Download Study Guide: Harper Regan

Study Guide: Harper Regan
BY: Simon Stephens
DIRECTED BY: Matthew Jocelyn
A Canadian Stage production
Mar 1-Mar 22, 2015
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Study Guide: Harper Regan
A letter to teachers and students:
Education is a vital part of what we do at Canadian Stage. We are committed to sharing material with
our audiences that will challenge, enrich and deepen their perspectives. Harper Regan, by Olivier Awardwinning playwright Simon Stephens, serves as a rich example of how contemporary theatrical text and
staging both mirrors and challenges contemporary life.
Harper Regan is an absorbing story that represents common challenges. The title character is a middleaged woman who leaves home affected by a wealth of unfortunate circumstances: Her father is on his
death bed, her boss is extraordinarily apathetic, her marriage is challenged since her husband has been
accused of pedophilia, and her daughter is a difficult teen. Harper vanishes for two days without
warning, over which time she encounters a medley of strangers and relatives. Her interactions and
experiences continue to test the relationship between eros and thanatos, sex and death.
The play will be directed by Canadian Stage Artistic and General Director, Matthew Jocelyn, whose most
recent production, Melissa James Gibson’s THIS (2013), was called “One of the best plays of this or any
other season” by NOW Magazine. Jocelyn’s thoughtful use of space and actors will add several layers to
Stephens’ text. For example, actors will be seen for most, if not all, of the duration of the performance
and their transformations into multiple characters will be visible. While it is impossible to fully anticipate
what the final production will become, I am confident that his interpretation will add symbolic
components and displays of theatrical conventions that may be analyzed as a class.
Simon Stephens’ Harper Regan is a gripping story that presents entry-points for discussions around the
meaning of loyalty, morality, and the bonds of family. Based on the script, this guide offers preliminary
context for students and teachers. It is meant to be a helpful tool in providing information as well as
strategies for utilizing a trip to this production for teaching diverse learners in a variety of subjects.
Throughout this document, connections to curriculums including Family Studies, Social Sciences,
Psychology, English, and of course Drama become evident.
Please don’t hesitate to contact me in order to discuss this exciting opportunity further.
See you at the theatre!
Cheers,
Erin Schachter, Education & Audience Development Manager
416.367.8243 x280
[email protected]
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Synopsis
Adapted from ‘Sometimes You Just Need to Get Away’ by Ben Brantley (New York Times) and
‘Harper Regan: a bittersweet drama of family life’ by Charles Spencer (The Telegraph)
One autumn evening, after learning of her father’s impending death, Harper Regan walks away from her
home, her husband, her daughter, and keeps going. She tells no one where she is going or whether she
is coming back. She has put everything that she has ever worked for at risk.
Harper goes missing for only two days, as it turns out. And she does not go very far — only the 200some miles between the outer London borough where she lives and the town in northeast England
where her parents are. Nor is there anything exotic about her itinerary: she visits a hospital, a bar, a
hotel and her mother’s house.
But the trip feels almost Homeric, an odyssey that seems to embrace all the essential primal acts of life
and death, of sex and violence. At the same time Harper Regan is specifically and resonantly topical, a
portrait of a world in which technology and the noise it generates only underscore the loneliness that
pervades a crowded planet.
Then there are the new men in Harper’s life: the student she meets on a bridge, the journalist she meets
in a bar, and the married man she meets through the internet. She will have very different physical
contact with each of these men.
The drama becomes an acutely perceptive and compassionate study of a brave and likeable woman
trying to make sense of her life after it has been blighted by several different kinds of crisis. There is an
unsentimental compassion in the writing, and a tough refusal to surrender to depression and despair.
The play insists on the need to tell the truth, but also recognises that it is impossible to get completely
inside other people's heads. Harper learns how important it is to tell people you love them, but also that
there is no point in nursing feelings of regret, fear and guilt.
Characters
Harper Regan – Attractive, insecure, yet bold; age 41.
Elwood Barnes – Harper’s boss, 65.
Tobias Rich – A 17-year-old college student that Harper meets by accident.
Seth Regan – Harper’s husband, a former architect, 43.
Sarah Regan – Harper’s and Seth’s rebellious daughter, age 17.
Justine Ross – A young, empathetic doctor who treats Harper’s dad before his death.
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Mickey Nestor – A primitive, prejudiced journalist, 29, who Harper meets in a bar.
James Fortune – A married man his late 40s who Harper meets through online.
Alison Woolley – Harper’s mother, in her 60s.
Duncan Woolley – Alison’s second husband, a kind construction contractor.
Mahesh Aslam – Duncan’s 20-something assistant, suffered permanent brain damage from football.
Theatrical Context
About the Play
Harper Regan was commissioned by the National Theatre in London, England in 2006, when Simon
Stephens was the dramatist in residence there.
