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The blog title this week comes to me courtesy of the BBC television program (or as they spell it in the former Motherland across the pond of the Atlantic, “programme”) called Blackadder. The premise was basically an excuse to insert a hitherto unknown and unrecorded total bastard known as Edmund Blackadder into satirical recreations of historical events and let hilarity ensue. Aside from showcasing a pre-House Hugh Laurie using his native English accent, the series is perhaps best remembered for its elaborately overblown put-downs, threats, and other choice bits of dialog. To whit:
“Must it end this way, Baldrick? Am I to cut you into thin strips and tell the Prince that you walked on an extremely sharp grid wearing a heavy hat?”
Our blog title is another quote where our bastard in question brags about his plotting; his cunning plan. A plan “so cunning you could put a tail on it and call it a weasel.”
It’s a great line, but pursuant to recent discussions in this very column I can’t really see any of my characters expressing themselves like that. Out of everyone Chuck might be most likely to wax (pseudo)eloquent but let’s face it, he’s not a BBC kind of guy. Half-remembered Monty Python movies, at best.
Anyhow, if it’s a choice between clever dialog and consistent character I’ll try to err on the side of character every time. And sometimes the dialog will end up clever anyhow, but on their own terms.