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More About Dialogue

© Dave Brandl

In the last article, Writing Dialogue That Speaks, I discussed writing dialogue that sounds like natural speaking. Not stilted, not flowery, but natural.

People speak in rhythms. They start and stop sentences in mid-stride. They pause while they collect their thoughts. Sometimes they speak in short sentences, sometimes the sentences go on and on. For dialogue to sound natural and, therefore, appeal to the listeners' ears, it needs some of that same rhythm.

One of my favorite playwrights, Neil Simon, likens his dialogue to music. Not only does he capture natural speaking very effectively, but he relates that when he's writing dialogue (longhand, by the way), he looks at how it appears on the paper. And as with music, he looks for visual flow and combinations of shorter and longer speeches, so that there is an attractiveness to the eye, signifying that the speeches are not all short nor all long, but vary.

In the same way that the pacing of the dialogue should vary, the voices of the speakers should also vary. It is undeniable that every character in any given play will reflect the voice of the playwright(s). To a point.

Let's say I'm writing a play about Winston Churchill. Although I have the ability to pull exact speeches of his from the history books, and while I can strive to capture his well-documented personality and delivery, there will still be many elements of me behind every speech I write for that character.

One of my main jobs, then, will be ensure that every speech I write maintains the personality of his well-known character, while at the same time infusing my own take on who he was and how he affected others. In other words, people need to recognize his character, but also be treated to a new insight into his personality.

Similarly, if I write a play about four friends, I need to infuse a unique personality into each of those four characters. One of the most common flaws I see in scriptwriting is where a playwright has several characters on stage at the same time, and they all talk exactly the same. The playwright's voice is so overpowering that every character is speaking it.

One major key to dialogue is that speeches should be unique. Each character should sound different from the others, just as people do with their speech patterns, life experiences, and methods of talking (accents, use of idioms and slang).