by Paul Ashton
Replicants. The only characters that can get away with a lack of humanity
are the pure and unadulterated villains and nemeses – because it is pre -
cisely their selfishness and lack of humanity that defines their role in a story.
Shakespeare’s Coriolanus is a much-maligned but interesting ‘hero’.
Seemingly brutal, granitic, driven by pride, military virtue and a disregard
for the common people, he is not an easy hero to connect with. But in saying
goodbye to his mother, wife and child when going into exile, and when they
are later used to deter his returning vengeance, we see the chinks in his
armour that make him as human as any other character. He is not simply
a killing machine – he is a man who is out of place and anachronistic in a
world that is changing around him. That is his tragedy – his heroism is in
fighting for what he believes in, even if and when it kills him.
DEFINITION
Character is so important that it’s worth asking what the word means,
where it comes from. A character is a person portrayed in a literary or
80 THE CALLING CARD SCRIPT
artistic work. The markings I am using here – and we all use every time we
write any language of words or symbols or numbers – are characters of an
alphabet. This is the root of it – a set of symbols arranged to express infor -
mation. The word derives from the ancient Greek term, χαρακτήρ, a tool
used for inscription or engraving. For your script to work, that ‘inscrip tion’
of character must be indelible, clear, strong, expressive, literally impressing
them into our hearts, minds and memories.
In contemporary terms, ‘character’ is defined as a number of things:
The qualities /features that distinguish one person from another.
A peculiar, eccentric or unusual person.
Status, role and capacity.
Public estimation and reputation.
Moral/ethical strength and fortitude.
It’s also interesting that we provide ‘character references’ in work and
‘character witnesses’ in court – as though the person we describe or recom -
mend is a kind of fiction or construct of the elements that we believe
constitute them.
ARCHETYPES
Before working out what ‘individual’ means, it’s worth thinking about what
archetypes are. In the work of Christopher Vogler, as inspired by Joseph
Campbell’s seminal anthropological research, he identifies common char -
acter and story archetypes that recur in stories ranging across the world,
time and cultures (the hero, the mentor, the threshold guardian et al).
Archetypal characters perform archetypal functions in stories – but when
they become simply a regurgitation of what has been seen before, they stop
being archetypal and become derivative and clichéd.
So in Star Wars, a modern reworking of the Arthurian ‘hero’s journey’,
you have the young, naive, foolhardy but brave hero plucked from apparent
obscurity (but with a ‘purpose’ he doesn’t yet understand) who em barks
on a quest after receiving a call to adventure, mentored by a hermit-
wizard-guide, to save a princess from the clutches of a dark knight serving
an evil emperor, and aided by a freewheeling bandit-pirate, passing
through wild places as he goes. He is lured inside the emperor’s terrifying
castle and must use his faith, courage and swordfighting skill against a
THE BEGINNING 81
faceless horde and even a dungeon monster in an epic battle of good against
evil.
But this isn’t an Arthurian tale set in medieval England. It is a sci-fi
adventure set in deepest space where the call to adventure is a hologram,
horses are spacecraft, castles are space stations, swords are light sabres
and faith is ‘the force’. Luke Skywalker’s petulant desire to escape his rural
prison is set against the context of repairing droids, twin moons, hovercars
and the scale of the journey into the unknown taking him through space at
light speed with an intergalactic smuggler and his big, hairy sidekick. The
quality of his emotions and experiences are Arthurian – the detail of the
world of the story is literally intergalactic.
So, is Luke simply an archetypal ‘Sir Percival’ naïf on a quest for the
Holy Grail? Yes and no. His character is archetypal and much more than
archetypal. His function is archetypal, but his personality is Luke Sky -
walker and only Luke Skywalker.
Not all your characters will or should necessarily have such a clear
and identifiable archetype from stories past. But there will be something
archetypal in their experiences, traits, attitudes, journeys, desires, flaws
and relationships. Don’t be afraid of this or fight it unnecessarily. Use it.
Archetypal functions are there because they have been tried and tested –
and have worked and satisfied. What will make your story is not trashing
archetypes but developing them, growing them, reinventing them, giving
them your own unique stamp in your own unique story.
FEATURES
Physiognomy is important. Characters need a physical presence and you
should give them one in your script – even if the actor who goes on to play
them could end up looking very different. A simple indication of sex, age,
size, manner, dress, ability/disability, tic /quirk or characteristic action (e.g.,
never looking anyone in the eye) usually suffices. But it rarely helps to be
too detailed, unless the detail is crucial in the story.