“I’ve always been a writer who has enjoyed commissions... because of the provocation of writing for a
specific stage, a specific space, a specific theatre culture, and often a specific actor.” (Simon Stephens,
theatreVOICE interview)
Harper Regan premiered at the National Theatre in 2008, starring Lesley Sharp. It has also been staged
in Israel, and had its American premiere in Chicago in 2010. This production is the Canadian premiere.
Works Cited:
"Playwright Simon Stephen on Harper Regan." Interview by Aleks Sierz.TheatreVOICE. Victoria and Albert Museum,
20 Oct. 2008. Web. 5 Dec. 2014.
About the Playwright: Simon Stephens
Born in Stockport, Manchester in 1971, Simon Stephens is often considered the most prolific British
playwright of his generation. He has written over 25 plays, many of which have been produced
internationally, in Germany, France, Portugal, Sweden and the United States. He was the resident
dramatist at the Royal Court Theatre in 2001, and also taught in their Young Writer’s Programme for five
years. He was the first resident dramatist at the Royal National Theatre in 2006, and is currently an
Artistic Associate at the Lyric Theatre Hammersmith. His works have received numerous awards
including the Pearson Award for Best New Play in 2001 (Port), the Tron Theatre Award for Best New Play
in 2003 (One Minute), the Olivier Award for Best New Play in 2005 and 2013 (On the Shore of the Wide
World, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time), and the Critics` Awards for Theatre in
Scotland prize for Best New Play in 2008 (Pornography).
Often commissioned to compose new versions of classic pieces, or adaptations for the stage, his most
recent work is a stage version of Mark Haddock’s The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
which opened to great success in the West End and will be opening on Broadway later this year.
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His works have been described as having some consistent stylistic qualities: “despite being touched by
despair or haunted by death, it often flickers with deadpan wit. For all the apparent bleakness of his
scripts [...] they're bound by a sense that redemption seems, somehow, possible”
Historical / Social Background
“What’s most interesting in this play is when Harper behaves and recoils like a child, sometimes a
scolded child and sometimes a rebellious child. There’s a nakedness to her that is revealed more and
more once she is back home in Stockport.” – Simon Stephens
Adapted from: Specializing in Secrets and Their Dear Cost, a New York Times interview with Simon
Stephens (See Appendix A):
Playwright Simon Stephens grew up in Stockport, England, just as Harper Regan did. He said he loathed
the “small-town mentality” of Stockport and felt increasingly uncomfortable with the conservative
politics of his father, a successful electronics salesman who admired Margaret Thatcher. By adolescence
he dreamed of escaping to London, where he settled after attending the University of York and a stint in
Edinburgh playing in a punk band.
By now, Mr. Stephens has a new appreciation for the town, as well as for his parents. His father died in
2001 at 59, and Mr. Stephens, who is married and has three young children, has since grown closer to
his mother. Such familial fracturing and reconciliation drive the plot of Harper Regan, particularly in
scenes in which the title character returns to Stockport and faces demons from her past.
About Stockport:
Stockport is a city in the Metropolitan county of Manchester. It was once an important centre for the
textile industry – particularly hatmaking – but now relies chiefly on tourism to its heritage buildings. It is
about 300 km from Uxbridge, where Harper and her family live during the play.
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Study Links
Here are some curriculum connection points and sample discussion questions. These questions may be
used to prompt conversations in your classroom.
English/Creative Writing
Define “anti-hero” and identify examples of anti-heros from literature, film and theatre.
In which ways is Harper Regan an anti-hero? What outcomes may be foreshadowed by knowing that
our protagonist fits this description? How would her literary categorization be affected by a different
ending? Explore alternate scenarios and discuss.
Social Sciences and Humanities
“At the same time Harper Regan is specifically and resonantly topical, a portrait of a world in which
technology and the noise it generates only underscore the loneliness that pervades a crowded planet.”
In what ways is each character, including Harper Regan, affected by the time-specific characteristics of
today’s world including, for example, the existence of technologies?
Harper Regan is set in contemporary England. This production’s director has decided however not to
implement accents for his Canadian audience. Does the text of this play effectively establish our location
without the assistance of aids such as way of speech? Consider how this story may be impacted if set in
a different place or period. In what ways may each character change? Furthermore, how may their
actions or reactions have been impacted by revised cultural and social settings?
Psychology
Simon Stephens presents an array of characters throughout Harper Regan that each comes with a rich
back story and uniquely, often dramatic, set of issues. Select any character from the play to analyze from
a psychological perspective. Utilize theory and critical thought in assessing this individual.
Harper seems lost and isolated due to myriad circumstances, but catalyzed by her father’s impending
(and eventual) death. How does grief affect people? Identify different stages of grief, and some of the
steps people go through to cope with their grief. What support systems may have been effective in
helping Harper to navigate her grief so that she did not feel inclined to escape her life by disappearing
for two days?
