Want to write a script for an actress playing two roles.
Any advice/tips -- any and all input graciously accepted.
Thanks.
Any advice/tips -- any and all input graciously accepted.
Thanks.
Duo Role for Actress
- Thread starter abwriter10
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I've seen it many times, both on Broadway and in community theatre, where I presume it's a budget issue rather than an artistic choice.
You know how you have a page with the characters and a few words about each? That's where you note that they're the same actor.
JOE... a brilliant college student with hygiene issues
PROFESSOR SANTOS/CLEAN JEAN... a professor nearing retirement/the bitter dorm custodian
MAGGIE/DORCAS... a pretty student on whom Joe has a crush/a plain, brilliant student seeking Joe's attention
Then within the script, you act as if they're entirely different actors and make no mention of the fact that one actor is playing two roles. In production, it won't be the playwright's decision whether they are or aren't.
I've seen some really good plays written for this kind of thing, and it's pretty amazing how the actor can be so different in two roles.
You do have to be careful, of course, that they're never on stage at the same moment, not even in passing, and that the appearance of each character allows times for costume changes as needed.
Maryn, curious why you're planning for this
You know how you have a page with the characters and a few words about each? That's where you note that they're the same actor.
JOE... a brilliant college student with hygiene issues
PROFESSOR SANTOS/CLEAN JEAN... a professor nearing retirement/the bitter dorm custodian
MAGGIE/DORCAS... a pretty student on whom Joe has a crush/a plain, brilliant student seeking Joe's attention
Then within the script, you act as if they're entirely different actors and make no mention of the fact that one actor is playing two roles. In production, it won't be the playwright's decision whether they are or aren't.
I've seen some really good plays written for this kind of thing, and it's pretty amazing how the actor can be so different in two roles.
You do have to be careful, of course, that they're never on stage at the same moment, not even in passing, and that the appearance of each character allows times for costume changes as needed.
Maryn, curious why you're planning for this
Dick van Dyke and Mel Brooks have both played multiple roles within a film. I know animation isn't the same, but Seth MacFarlane voices about half the cast of Family Guy. I saw a production of Wicked in Boston that a couple of the smaller roles were played by the same actors as well.
My experience with scripts is that it's the name of the character rather than the actor playing the role. I've been on the performance side rather than the writing side, for whatever that's worth.
So it's DOCTOR FRED and DOCTOR NICK rather than Joe Schmoe as FRED and Joe Schmoe as NICK.
Not sure why two roles are predestined to be played by the same person, but +1 to Maryn's comment on making sure those two roles don't meet and allow time for costume changes.
My experience with scripts is that it's the name of the character rather than the actor playing the role. I've been on the performance side rather than the writing side, for whatever that's worth.
So it's DOCTOR FRED and DOCTOR NICK rather than Joe Schmoe as FRED and Joe Schmoe as NICK.
Not sure why two roles are predestined to be played by the same person, but +1 to Maryn's comment on making sure those two roles don't meet and allow time for costume changes.
Thanks for the replies.
The technical part of "combining" the two roles, e.g. talking to each other, can be handled post-production.
The storyline calls for twins.
Princess Switch is the only current duo-role film I can think of. Can anyone think of any other current ones?
I was thinking are there any storyline "quirks" that I should be aware of.
The technical part of "combining" the two roles, e.g. talking to each other, can be handled post-production.
The storyline calls for twins.
Princess Switch is the only current duo-role film I can think of. Can anyone think of any other current ones?
I was thinking are there any storyline "quirks" that I should be aware of.
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The only ones I can think of offhand are older, like The Parent Trap or Eddie Murphy's The Nutty Professor (where he plays his entire family and a few other characters.) I found this list of films and TV shows ranging from classics to modern with people who played twins (or clones). It has a few from the last 5 years that I've never heard of, but they might give you the leads or ideas you're looking for.
I think I may have leapt to an incorrect assumption. This is for TV or film, rather than the stage?
It's not the screenwriter's call how the effect of twins (or clones, or invisible people, or characters who turn into monsters) is created. That's up to whoever does their production design and effects. Most likely twins would be one actor playing both characters, with body doubles seen from the back or their faces blocked when they're in the same scene--but you wouldn't write that in, because whatever problems that presents in filming are not yours to solve. Your whole job is to tell the story that includes the twins.
You'd write it as two individuals, which is what twins are, after all. The first time each is introduced, their brief character description should note they're identical twins as well as note any ways in which their appearance is radically different.
Make sense? It would probably serve you well to read screenplays--what they filmed from, not transcripts--for movies or TV shows with twins played by a single person, especially recent ones that were not scripted by the director-producer.
Maryn, who has no twin
It's not the screenwriter's call how the effect of twins (or clones, or invisible people, or characters who turn into monsters) is created. That's up to whoever does their production design and effects. Most likely twins would be one actor playing both characters, with body doubles seen from the back or their faces blocked when they're in the same scene--but you wouldn't write that in, because whatever problems that presents in filming are not yours to solve. Your whole job is to tell the story that includes the twins.
You'd write it as two individuals, which is what twins are, after all. The first time each is introduced, their brief character description should note they're identical twins as well as note any ways in which their appearance is radically different.
