How to Cook a Protagonist (And Other Ingredients)

Let us talk about story.

This is a wierd one because I believe everyone knows what makes a story.

So I will not be saying anything unknown.

Last production I devised, I asked, "what makes a story?" and I received the blankest of stares.

30 second rant:

I don't think that learning actors/artists are ignorant.

I believe that through education learning artists believe they are ignorant.

So often the lesson is: wrong, do it this way. Wrong, your instincts are innacurate.

I have been told I don't know how to breathe "properly".

I have had actors say: "I think he stands better than me."

Where does this come from?

Who teaches us this?

I think teachers mostly. Directly and indirectly.

The notion that we, as learning artists, are not enough in an institutional setting is highly prevalent.

We need to take care of young and learning artists because they are the best resources to have.

Convincing them they do not have a grasp of story, so much so that they are paralyzed when asked about it, is inexcusable.

End rant.

So what makes story?

This may not be the only answer and it can vary:

Classically:

1) Beginning

2) Middle

3) End

How do you define these?

Based on what is referred to as the protagonist.

Protagonist: the character who changes the most or has the most changed about their world.

In Hamlet/King Lear, you can be sure it is Hamlet and Lear. Hamlet kills the most and dies last. Lear goes insane the most and dies last.

However in Othello/Julius Caesar, it is very much Iago and Brutus. Iago, after a four hour monologue says, "I'll speak no more.

How can we tell who is our protagonist?

Circumstances. I go with context clues:

1) Who is onstage the most?

2) Who is left standing/victorious/destroyed by the story?

3) Who begins/ends a play?

Ultimately a protagonist boils down to:

Through whose perspective do we see the story? Through what lens?

This gets hard/interesting with stories like Three Sisters.

In it you have Irinia, Masha, and Olga. Threee ladies. Three protagonists?

I would contend three possible protagonists.

It is a director's/ensemble's joint effort to decide/discover just who is telling the story.

Is it the eldest sister, Olga, longing for a young man to sweep her away from her work?

Is it the middle sister, Masha, who longs for escape from her stifling husband?

I maintain it is the youngest, Irina. (spoilers)

She begins the play with her hope for a new day and she has the final tragic moment.

Her sisters' hopes are dependent on the suitor Vershinin who abandons them to their provencal life.

Theirs vanishes with Vershinin's exit in the middle of Act IV.

It is not until the death of Tusenbach, Irina's husband, at the end of Act IV that it is revealed no one will be leaving for Moscow and the tragic nature of the play is revealed.

Therefore, only once Irina has lost hope is the tragedy complete.

Ergo, she is the tragic protagonist.

Now, the antagonist is what/who is pitted against the protagonist.

The opposing force in the universe.

This is not necessarily good guy/bad guy relationship.

Take a look at Richard III. Unequivocally one of the evillest bastards...ever! (He kills the little children).

But, undoubtedly he is the protagonist of the story.

With Lear it is even worse: Lear (protagonist) starts the play by banishing his youngest daughter and refusing her dowry. Edmund (antagonist) starts the play by arguing he has never been treated kindly by anyone and has been made vengeful becaue of it.

The beginning is the protagonist's stasis (their world as it is) and the displacement/introduction to the main conflict (the new world order)

The end is the final conflict between protagonist and antagonist, along with outcome/result of the main conflict (new stasis)

The middle is the events between these two poles of beginning and end.

The rest (classically) is just set dressing.

From this you can create a narrative, a scene, a whole story.

This is not foolproof.

It is not complete, but it is a starting point.

Most stories will have at least these ingredients.

So when dealing with something like a devised piece or a thorny play:

What  is the beginning, middle, and end?

Who is the protagonist/antagonist?

In Faust, all we could agree on is that the stasis is the begining few scenes.

Faust is bored/lonely in the beginning.

It is not until the sumoning that he discovers a possible friend and intellectual equal in Mephistopheles.

This or the signing of the contract is the first major event.

The major events are the changes between beginning, middle, and end.

The end being Faust's change in fortune: his dargging to hell (or ascension to Heaven, depending on text)

So moving forward for weeks we worked on the play with Faust as the protagonist.

He iis the lens of the play.

But, then we added n introduction to the play: Mephistopheles and God meeting in Heaven.

The wager they make and the final scene made it Mephistopheles's play.

Suddenly the dramatic question was no longer about Faust: Is he redeemable?

But it became about Mephistopheles: Is Mephisto greater than God?