Family Studies
Excerpt from “Specializing in Secrets and Their Dear Cost” by Ben Brantley (New York Times):
When [Simon Stephens] feels particularly challenged, he will resort to a favourite writing exercise, giving
himself 10 minutes to dash off what makes him angry, frightened, hopeful and ashamed about a given
theme he wants to explore. For Harper Regan, that theme was marriage, and the 10-minute exercise led
to a speech about companionship and hope that Seth delivers at the end of the play.
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“What I wrote in that exercise reminded me of something Jane Austen said — that you don’t fall in love
with somebody’s strengths, you fall in love with somebody’s flaws,” Mr. Stephens said. “That’s what
makes your heart stop. And it’s one of the truths that Harper and Seth come to face, as I think many
people do.
I think writers have obsessions that they return to in play after play, and I certainly have mine around
family and Stockport — whether it is possible to tell the truth, the consequences of lying and whether
it’s possible to ever go home again.”
HARPER: I wanted to be loved unconditionally and you wanted to be loved better than anybody else in
the world and I think both of us really let one another down. And I think that always happens. I see it in
Sarah. She’ll do exactly the same thing to me as I did to you. It’s completely inevitable. It’s awful. But I
never thought you’d have the nerve to lie to me about something like that.
ALISON: I wasn’t lying. I was telling you the truth.
(Stephens 79)
Meet the Regans (Harper, Seth and Sarah): Identify each family member’s unique circumstances that
may understandably impact their interactions within the familial context (for example, the fact that Seth
has been accused of pedophilia and as a result is unable to work). In your opinion, is this a believable
representation of a family?
Critically assess Harper as a mother and a wife. In what ways do you admire her behaviours? In what
ways do you think she could behave more productively? Identify from the play experiences that may
have shaped her behaviours. Repeat this exercise for Seth as a father and husband as well as for Sarah
as a daughter.
Works Cited:
Healey, Patrick. "Specializing in Secrets and Their Dear Cost." The New York Times. 7 Oct. 2012, Theater, sec.: AR4.
Print.
Literature
There is evidence that Simon Stephens was influenced by two great Ancient Greek writers while penning
Harper Regan: the poet Homer and the playwright Euripides.
In what ways can you identify the influence of Homer and Euripides in Harper Regan? Consider both the
structure and content of the play. Identify other examples of contemporary work with ancient or
classical influences.
Identify two or more interpretations of Simon Stephens’ ending. In your opinion, is this a happy ending
for Harper? What are alternate endings for this character?
Drama
Matthew Jocelyn’s concept for Harper Regan involves all of the actors being visible for the entire
duration of the production. In what other ways does his staging resemble Readers Theatre? Specifically
consider Contemporary Readers Theatre, a practice in theatre that critically considers an author’s
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written word in order to highlight themes and concepts that resonate with an audience. Augusto Boal is
considered a great influence on this practice. How are Boal’s techniques and theories consistent with
this approach? How may you connect Boal’s work to this production of Harper Regan?
Critical Exploration
Ancient Greek References in Harper Regan
Homer’s The Odyssey
Adapted from: “Sometimes You Just Need to Get Away’ by Ben Brantley (New York Times)
Brantley, Ben. "Sometimes You Just Need to Get Away." The New York Times. 11 Oct. 2012, Theater Reviews sec.:
C1. The New York Times. 10 Oct. 2012. Web. 4 Dec. 2014.
One minute Harper’s talking in her kitchen to her husband, Seth, who’s preparing dinner. “I’m in your
way,” she says. “I’ll go now. I won’t be long.” And she walks out the door and into a journey that is as
ordinary as a Lifetime movie and as extraordinary as Alice’s down the rabbit hole.
Harper goes missing for only two days, as it turns out. And she doesn’t go very far — only the 200-some
miles between the outer London borough where she lives and the town in northeast England where her
parents are. Nor is there anything exotic about her itinerary: she visits a hospital, a hotel and her
mother’s house.
But the trip feels almost Homeric, an odyssey that seems to embrace all the essential primal acts of life
and death, of sex and violence.
TOBIAS: I only saw you two days ago.
HARPER: Is it only two days?
TOBIAS: It was Monday.
HARPER: It seems years ago.
TOBIAS: What did you want to tell me?
HARPER: I’ll tell you in a bit. A pause. She pulls out a cigarette and lights it.
It’s good for people, travel, you know?
TOBIAS: Is it?
HARPER: It makes you think about things. It can be a bit unsettling.