INT. HALLWAY - SUBURBAN HOUSE - DAY
KARYN, dressed in pink and ruffles, pauses at the door to her identical twin sister's room and pushes it open. Everything is black or deep purple: draped lace, skeletons, skulls, and coffins. Her sister MARYN, dressed in full-black goth, closes the door in Karyn's face without a word.
Make sense? It would probably serve you well to read screenplays--what they filmed from, not transcripts--for movies or TV shows with twins played by a single person, especially recent ones that were not scripted by the director-producer.
Maryn, who has no twin
There's usually one reason for a single actor to play two or more roles, and that's to create a tour-de-force - in essence, to showcase the actor's skill in shifting between the characters, and the filmmakers' ability in stitching the parts together seamlessly. That said, there's nothing new about this kind of casting, particularly when it comes to twins. For example, I date back far enough to remember The Patty Duke Show from the 1960s, in which the teenaged star played "identical cousins," one a bouncy NYC-based extrovert and the other a more demure, sophisticated girl with a sort-of British accent. And in the movies, the single-actor-playing-twins schtick dates back even further.
It's so easy to accomplish this particular variety of stunt casting now, in the age of CGI and other special effects, that the idea isn't particularly compelling anymore. (I mean, think of the multiple Agent Smiths in the second Matrix film.) IMO, you may have the cart before the horse here: your "storyline quirk" should drive the need to cast a single actor in dual roles, and not the other way around.
It's so easy to accomplish this particular variety of stunt casting now, in the age of CGI and other special effects, that the idea isn't particularly compelling anymore. (I mean, think of the multiple Agent Smiths in the second Matrix film.) IMO, you may have the cart before the horse here: your "storyline quirk" should drive the need to cast a single actor in dual roles, and not the other way around.
Is this a case where the two characters are a single individual? Say, one is a pop star persona and the other is the same character in their everyday life? Or is it twins/dopplegangers, where the two appear identical but are actually two separate people?
It does seem obvious that two parts could not be on stage at the same time, but could be on screen interacting using special effects such as green screens.
It does seem obvious that two parts could not be on stage at the same time, but could be on screen interacting using special effects such as green screens.
Yes - this is for a film
Yes - one character playing two roles.
Yes - searching for actual scripts (just found transcripts so far but still looking.)
Yes and thanks for your input -- exactly what I'd hope I'd get from you guys.
Yes, yes, yes to the Patty Duke show -- the first show that popped in my mind when I started thinking of this.
Yes - one character playing two roles.
Yes - searching for actual scripts (just found transcripts so far but still looking.)
Yes and thanks for your input -- exactly what I'd hope I'd get from you guys.
Yes, yes, yes to the Patty Duke show -- the first show that popped in my mind when I started thinking of this.
I'm confused. At the top of the thead you said "one actress playing two roles." Now you're saying one character? I don't get it. Aren't the two roles two different characters? How can one character play two roles? Is the character the same person, but in parallel dimensions or different periods of time that somehow intersect?
On another note, since some of us are citing examples, I'd like to put in a word for David Cronenberg's horror flick Dead Ringers, in which Jeremy Irons plays twin gynecologists who are up to some creepy stuff. Not Cronenberg's best known film, and maybe the plot does get needlessly convoluted, but I really like it for its overall weirdness and for the great Jeremy Irons.
Oh yes! One of the few Christopher Nolan films I've seen. I recently watched it again. Michael Caine in a great role. And David Bowie as Nikola Tesla!
I put together a list. (Takes a bow for high-level work avoidance skills.) I would seek shooting scripts at Drew's Script-O-Rama. Some will be Word documents, but most will be PDFs.
Adaptation
Austin Powers franchise
Big Business
Boondock Saints
Bowfinger
Constantine
Counterpart (limited series)
Dead Ringer
Dead Ringers
Double Impact
Friends (TV series)
Harry Potter franchise
I Know This Much is True (limited series)
I Know Who Killed Me
Jack and Jill
Leaves of Grass
Legend
Living With Yourself (limited series)
The Man in the Iron Mask
Me, Myself, and Irene
Multiplicity
Orphan Black (limited series)
The Parent Trap
The Patty Duke Show (TV series)
The Prestige
Princess Switch
A Simple Favor
The Social Network
Split
Two Dragons
I took a peek at the first four I found, all produced with one actor in two roles, playing their own identical twin. In all cases, the roles were written with the relationship spelled out when the audience first sees they're the same, then treated as two separate characters who could literally have been played by two actors, like Schwarzenegger and DeVito in Twins.
Adaptation
Austin Powers franchise
Big Business
Boondock Saints
Bowfinger
Constantine
Counterpart (limited series)
Dead Ringer
Dead Ringers
Double Impact
Friends (TV series)
Harry Potter franchise
I Know This Much is True (limited series)
I Know Who Killed Me
Jack and Jill
Leaves of Grass
Legend
Living With Yourself (limited series)
The Man in the Iron Mask
Me, Myself, and Irene
Multiplicity
Orphan Black (limited series)
The Parent Trap
The Patty Duke Show (TV series)
The Prestige
Princess Switch
A Simple Favor
The Social Network
Split
Two Dragons
I took a peek at the first four I found, all produced with one actor in two roles, playing their own identical twin. In all cases, the roles were written with the relationship spelled out when the audience first sees they're the same, then treated as two separate characters who could literally have been played by two actors, like Schwarzenegger and DeVito in Twins.