Talk the Talk. Penny Penniston
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:
• Low status: characterized by subordination or deference to others
• High status: characterized by superiority, primacy, or dominance over others
If you listen, you can hear these status roles reflected in the way people talk:
VERY LOW STATUS: If you're not using it, could you please pass that pen?
LOW STATUS: Please pass the pen.
HIGH STATUS: Give me the pen.
VERY HIGH STATUS: Pen. Now.
And:
VERY LOW STATUS: How are you feeling? Are you thirsty? Should I get you a drink?
LOW STATUS: If you're thirsty, let me get you a drink.
HIGH STATUS: You look thirsty. I'm getting you a drink.
VERY HIGH STATUS: You're thirsty. Go get something to drink.
Status is an incredibly powerful tool in the writing of dialogue. It influences not only how people speak, but also how they interact with each other. It adjusts itself from line to line and moment to moment. Most important, there is something about status that is instinctive. You do not need to explain status interactions to an audience. High status and low status cues are hard wired into our brains. Millions of years of evolution have designed us to instantly recognize when someone is asserting dominance, when someone is challenging dominance, and when someone is being subordinate. These social cues allowed our animal ancestors to lay claim to food, recognize threats, and share in resources. As humans evolved, as we developed language, tools, civilization, and culture, this primal understanding has taken on many complicated layers. But the underlying forces of dominance and subordination, of primacy and deference, still influence our speech and behavior.
This entire section of the book will be devoted to status and the myriad ways that it plays out in human interaction and dialogue. For this lesson, let's just focus on crafting lines that reflect different status levels.
LESSON 4: SCRIPT ANALYSIS EXERCISE
Neil Simon's dialogue tends to have very clear and simple status interactions. Have the group review three different dialogue scenes from Neil Simon plays or screenplays. (See the Appendix for a list of suggestions.) Choose scenes that contain only two characters and are two to three pages in length.
Individually or as a group, go through each scene line by line. Identify the status role that the speaker is taking in each line. Make a note next to each line:
• VL = very low status
• L = low status
• H = high status
• VH = very high status
For Discussion:
1. Did you notice a trend for any of the characters? Which characters had a tendency to play high status? Which characters had a tendency to play low status?
2. Did characters ever break their status trend? If so, when? Why?
3. How did the characters’ status tactics affect your impression of their personalities?
4. How did the characters’ status interactions affect your understanding of their relationship?
LESSON 4: BEGINNER EXERCISE
For each of the activities below, write a line or two of dialogue that reflects how the very low status, the low status, the high status, and the very high status player would accomplish this activity:
• Ordering a cup of coffee, with sugar, in a restaurant
• Asking someone out on a date
• Talking a cop out of a speeding ticket
• Asking someone to pay back a debt
For Discussion:
1. Randomly read the lines out loud to the group. Have the group guess which status role the speaker was taking.
2. What in the line made the group select that status role?
3. If the status role that the group guessed is different than the status role that the writer intended, discuss what it was in the writing that caused the discrepancy.
4.