(Stephens 83)
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Summary of Homer’s The Odyssey
The Odyssey is Homer's tale of Odysseus’ 10-year long journey home following the Trojan War. His
voyage includes encounters with mystical creatures and gods, presenting him an epic series of
challenges in order to return to his family. At home his wife Penelope and son Telemachus await his
arrival while being faced with forceful suitors vying for Penelope and pursuing Ithaca’s throne.
Ultimately, upon his return, Odysseus proves his identity by winning a contest, kills all of the suitors and
reclaims the throne of Ithaca.
Parallels between Homer’s The Odyssey and Harper Regan
Harper’s journey similarly takes her to the very borderlines of the relationship between eros and
thanatos, sex and death.
There are numerous parallels between Harper’s two-day journey and Odysseus’ 10-year odyssey. Both,
for example, encounter harmful characters whom they confront on their travels. In the case of Harper
this includes several men (Tobias, Mickey, James) who each represent a unique challenge that she must
overcome, ranging from emotional conversation to sexual interaction. Similarly, Odysseus faces a
spectrum of psychological and physical confrontations.
Another significant resemblance relates to how each work resolves. The Odyssey concludes with
Odysseus’ wife Penelope accepting him upon his return despite his questionable, and often
promiscuous, behaviour throughout his 10-year absence. It is evident that Penelope forgives her spouse,
once he proves his identity, with the desire to keep her family intact. Similarly Seth welcomes Harper
home following her own puzzling voyage. When Harper returns from her trip to Stockport, Seth forgives
his wife in order to continue living out his familial fantasy.
Euripides
“*National Theatre Director Nicholas Hytner+ said to me, ‘read Euripides. So I spent two weeks reading
as many Euripides plays as I could get my hands on... and settled upon wanting to write three things: I
wanted to write a play about a quest; I wanted to write a play which was dominated by a central
protagonist; and I wanted to write a play in which a transgression within a family had cursed that family,
and that the quest was an attempt to solve that curse.” (Simon Stephens, theatreVOICE )
Euripides was the last of the three great tragedians of classical Athens. In contrast with
Aeschylus and Sophocles, Euripides is known primarily for having reshaped the formal
structure of traditional Attic tragedy; he was the first tragedian to utilize strong female
characters and intelligent slaves. In rather sharp contrast with Aeschylus, Euripides satirized
many of the major figures of Greek mythology, and the cynical view of the gods suggested
in many of his plays may indicate that he lived in a time of growing disenchantment with
the Greek pantheon. His plays seem modern by comparison with the earlier tragedians,
focusing on the inner lives and motives of his characters in a way that had been unknown to
Greek audiences. They also seem modern in another sense: Without clear conviction in the
beneficence of the gods, chaos rather than order seems to win out.
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While Aeschylus was predominantly a moral playwright, and Sophocles primarily concerned
with the role of the fates and the gods, Euripides' work was the most concerned with the
simple humanity of his characters. He was concerned more often than not with characters
much closer to earth than the towering heroes and demigods that had dominated ancient
Greek literature prior to his times. The roles he provides for women and slaves hearken
toward increasing egalitarianism. The tone of his work is more ironic than his predecessors.
Without a clear moral structure, his characters' actions seem more ambiguous, less noble.
As one of the foremost playwrights in all of Western literature, Euripides' contribution to
the development of Western drama and literature in general is inestimable. (New World
Encyclopedia)
The following excerpt from A Short Introduction to Classical Myth by Barry B. Powell exposes several
characteristics that are associated with Euripides which clearly influenced Stephens’ play Harper Regan.
Euripides was a poet of great range who subjected the traditional myths to rigorous
scrutiny and sometimes severe criticism. His characters are often deflated heroes, mere
mortals caught up in some all-too-human squabble. His characters often veer off into
abnormal mental states. Aristotle remarked that Sophocles showed men as they ought to
be, but Euripides showed them as they really are (Poetics 1460b). He reflects contemporary
Athenian rhetoric; most of his plays center on a long debate. He had been called an
irrationalist because he likes to celebrate the power of emotion over reason.
In Aeschylus, the inherited curse and divine will motivate the action; in Sophocles, fate
stands behind events; in Euripides, passionate, often erotic and especially female emotion
drives the action. He is the most modern of the tragedians. His plays were often revived in
antiquity and are commonly performed today. Euripides loved sensational bloody scenes
and was not above happy endings.
...
In their loves and hates, the characters in Athenian drama can be extreme cases, and in no
sense do such tales reflect ordinary life. Yet the audience must have experienced
corresponding emotions, although more muted, in their own lives, even as we experience
the same emotions today. At precisely the same time as the tragedies were performed,
with their gory scenes and exaggerated emotions, Greek philosophy and Greek science
were coming into being. Some intellectuals, for example Anaxagoras, already in the fifth
century BC subjected myth to a rigorous criticism, denying its validity as a means to achieve
understanding.
