CdV: Inspiration and Influences
Nov. 23rd, 2008 11:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jezebelinhellCharacter building exercise for OCs: tell us in depth who or what influenced your character and in what way. You might also want to consider how your character is different. Oni-mun (![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
onikins ) was right when she said that this would be a good character development exercise. So kid, this one's for you. Tag, your turn! (It's more fun to do this to see what/who influenced Oni to be honest!)
Anyone else with an OC who might be interested, please feel free to join us in this exercise. The more, the merrier!
Catherine de Volanges
onikins ) was right when she said that this would be a good character development exercise. So kid, this one's for you. Tag, your turn! (It's more fun to do this to see what/who influenced Oni to be honest!)Anyone else with an OC who might be interested, please feel free to join us in this exercise. The more, the merrier!
Catherine de Volanges
Basic character concept: Intelligence agent
It is probably quite obvious that one of her greatest influences is Vesper Lynd from Casino Royale. Not only does she wear Eva Green's face, but she has the same panache for scathing sarcasm as seen on the train to Montenegro scene in Casino Royale, which can be read not only in her voice, but by her eyes. Like Vesper, Catherine 'has no tell" and she has a rather "pricky demeanor" when she completely herself (the personality tip-of-hat to Green's Vesper was actually chosen before the PB, which was initially in competition with Aishwarya Rai and a few others, all of which would not have worked well). I like others to be able to visualize the way my characters sound and talk, which is made harder by OCs. Catherine, like Green, is French, but when Green/Lynd speaks English, she speaks it with a English accent that has a sort of croaky yet pleasant tone to it. There is a hint of french in it, but is hardly emphasized (she changes her accent, etc to suit a situation). So, in a way, both Green and Lynd have helped significantly form Catherine's personality, accent and visage. Green is beautiful, but not overly so that would prevent Catherine from doing her job and being overly memorable when she does not want to be (Catherine's abilities, however, make her overly memorable, which is why she tempers their use). Her 'look' is very pliable, another characteristic important to the character. Therefore, part and parcel of both, Catherine is like an 'evil' version of the Vesper Bond girl.
Catherine also gives the movie/show La Femme Nikita a slight tip of the hat. In La Femme Nikita, the lead character is recruited into a shadowy ultra covert anti-terrorist organization called Section One. Once your in Section the only way to get out is "in a body bag". Section One is organized, quick and efficient, often getting done the seemingly impossible tasks that other organizations cannot get done. In a way, that reality mirrors the Tremere clan of VtM and is one of the reasons it was chosen. It's a highly hierarachic clan, cold, impersonal, rigid and highly efficient. And like Section One, there is enough treachery to go around at least several times over. Catherine's targets are mostly supernatural (vampires), however, and instead of having been trained using a gun, bomb, etc, she has been taught blood magic, unique to her kind, since regular weapons wouldn't really work. Like the lead character in La Femme Nikita, Catherine doesn't exactly seem like she fits into that organization. Both have a certain joie de vivre and enjoy beauty and art, good times and self-expression (whether through sex--well, at least when Cat was mortal--art, fashion, etc), but seem trapped by their "world" on first appearance. However, both realize that they are integral part of the organizations they belong to and end up fighting for it them [this is more true for Nikita and has yet to be deteremined for Catherine].
Her creation was not influenced by this next character (at least not intentionally) and, hopefully, she won't be type-casted as this bloke, but she does-with dialogue-sometimes give the Matrix's Merovingian recognition because their roles are similar. As an intelligence gatherer, Catherine, with elaborate networks and her fingers in many pies, is privy to information quite like the Merovingian. And she is French as well. Also, they both have a socialite 'cover'. However, the Merovingian is pretencious and pompous to an extreme. Catherine is more modest (not to say that she does not have a decent smattering of elitism), an attitude like his would be off-putting and make her job harder.
