I recently took a five-week online class on adapting acting techniques to fiction writing taught by Barbara A. Barnett for Odyssey. I was intrigued by the idea, especially because acting is a topic I knew nothing about. I’ve never taken an acting class or studied theater or film.

In fact, I don’t watch movies (the last movie I saw was in 2019. It was Beetlejuice, in case you’re curious), and the only play I saw during that period was one high school production of Footloose.

Meaning, I assumed I had a lot to learn.

And indeed, there were a lot of theories, approaches, and methods, but it really boiled down to that same piece of writing advice you’ve heard said over and over and over:

SHOW DON’T TELL.

Show Your Stuff via Goals

Actors have to show. They have no interiority (unless they’re using voiceovers, but I believe that’s still quite rare). To convey an emotion, a desire, or a goal, they need to do something (show).

One of the most useful points we discussed was the importance of characters having goals and acting (no pun intended) on them. These scene-level goals were called “action objectives.” Action objects must be (1) possible to fail, (2) true to character, and (3) specific.

The characters should have a goal in every scene, and usually it relates to the “super objective,” which is the story-specific goal. The action objective might be to break into a building unseen, which is part of a larger goal to steal the McGuffin, which is part of the super objective to defeat the Bad Guy.

I’ve seen the goalless protagonist as a common issue in the short story slush pile. This protagonist simply ambles through a series of events, which doesn’t make a compelling story. The goal (action objective) doesn’t need to be big but there should be stakes. It can be as simple as getting to school on time and thus avoiding detention.

The place I see the goalless issue most often is prior to the inciting incident. Even before the plot officially kicks off, the protagonist should have a goal. This goal gives the reader a reason to care and therefore more invested in your protagonist’s actions. It also helps the writer stay on track.

Emotion!

Barnett said actors should act out actions—not emotions. Since humans (and actors especially) can easily convey countless and complicated emotions with just a look, this surprised me.

But I think it’s a useful way to, again, think about that classic writing advice: show don’t tell. If you can turn your emotions into actions, you will definitely be showing them. This is obviously easier with big emotions. Rage, for example, is easy to show via action, whereas mild annoyance doesn’t manifest into action quite so easily.

We also discussed ways to classify emotions. One such way is into primary and secondary emotions. Primary emotions are gut reactions while secondary emotions are thinking reactions to primary emotions. Fear might be the primary emotion, and the secondary emotion might be anger. Barnett said the primary emotion is felt but the secondary emotion is observed externally.

Hence, actors portray their characters’ secondary emotions, but authors, through interiority, can actually present both.

There are five broad ways to portray emotion in written fiction:

• Physical response
• Dialogue
• Actions
• Thoughts
• Naming the emotions

Of these, actors cannot generally use the last two. Those require interiority. The first three are therefore the most “showing,” while the later two lean toward “telling.”

Developing Characters

We also discussed a few techniques actors use to get into character. One such tactic was for the actors to use their own emotions and personal experience to guide the character’s actions and reactions. For example, if their character is upset, they think of a time when they were upset and react similarly. A related tactic is to imagine themselves in the character’s circumstances.

While these can be used for developing and writing characters, I don’t love these techniques. The best book characters are larger than life. They have big reactions and big flaws. They rise above the ordinary, and they kick ass (metaphorically or otherwise). They fight dragons and question their sexuality amid the Apocalypse.

And do you know who is not a larger-than-life character?

Me.

I am boring. No one wants to read a book about me or characters who react like me (i.e., in boring, ordinary ways). It would be a total snooze fest.

But if you are a larger-than-life person who reacts in big and bold ways, I guess this can be useful advice.

Instead, when writing I imagine how the specific character would react given my knowledge of their past, goals, and the situation. This requires knowing your character well. We discussed using character sheets, which are apparently also used by some actors, to help develop depth for characters.

Advantages and Disadvantages

Movies and theater, of course, have many storytelling advantages out of reach of the novelist. The score can heighten the viewer’s emotions. A single image can convey a million details that would take pages and pages to describe. Facial expressions portray nuanced emotions that are difficult to capture with written words. Details can be hidden subtly in the background without ever being mentioned. These are all tools the fiction writer cannot use, although I have seen authors making playlists for their novels—a clear attempt to try to tap into the power of the score.

However, there are also tools better suited to the writer. The reason I prefer books to movies is the interiority that writing provides. Books give us insight into the character’s inner thoughts and feelings, the ones they hide from the world. The ones they never say aloud. This is one of the great delights of reading. It gives us a chance to be mind readers.

Writing also has the advantage of telling—which yes, can be an advantage. Instead of showing the boring stuff, we can just skip over it with a few words, e.g., “After visiting fifteen different apothecaries…”

To convey this interiority and boring information, movies must work them into dialogue, which can feel clunky or unrealistic.

Should You Think Like an Actor?

Overall, these acting techniques offer an interesting way to examine characters, but they’re not really different from traditional writing advice. If the acting metaphor is something that resonates with you, it is definitely worth exploring, and there are some books on this subject you can use to do a deeper dive. If it doesn’t resonate with you, there are plenty of other traditional writing techniques to practice character development and show emotions.

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