Link to project:
Link to Safety Checklist: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1CZhPrKxVvuRCkPLwG2h9rTsCe6ScmAdG/view?usp=sharing
Reflection:
Initially I decided to join the Getting into Character course because I have a passion for working with actors and an affection of character driven narratives. I wanted to learn more about how a character should function to serve the story however, I learnt something much more profound… the character is the story. No longer do I perceive actors as characters, but rather as complex people hidden behind a guise (McKee 1999).
Reading Stephen McKee’s Story: Substance, Structure, Style and the Principles of Screenwriting, taught me about how characters should make choices under pressure. McKee proposes that “Choice under pressure will strip away the mask of characterization” (1999, p. 101). This is something I really tried to apply to my assignment. I used the character’s internal dialogue generated from her backstory to put pressure on her to choose how she was going to answer a question. This literally stripped away her performative behaviour and revealed her true character. Another element McKee highlighted is structure, contending that “the function of structure is to provide progressively building pressures” (1999, p. 105). I chose to do this through sound and by placing my character in a high stakes situation. The character’s internal dialogue and the sound design surrounding it becomes more and more intrusive until she makes the decision to reveal her true character. By placing her in an environment where she has the most to lose, the ‘decision’ moment resulted in a shift for this character which gave the audience the opportunity to really empathise with her.
Fitting my character into a single archetype was challenging. I used Christopher Vogler’s book,The Writer’s Journey,as a resource to develop my character’s anti-hero qualities and structure her hero’s journey. I knew she needed to be “connected to the idea of self-sacrifice” (2007, p. 30) and that the audience needed to sympathise with her despite her flaws. She resolves her journey by sacrificing her pageant title so she can expose her true inner character. Her search for identity and growth throughout the monologue was initiated through Vogler’s theories.
In our second-class lecture we spoke about the concept of character’s wearing a mask, referring to heroes carrying aspects of other archetypes (Gough-Brady 2020). In my character I found she also wore the mask of the mentor. Her performative behaviours paired with the camera work, particularly the pauses and extreme close shots, projected a critical mentor-like function in moments of stillness. Another lecture in week four introduced us to the idea of hero-phobic cultures. It seems that Australians tend towards the ideology of a hero being humble or for their ego to be diminished. I applied this to my character, she is not outwardly a hero, nor does she ever position herself to want the hero title.
In the book The Heroine’s Journey, Maureen Murdoch proposes that the inner mother can function as a shadow figure (1990, p.15). I used the ‘terrible mother’ archetypal model to become a voice in my character’s mind. The way that she reacted to her mother’s taunts became a great tool for revealing more about her inner character to the audience.
I knew my character’s physical behaviour also needed to be considered when developing her. I chose to make her overly expressive, a little highbrow and catty. As our hero underwent a change, her vocal pace, pitch, and tone changed. With this alteration her essence transitioned from nasty and simple to robust and assertive. Craig Batty’s Screenplays “Shaping Characters” text really assisted me here. I explored how my characters speech would sound and change and how her vocabulary would evolve throughout her journey.
A key viewing experience that consolidated my understanding of character and informed a lot of the creative choices I made was watching Night Cries A Rural Tragedy (1990) created by Tracey Moffatt. Firstly, the sound in the work was speaking to the audience almost as much as the visuals. The film maker managed to use sound as a way of communicating what is being felt by the protagonist (who is a victim of assimilation is now taking care of her elderly white ‘mother’). Secondly, the studio setting oddly worked well to further this character’s experience of being forced into a colonised environment. After watching Night Cries A Rural Tragedy (1990) I felt I got a better understanding of how place and space impact an audience’s interpretation of the character and that you can be as innovative as you like.
One of the challenges of producing this work under the current circumstances was taking on all the on-set roles (including performing). Even though I was organised with my script and shot list, I found setting up the camera and lighting took far longer than it normally would. To work around this, I used a green screen so I could move my position instead of resetting the camera for every new shot.
I was relying allot on the audience’s suspension of disbelief when constructing this character’s world. This was a concept I learnt about in our week five lecture. Due to the COVID-19 restrictions, I used overlays and aftereffects and applied them to the green screen in post-production which helped to construct my character’s environment. This meant I needed the audience to enter a fictional space and be willing to let go of their knowledge of the ‘real world’. I realised how important continuity and consistency across the colour grade was to keep the audience convinced of the character’s environment. Another tool I found helped me to fill in the gaps of this monologue was sound. I was able to create the environment, set the emotional tone and reveal the character’s inner recollections with the audio score.
I believe the most successful aspect of this character is the strong connection she has to her backstory and how this informed her behaviours and choices. If I were to re-envision her, I’d give her additional difficult decisions to make under pressure which would provide the audience a deeper understanding of the story. I’d also spend more time really working on my character’s movement and voice to refine the performance.
Overall, my experience with this studio was unique and valuable. I am glad I took the time to really understand the complexities of character and discover how important they are. Although I have only started to scrape the surface on mastering my understanding of character, this course has been a great foundation and I fully plan on using what I learnt here when I make my own content in the future.
References:
Batty, G 2012, Screenplays How to Write and Sell Them, Oldcastle Books, Harpenden, UK.
Gough-Brady, C 2020, ‘Getting into Character’ PowerPoint slides, Media 4 Comm 2627, RMIT University, Melbourne.
McKee, R 1999, Story: Substance, Structure, Style and the Principles of Screenwriting, Methuen Publishing Ltd, London, UK.
Murdock, M 1990, The Heroine’s Journey, Shambhala Publications, Colorado, USA.
Night Cries a Rural Tragedy 1990, DVD, Women Make Movies, New York, NY, directed by Tracey Moffatt.
Vogler, C 2007, The Writer’s Journey, Michael Wiese Productions, San Fracsico, USA.