Who’s Playing Who?
Some thoughts on ‘dream casting’ — plus a free short story about mistaken identity — and news about an online sci fi and fantasy convention
The dance of the imagination is a fascinating one, especially when the inner world of one human meets another’s. But does this tango emerge randomly from the magic of individual minds or is it predestined by cultural conditioning?
Another author recently asked me to cast an eye over an early draft of a short story, which I was delighted to do, as I love this writer’s work. And indeed it was another delightful expression of his distinctive vision, but then, my own imagination stumbled face-first over an unexpected obstacle.
As I have a tendency to do, I had immediately cast one of the characters in this story by visualising a particular screen personality. In this case, could hear his delivery of the dialogue, see him walking around a set that I had built in my head from the given clues. I watched him perform gestures and actions that may or may not have been described, but which I had animated in my mind.
You may not know the name Adrian Scarborough, but you would likely recognise him on screen. For me, this reliable ‘character’ actor provided a personal short cut to incarnating one of the two protagonists in the story, a character referred to through much of the narrative only as ‘the curator.’ Curiously, I did not so clearly visualise the main character from whose point of view the story is told, the type of ‘Everyman’ thrust into a strange situation that this author excels at creating, but the irony did not escape me that the story is about mistaken identity.
So what was my own ‘mistake’? Well, towards the end of the draft, the author suddenly dropped in a ‘her’ to describe the gender of ‘the curator’. (I should clarify immediately that this is not an incisive social comment piece about our wider assumptions and prejudices regarding gender. Those have been, and will be written by people far more qualified and perceptive than I.) But this was a reminder about the myriad assumptions most of us probably make every day… and the process of investigating and unravelling those reflexes.
Having said that, who knows, Adrian Scarborough might well be capable of very some convincing and entertaining drag, and maybe it was an epic failure of the imagination on my part not to make that smooth gear change as I kept reading. Or to have simply recast the role with Imelda Staunton, and gone back to the beginning of the tale.
(For those interested in the reading the story that inspired this post, there is a free link to it on the Breakthrough Books Substack at the end.)
But, back to the point… my shock at having to re-assess the character that I had come to ‘know’ so well in only a few paragraphs sent me off on a tangent. It made me think not only about the conclusions we jump to, but also about this tendency we have to immediately envision the personalities in a story — perhaps with a unique image mocked up in one’s head or perhaps by seeing a ‘real’ person/actor playing the part. And this might just as easily apply to fiction or non-fiction. Sometimes I ‘see’ the subjects of a news article when it does not feature any relevant photographs, or is not about well known figures.
And we so often automatically stereotype, don’t we? On the flip side, we may often also miss the chance to perceive a story’s characters as diverse. (Speak for yourself, Stephanie! Yes, I realise there will be many exceptions here, especially those with more agile minds who have trained themselves more successfully to look at the world differently.)
But I also wonder whether visual artists might escape these tendencies and undertake more original acts of inner creativity, painting entirely unique characters in their heads whenever they encounter a non-prescriptive narrative? (I would love to hear from any such artists with their perspective on all of this.) Maybe it’s just those of us who watch too much film and television who do the advance work on behalf of a casting director?
Fan fiction? An imagining of “Sarah” from Bone Lines, by Eli Allison
It’s not just when reading, of course, but when writing (if you’re a writer) that you may populate a scene, or indeed an entire book, with familiar faces. An act that has the potential to both limit and inspire, and so is best employed cautiously and flexibly, especially as subtly altered versions of each character develop and acquire their own distinctions.
But I also have to wonder whether modern life in general and social media in particular — in which visualisations are often force-fed to us moment by moment (especially in the age of AI) — might be making this work of the mind’s eye redundant. Is the balance shifting (or being pushed) from individual imaginative agency to more of a homogenised ‘groupsee’? I certainly notice that the heroes and heroines on the illustrated covers of certain genre novels tend to look remarkably alike, if not actually like anyone in particular.
