Too many shoulders to cry on

NORI Dalisay played the best friend of generations of Sampaguita Pictures’ leading ladies

So many teleseryes are being churned out these days by our TV networks that some lazy scriptwriters have come up with excessively quickie and knee-jerk ways to whip up teleplays in the blink of a jaundiced eye, without really thinking or being creative.

Aside from hoary, old plots and gasgas conflicts like generational strife, the rich-poor dichotomy and the horribly overused vengeance and retribution motifs, another terribly lazy writers’ ploy to effect plot and character development is to resort to the age-old “shoulder to cry on” device.

By this, we mean the use of sundry confidants, “best friends,” neighbors, relatives—any readily available supporting or minor character, whose main function is to provide the sympathetic shoulder or ear for the drama series’ principal characters to vent their emotions on, or to provide plot information to keep the viewer updated on what’s happening or is threatening to happen in the unfolding drama!

The female bida, in particular, has a veritable platoon of amigas to unburden herself on, informing them (and the viewer) of every painful or happy emotion she feels.

‘Adjunct’ performer

In the old movie days, this essential function was epitomized by the most iconic “shoulder to cry on” of them all, a supporting actress named Nori Dalisay. She played the best friend of generations of Sampaguita Pictures’ leading ladies, a veritably ageless “adjunct” performer who should be given some sort of “lifetime achievement award” for her loyal and preternaturally patient services through the years—and decades!

We’re joking of course, but the Nori Dalisay syndrome persists to this day, and has even become much more de rigueur, no thanks to lazy writers who resort to it with knee-jerk ferocity!

If you bother to analyze a typical teleserye episode, you realize that it consists mostly of a series of short scenes in which characters sit down and talk about what’s just happened and what they feel about it, while somebody else, usually a minor player, listens in on the weepy outburst or angry tirade.

A variation on the theme has other nosy characters speculating about what could happen, or yet another minor player overhearing something going on or being said by a principal character—and then misrepresenting or exaggerating the information to others, so that his or her exaggerated version provides even more emotional drama to the show, as the hero or heroine reacts to it!

It’s all terribly predictable, passive and lazy, the veritable antithesis of what dramas should be—less talk and more action, less conjecture and more creative and emotional plot and character progression.

Lazy scriptwriters, please give all those shoulders to cry on and ears to vent on a good, long rest, and do your job more productively and creatively, as you’ve been contracted to do.