Catherine's greatest influence, at least in terms of helping to create her background, was Madame du Barry, a French courtesan. Although she invokes the courtesan spirit through adapting signnificant elements of historical figures like Madame de Pompadour and Veronica Franco (such as intelligence, education, musical arts, the art of seduction) Barry is part of her background since both hail from revolutionary France during the reign of Marie Antoinette. The rituals and ruthfulness of the French court is such that I had to draw form a french example to be historically correct. Indeed, Barry will have many references in fan-fiction as in this verse, Catherine was her 'student'. Much of who she is now was refined during this period of her background and I borrowed elements from Barry's history to get a believable and historically accurate background (or as much as I could for the time being). Catherine's intelligence had to be explained, since women from those times were not educated in the way that men were. Only courtesans had those liberties (and this is not true everywhere, Catherine embodies the 16th century Italian Franco cortigiana onesta, the intellectual courtesan, rather then a lower courtesan or prostitute) and Catherine's inherent strategic acumen is supported by her knowledge, which had to be gained in that way. Catherine is different then Barry, because she is very aware of politics and desires to manipulate them to her own ends. Barry, on the other hand, was seen by others as a tool of manipulation that could inadvertently influence the King. Although in modern nights Catherine is not a courtesan, the skills and traits that she picked up as one still come in useful. In fact, they are the things that got her Embraced.
"While the old model of the Courtesan royal still exists, it is somewhat rare. With the fall of most Monarchies and the rise of democratic societies, the role of the courtesan changed. In government, they have acted as spies such as was alleged with Mata Hari. Courtesans are not necessarily kept for the purpose of companionship or sexual pleasure."
Then there are Catherine's collective influences, where no one single person made a imprint, but collectively they did. For instance, starlets like Marlene Dietrich and Mata Hari, glamorous woman, who, like Catherine, appreciate the finer things in life (or unlife in Catherine's case), and whose lives have a veneer of deceit to them since both were spies (I'm talking about the myth they left behind more than the actual reality). Then, there are other historical woman, who served as spies in some capacity during various wars. Catherine is shaped by them too, although she was already an 'intelligence officer', finding out information and manipulating politics and people for her own ends as a courtesan. After all, the two oldest professions in the world are prostitution and spying and no two careers are as inextricably linked as these. Catherine is a product of both and I hope that these currents will leak through to her personality.
Materials used in the formation: (1) VtM core book, second edition, (2) Tremere clanbooks, 1st and 2nd edition, (3) What Marie Marie Antionette wore to the Revolution, (4) Courtesans, (5) books on espionage, (6) Casino Royale (movie), (7) sites on the French Revolution, (8) every book I ever own on Victorian London (after she is forced to flee France, she moves to London for a spell, no pun intended.)
It is probably quite obvious that one of her greatest influences is Vesper Lynd from Casino Royale. Not only does she wear Eva Green's face, but she has the same panache for scathing sarcasm as seen on the train to Montenegro scene in Casino Royale, which can be read not only in her voice, but by her eyes. Like Vesper, Catherine 'has no tell" and she has a rather "pricky demeanor" when she completely herself (the personality tip-of-hat to Green's Vesper was actually chosen before the PB, which was initially in competition with Aishwarya Rai and a few others, all of which would not have worked well). I like others to be able to visualize the way my characters sound and talk, which is made harder by OCs. Catherine, like Green, is French, but when Green/Lynd speaks English, she speaks it with a English accent that has a sort of croaky yet pleasant tone to it. There is a hint of french in it, but is hardly emphasized (she changes her accent, etc to suit a situation). So, in a way, both Green and Lynd have helped significantly form Catherine's personality, accent and visage. Green is beautiful, but not overly so that would prevent Catherine from doing her job and being overly memorable when she does not want to be (Catherine's abilities, however, make her overly memorable, which is why she tempers their use). Her 'look' is very pliable, another characteristic important to the character. Therefore, part and parcel of both, Catherine is like an 'evil' version of the Vesper Bond girl.
