Character Backstories? Pfft! Who Cares!
Story first. Backstory later. Or never.
Prefer this as a video? Watch here!
Prefer this as a podcast? Listen here!
Hello! Welcome to my weekly newsletter!
Enjoy a dose of my playwriting process,
writing confessions, and all the mess in between.
Hot take: you don’t need to know your character’s childhood trauma unless it’s in the play.
You don’t need a spreadsheets of their birthdays, blood types, or how many times they’ve had sex, or god forbid — astrological charts (unless that’s literally plot-relevant).
As a playwright, your job isn’t to be their biographer.
It’s to write the moment. The now. The urgency of what’s unfolding.
But Ian, you said “make your characters real”.
Yeah, but reality doesn’t come from excessive lore. Reality comes from clarity of action. What happened for your character to be doing this? And does the audience see/hear what happened?
Every line, every silence, every gesture needs purpose.
So, leave room.
Let actors and directors ask the juicy questions.
Let them dig, interpret, layer.
That’s the magic of collaboration.
That’s the magic of theatre.
Being overly prescriptive can actually create distance and box actors in.
As someone who used to act a lot, I never wanted a full character sheet. Neither would I prepare a full character sheet. I wanted space to find them, not be told who they were.
I mean… I am stubborn. So…
Ask yourself this:
Is this detail important to the story onstage?
If yes — write it in.
If not — trust the team to find meaning in the gaps.
You’re not lazy for not writing a 10-page character bible.
You’re writing the story that matters and letting the rest to be discovered in the room.
So stop wasting time. Or using this an excuse to not get to the meat of your script.
Just write what matters.
How much backstory do you write? Does it help you?