This description of Euripides’ narratives further highlights the connection between the Athenian’s work
at Harper Regan. From the Introduction to Ten Plays by Euripides, by Moses Hadas:
*Euripides’+ language... approaches the colloquial; his plays tend to move from darkness to
light. But most important, his personages do not invite tragedy in order to illustrate the
operation of some grand ethical abstraction and to achieve heroism; theirs is the humbler
aim of surviving as tolerably as may be amid conventional constraints which make tolerable
existence difficult – not to die gloriously but to live happily ever after.
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For the first time in history, heroes and heroines on the stage were not idealized: as
Sophocles himself said, Euripides shows people not as they ought to be, but as they actually
are.
Works Cited:
"Playwright Simon Stephen on Harper Regan." Interview by Aleks Sierz.TheatreVOICE. Victoria and Albert Museum,
20 Oct. 2008. Web. 5 Dec. 2014.
Euripides. (2013, October 9). New World Encyclopedia, . Retrieved 15:36, December 22, 2014 from
http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/p/index.php?title=Euripides&oldid=974740.
Euripides. Ten Plays by Euripides. Trans. Moses Hadas and John McLean. New York: Bantam, 1960. Print.
Powell, Barry B. A Short Introduction to Classical Myth. Prentice Hall, New Jersey: 2002. Print.
The Dominant Central Protagonist
Most Euripidean plays are named for a central protagonist whose personal journey is the focus of the
work. Also of note is the fact that Euripides was one of the few Athenian playwrights to feature female
protagonists. In most cases, these women-focused tragedies were motivated by either the absence of or
misconduct by men to whom they are connected. These characters, such as Medea and Alcestis, were
driven to extreme acts by the actions of their fathers and husbands. Similarly, in Harper Regan, Harper is
dealing with an insensate male boss, dying father and a husband who has been accused of pedophilia.
The collection of these relationships motivates her journey.
The Transgression That Curses a Family
“Mr. Stephens initially wanted to write about the emotional chaos set off by sexual improprieties as a
way to explore how desire can conflict with morality.”
Healey, Patrick. "Specializing in Secrets and Their Dear Cost." The New York Times. 7 Oct. 2012, Theater, sec.: AR4.
Print. (See Appendix A)
In Euripides’ plays, as in many Greek tragedies, the tragic events are often set off by a moral
transgression, such as a breach of trust, or marital unfaithfulness. For example, in Medea, Medea’s
husband Jason divorces her and arranges to marry another woman, despite the fact that Medea
previously used her powers to save him by slaying a dragon. This leads her to plot to kill Jason’s new
fiancé and father-in-law-to-be. Evil as they sound, those murders are actions of revenge which are
intended in Greek culture to restore a moral balance. In Greek tradition, however, it is usually the male
hero who can carry out an action that restores morality – that is their heroic obligation. Euripides’
heroines are unusual as, in the case of male moral transgression, they must carry out the restorative
action.
“Like a Homeric warrior, *Medea+ defines herself by her moral obligations. This implies the
inseparability of moral action and personal psychological security. Such talk is familiar from the likes of
Ajax but is strange on the lips of a woman and a barbarian, in a non-military context, and involving
deceit.”
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Similarly, Harper Regan is affected by a curse in the form of a husband who has been accused of a
deplorable crime. This accusation also results in tension between Harper and her mother as well as an
economic obligation to a thankless job since Seth is not able to work. For these reasons, perhaps it is
possible to interpret her reckless actions while in Stockport as revenge acts that restore balance
between Harper and her husband. And perhaps, consistent with Greek tragedy, the state of their
marriage by the conclusion of the play can be optimistically interpreted as a clean slate to build a better
relationship.
SETH: I like the smell of my daughter’s neck.
HARPER: And the way her hair falls down her face.
SETH: And the way her hair falls down over her face when I kiss her neck. Her boyfriend is a fine, honest
man. He looks after her and enjoys my jokes and never tells her about any of the cigarettes I secretly
smoke when I’m away at various major European cities at conferences.
And the morning rises over Sussex and Surrey and Kent. It is a beautiful day.
I would love her to see it. I’d love them all to see it.
They continue to eat their breakfast.
SARAH rubs her eyes.
She looks at them both.
(Stephens 101-102)
There are multiple ways to interpret the ending of Simon Stephens’ script. Certainly the final scene
between Seth and Harper (and Sarah) may be viewed as a cautiously hopeful ending. Upon closer
examination, we can recognize that it is an incredibly complex scenario. While it could be seen as
hopeful, we may question Seth’s intention when he mentions kissing his daughter’s neck and Harper’s
corresponding reaction. And additionally, it is important to critically consider Harper’s desires overall.