Of course, the feedback loop of culture enables us to visualise stories in this way only because we already have certain images — or preferences — in our heads. It makes me wonder what readers ‘saw’ when enjoying a book before the birth of cinema. The face of a laughing cavalier perhaps, or a sombre couple getting married, or a serving girl wearing an earring above her station.
Photo by sıtkı aksoy on Unsplash
(Random pup! Couldn’t find a free image of the actual ‘Laughing Cavalier’ painting, but this grinning cavalier spaniel made me smile, so I thought it was worth sharing instead)
Photo by Hynek Janáč on Unsplash
(pre-computer age recollections of the iconic lassie with the pearl earring probably wouldn’t have been pixelated in people’s minds, but then imagination and memory can do strange things. Especially if we are all living in a simulation?)
Maybe readers from other eras saw something closer to home… perhaps the village butcher, a dancing warrior, an admired elder, the profile on a coin, a girl dancing around a May pole. Would they have added their own voices and mannerisms too, as the characters from whichever books they were reading began to move around and interact with each other?
Would there have been a similar process with oral storytelling? (Something that plays a significant part in the prehistoric sections of my Children of Sarah books.) How descriptive and explicit would the storyteller have had to be, or would each campfire listener have created their own inner picture of the tale’s protagonist — human, animal or supernatural — based on whatever information was stored, from whatever they had encountered in their own ancient worlds? Or, after sighting themselves in a still body of water, did they project their own faces onto the personas in the story?
Maybe many a modern novelist gets away with a more pared-down literary shorthand, because they know readers will apply their own overflowing brain-banks to fill in the blanks… But what of those genetically or otherwise unable to create pictures in the mind’s eye, what is the reading or listening experience like for them?
All these questions, and my misgendering of my friend’s story, has made me think once again about who I would enjoy interpreting the various characters in any adaptations of The Children of Sarah books. I did have certain faces and voices flowing in and out of view while I was writing, but those have evolved over the years, especially as certain actors have grown beyond the appropriate age range, and indeed as the characters themselves underwent their own unique evolutions. (The books were first conceived 20 years ago.)
So, I decided to search my own all too busy ‘movie’ mind once again — and come up with my latest dream cast list. Some choices were obvious, and recognisable as A-Listers — but for others I had to do a little research. This was actually great fun, looking for the right character actors for some roles, but also thinking about lesser known, or indeed potential “breakout” stars.
Diversity was also a consideration. Some choices, such as for the “ancestral” characters in prehistory, are guided by what DNA tells us about human morphology — and the relevant locations in the books — 70k years ago. Some of the modern characters were instructed by a known genetic heritage in their particular histories and tied to a specific geography, and this also reflects certain themes within the books (for example, variations in eye colour being a strong motif).
But as other modern characters developed, even into the writing of book 2, I began to see them as particular ethnicities, sometimes differing from how they first came to mind, especially if I had not been specific about it previously. Having said that, I would welcome any fluidity — including of gender — in much of my ‘dream-casting’ as it stands, should these stories ever make it to the screen. Those initial images in my mind have long since served their purpose and are ready to be handed over.
So, here’s my current (open to inspiration) cast list:
“Sarah” in Bone Lines – the pregnant young prehistoric shaman and sole survivor of her tribe, who goes on a marathon journey of survival: Zendaya
Dr Eloise Kluft – the genetic scientist in the modern narrative, who is investigating “Sarah’s” remains in Bone Lines, and attempting to prevent the next pandemic in The Fire in Their Eyes: Cate Blanchett or Emily Blunt
Tom – Eloise’s younger on/off lover: Tom Blyth (Billy The Kid, Hunger Games, People We Meet on Vacation, etc.) Or, maybe here’s that opportunity to discover a breakout star? This character first arrived in my head about 15 years ago, there have been various other visualisations of him over the years, including a number of other acting ‘Toms’ — and so, hey, perhaps here’s the seed of a different blog on nominative determinism? (To be fair, I should acknowledge that this character was also a wee bit influenced by my former partner.)
