About Quiz Show and Character
Post 1329:
I like to stay on top of current events, so I recently checked out Quiz Show, a movie from about thirty years ago. I have my finger on the pulse.
What a movie. From a writing perspective, there’s a lot to learn about characters. From a life standpoint, there’s a lot to learn about character.
The story is about a real smart dude named Charlie, from a dynasty of real smart dudes back in the day. He’s doing alright, but he lives in the shadow of his more accomplished family members. For a pampered Ivy League brat teaching other Ivy League brats, he’s actually a pretty nice guy. He’s written and portrayed with a kind of boyish innocence, even though he’s about to do a bad thing.
The story revolves around a classic Faustian bargain. I guess it’s also referred to as a deal with the devil. Robert Johnson at the Crossroads. Anyway, like Faust, Charlie has to give up his soul for fame and fortune, spitting out rehearsed answers on a TV show like he’s coming up with the answers himself.
So there’s Charlie. He enjoys the fruits of this tainted bargain, as much as he can. But he’s got a conscience. It eats at him. He goes through cycles of justification and guilt, like any decent person doing the wrong thing would. I think it’s smartly written. You see the pressure of his family and the way he’s wrangled into the deal before he has that much time to think about it. Still, he’s a liar and a cheat. But who’s he hurting? And wouldn’t you take a crap ton of cash to go on a show? Are there really any victims? The people at home watching on their televisions love Charlie. They want him to win. His intellectual erudition gets kids interested in studying. Maybe Charlie’s a hero.
Nope. But the things we tell ourselves. Anyway, you can’t be a liar and a hero. But that doesn’t mean we can’t identify with his plight. Written by someone less adept, we’d simply think the guy was a complete jackass. But it’s more complicated. More complicated means more interesting.
Okay, that's Charlie. Now let’s talk about Goodwin. He’s another Ivy League guy trying to find out if the shows are corrupt. He’s sent by Congress. Goodwin is the good guy here with an appropriate name, the one with pure intentions. His character wants the truth. But he’s no paragon on a perch. First, he works for Congress, and a lawyer coming from Washington to find corruption in someone else is sort of a funny concept. Second, he’s ambitious. Taking down NBC would be a big feather in his cap. But Goodwin likes Charlie. He’s got a heart. He doesn’t want to ruin people, even though he’s being willfully naive, thinking that his investigation won’t seriously mess up the lives of Charlie and others that were on this frigging show. He finds that getting to the truth isn’t simple. In the end the big shots get away clean and the smaller guys like Charlie take the fall. It’s a small victory, but Goodwin is a decent person that wanted to expose corruption on a larger scale. So much for that.
Quiz Show gives us the perspectives of these two men. One is right, the other wrong. But it’s the nuance that makes it a compelling story. Charlie and Goodwin have their motivations and they’re both young and eager to make their marks. We get to see them as real people, wrestling with good and bad, light and dark.
Not all characters can have this depth. But main characters should. The more layers, the more we identify. Because we’re complicated ourselves. Take me, for example. I can’t decide whether I want to play video games or watch Netflix tonight. Should I do the laundry or the dishes? The questions that try men’s souls.
Ultimately, Quiz Show helps us understand that to be a decent person, winning is not enough. For people that don’t care about being decent, winning is great. They go along smiling with big fake white teeth without feeling a thing in their tiny black hearts. Just ask the next politician or entertainment exec you meet. They’ll tell you: They’re in the business of giving people what they want. Simple.
Why couldn’t I get a tiny black heart? Whatever. I got to figure out this whole laundry/dish dilemma. Cheers and see you after.