What is “idyllic family life”? This is rather ambiguous. Would Harper indeed want a fresh start, were it
possible for them to start over? Is this marriage really a happy ending for Harper? Or is it rather a
reversal of her emancipation from the past? Are these two meant for a future together? These are
choices that Matthew Jocelyn, the production’s director, may clearly define or leave up to the audience
to decide for themselves.
Works Cited:
Lawrence, Stuart. Moral Awareness in Greek Tragedy. 198. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2013. Print.
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Anti-Hero
HARPER: We act like idiots. We have the ability to be really cruel. Again and again and again. Sometimes
we even realise. Sometimes we step outside ourselves and we look at ourselves for a bit and ask
ourselves, ‘Am I actually doing this?’ and we tell ourselves, ‘Yes, I actually am.’ And carry on doing it.
Don’t you dare judge me for what I did to him.
(Stephens 95)
According to The Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms, an anti-hero is a central character in a dramatic or
narrative work who lacks the qualities of nobility and magnanimity expected of traditional heroes and
heroines in romances and epics. Unheroic characters of this kind have been an important feature of the
Western novel, which has subjected idealistic heroism to parody since Cervantes' Don Quixote (1605).
The anti‐hero is also an important figure in modern drama, both in the Theatre of the Absurd and in
the tragedies of Arthur Miller, notably in Death of a Salesman (1949). In these plays, as in many modern
novels, the protagonist is an ineffectual failure who succumbs to the pressure of circumstances.
The anti‐hero should not be confused with the antagonist or the villain.
Baldick, Chris. "Anti-Hero (Anti-Heroine)." The Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms. 3rd ed. Oxford: Oxford UP,
2008. Oxford Referece. Web. 4 Dec. 2014.
5 Types of Anti-Heroes by Liz Bureman on The Write Practice
Cited from: http://thewritepractice.com/anti-heroes/
The Classical Anti-Hero
Traditionally, a classical hero is a character who always wins their battles, with sharp intellect,
unshakable self-confidence, and excellent judgment. So it stands to logic that the classical anti-hero,
which is the original anti-hero, is terrible in a fight, is not the brightest crayon in the box, riddled with
self-doubt, and makes decisions based on self-preservation instead of bravery. The classical anti-hero’s
story arc follows the conquering of his own fears and coming to terms with himself to fight whatever
threat faces him.
Frodo from Lord of the Rings falls into this category, since he’s a decent guy, but there’s a lot of baggage
that comes with carrying that ring through three books.
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The “Disney” Anti-Hero
This is what most people tend to think of today when they think of an anti-hero. At his core, the Disney
Anti-Hero is still fundamentally good, but doesn’t have the relentless optimism of a classical hero. They
tend to be sarcastic and more realistic, and tend to put logic before honour, but they won’t outright
perform acts that are morally ambiguous. Like the Classical Anti-Hero, odds are pretty good that this
type of anti-hero will develop into a classical hero by story’s end.
Haymitch Abernathy from the Hunger Games trilogy and Severus Snape of Harry Potter fame are two
good examples of this type of anti-hero.
The Pragmatic Anti-Hero
The Pragmatic Anti-Hero is basically exactly what it sounds like. Generally no worse than neutral in
morality, the Pragmatic Anti-Hero takes a big-picture view of his role, and if something or someone
needs to be sacrificed for the greater good, so be it. They won’t kill indiscriminately though: anyone who
dies at the hand of the Pragmatic Anti-Hero either had it coming, or had to be killed in order to achieve
the higher goal. These anti-heroes are equally as likely to defect from classical heroism by the end of the
story as they are to convert.
Harry Potter himself, by the end of the series, fulfills this role, as he is constantly breaking rules, and
uses two unforgivable curses and robs a bank by series’ end in order to off Voldemort once and for all.
The Unscrupulous Hero
This is as dark as you can get with your anti-hero while still being technically good. The Unscrupulous
Hero lives in a world that has a morality that is made up of varying shades of grey, with their grey being
slightly lighter than that of the villains. Often they live in a really unfortunate setting, which accounts for
their distrust of humanity and penchant towards violence. They’re big on revenge, and when they take
their revenge, count on it being something to see. There might be some collateral damage in their
actions, but that doesn’t faze them.
Jack Sparrow of the Pirates of the Caribbean film series and the Blues Brothers of the titular film are
examples of this type of anti-hero: their intentions are good, and they are fighting on the moral high
side, but they don’t really care how much damage they cause or who they double-cross on their way to
achieving their goals.
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The “Hero” in Name Only
These anti-heroes fight on the side of good, but they have no good motivation. Either their intentions
are completely selfish, and they only happen to be pointing their weapons at the token bad guys, or
their motivations are only slightly less terrible than the villains’. Sometimes they’re just bored and need
someone to point a gun at. You’ll still root for them, but you won’t agree with a lot of the ways they do
things.
