How the Characters of 'Lilian's Last Dance' Came to Life Through Travel, Imagination
Updated: Sep 7
What Travel Taught Me About Creating Memorable Characters
QEII lecturer, famed director Josh Logan gave tips on crafting believable characters
STORY By CHRISTENE MEYERS
Ask any novelist where a character comes from and you'll probably hear the same answer: "It's complicated." My characters certainly are. The people who inhabit Lilian's Last Dance didn't arrive all at once or introduce themselves in neat little packages. They wandered into my imagination over decades of travel, working in theater, meeting fascinating strangers, laughing with lifelong friends and quietly watching the world unfold. Every journey added another voice, another personality, another story waiting to be told.
CROSSING the Atlantic in the summer of 1986 on Queen Elizabeth II, I met famed Broadway producer and director Josh Logan, a guest lecturer.
He was one of my idols, for I'd grown up with the music of "Annie Get Your Gun," and "South Pacific," both of which he directed. My late husband, Bruce Meyers, an accomplished actor and creative writing professor, encouraged me to approach Logan and express my interest in his legacy and his passion: musical theater.
HE WAS GRACIOUS, and delighted to visit. Although he was elderly, and sometimes used a walker or wheelchair, he came alive when talking about theater. I took notes on his lively lectures and during several private conversations om that crossing. He died two years later, in 1988, leaving a legacy to the world -- and invaluable advice for this reporter!
LOGAN TOLD ME that research and "reinvention" are critical to making the characters come alive. "Know your characters' history, but make them your own," he said. Before "South Pacific" he studied James Michener's "Tales of the South Pacific," which inspired the musical. He also visited the islands many times.
Travel helped Create Characters for "Lilian's Last Dance"
TAKING a cue from that inspiring week on the ocean with a genius Broadway great, the creation of "Lilian's Last Dance" took me on many journeys. Bruce and I, then Billy and I, and later Keller and I, traveled to Hawaii, England, France, Australia, Peru and many mainland North American states. The work survived both the death of Bruce and of my second husband, my "Lilian" collaborator, Bill Jones. Before he passed, in 2005, we filled notebooks with useful detail from which I drew, with Keller's help.
WE'D COLLECTED maps, visited museums and read a dozen books about silent movies, vintage travel, art and World War I. (Part of the action unfolds on the Front.) We located Gertrude Stein's salon in Paris, at 27 rue de Fleures, where she, Alice Toklas and brother Leo entertained the literati. We loved people watching in the fabulous Musee d'Orsay, where several paintings from Steins' collection hang.
We booked shows in the much photographed Moulin Rouge, studying both audience and performers. All helpful in making the characters come alive in believable settings.
WE TRAMPED all over Paris -- from the Left Bank to Montmartre to the Jardin du Luxembourg, to the Tuileries Garden, all of which were frequented by Stein and her lover, muse and secretary. We set the scene for our character, Elfego Fuentes, to call on Stein, along with "real life" writers Ernest Hemingway and Ezra Pound. By chance, Billy and I met an elderly woman whose grandmother, an aspiring painter, was taken under Stein's generous wing. She provided marvelous detail.
Our "Lilian's Last Dance" characters were inspired by a lifetime of observing remarkable people and places and studying notes and conversations.
PAINTER ELFEGO, one of the novel's major characters, is a South American born artist whom the Stein character befriends in our story. So we booked an Amazon cruise to find a village where Elfego might have grown up. We flew to Quito, Peru, then cruised through the rain forests to Brazil. We were smudged by witch doctors and deep in the jungle located a village with structures built in the early 1900s. This would be Elfego's birth place!
WE'RE EXCITED about early reviews for "Lilian's Last Dance." Here's one from historian and professor Elle Pieffe, of Rome, who liked the painter Elfego: "Lilian's daring, beautiful soul shines in the brush strokes of her Peruvian soul mate artist, in sizzling shots of a western gunfire duel, in silvery rain blessing Paris in winter. The mystery fades into a portrait of a person we'd love to have met.....and won't forget! You'll love this book, absolutely."
Looking back now, I realize Lilian's Last Dance isn't simply about fictional people. It's a celebration of the countless individuals who left lasting impressions on my life. Every traveler carries home souvenirs, but writers bring home something even more valuable -- stories.
I hope that as you meet the characters in Lilian's Last Dance, you'll recognize pieces of people you've known, places you've visited, and perhaps even a little of yourself. That's the magic of storytelling, and it's why every journey is worth taking.
Find "Lilian's Last Dance" on Amazon e-books.
COMING SOON: Hitting the road in Europe was part of the research for the revisiting and rewriting of "Lilian's Last Dance." But hitting the road in America provides fun, too. Next up, Julian, California, one of our favorite get-aways. We love the fine dining, restful settings, fun shopping, ice cream and delicious apples for the world's best pie.
Remember: carpe diem, so explore, learn and live and visit us weekly at: www.whereiscookie.com
Great read about the beginning of theater, the Old West, betrayal and romance