3. As you write the monologue, you must follow these rules:
• The goal is to imitate the voice as accurately and realistically as possible. Make sure that you avoid parody.
• In the monologue, avoid names or references that could instantly identify the character. For example, if you are writing a monologue for Lisa Simpson, it is cheating to include a line like “That's what I told my brother, Bart,” or “Here we are in Springfield.”
For Discussion:
1. Read each monologue aloud to the group. Evaluate the personality of the voice. How would you describe this character? What in the dialogue influences your perception?
2. Have the group look at the character list and try to guess who the speaker is.
3. Survey the people who guessed correctly. What was it about the monologue that made them able to identify the character?
4. Survey the people who guessed incorrectly. What was it about the monologue that threw them off and left them unable to identify the character?
5. Were there any sections of the monologue where the writer cheated? Did he use any specific names or references that immediately gave away the identity of the speaker?
6. Have each writer discuss how he approached the monologue. What specific vocal patterns did he notice in the character's speech and try to recreate in the monologue? What was the most challenging aspect of writing the monologue? In approaching the challenging parts, what did the writer do to overcome those challenges? What insights about dialogue writing can be gleaned from that approach?
LESSON 2: INTERMEDIATE AND ADVANCED EXERCISE
1. For this exercise, you will need to select a person whose voice is unfamiliar to you. This might be a distant acquaintance or it might be a well-documented but still obscure public figure. Whoever it is, the person should be real (not fictional). Immerse yourself in that person's voice for a week. If you know the person, interview her in detail and ask her about her life. Spend as much time as possible with her in different social settings. If the person is a public figure, spend a week listening to her speeches, public interviews, or broadcasts. Read material that will give you background information on her life (interviews, biographies, memoirs, etc).
2. After spending the week becoming familiar with the new subject, write a monologue capturing that person's voice. The monologue can be on any subject you wish, but it must obey the following rules:
• The monologue must be completely original. Do not simply cobble together existing statements by the subject.
• The monologue must be set in a particular time and place and it must be spoken to a particular person or people. In stage directions before the monologue, describe where the subject is when she speaks. Describe exactly whom she is speaking to.
For Discussion:
Each author should read his monologue out loud to the group. Do not read the stage directions out loud, only the monologue.
1. Upon hearing the monologue, what are the group's impressions of the speaker? How would the group describe her?
2. What verbal habits or tics do you notice in the speaker?
3. What is the subject of the monologue? What emotional overtones does it convey?
4. Where and when does the monologue take place? Who is the subject speaking to? What other context can you glean from the monologue?
5. Why is the speaker saying this monologue? What motivates her to speak these words?
6. Ask the author: How do the group's impressions differ (if at all) from your intent? Did the group miss out on anything that you intended to convey? Did the group read anything in to the monologue that surprised you?
7. If there are different interpretations of the monologue, try to identify the elements of the monologue that led to those different interpretations.
After hearing all the monologues out loud, discuss the following:
1. When your group answered the questions above, there may have been conflicting opinions over the interpretation of some monologues. There may have been distance between what the author wrote and what the audience inferred. When is it acceptable for different audience members to have different interpretations of something that a character says? When is it acceptable for the audience to infer something that the author did not intend? When is it not acceptable?
2. Which monologues gave you the most sense of context? Which ones gave you the clearest sense of who the speaker was, where he was located, whom he was speaking to, why he was speaking, etc.? What was it about those monologues that allowed you to make such clear inferences?
LESSON 2: SOLO EXERCISE
This exercise requires a bit of eavesdropping. When you are out in public, listen in on a nearby conversation. Note the location, tone, and subject matter of the conversation. Zero in on one of the conversation participants. Focus on that person. Listen for the particular personality of that person's voice. Jot down three quotes from him as he speaks.
Take the three quotes and weave them into an original monologue that captures the conversation participant's voice. The monologue can be on the same subject as the overheard conversation, or it can be on a completely different subject.
