You bring up a good point… Which is always an outstanding reason to have at least two or three people you trust to read/proofread your scripts.

Sometimes, you’re so CLOSE to the writing and the story that to some, those oh so obvious elements are no longer obvious.

Unk

I once changed a character’s name to JAKE, but must have had The Blues Brothers on my mind, because I inadvertently called the character ELWOOD several times. I ultimately liked ELWOOD better and changed all of the JAKEs.

Unk

;-)

Just kidding. His name is Unk.

- E.

It can absolutely work especially if you’re making it part of the story in some way… Like in DIE HARD we saw two Agent Johnsons. The comedic effect was perfect…

MovieQuill/Todd,

What happens when you go to the pound and they ALL come crawling to you?

I just ask because it happens to me every time I go…

Unk

All I can say about having two characters with the same first name is that you might consider having some kind of reason for that otherwise, most professionals reading it are going to wonder and actually LOOK for that reason and if there is none, then they’ll wonder why. I would never tell anyone NOT to do it — just have a reason TO DO IT. You say that having the two Todds is crucial to the story so I’m assuming there’s a reason to do it that way… There’s always exceptions for any type of guidelines…

Actors reading for FAT COP? Trust me, there would be a friggin’ line out the door of actors reading for such a part… But I was talking about even minor parts. Most of the people I know (myself included) would rather see a character name that gives us a visual image. A name like FAT COP tells us a couple of things… 1) The character is a fat cop. 2) It’s obviously a minor part that we really do not have to concern ourselves with remembering much about except what happens right then and there with the character. When you give a minor character an actual first name or first and last name, we can’t help but wonder how large a part this character has and we subconsciously search for him or her as we read on. Normally, when we see a character name that simply helps push an image into our mind’s eye, we instinctively know that this is a minor character and probably a very short part.

Of course on the other hand, I’ve read scripts where a major character was given a visual image character name instead of an actual name and even though it worked, since the character was a major character, I would have just as soon seen him given a real name… First. First and last. A nickname.

I guess what I’m saying is that normally, we’re used to seeing minor characters given names like COP #1, COP #2, FAT COP, VEGETARIAN COP, whatever… When we see that name, it’s kind of a cue that tells us not to worry too much about that character as opposed to giving a very minor character a real name… When that happens, we instinctively wonder when that character will return. Needless to say… It’s a thin line and we all have our preferences.

Webs,

No… the script with the alliteration had nothing to do with a comic book… If it had, that would have been fine… What it really comes down to is WHY include anything that MIGHT take a professional out of the story? Fine if there’s a reason… Make sure it’s CLEAR to whomever’s going to read it. If there’s no reason for it, why do it? Like I said in the post, I had to go back and see if there was something I missed. The names were so contrived that I couldn’t help but think I missed the reason for it.

I didn’t because it wasn’t there… LOL.

Unk