Street Magician

Character notes after the jump:

Street magician on weekends. Wants attention for talent, to get a gig, no matter how small.

Driven by desire to perform. Feels most himself when performing.

Security guard during the week. Works nights. Feels invisible, doesn't get to be personable.

Very passive, but on the stage, with a captive audience, is a place where he feels he can truly be himself.

As far as actual skill goes, he's not exactly a master. He's an amateur with no training. He has medium skill. If he had the time and money to devote to learning, he could be better.

Money: doesn't earn much. From a family of little means. Grew up in the midwest.

Security job makes him invisible. Supervisors don't even notice him.

He has friends, but not the type of friends he would like to have. He wants sophisticated, glamorous friends.

Not married, no girlfriend.

He's close to his mom. He can talk to her and she listens. He's not so close with his dad. His parents are still married.

He fears he really is invisible [and that anyone who could see him would think he's as lame as he thinks he is]. He's starting to fear that his job as a security guard will last him the rest of his life.

The people who matter in his life are proud of him. They're impressed with the new tricks he shows them. They are the captive audience he desires, but one made up of friends and family, so he dismisses them.

With his buddies he does little more than sit around and drink, watch tv, talk about women. Not the intelligent, meaningful conversation he likes to imagine.

Obstacles: The way he sees himself. He's gotten shot down at auditions and has given up. Defeatist mindset. He still goes out to the market to perform on the street, but he doesn't go to auditions anymore. He doesn't talk to people, try to make connections.

At the turn, he realizes has the ability to say fuck it. His circumstances won't allow him to do what he wants to? Fuck it. Why should that stop him? He can do whatever he wants. He uses his time spent as a security guard as a sort of stage on which to perform. He figures he's invisible anyway. Why not? He plays in the grand windows of office building lobbies to an empty street. His greatest fear has become his advantage. This turns him from a passive character into an active one. (Do you want, whenever, whatever, 'cuz why not?)

He has confidence onstage that he doesn't have offstage. Otherwise, he's the passive type, the type that gets talked over.