JACK ROBIN: Wait a minute, wait a minute, you ain't heard nothin’ yet!
—The Jazz Singer (1927)
LESSON THREE:
Creating an Original Voice
I am reading a review of a red wine:
This blend of Merlot and Cabernet Frac… tastes of ripe black fruits (blackberry, black currant, boysenberry), with hints of vanilla, cocoa, and brown spices from the oak treatment.
The most interesting voices, like the most interesting wines, contain a mix of flavors. Good writers weave multiple facets into a character's speech. Each voice is a blend of personality traits and social habits. There are overtones and undertones; there are bold statements and subtle hints. All of these come together to create a multifaceted flavor.
The easiest way to come up with an original character voice is to be one of those writers who has such a good ear for dialogue and such a strong sense of character that the voices simply start talking in your head. You can hear them even before you start writing.
However, if you're one of us mere mortals, you are going to have to rely on the second easiest method of coming up with an original character voice. You are going to have to identify the particular mix of personality traits and social habits that define your character. Then you are going to have to create the sound of that mix in speech. How does a nervous person talk? How does a dictatorial person talk? How does a person who is both nervous and dictatorial talk?
Always remember that the most interesting voices and the best dialogue writing come with a blend of flavors. Characters who speak with only one tone and in only one dimension are flat, predictable, and stereotypical. The most powerful technique for adding interest to a character's voice is to add multiple dimensions to that voice.
LESSON 3: SCRIPT ANALYSIS EXERCISE
NOTE: In this exercise, beginning and intermediate writers should analyze published work by established authors. See the Appendix for a list of suggestions. Advanced writers have the option of bringing in their own work for analysis.
Have each writer bring in a two- to three-page dialogue scene from a play or screenplay. Make sure that everyone has the opportunity to read the scenes to themselves (not out loud) before the beginning of the discussion.
For Discussion:
1. What tones do you hear in each character's voice?
2. What do those tones tell you about each character in this scene?
3. Is the group in any disagreement about the tones? (For example, does one reader feel that a character is being sarcastic while another feels that a character is being sincere?) If so, what in the script has led to these different interpretations?
4. What lines, in particular, bring out the strongest or clearest tones?
5. What lines, in particular, seem to have multiple tones or dimensions?
6. Does the balance o
f tones in each character's voice ever shift? If so, when? Why?
7. Do any tones seem to be missing? For example, is there some bit of subtext or tension going on in the scene that does not seem to manifest itself in the dialogue?
LESSON 3: BEGINNER EXERCISE
This is a list of tones you might hear in a character's voice. Feel free to add to the list.
abrasive
alert
anxious
arrogant
bewildered
bitter
bored
bright
calm
cheerful
clumsy
commanding
creepy
cultured
decorous
defiant
deranged
detail-oriented
domineering
eager
erratic
excitable
exuberant
fanatical
fearful
fearless
flippant
frank
furtive
gentle
grouchy
guilty
hesitant
jittery
laid-back
lonely
meek
morose
naive
nervous
ominous
opinionated
optimistic
paranoid
pessimistic
precise
proud
reckless
reflective
romantic
sarcastic
sensitive
short-tempered
shrewd
squeamish
sullen
taciturn
vague
verbose
vulgar
weary
willful
wry
zany
1. Select one adjective from the list (or draw it out of a hat). Write a monologue with that tone (and only that tone) underlying it.
2. Select another adjective from the list (or draw it out of a hat). Rewrite the previous monologue so that both tones blend into it.
3. In writing the monologues, there is only one rule. The character is never allowed to explicitly tell us the underlying tone. It's cheating to write “I feel sullen,” or “I am detail-oriented.”
For Discussion:
1. Read the first monologue aloud to the group. Have the group guess which adjective was the underlying tone for the speech.
2. Why? What is it about the monologue that leads members of the group to select that adjective?
3. Does the writer ever cheat? Is there any point in the monologue where you feel the writer has explicitly told the audience what the underlying tone is supposed to be? If so, where? Could you cut that section out of the monologue and still have the monologue communicate the selected tone?