Catherine also gives the movie/show La Femme Nikita a slight tip of the hat. In La Femme Nikita, the lead character is recruited into a shadowy ultra covert anti-terrorist organization called Section One. Once your in Section the only way to get out is "in a body bag". Section One is organized, quick and efficient, often getting done the seemingly impossible tasks that other organizations cannot get done. In a way, that reality mirrors the Tremere clan of VtM and is one of the reasons it was chosen. It's a highly hierarachic clan, cold, impersonal, rigid and highly efficient. And like Section One, there is enough treachery to go around at least several times over. Catherine's targets are mostly supernatural (vampires), however, and instead of having been trained using a gun, bomb, etc, she has been taught blood magic, unique to her kind, since regular weapons wouldn't really work. Like the lead character in La Femme Nikita, Catherine doesn't exactly seem like she fits into that organization. Both have a certain joie de vivre and enjoy beauty and art, good times and self-expression (whether through sex--well, at least when Cat was mortal--art, fashion, etc), but seem trapped by their "world" on first appearance. However, both realize that they are integral part of the organizations they belong to and end up fighting for it them [this is more true for Nikita and has yet to be deteremined for Catherine].
Her creation was not influenced by this next character (at least not intentionally) and, hopefully, she won't be type-casted as this bloke, but she does-with dialogue-sometimes give the Matrix's Merovingian recognition because their roles are similar. As an intelligence gatherer, Catherine, with elaborate networks and her fingers in many pies, is privy to information quite like the Merovingian. And she is French as well. Also, they both have a socialite 'cover'. However, the Merovingian is pretencious and pompous to an extreme. Catherine is more modest (not to say that she does not have a decent smattering of elitism), an attitude like his would be off-putting and make her job harder.
Catherine's greatest influence, at least in terms of helping to create her background, was Madame du Barry, a French courtesan. Although she invokes the courtesan spirit through adapting signnificant elements of historical figures like Madame de Pompadour and Veronica Franco (such as intelligence, education, musical arts, the art of seduction) Barry is part of her background since both hail from revolutionary France during the reign of Marie Antoinette. The rituals and ruthfulness of the French court is such that I had to draw form a french example to be historically correct. Indeed, Barry will have many references in fan-fiction as in this verse, Catherine was her 'student'. Much of who she is now was refined during this period of her background and I borrowed elements from Barry's history to get a believable and historically accurate background (or as much as I could for the time being). Catherine's intelligence had to be explained, since women from those times were not educated in the way that men were. Only courtesans had those liberties (and this is not true everywhere, Catherine embodies the 16th century Italian Franco cortigiana onesta, the intellectual courtesan, rather then a lower courtesan or prostitute) and Catherine's inherent strategic acumen is supported by her knowledge, which had to be gained in that way. Catherine is different then Barry, because she is very aware of politics and desires to manipulate them to her own ends. Barry, on the other hand, was seen by others as a tool of manipulation that could inadvertently influence the King. Although in modern nights Catherine is not a courtesan, the skills and traits that she picked up as one still come in useful. In fact, they are the things that got her Embraced. "While the old model of the Courtesan royal still exists, it is somewhat rare. With the fall of most Monarchies and the rise of democratic societies, the role of the courtesan changed. In government, they have acted as spies such as was alleged with Mata Hari. Courtesans are not necessarily kept for the purpose of companionship or sexual pleasure."
Then there are Catherine's collective influences, where no one single person made a imprint, but collectively they did. For instance, starlets like Marlene Dietrich and Mata Hari, glamorous woman, who, like Catherine, appreciate the finer things in life (or unlife in Catherine's case), and whose lives have a veneer of deceit to them since both were spies (I'm talking about the myth they left behind more than the actual reality). Then, there are other historical woman, who served as spies in some capacity during various wars. Catherine is shaped by them too, although she was already an 'intelligence officer', finding out information and manipulating politics and people for her own ends as a courtesan. After all, the two oldest professions in the world are prostitution and spying and no two careers are as inextricably linked as these. Catherine is a product of both and I hope that these currents will leak through to her personality.Materials used in the formation: (1) VtM core book, second edition, (2) Tremere clanbooks, 1st and 2nd edition, (3) What Marie Marie Antionette wore to the Revolution, (4) Courtesans, (5) books on espionage, (6) Casino Royale (movie), (7) sites on the French Revolution, (8) every book I ever own on Victorian London (after she is forced to flee France, she moves to London for a spell, no pun intended.)