You also need not be literal and obvious – metaphor and simile can be
powerful indicators. The point about a feature – whether it’s a big nose, a
pronounced limp or an excruciating shyness – is that it’s noticeable, percep -
tible and something that makes this character stand out from the other
characters around them. And it’s fine to give us a simple, clear, tangible first
82 THE CALLING CARD SCRIPT
impression. If they have much greater complexity and depth, then we will
look beyond the initial wrapping in due course. It never helps to give long-
winded explanations of personality and backstory in the introduction, so
don’t do it.
One of my favourite introductions is in Matthew Graham’s opening
episode of Life on Mars, where Sam Tyler is described thus on page one:
‘SAM himself is smart, lithe, mid-thirties. If he were a flavour he’d be
spearmint.’ This neat description does an awful lot of work. A fairly specific
age. Smart means not just smart-looking, but intelligent and sharp. Lithe
means flexible or supple – which in turn mean resilient to physical pres -
sure, graceful and mentally flexible. But my favourite part is the flavour. Of
course, Sam does not literally taste of spearmint – but there’s something
about this which tells us about his too -sharp, too-cleancut, too-anal per -
sonality in an age where forensic technology can give police work some
definite, clear, evidential meaning. The point being that the 1970s, where he
will soon find himself, are not spearmint-flavoured – they are cigarette,
sweat, booze, chip and grime flavoured.
ECCENTRICITY
It is natural to hit upo
n eccentricities, peculiarities, unusual tics and quirks
that will speak your character loudly, clearly and distinctly. And in comedy,
soap opera and genre-driven stories they are crucial – from the ‘types’ of
sitcom and theatrical farce to the catchphrases of EastEnders to the goodies
and baddies of the movies. But be careful that your character isn’t simply
a construct of tics, quirks, catchphrases and stereotypes. Eccentricity will
only get you so far, especially with the main, lead characters driving your
story. The peculiarities need to be at the heart of a character, not simply
sitting on the visible surface. They need to be a quality, not just a feature;
that is the difference between any number of forgettable quirky geeks and
the unforgettable Napoleon Dynamite. Napoleon isn’t just weird on top – he
is weird in the middle too.
QUALITIES
What qualities can be attributed to your characters in the things they do and
have done? What physical abilities and achievements? Or, alternatively,
THE BEGINNING 83
what disabilities and limitations? What do your characters – and audience
– see when they look at another character? What perceivable, recognisable
qualities – positive or negative – do they possess? What talents?
Confident, aware, intelligent, charming, persevering, tenacious,
ambitious, enthusiastic, faithful, believing, honourable, generous,
patient, understanding, empathetic, reasonable, rational, sensible,
selfless, steadfast, honest, pure.
Self-defeating, blinkered, stupid, ignorant, sarcastic, lazy, doubting,
cynical, mean, envious, jealous, covetous, irascible, uncaring, unsym -
pathetic, irrational, arrogant, vicious, selfish, fickle, dishonest,
licentious.
These lists are largely positive against negative. However, it isn’t simple
extremes that are most interesting, but complex combinations. The charm
displayed by a trickster seeking to swindle someone out of their cash is not
a positive quality; and there can be a fine line between confident and arro -
gant, or ambitious and covetous, or tenacious and unsympathetic. Various
qualities can lie in seeming contradiction. Nobody is singularly anything.
The point about qualities is not in the first instance what characters
try to be or show to other people, but what they revert to when the mask
slips, when the heat is turned up, when they are threatened, when they are
tempted, when they step outside their comfort zone and into the unknown.
Who are your characters really when they can no longer pretend, blag or
hide?
CAPABILITIES AND FLAWS
Capability is what a character can do; a flaw is a weakness that limits that
capability.
Capabilities need not necessarily be morally qualitative – for example,
the Christian virtues set against the seven deadly sins. They can simply be the
outcome of what a character does and does not do. Abilities and weak nesses
are multi-layered – they can figure on a moral, emotional, psycho logical,
physical or social level. Complexity comes, for example, when physical ability
(dancing) is countered by social, emotional and psychological handicaps
(poverty, bereavement and lack of confidence), as in Billy Elliot. Billy can
84 THE CALLING CARD SCRIPT
never change where he comes from socially or culturally, nor can he undo
his mother’s death, but the sheer force of physical ability alongside the
qualities that makes us engage with him (charm, cheek, persistence, pas -
sion), mean he can still get to ballet school, excel, and make his once-
doubting father and brother proud.
