Having the ability to create and transform into a complex and well-developed character is one of the most important skills an actor can have. The ability to do this widens your casting possibilities astronomically.
Some actors have even made their careers entirely off of their impressive ability to appear as someone completely different, showcasing their talent for character acting.
However, it can be difficult to know where to start when learning this skill, or how to move forward when we get stuck. So, I’m here to help you. Here is my step-by-step guide for how to create a character.
Heads up: This page includes affiliate links. If you click and purchase, I receive a commission at no extra cost to you. I only recommend tools I have personally vetted.
Script Analysis
Script analysis is the first step on the way to creating a full character. While you can’t build a character off script analysis alone, you can’t build a character without it. A thorough analysis of your script will allow you an insight into the world of the character and the things they want, do and say. Some of the elements you may be able to look for in your script analysis to understand the character’s motivations and provide justification for their actions include:
- What your character wants
- Your character’s relationships with others
- The place your character lives
- The struggles your character faces
- The journey your character goes on and the lessons they learn
Script analysis is so important, I have a whole post dedicated to it. This will guide you through a number of specific acting exercises you can do in order to get the absolute most out of your script analysis.
Feel free to read my post on script analysis HERE
Similarities and Differences
A great way to get a sense of the journey you need to go and the steps you need to take in order to build your character is to note the similarities and differences between you and them. Make one list of similarities and one list of difficulties.
These should be all the things you can notice in your script. They can be facts such as where you live or the jobs you do, or it can be more subjective things such as personality character traits.
When you create character, you are going on a journey. Your personality and life are the starting point, and the character’s personality and life are the end point.
In order to get from the start to the finish, we need directions and signposts or we will never be able to get there. These similarities and differences are those directions you need in order to get from yourself to the character.
You will need to bring the things that make you relate to the character and keep them close to your heart. These are your personal connection to the character – the fuel that will allow you to bring your heart and soul to your performance and make it truly great. You offer these things to your character in order to tell their story.
The exercises you undertake in order to build the character will enable you to learn how to encapsulate their differences and make them part of you so that you make communicate them fully in your performance. This is where the transformational element of acting lies, and one of the most important parts of how to develop a character.
Backstory
Creating a backstory is one of the most successful ways that you can understand your character and become closer to them. It can help you to see them as full human beings with a past, a life before the moment we find them.
It can also help you understand more about the reasons behind the actions they take in the play, or why their objectives are what they are. There are many ways to do this and here are some of the best.
Research
Research the facts you have discovered about their life and background. If you have done your script analysis correctly, you may have found that the playwright has been kind enough to give you some information about this character’s background such as where they’re from, the time period they lived in, their relationship with their parents, their social class, a specific culture they are part of, hobbies, and many other things that have formed who they are as a person.
Many of these will be different to the things that make you who you are. Understanding the social context the character exists in can shed light on their internal conflicts.
So, it’s time to employ your research skills! We are very lucky to have the internet at our fingertips these days, but a trip to the library can never go amiss too. Your job is to find out as much about the things that are foreign to you but are fundamental to your character. You will be surprised how many details you pick up on and how much closer it will make you feel to your character.
TOP TIP: It can feel a bit boring or aimless to just research things without a goal. So, make it specific. Make a list of things to research. Set a time limit on how long you’re going to look into each topic. Make a list of specific questions you have about each topic. Make notes on your research. And use different methods – watch documentaries, look at photos, and read newspaper articles.
Check Out This Video On Researching A Role
Acting With Keira has made a great video on researching a role that has loads of excellent tips it it. Give it a watch to learn even more about the importance of research.
Character Biography
Forming a character biography is a classic tool that many actors use in order to create a character backstory. This is where you answer questions about your character such as their likes and dislikes, their habits and their life. This can be helpful when developing the specific details of someone’s life.
Here is a good example of a character biography you can use.
However, I don’t like this tool too much. At least, not used just on its own. The problem with it is that it simply gets you to list facts about your character, which is fine. It’s always good to know your character better. However, with this tool, you do not form an emotional connection with the information you discover or imagine for your character.
It remains simply ideas and words on a page, which isn’t very helpful when we are trying to create a living, breathing, feeling person. That’s why I actually prefer these next couple of exercises of the traditional character biography.
Daydreaming
Imagination is one of the actor’s greatest tools, and I think it can be a very useful one when creating your character’s backstory. In the exercise, rather than sitting and coming up with facts about your character’s past, you immerse yourself in it through the use of daydreaming. Here are the steps you need to take in order to daydream your character’s past.
- Sit down and take some deep breaths. Try and focus on your breath. Run your awareness over your body and notice how it feels. Return to your breath.
- Now turn your attention to your character. Invite your mind to show you a moment in their past.
- Don’t overthink it. Whatever your mind delivers to you is perfect. Do not think that whatever it gives you isn’t right or good enough because it is. The trick here is to try and let go of control and just follow what your imagination gives you. You are not creating the story. You are simply watching it play out like a film in front of your eyes.
- Now all you have to do is let your imagination run away with you, sit back and enjoy. Let your imagination daydream about any part of the character’s history that it wants to. Our brains are great and making up stories, even without any logical guidance from us. If you simply let your imagination run wild, it will offer you ideas about the character’s background that a powerful and personal to you. Ones that you simply could not come up with if you attempted to be in control and come up with something clever.