Sherlock Holmes in the BBC’s re-imagining of the character is an example, since he explicitly describes
himself as a high-functioning sociopath and makes it clear that he only takes on cases that he finds
mentally stimulating. Dexter of the TV series of the same name walks the line between this and a villain
protagonist.
Why an Anti-Hero?
Cited from How to Create an Anti-Hero that Readers Love by Jessica Page Morrell on Writer’s Digest:
http://www.writersdigest.com/online-editor/how-to-create-an-antihero-that-readers-love
One of the most important qualities to remember is that anti-heroes rarely, if ever, reflect society’s
higher values—or what we like to think of as our society’s values; their thinking and values are often
antithetical to those of the norm. For example, the sort of traits valued by most members of society—
such as honesty, strength, integrity and compassion—will not always be exhibited by an anti-hero in a
story. Or, he might have a character arc where he grudgingly adopts some of these traits. Traditional
depictions of main players were of good guys with traits that we all wanted to emulate. Anti-heroes turn
that assumption upside down.
Here is the trick to creating anti-heroes: They always possess an underlying pathos. Most characters
come with flaws, neuroses and “issues.” But with an anti-hero, these problems are more noticeable and
troublesome, and they sometimes get in the way of forming intimate attachments. There is always
something that is messing up the anti-hero’s plan, and that something is usually from his past. A story
with an anti-hero in a starring role might depict how a person cannot easily escape from the past,
particularly deep losses.
Additional Source:
An anti-hero of one’s own - Tim Adams
TED-Ed video, list of additional resources and accompanying lesson: http://ed.ted.com/lessons/an-antihero-of-one-s-own-tim-adams
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APPENDIX A
Healey, Patrick. "Specializing in Secrets and Their Dear Cost." The New York Times. 7 Oct. 2012,
Theater, sec.: AR4. Print.
The Off Broadway play Harper Regan, a 2008 British drama about a woman swamped by family
problems, was first going to be called Seth Regan, after Harper’s troubled husband. The title change was
hardly superficial for the playwright, Simon Stephens. Like Tennessee Williams, who wrote several
versions of (and titles for) A Streetcar Named Desire before realizing that his real subject was Blanche
DuBois, Mr. Stephens goes down as many rabbit holes as necessary to discover the ideal wonderland in
which to set his stories and characters.
In the case of the Regans, Mr. Stephens initially wanted to write about the emotional chaos set off by
sexual improprieties as a way to explore how desire can conflict with morality. Mr. Stephens consumed
books and movies about compulsive behavior and molestation, then outlined scenes. When he was
about to start writing dialogue, Mr. Stephens found himself in a meeting with the artistic director of the
National Theater in London, Nicholas Hytner, who was lamenting the lack of new plays with major roles
for actresses in their 40s and 50s.
“I was silently furious with Nick, thinking you can’t impose a scheme on writers like that,” Mr. Stephens
recalled during an interview this summer at the National, where he was rehearsing his new play, The
Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time.
“So I sat there and muttered in my head: ‘O.K., so what if the first scene of Seth Regan is not about Seth
but instead it’s his wife asking her boss for time off because of a family problem? That would be,” — he
paused for dramatic effect — “more interesting. And what if it’s Harper running into a young man who
she finds herself flirting with, rather than Seth meeting a teenage girl? Much more interesting.”
Though Seth’s problems remain central to the plot, the story is told from Harper’s point of view. That
shift is the most extreme change in storytelling that Mr. Stephens, 41, has undertaken in his two-dozen
plays, yet it fits with his view of himself as an “action designer and story designer,” someone who
spends months mapping and remapping the worlds of his plays, before writing them quickly. (It took
him only four days to finish Motortown, a 2006 play about a British soldier back from Iraq.)
Concentrating on Harper’s story paid off in critical praise for the play, which helped make Mr.
Stephens one of the hottest writers in London theatre.
His star has risen even further with The Curious Incident, his adaptation of Mark Haddon’s novel, which
opened to raves in August and has caught the eye of the American theatre producer Bob Boyett, who
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has transferred National productions to Broadway, including War Horse, and said he would look at such
a possibility for Curious Incident in the next couple of years.
In the meantime Mr. Stephens is hoping for his breakout moment in New York with Harper
Regan, which is in previews at Atlantic Theater Company and is to open on Wednesday. He made his Off
Broadway debut there last year with an earlier play, Bluebird, starring Simon Russell Beale as an
emotionally damaged taxi driver. That Atlantic production received mixed reviews from critics, and Mr.
Stephens had some tough words for it himself, saying he was disappointed in its quality as a play.
“I wrote it almost 15 years ago, and as I was watching it I thought, ‘C’mon, if you had this material now,
you would shape it differently.’ But I didn’t want to rewrite Bluebird for New York, because, I think, you
can just end up constantly rewriting. Brecht was constantly rewriting his work, and I’m too restless. I just
want to write more plays.”
