About Tone Tone Tone
Post 558:
I was watching Barry last night on the HBO. Great stuff and everything, but this isn’t a review. I might do one that applies to the show, but today I’m using it as an example of handling tone.
Tone is big when you’re telling a story. One of the biggest. Sometimes dudes and ladies think of it last. Mistake.
For instance, Barry is a comedy and a drama and a love story and a crime story with whimsy and brutal violence, self-reflection and heedless hilarity.
This has to be managed with caution. You don’t want the funny moment subverted by the darkness in the story or vice versa. I think one could probably file the whole show as some sort of absurdist postmodern blah blah blah give-me-a-break thing.
But I’m not a jerk.
So I won’t.
I’ll say it’s a comedy when it’s funny. A drama when it’s dramatic. You get my point.
If you’re writing something with publication in mind, you’re going to get people telling you to keep the tone consistent. They may be right, or they may be an asshole with a one-dimensional brain. You have to figure that out.
You need a plan. The writers of Barry sure have one. They aren’t dumb. They take the story of a hit man wanting to be an actor and play those two incongruous professions against each other. One profession serves to elucidate the ridiculousness of the other, all the while giving the audience enough about being a badass actor and a badass soldier to make you reset and respect each job.
It’s an interesting bit of work, and it is a serious study in tonal manipulation.
I like all the changes they throw in Barry. I also like a consistent tone. If you’re writing straight-ahead murder mystery, it probably doesn’t make sense to go crashing through the convention cones.
Just have a tonal plan. It doesn’t have to be completely set in stone—obviously—but get something going in your brain, as you would when considering the plot and the characters.
This is probably something they teach on the first day of creative writing class. Who cares. There’s nothing worse than a class on creativity. Boring! Plus free! Yay!
Get your tone on. Cheers and see you after.
