Mrs Lyons- Character development

  

Name: Jenifer J Lyons

Occupation: She is a housewife. Her job is to stay home and take care of her child Edward. She has to make sure the house is clean whether she cleans it or someone else does that’s her job. She has to cook dinner for her husband (when he’s home) and child.

Age - was first seen on stage when she was in her early 30s.

Intelligence- Her family paid for her to have a good education at a private school. She got good grades and is a smart woman which is why it was so easy for her to manipulate Mrs Johnstone into giving her the child. 

Gender  – female

 

Knowledge – She knows how to have a ‘happy marriage’. She understands the responsibility she has as a wife. 

Mannerisms – she is very gentle (when she’s not angry). Walks shoulders back and chest forward. She’s polite and covers her mouth with a tissue whenever she coughs. She shakes people hands when she first meets them, if they’re upper class. 

Personality – She started off as kind and polite. But due to desperation she became manipulative and cruel. She was quite controlling of her son. She’d often lash out at people and became very sceptical of new people due to paranoia. I’m the end she became a very fragile person emotionally. 

 

Clothes – she wears nothing more than 5cm above the knee. And she loves to wear polar necks and blowers. She always wears her pearls that her mother and father gave her as a wedding present. She wears little ballerina slip on shoes with a heel. 

Temperament - she lashes out a lot. She cannot really control her emotions because most of the time her fears are controlling her instead. She has found herself slapping her so when he was only a young child and then regretting it later but in the moment she can’t control herself.

Grooming – Mrs L is always looking neat and tidy until the end when she doesn’t care about herself anymore. But at the beginning she wouldn’t be caught with a hair out of place. She does her makeup every single day to look presentable and pretty. She always smells like expensive perfume and she always has her nails freshly painted red or French tip. 

likes/dislikes – She dislikes superstitions. She finds them stupid and laughable. She sees superstitious people as weak and uses that weakness against them. She likes the country side. She feels secure and safe there. She feels free. She likes looking at the cows and the birds, she likes animals.

Movement – She is very ladylike. She sits respectfully and walks with her shoulders back and chest forward.                

Beliefs – Mrs Lyons believes that having a child is the most important thing for a woman. That’s why she fights so hard to have one, no matter how cruel the circumstances were.

style of speech – she has an RP accent to represent her power and wealth.

Fears –  Mrs Lyons fears have always been that Edward and mr Lyons would find out the truth. This fear eats away at her causing her to be severely mentally I’ll and disconnected with reality until the end where it drives her to kill Mickey. 

Anything else – The narrator has a strong connection to Mrs Lyons. We never find out what connection it is. Is he the devil whispering into her ear? Is he the voice of Mrs Lyons inner thoughts. Is it the voice of her anxiety? We never know. Much like we spend a lot of time trying to figure out who Mrs Lyons is as a person. Did she do these horrible things out of desperation or cruelty? Love or hate? I think she did cruel things because she was desperate. Love caused her to hate. 

Goals – At the beginning her main goal was to have a child however later on her main goal was to make sure her child or husband never found out the truth of where the child came from, that’s what drives her to move away to the country. 

self – image – Mrs L is Confident with how she looks. She knows she’s wearing nice clothes and is always groomed. She views herself as someone who is clean and respectable. 

THE CHARACTERS ‘WORLD’

 

Relationships with friends colleagues, lovers etc (DO they have friends? Are they married. Dating etc)  - 

 

She has friends that she’s known for a long time. They’re also middle class and believe in the same things she does. However as time goes on she sees them less and less and when her husband dies she doesn’t see them at all. She isolated herself.

Ethnicity  & cultural background – (class, education, where they were brought up) - 

Also personal history – (significant events in their the character’s life their personal ‘backstory’)

Mrs L was brought up in middle class Liverpool. She had a privilege life where they never struggled for money. She married Mr Lyons when she was 19 as it was expected by their parents. She didn’t have a problem with it though, she felt like a real woman once she was married and she looked forward to raising their child. 

Mr Lyons died when Edward was 19 and she drank away her loneliness, depression and paranoia/ anxiety where she became an alcoholic. 

Their general history –( what time have they been brought up in)

 

Mrs L was born in the 2930’s. This time Period was completely different to life as we know it now. There wasn’t equality between man and woman. She grew up in a time where women were expected to be carers for their husbands and live entirely to serve them, raise their children and take care of their home. 

 































































                                                                                                        







 

 

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