4. Have the writer reveal which tone word was behind the monologue. If the tone that the writer chose is different than the tone that the group believed it to be, discuss the difference in meaning between the two words. What are the variations in the shades of meaning? How do you recognize that subtle difference in speech?
5. Read the second monologue out loud to the group. Have the group guess which adjective was the second underlying tone for the speech.
6. How did the addition of the second tone change the monologue?
7. After everyone has presented their assignments, discuss which tone combinations made for the most interesting voices. Why were those combinations more effective?
LESSON 3: INTERMEDIATE AND ADVANCED EXERCISE
Look at the list of words in the Beginner Exercise. It is a list of tones you might hear in a character's voice. Feel free to add to the list.
Select four words from the list (or draw them out of a hat). Write a monologue that blends all four tones together into one character's voice.
For Discussion:
1. Read the monologue out loud to the group. Have the group guess which adjectives supplied the underlying tones to the speech.
2. Why? What is it about the monologue that leads members of the group to select those adjectives?
3. Have the writer reveal which adjectives were behind the monologue. If the words that the writer chose were different than the words that the group selected, try to identify which aspects of the monologue led to the differing opinions.
4. Discuss the balance of the tones in the monologue. Were some tones more dominant than others? What does the relative weight of all of the tones tell you about the character?
5. For the writer: Discuss how the four adjectives helped or hindered your monologue writing process. What choices did the adjectives force you to make? What limitations did they impose? In what ways was that helpful? In what ways was that frustrating?
LESSON 3: SOLO EXERCISE
There are distinctive voices all around you. They exist in the people you know, in the characters you see on screen or on stage, in the magazines or blogs that you read, and in the public figures you hear every day.
1. Seek out four distinctive voices in the social, political and cultural environment. Try to vary your sources. (Don't pick four voices exclusively from television, for example. Don't exclusively pick four sarcastic people.) Here's a sample list of voices:
• My husband (a person I know)
• Maxim (a magazine)
• Jerry Lundergaard (William H. Macy's character from the movie Fargo)
• Oprah Winfrey (a talk show host)
2. Once you have your list, write at least three adjectives that describe the tones underlying that voice. It's okay if your judgment is subjective. Here's a sample list:
• My husband (a person I know): intellectually driven; articulate; sarcastic
• Maxim (a magazine): cocky; adolescent; hipster
• Jerry Lundergaard (William H. Macy's character from the movie Fargo): dim-witted; desperate; chip on his shoulder
• Oprah Winfrey (a talk show host): earnest; matronly; charismatic
3. Now, remove the names and just look at the list of adjectives. Again, here is the sample:
adolescent
articulate
charismatic
chip on shoulder
cocky
desperate
dim-witted
earnest
hipster
intellectually driven
matronly
sarcastic
4. Randomly select three adjectives from your list and write an original monologue that blends those tones together into an original voice.
5. Repeat this exercise regularly as an ongoing writer's workout. Create a permanent file for each new voice that you develop. In the future, when you are developing characters for scenes and full-length scripts, you can refer back to these files for ideas and inspiration.
DIALOGUE:
HOW PEOPLE TALK TO EACH OTHER
FEYDAK: There are two kinds of people in one's life — people whom one keeps waiting — and the people for whom one waits.
—S. N. Behrman (Biography)
LESSON FOUR:
Status
Let's begin with a fact that underlies all human interaction. Human beings are animals – literally. With our advanced brains, our sophisticated language skills, and our stunning fashion sense, it's easy to forget that — deep down — we still carry instincts from our mammalian ancestors.
In his book, Impro, Keith Johnstone argues that humans, like animals, take on status roles in their interactions with one other. These status roles are more flexible and more complicated than the behaviors that defne the status of pack animals, but at a fundamental level they can be broken down into two similar categories:
Talk the Talk Page 3
