Creating dynamic, compelling characters is one of the greatest joys and challenges of writing novels, stories, plays, screenplays, and even memoir. Just like us, characters don masks that hide their personal selves from others and sometimes from themselves. The writer’s job is to allow or provoke his or her characters to reveal themselves as their masks fray, crack or crumble in their drive to achieve the objectives they think they want and overcome the obstacles blocking them.

Program recap by C. Jonathan Shoemaker

Actress, playwright and creative writing teacher, Nina Solomita, our guest speaker on Tuesday, April 21, guided the audience through a series of questions that led us to consider various character traits in ourselves as well as in others. Each successive question revealed the relationship between an individual’s self image and his/her attitude toward others.
Nina's exercise for the audience showed us how a protagonist's character can be built based upon Aristotelian principles. In a play, or any other piece of fiction, circumstances cause protagonists to behave or speak in a certain way, which in turn reveals something about her/his character. Having a clear picture of what protagonists think of themselves and others gives us clues as to their real personality and basic character.

Writing plays or fiction, we can use the exercise to develop a personality for each character that takes a prominent role in our work. When we create our main protagonists, we should determine what they feel to be the greatest misconception about them. This is their mask, the way others perceive them, which they wear to get through life. We should determine their greatest fear, their greatest strength, and what they admire and hate in others. If we know what trait will most likely get them into trouble, we can show how antagonistic forces exploit that trait. The very trait that protagonists dislike in others is revealed in their own personalities.

If we, the authors, the playwrights, know the traits/personalities of our protagonists, we will have built dynamic, compelling characters. We will have variations across a broad spectrum of characters:  “Those who are only concerned with themselves. Those who are concerned with themselves plus one other [person]. Those who are concerned with themselves plus family. Those who are concerned with themselves plus community. And those who are concerned with themselves plus all of  humanity.” Each one of them has a fatal (or not so fatal) flaw.

The trait that our protagonists most hate in other people is likely to be their “dark side,” the side they spend most of the time on stage hiding from themselves.

What they say hides/camouflages what they really mean. Even their silence, at times, indicates a reluctance to let down the mask.

But the audience wants to see the mask come off. If characters are pushed to the extreme by the “3 C’s” (conflicts, crises and complications), the mask will come off. In a play, the stakes are high. The protagonists have a lot to lose. Inner change happens in response to outer changes. They feel they are losing it.

And the mask comes off.

The writer’s job is to provoke the characters to reveal themselves as they overcome obstacles in their drive to achieve objectives.

Nina Solomita has an M.F.A. from Goddard College in Creative Writing with an emphasis on playwriting. In 2002, her play Fania was produced at the Carl Cherry Center in Carmel. It was also performed at Threshold Theatre Company in Boston, MA. Her play Brought Me No Comfort was performed in Boston by the Theatre in Process Company. The Subway Play and Bank Street Blues have had staged readings and workshop productions. She has been involved in theatre in various capacities (acting, directing, administration, writing) for over 30 years. She recently performed in Tony Kushner’s Homebody/Kabul in the role of The Homebody, and in Second Nature at the Cherry Center. She was a winner in the One-on-One Monologue Competition sponsored by the Cherry Center. Her writing has been published in The Pitkin Review and in the arts sections of several periodicals. She teaches Creative Writing workshops and also writes and edits nonfiction.