We do long-form-style improv. Our focus was characters and telling a long arc story over about an hour and a half. It was closer to a one-act play than one-off sketches.
I've long been interested in the role of 'minor characters' in major events. This has been the focus of a lot of the fiction and nonfiction I've written.
I would solve a lot of literary problems just thinking about a character in the subway, where you can't do anything anyway.
Character is how you treat people who can't do anything for you in return. Integrity is how you act when you think nobody is looking.
Plot exposition that can be gently wound out by the authorial voice and internal monologue of a character in the length of a page has to be delivered in a matter of seconds on the stage.
If I don't have a project going, I sit down and begin to write something - a character sketch, a monologue, a description of some sight, or even just a list of ideas.
What happens if you're the guy who's been on the show ten years and is highly paid but they have nothing for you to do is that they bring in other people, and you become a supporting character to those people.
Quite casually I wander into my plot, poke around with my characters for a while, then amble off, leaving no moral proved and no reader improved.
It is scary for an actor when you get hired as a lead. No matter what the plot is, it is your job to do something interesting enough to make them want to get inside the lead character's head.
Maybe Larry Kings cannot thrive or even survive in a world where the norms for discourse are rage, vehemence and character assassination. King wanted to be liked, not feared; admired, not loathed.
I am not somebody who meets a man or a woman somewhere and feels like that is an incredible character that I must write into a play.
I still think of myself as a stage actor. When I do film and television I try to implement what I was taught to do in theatre, to try to stretch into characters that are far from myself.
So, why do you write these strong female characters? Because you’re still asking me that question." [ speech, May 15, 2006]
Redemption is something you have to fight for in a very personal, down-dirty way. Some of our characters lose that, some stray from that, and some regain it.
I write to give myself strength. I write to be the characters that I am not. I write to explore all the things I'm afraid of.
I don't know if I've ever played a character who's close to me. There have been some elements of myself in different roles. Sometimes, I show one side of myself and then completely conceal the other.
Writing for me is quite a plastic form, a kind of mental sculpture, although that sounds weird. It acquires its character and its depth as it goes along.
My father is a man of impeccable character who has worked tirelessly for the United Nations for many years. His integrity is beyond reproach.
I choose material instinctually - at the heart of it are characters that I feel are fresh and original, and allow for an opportunity to, I suppose, explore uncharted ground.
I like to cast actors I admire, one's that are talented. Each one will bring something new to the part. This play has been done thousands of times and now certain characters are too familiar.
That's the way it happens - some characters you set out to use, some are happy accidents. As long as it works, it doesn't really matter how you got them.
