Adaptation

Last night was a big TV viewing evening in Chez Orloff. Most of you who read this blog know with the exception of Anthony Bourdain on Travel Channel, re-runs of House with Oldest Daughter when she is home, and anything on physics or astronomy on PBS, I don't watch TV--except for re-runs of Law & Order. Re-runs. Since I don't like being beholden to following anything in order or a straight chronology, even though there ARE first-run Law & Orders, I don't watch them. I know. Kind of weird. But I made an exception, because last night Law & Order: Criminal Intent introduced Jeff Goldblum's new character.

Now, I have to tell you that somewhere along the line over his long career, I became aware that Jeff Goldblum was both brilliant and very eccentric, and I like that. In fact, he's on my short list for potential husbands. But it was more than my lingering fascination with the tall actor--it was how the cast would adapt to an entirely new personality thrown into their midst.

Adaptation.

I think of what happens when I fully develop ONE character as my main character for a novel. I stick him or her into a plot, and they adapt. But it is somewhat like examining a specimen under a microscope. Then I give them other characters--a nemesis or several of them, a sidekick, a family, maybe, a moral dilemma involving any of the above. And I see how they adapt.

In fact, since so much of fiction is about conflict and change, it can seem as if the entire process is designed to keep my characters on their toes, uncomfortable, constantly adapting. I am in the midst of Magickeepers II. And already, I am forcing my young hero to adapt--right on page 1. You see, in Magickeepers I (out on Friday--I'm kind of giddy), Kolya had to learn a magic act to perform in front of thousands every night in Las Vegas. But no sooner does he get comfortable with the act, that his cousin, in Book II designs an entirely NEW show (it would be like Cirque du Soleil launching a new show with the same cast every three or four months--almost impossible!). He never gets to really relax, to increase his comfort level. His demanding older cousin is so intent on his quest for greatness that he drives everyone around him to exhaustion. And so Kolya, to survive, must adapt.

Thoughts? Do you see your fiction as studying adaptation? Any thoughts on Goldblum's addition to the cast? On tall men, in general? On staccato delivery of lines (Goldblum's hallmark . . . I kind of dig it)?