Growing up, my sisters and I had a “boy next door”, who, to be literal, actually lived up the street a few condos. Mike Doyle was a little younger than me, super sweet and cherubically cute. (His brother Billy, at a couple of years older than me, was ripe for future alpha-male crushing material, but that is a story for a different day).
Mike Doyle, an actor experienced in being killed in television shows, on the set of “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.” photo: Michael Appleton for The New York Times
This great article in the New York Times (subscription may be required) features Mike’s hilarious narration of his many and varied on-screen deaths. And here is a video interview from Nightline about the same thing. And since we at Waxcreative work with so many authors –and readers– I was wondering about the written death scene. How hard is it to craft? And if you have written them over and over, does it get easier?
As for Mike, I am thinking he’s getting quite good at this dying on camera thing and look forward to him getting back on the small screen and spattering it with fake blood for many characters to come!
Oh, Mike Doyle… how I had such a crush on thee, my occasional babysitter…
I TOTALLY WATCH L&O — I have seen O’Halloran for years and saw him dead last night. How funny! Small world.
As for books, I love a good suspenseful contemp, so somewhere someone dies. I appreciate when an author takes the time to make it seem real (not that I have ever seen a real homocide!)
Cute little kid, he was. As a single-digit boy, Mike was definitely not one of the urchins on that block in Connecticut whom I figuratively wanted to murder.
Thanks so much for including me Emily. Love your site.
xMike
I actually have only written one death scene, and that person died in her sleep on an operating table.
Love the big smile and the knife in the chest–my sort of death scene.
The hardest one I’ve ever written was when I killed off a dog. I cried buckets over that poor fictional dog, and it was an emotional scene to write, and I had a very guilty pleasure of looking back at the pages and thinking, “Wow, I killed that dog good.” It was one of those days . . .
One boy, three girls, all crushing on him. (See JQ’s tribute on FB.) Steve didn’t know enough to worry about it then.
This is a great question because as a romance author, I find myself frequently faced with the question, “Is it hard to write the sex scenes?” usually paired with the ubiquitous, “How do you do ahem…your research?”
But rarely if ever does anyone inquire about choreographing a death scene and since you did, I’ll chime in ASAP.
Writing a killer death scene can be well…murder.
For me at least. In my first book, A ROGUE’S PLEASURE, I actually had the villain killed “off screen,” which probably cost me at least 1/2 star from my 4 star Romantic Times review.
Since then, I’ve learned to bite the bullet, so to speak, but I still find it very difficult, not because I’m squeamish (tho I am, a little) but because while I’ve done the um…horizontal dance in real life I’ve never actually killed anyone.
Fortunately there’s Google, Wikepedia, and any number of great how-to books to help get the details down, including a little gem of a book called CAUSE OF DEATH: A WRITER’S GUIDE TO DEATH, MURDER AND FORENSIC MEDICINE.
Great advice, Hope. And though *I* wasn’t worried, thanks for assuring us you aren’t headed to the slammer for Murder-1.
UPDATE: April 2010
Last week Mike Doyle’s mom had to watch him get killed off again (#8) in a guest stint of Criminal Minds. That same night, Mike is shot supposedly to death in the opening scene of In Plain Sight, then wakes from a three-year coma and -gasp!- comes back to life and gets to live when the credits roll. Mother’s Day comes early. Nice.
Video links may expire (I can’t find CM online anymore, just the clip):
http://www.cbs.com/primetime/criminal_minds/video/?pid=oqkgpJl5vd9sVJK2fZoz37tNJYT8ElIx
http://www.hulu.com/watch/142221/in-plain-sight-coma-chameleon#s-p1-so-i0
i always watch the tv program Criminal Minds it is quite interesting`;~
the thing i like about Criminal Minds is the suspense