Tony Soprano is capable of cold-blooded murder – a truly deadly sin –
in the name of ‘honour’ as set against a mafiosa code of morality, yet he is
beset by psychological doubt, depression and the feeling that he will always
somehow be a failure to someone. This doubt is almost in diametric oppo -
sition to the confidence required to know that a hoodlum who does the ‘wrong’
thing deserves punishment.
No person is perfect. No person is all bad. Everyone is complex.
ESTIMATION
The natural extension of what can be observed in characters is the estim -
ation people have of them and the status they are given in the world of the
story: what is presumed of them and how this affects how much power and
influence they have, whether real or imagined. One character’s estimation
of another can form the basis of the conflicts and tensions in their relation -
ship. Mistaken assumptions by one character about another can form the
basis of their actions and the consequent repercussions.
Othello is a good example in that ‘estimation’ and ‘reputation’ are
central ideas in Shakespeare’s play. At the start, the world around Othello
makes massive assumptions about him – he has the renowned status of a
powerful military leader of men, yet his ‘blackness’ marks him out as an
unsuitable husband for the daughter of a white man. This unsuitability and
the fact that he does secretly marry the daughter of a prominent white man
sets in motion a series of events that lead to tragedy. Iago plays on Cassio’s
sense of ‘reputation’, Iago soliloquises on what people see of him as com -
pared with what we know of him below the surface, and Iago manipulates
Othello’s sense of Desdemona’s ‘reputation’ as a faithful wife. Public estim -
ation (in contrast to the truth that people might not immediately and
clearly see) is at the heart of the conflict, story and tragedy.
So, what are your characters like when people look at them, observe
them, judge them, compartmentalise them – and interact with them. What
are the distinguishing features that set them apart? And then, what do
THE BEGINNING 85
your characters see when they look at themselves – and when we see
beyond what is visible on the surface to the other character?
ATTITUDE
Capabilities and flaws are relative to the POV of a character (and audience
member). One person’s ability is another’s flaw – to some empathy is
strength, to others it is weakness. What makes characters increasingly
distinct and interesting and complex is their attitude towards themselves,
other people and the world around them. No two people will fully agree in
every detail or about everything in the real world. It is attitude, perspec -
tive, point of view which makes them not just an assemblage of char acter-
istics, but an expression of who they uniquely are in the world you create.
POV
As I have already said, POV is a film-making term – what the camera sees
from a particular place, and what a character sees from their standpoint.
But POV isn’t just physical – it is emotional, political, social, psychological,
gendered, sexual, intellectual, religious. It is subjective, personal, indivi dual.
No two POVs are the same – no two beings could make their responses to
one thing exactly correspond, never mind their responses to everything.
The key thing for the writer is to make that character POV individual
by making it complex – by making it as wide a
nd full as possible. The audi -
ence needs to understand what the world looks, smells, tastes, sounds, feels
like when that character interacts with it. To stand in their skin, step inside
their shoes, use their eyes, ears and touch.
This is empathy – seeing the world from another person’s POV.
Empathy is the emotional tie that binds audience to character and story.
We don’t need to like them – just to see the world from their POV.
This does not mean POV should be logical, neat, tidy. On the contrary,
POVs are illogical, messy, unordered, perhaps involuntary, inexplicable,
conflicted, compromised, contradictory. A character – a person – can for
example wish and yearn for the stability of a family to love, yet fear and
avoid the responsibilities of supporting one.
Characters don’t need to fully, clearly recognise all the various ele -
ments that make up their full, complex POV. They don’t need to understand
86 THE CALLING CARD SCRIPT
why they feel the way they do when they look out at the world at the start
of the story. On the contrary, if they have full clarity at the start, there will
probably be nowhere for them to go, no understanding to achieve, no anag-
norisis – no journey to complete.
Most likely, the less neat, tidy and logical they are, the more human
and interesting they will appear to be. They may believe their POV makes
sense at the start – but does it? And what will change about how they see
the world by the end of the story?
HISTORY AND BACKSTORY
Certain kinds of stories and characters tend not to demand a detailed,
informed sense of where they have come from, what their history is, what
their backstory is, and what has formed them as a person; surrealism and
absurdism in particular, but sitcoms too and most kinds of broad comedy
and farce. Their psychology appears more existential, focused entirely on
what they do and what we can see with little psychological regard for what
has gone before. There may be implied pasts – we perhaps presume Didi