ABSTRACT
A character is really nothing more than a perspective or collection of sentiments that are at least slightly different from your own everyday perspective. A character is an outlook that is typically not yours. However, one of the reasons movie actors come to be typecast, playing very similar roles from one film to the next, is because they are able to relate strongly to that “type” of character. In other words, the character closely resembles at least one aspect of the actor’s real experience or personality. In fact, this is precisely what often makes a character a character, namely that it is but a single aspect of a personality, theatrically exaggerated to dominate the entire person. In the film The Silence of the Lambs, Anthony Hopkins’s character is that of a psychotic, emotionally detached, brilliant serial killer. I don’t for a moment believe that in real life Hopkins is like that. I do, however, believe that some part of his real personality can at least relate to the idea of being emotionally cut off and of harboring monstrous, profound malice toward others.
