Creating a Basic Character - Pepe DePenne

For this exercise we'll create a character and give them a backstory.

Let's call him Pepe. Pepe DePenne.

We must first look into the dramatic need of Pepe. The first part of defining a character is determining what it is that they wish to achieve. Pepe is a first generation immigrant, having had two parents move from Italy to begin a new life in America. In lieu of the reasoning behind leaving the home country, the DePenne family is quie poor, and does not have the money for the luxuries that the typical American family can afford. The one that upsets Pepe the most is the fact that he has always wanted to embrace himself in American cuisine, particularily the classic American hamburger, but his family cannot make sense of going out to buy food when they could just make food at home. So instead Pepe is forced to eat nothing but pasta every day of the week. Nevertheless, with each plate of pasta Pepe still longs for the day that he can have a hamburger, so that he can enjoy the apparently mouth-watering taste that he sees on television advertisements.

It is this need of the character that gives Pepe a goal, or even an ending to the story. How Pepe achieves or does not achieve this goal becomes the action to the story.