Mr. Stephens has been in a hurry since his childhood in Stockport, a suburb of Manchester in Northern
England, where he has set several plays, including On the Shore of the Wide World, which won the 2006
Olivier Award for best new play, and the critically praised Punk Rock, from 2009. He said he loathed the
“small-town mentality” of Stockport and felt increasingly uncomfortable with the conservative politics of
his father, a successful electronics salesman who admired Margaret Thatcher. By adolescence he
dreamed of escaping to London, where he settled after attending the University of York and a stint in
Edinburgh playing in a punk band, Country Teasers.
Mr. Stephens has a new appreciation for the town, as well as for his parents. His father died in 2001 at
59, and Mr. Stephens — who is married and has three young children — has since grown closer to his
mother. Such familial fracturing and reconciliation drive the plot of Harper Regan, particularly in scenes
in which the title character returns to Stockport (her hometown too) and faces demons from her past.
“I think writers have obsessions that they return to in play after play, and I certainly have mine around
family and Stockport — whether it is possible to tell the truth, the consequences of lying and whether
it’s possible to ever go home again,” Mr. Stephens said.
During a rehearsal of Harper Regan last month in New York, Mr. Stephens gave voice to those
obsessions as he offered suggestions to Mary McCann, who is playing Harper. He urged her to convey
more fragility in a scene leading to the revelation of a major secret.
“What’s most interesting in this play is when Harper behaves and recoils like a child, sometimes a
scolded child and sometimes a rebellious child,” Mr. Stephens said as Ms. McCann and the production’s
director, Gaye Taylor Upchurch, listened intently. “There’s a nakedness to her that is revealed more and
more once she is back home in Stockport.”
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Mr. Stephens gave the Harper Regan script to Ms. McCann a year ago when she was in the Atlantic cast
of Bluebird, also directed by Ms. Upchurch. He was convinced that Ms. McCann, a founding member of
Atlantic Theater Company and the wife of its artistic director, Neil Pepe, would be right for the role
because, he said, “she has this remarkable capacity to access huge emotion and then to contain it.”
Ms. McCann said she had immediately pined to play Harper: “I just related to her. I’ve gone through
something of a midlife crisis too, wondering from time to time if I should be doing plays, and I know
about dealing with older parents and dealing with kids.” She added, “This is a woman who finds herself
finally facing up to truth in her life and dealing with that truth — a kind of slow empowerment that’s
thrilling, and hard to figure out how to play.”
Truth and lies also preoccupy the teenage hero, Christopher, in The Curious Incident of the Dog in the
Night-Time, though he is differently equipped from Harper to tackle those issues. Christopher has
behavioral difficulties, akin to autism, that prevent him from relating to people as he investigates the
murder of a neighbor’s dog. That Curious Incident overlapped with his thematic concerns was a happy
coincidence; Mr. Stephens did not seek out the adaptation, but rather was asked by Mr. Haddon to
attempt it.
The main challenge of the stage adaptation was transforming Christopher’s first-person narration from
the book, which Mr. Stephens opted to do by assigning narration to different characters and having
Christopher describe his experiences by writing them into a play within the play.
“I thought it would be a huge problem,” Mr. Haddon said of the narration. “He’s made the problem
vanish into the air.”
Mr. Stephens said he mapped out the structure of Curious Incident much the same way he did with
Harper Regan, plotting out scenes and character interactions before worrying about dialogue. When he
feels particularly challenged, he will resort to a favorite writing exercise, giving himself 10 minutes to
dash off what makes him angry, frightened, hopeful and ashamed about a given theme he wants to
explore. For Harper Regan, that theme was marriage, and the 10-minute exercise led to a speech about
companionship and hope that Seth delivers at the end of the play.
“What I wrote in that exercise reminded me of something Jane Austen said — that you don’t fall in love
with somebody’s strengths, you fall in love with somebody’s flaws,” Mr. Stephens said. “That’s what
makes your heart stops. And it’s one of the truths that Harper and Seth come to face, as I think many
people do.”
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This Study Guide was created and compiled by:
Erin Schachter, Education & Audience Development Manager
Ceilidh Wood, Education & Audience Development Coordinator
Educator Outreach Program Sponsor:
Canadian Stage Educator Advisory Committee, 2014.2015
Please feel free to contact me or an Advisor from your own board to discuss productions and
further education opportunities at Canadian Stage.
Erin Schachter
Alicia Roberge
Christine Jackson
Janet O’Neill
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Julian Richings
Laurence Siegel
Melissa Farmer
Michael Limerick
Sally Spofforth
Shawn Rocheleau
[email protected]
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TDSB
Arts Educator
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Arts Education Consultant
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Monarch Park, TDSB
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Middlefield CI, YRDSB
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