Have a Little Character!

By Danielle Mc Mahon

I am a character person, from books to movies, television shows to phone calls, to everyday acquaintances, I love characters.
For me the most important part of any story are the characters. When I read a book or watch something on the silver screen I become completely attached to the people around whom the story is centred.
This applies for television shows also, it has been a more than common experience in the past number of years to find me in floods of tears staring at my computer because something traumatic is happening to my favourite characters on a television show.
About a month ago I was heartbroken when I finished reading an amazing book, I had become so involved with the characters and their lives that I was devastated when I read the last word and realised that I would never hear how the rest of the story played out.
Last weekend we started watching a relatively new series, I had seen trailers for it and different fan videos but I really wasn't sure if I would like it as it is set in a women's prison and I guess I'm just not that tough. Despite this we decided to delve in and take a chance. The chance paid off and the delve was worth it. In seven days we watched a total of twenty-five episodes and today I found myself at a loose end, devastated by the fact that there would be no new episode until June!
The characters in this show are amazing, even-though they are criminals you want to be their best friend, when you are having a bad day at work their portrayal of being in jail makes you actually think about whether it is really all that bad, which is a pretty powerful affect to have over an audience!
It is not only the characters as individuals which draw you in, but the cliques. The roles are played so well that you can actually picture which clique you would belong to, how you would manage to survive, how you would relate to all of these women, something which is hard to do if the characters are not written and played well.
Over the past couple of weeks the idea of characters, how they are created and why, has become something pretty central to my thought pattern. Aren't we really all just trying to create our own characters? Everyday we dress and behave a certain way, we make conscious decisions about how we appear to others, we choose what to speak about and how these themes reflect on us and how we are perceived by others as a result.
So what happens when you have created a character which is not really you? It is not as simple as deleting a paragraph in your word document, or asking the director and costume designer to change the attitude and appearance of the actress or actor who is playing the role. How do you fix what you yourself have created in your own real life situation? Do you get a haircut, go on a shopping spree? What about the rest? How do you take a step back, re-imagine and recreate a character when the character is you?