The Key to Writing Complex Characters
“Do I contradict myself? Very well then, I contradict myself. (I am large. I contain multitudes.)” -Walt Whitman
Characters are not real, but they should breathe life just like you or me. And the best ones do.
Forrest Gump. Captain Jack Sparrow. Wonder Woman. Regina George. Michael Scott. Shrek.
The best characters in film and television are permanently etched in your memory because they feel alive.
But what is the secret to writing characters who are as solid and real as actual people?
Human beings are complex creatures. We have flaws and quirks. We say weird things and have habits that make little to no sense. Some aspects of our personalities directly contrast with other characteristics.
And therein lies the key — contradiction.
In order for characters to have the same complexity as a real person, writers must imbue them with contradictions. Characters have to be made up of opposing details, quirks, and intricacies.
These contradictions need not be overtly stated to the audience — in fact, it’s better if they’re not acknowledged at all. Your character’s contradictions should be revealed in their actions, words, and emotions.
A character can say one thing, but act in a way that completely contradicts his own statement.
Like how Casablanca’s Rick Blaine states, “I stick my neck out for nobody,” and then puts himself in jeopardy at the end of the movie. Or how in the first episode of Scandal, one of the employees at Olivia Pope & Associates tells the newest hire that Olivia doesn’t tolerate tears, only for the audience to see Olivia cry before the end of the very same episode. Ron Swanson repeats throughout all seven seasons of Parks and Recreation that he doesn’t have friends, per se, and yet he is constantly giving advice to, helping, and hanging out with his “workplace proximity associates.”
Contradiction can also reveal itself in a more obvious way, both to the characters in a piece and the audience. Some characters present themselves a certain way in one scene, and an entirely different way in the next. The domineering music teacher Mr. Fletcher in Whiplash is abusive then sincere, quiet then loud, harsh then compassionate. It makes him difficult to pin down, difficult to understand, and therefore very, very real.
A character’s complexity and contradiction can also be shown over time, revealed piece by piece like the layers of an onion.
Elle Woods seems like a blonde bimbo at the beginning of Legally Blonde but proves herself to be much more than a girl who loves the color pink by the end of the film. As Lady Bird McPherson comes into her own in Lady Bird, accepting where she’s from, who her parents are, and what she wants in life we get a deeper and deeper understanding of who she is as a person.
Miranda Priestley may seem like an ice-hearted queen who cares about nothing but her magazine, but in the final scenes of The Devil Wears Prada, both the protagonist and the audience realize she is so much more.
The same can be said for complex, contradictory — one might argue, iconic — characters across the history of entertainment. Dom Cobb in Inception. Moira Rose in Schitt’s Creek. Vito Corleone in The Godfather. The entire cast of characters in The Good Place, Shameless, and You’re the Worst.
As Walt Whitman wrote, we are large. We contain multitudes. And so must the characters we create.
None of the photos in this post are my own.