Back when I worked as a reader, when I didn't "get" a character I'd often drop a backstory note about fleshing out the guy or gal in question. The producer I worked for would sigh, like he was disappointed and mutter that I was just like the studio honchos in suits, always yearning to see "how I came to be" scenes shoehorned at the midpoint of a story. He hated backstory with a passion I didn't understand when it seemed to me, fresh out of school, that learning about a character's past was a quick way to "get" him, nay, even like him.Flashforward a couple years, on a recent draft of the much mutating crazy Bollywood musical, and I understand where that curmudgeonly independent producer was coming from, and how much backstory can be overcredited for making a sympathetic character sympathetic. Very rarely, is a clearly laid out backstory the reason you like or root for a character. Matter of fact, backstory can cripple your otherwise pretty darn compelling main guy.
So how do you create a likable protagonist? Here are a couple ideas from Mary Lynn Mercer's "The True Nature of Sympathetic Characters" which I found on a late night Google. It's intended for fiction writers so you have to chuck the last part about internalization but the rest of it is pretty on target.
• Get rid of self-pity. Readers hate it and furthermore (my opinion now) it's not active and your protagonist needs to be active.
• Scenes of goodness, "saving the cat" scenes that are unconnected to the story
• Melodramatic backstories
• Character's that don't quit. This is connected to that active protagonist. If the character cares deeply enough to continue on the quest when all around is dark, we're going to care about that character.
• Inner weakness. Conflicted characters. They have the drive to see them through the story quest but it must not come easy. Every step is hard but they can't turn back.
• Know your genre boundaries. What's fine and "humanizing" for your hero to do in a Western might be downright death for him to do in a romantic comedy.
Crazy how much the creation of a sympathetic character can have so little to do with laying out explicitly the "ghosts"/backstory of the character's life, right?
Now excuse me while I go cut the part where my protagonist talks about the car crash her mother died in, life in the orphanage and the puppy she couldn't save when the orphanage caught afire. (I kid...kinda.)
Happy writing.
photo by Crail
Originally uploaded by AndyRob
2 comments:
"• Know your genre boundaries. What's fine and "humanizing" for your hero to do in a Western might not be downright death for him to do in a romantic comedy."
At first I read this as "might be downright death..." not "might not be downright death..." If it's not a typo, I'm pleasantly surprised at this advice, and I agree with it. I think the modifier "might" is important here, though. While similar situations might blur the lines for a genre, and certainly some situations can't cross over and would just be ridiculous in one genre but not the other, I think other times it may add interest to do something not regularly seen in say, that romantic comedy. Then, however, you may leave trouble for marketing or something; the execs may not like a story stepping outside the rigidly defined lines.
In many respects though, I think whatever humanizing events there are can be adapted to jump the genres. In a western they may need to be made more dramatic or something, but I think if one has a great idea it can often be made to work in most situations, as the things that people identify and/or sympathize with are more or less universal.
Crap. It is a typo Aleks. (Thanks, I fixed it.)
You bring up an interesting point about genres, though. I got this "genre boundaries" note recently when my hero did something unusual/ off-tone for a rom-com lead.
This happened, I think, because the project I have has blended genres which is exciting, it creates something fresh, but it also risks alienating a core genre audience who's going to come to the movie expecting certain beats. It's a balance that I hope to pull off. The elusive "same only different."
That said, surprise in a script is generally a good thing, and that surprise can come from your hero behaving in an unconventional way for the genre. Modern male-centric slacker/striver rom-coms have certainly made ample use of that.
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