Freewriting
This is another way for you to connect to the character’s history without overthinking too much, and allowing ideas and answers to come to you naturally. Freewriting is where you select a topic and simply allow yourself to write for a certain length of time without stopping or taking breaks to think. You must keep writing, even if what you write is total gibberish. These are the steps you need to take to do this exercise:
- Choose a topic from your character’s past. This may be their relationship with their parents. Their first love. Their childhood best friend. The place they grew up. Their first day at school. Their worst day as a child. Their favourite birthday. Absolutely anything you like.
- Set a timer for 10 – 15 minutes. You can always go for longer if you want, but you have to write for the full time you set the timer for.
- Write. Just write a continuous stream of consciousness. No breaks, don’t slow down. Just write, write, write on the topic you have chosen. If you want to go off on a tangent then allow that to happen. You will be surprised by the creative ideas and personal connections you will make during this exercise.
If you want to learn more about building a character background, check out my post on it HERE.
Diary Entries
This is another great way to create an emotional connection to your character. You can use this for significant events that happened in your character’s past that are linked to or mentioned in the play, or you can use it for events that happen during the play itself. Or you can create entries entirely from your own imagination. It is completely up to you.
The exercise is very simple; keep a diary as your character. Write entries in your character’s voice, trying to keep in mind how they would express things and talk about events from their specific point of view, or how they feel about certain things.
This is a great way to get an insight into your character’s inner thoughts and feelings and track their emotional journey.
Character Physicality
This is where you really begin the work on the transformational aspect of how to create a character. Hopefully, if you’ve followed all the steps on this list so far, you have collected information and insights into your character’s life, relationships, thoughts and feelings. All of these things should influence the decisions you make about your character’s physicality.
Your character’s physicality is, basically, how they stand and move. Some important things to think about when it comes to physicality are:
- Posture. Are they upright, bent forward, or slouched? Is their weight distributed evenly?
- How fast they move or ‘outer tempo’. Do they make quick movements of slow ones?
- Tension. Do they hold a lot of tension in their body or are they relaxed? Are there any specific points of tension, such as from stress or from an injury?
- Do they make big or small movements?
- Do they move gracefully or heavily?
- What is their walk like?
- What body part do they lead with? Their head, chest, pelvis, feet?
- What animal is your character like? How might this influence their movement?
Remember, each of the decisions you make about your character’s physicality should give us an impression of what kind of person they are and what kind of life they lead.
Another good idea what creating character physicality is to look into the methods of different movement practitioners. Some good ones to research include:
- Rudolf Laban. Particularly the eight efforts
- Jaques Lecoq. Particularly the seven levels of tension and undulations.
- Michael Chekhov and Psychological Gesture.
Check out my post on creating a character physicality HERE.
Character Voice
Often, the character’s voice can be forgotten or left behind beyond asking if they have an accent. Actually, it is just as important as the physicality of the character. A vocal transformation can be one of the elements that take your performance to the next level. Some of the things you might be able to think about include:
- Accent. Where are they from and what time do they live in? Try to listen to real people from the area talking with the accent. Be specific, and make sure to learn your lines in this accent. Always get an accent coach if you are able to and especially if you’re struggling.
- Pitch. Do they have a high or low voice?
- Musicality. Are they very expressive with their voice or monotone?
- Tempo. Do they speak fast or slow?
- Rhythm? Do they speak in a regular, steady rhythm? Or do they take lots of pauses and speed up and down?
- Articulation. Do they articulate well or do they slur their words and speak lazily?
- Resonance. Where does their voice resonate? In their nose? In their chest? The top of their head?
Make sure to make specific decisions when it comes to your character voice and make sure to practice it regularly. Often, speech is a course of habit.
Daily Routine
My final tip for how to create a character is to simply think about their daily routine and the way they lead their day-to-day life. When do they get up? What is their morning routine? Is there a specific kind of music they listen to? What films do they like? Do they go to cafes or bars? What do they drink? Answer as many of these questions as you can. Maybe think about incorporating some of these into your own life.
Now, there’s no need to go “full method”, as some people may call it, and live your life as the character. However, maybe you could think about watching some of the films they might like, or listen to their style of music, change the time you get up and go to sleep.
Maybe you could try out their morning routine, or have some of the food and drink they enjoy. Maybe you could go all out and spend a day as your character and do the things that they might do all day.
Do not think of this as becoming your character. You are still you. You have control over your actions, and this is not an excuse to do rude or dangerous things. Think of it as a research task. Doing the things your character does allows you to get an insight into how those things make you feel and how they change the way your day goes. It can be a whole lot of fun and useful too!
Watch Samuel L. Jackson Talk About Character
Where better to learn about acting than from one of the masters? In this video, Samuel L. Jackson talks about the importance of building a character and how to do it.
Conclusion
Here is a very general guide on how to create a character. If you follow these steps you will be able to fully transform into your character. It is a demanding and difficult part of acting, but extremely rewarding when done thoroughly. While character creation isn’t everything that goes into playing a part, it is a very big part of it and an important thing to master.
Thank you so much for reading, I hope this post has been helpful and please feel free to message me with any questions.
