004 about this...

COMPULSIVE CHARACTERS

Characters can be good or bad, but they can’t be boring. An interesting character is driven. The very thing that would put you on medication in the real world is exactly what we’re looking for in characters in the *reel* world: we want them to be obsessed or compulsive. When your protagonist is placed in a situation where they can’t help but react, we get to see a glimpse of their true character. In *The Incredibles* Bob Paar is on the way to his wedding when he hears a call on his police scanner about a police pursuit in progress... and is compelled to don his superhero suit and become Mr. Incredible. On the way to capturing the armed badguys, he passes an old woman whose cat is stuck in a tree... and must help her get the cat out of the tree. Helping people is a compulsion for him! In the opening scene he manages to rescue the cat, stop the criminals, stop the mega-villain Bombvoyage from some fiendish scheme, capture a purse snatcher, save a commuter train full of people from running off a cliff and stop a suicidal man from jumping off the roof of a building. He just can’t help himself!

And that’s his downfall. The suicidal man sues him, which results in the government banning superheroes and sending all of the superfolks into the Superhero Relocation Program. Now Bob lives a typical suburban life and works for an insurance company where he constantly gets into trouble for helping customers collect on their claims even though it means the insurance company may lose money. He just can’t help himself - it’s his nature. His character. And he will end up losing his job because of his compulsion.

What is your characters obsession or compulsion? What drives them? What is that aspect of their character that they just can’t help doing?

Good characters are kind of crazy.

- Bill

While appreciating great characters......

That kinda makes it sound like things happen to great characters and the story roles out from them.

I think the writers needed to explain Bob's drive later in the movie and hence create compulsion. I think they needed to get Bob and Helen to cut off from their Superhero World and move them into the Ordinary World hence they needed to engineer the lawsuit and the superhero ban.

I think it's plot driven, not character driven.