Darius – Eloise’s archaeologist ex, who has partly middle-eastern origins, and entirely unrelated to that, an ego the size of Mt Kenya, where he continues to work on the “Sarah” dig: Kal Naga (from Vikings and Messiah, among others) Once upon a time it might have been Omar Shariff.
KC – Eloise’s close friend and colleague in genetic science, who hails from the US: Daniel Henney (The Wheel of Time) or Henry Golding (Snake Eyes, Nine Perfect Strangers, The Gentlemen)
Max – the young rock-climbing and surfing Aussie astrophysicist / aspiring TV boffin who found “Sarah’s” bones on Mt Kenya during a climbing accident: Charlie Vickers (of Sauron in Rings of Power fame, but with blue contacts and, of course, the appropriate wig for Max’s long, blonde, curly locks) or, Sam Reid – Interview With The Vampire (TV version)
Jessica – the psychiatric nurse caring for Calumn, married to Max and mother-to-be: Florence Pugh (well, I said I was dream casting!) Originally I saw Jodhi May in this role (Last of the Mohicans, The Witcher)
The Old Woman – “Sarah’s” daughter, the respected shaman and storyteller of her tribe in The Fire In Their Eyes: Noma Dumezweni (Murderbot) or Naomie Harris, aged up — I once saw her as Sarah! (28 Days Later, Moonlight, and a couple of Bonds as Moneypenny.) Both would need “fiery” contacts, though!
The Outsider – the stranger who turns up at The Old Woman’s camp — and who may or may not be related to her: Daryl McCormack (Peaky Blinders, Bad Sisters, The Wheel of Time)
The Warrior – The Old Woman’s grandson in Fire — same actor could play Sarah’s lover (so his own great-grandfather) in Bone Lines?: Aaron Pierre (The Morning Show, Rebel Ridge, The Underground Railroad)
Rev John Evesham – of Anglo-Indian heritage, friend to Eloise and Jessica, pastor to the incarcerated arsonist Calum: Navin Chowdhry (Star Wars, Doctor Foster, Eastenders)
Calumn – the tall, thin arsonist who tries to burn “Sarah’s” bones in book one, and is in secure psychiatric care in book two: Peter Capaldi, (Dr Who, The Thick of It, Paddington) though again, he is slightly out of age range now. So, if I’m really tripping into fantasy worlds once more… Tom Hiddleston! (With a good makeup job to somewhat disguise his attractiveness.)
Eddie Briggs – a powerfully built, violent offender in the same psychiatric facility as Calumn: A Tom Hardy cameo! (Yes, I know, the dreaming is off the scale here!)
So, what do you think… and who would play who in any of your stories, or in the ideal adaptations of any of your favourite books?
At this point, I’d also like to let any interest parties know about Wiscon, an online feminist sci fi and fantasy conference taking place from 21st to 25th of May. I will be participating on a couple of panels, Ways of Knowing (with Women’s Prize for Fiction longlisted author Lulu Allison!) 1pm US Central time, 7pm GMT on Saturday 23rd, plus the session on Pluribus and readings on the Sunday. Here’s the public schedule.
Now: As promised, here’s the link to that free story, The Wrong Books, by Jamie Chipperfield.
Spoiler alert: If you do read, you may notice that the author edited out the late ‘her’ after I mentioned my experience and told him, just for fun, who I had seen as the curator character, and decided to leave this completely to the imagination of the reader. Whether or not my input was helpful it’s hard to say but sometimes the development of writing can take a sudden twist or turn through consultation, for better or worse. I didn’t mean to influence him — or any reader — by sharing my visualisation, but he seems more than happy to leave that character entirely open to individual interpretation now. So, sorry for any spoilers (or uninvited influences on the imagination) with this story, but it would be interesting to know whether anyone agrees or disagrees with my casting of the role of ‘the curator’ and whether or not they see any other actor, of any other gender identity, playing the part?
