RP Resources

I've written faux celeb for a loooooong time, so I think I can help with this one! I apologize in advance, this comment is going to be a whole damn research paper LMAO

First of all, it can be confusing, I agree, because everybody does it just a little bit differently. Yes, using all the claims for one actor is frowned upon while you have to use all claims for a musician (more on that in a minute). Some comms even allow a lot of wiggle room for production dates of films and tv shows or albums in order to give people more flexibility and control over their own characters. Some comms are open minded and lenient when it comes to roles your actor can have (meaning, your pb doesn't need to be a carbon copy of the original actor who had the role) and some places get super strict, limit ages and age ranges, and even limit races when it comes to picking roles for your actor.

Here's a general guideline that might help you setup a character for a faux celeb game and get into the mindset of writing a faux celeb character:

- For the most part, faux celeb is all about creating a brand new celebrity in the form that you want to! This is why it is frowned upon to select all the same roles from one actor. A lot of actors get cast IRL due to their "star power" or "star quality" -- not just speaking casually here, this is an actual industry term that filmmakers, producers and studios use to direct the vision of a project sometimes. It's like this: if you cast Tom Cruise, you're getting TOM CRUISE. But if you cast Joaquin Phoenix, he may give you virtually anything under the sun. So if you create a character with all the same roles as a person irl, you're limiting your character to essentially being a "copy" of that real life counterpart, instead of creating your own character's feel/style/persona/etc. (You might as well just celeb the person instead of doing faux celeb at that point lol). It is also frowned upon because ideally, people want to be able to have a lot of different roles they can choose from and most comms want people to not "hog" certain roles, so not using an entire actor's body of work helps with that. (Though I should note, I have seen one or two comms allow and sometimes even require you use an actor's entire body of work.)

- another confusing thing: this rule seems to change when referring to directors. it seems that most characters who have directing credits take on the entire body of work of that director. it doesn't REALLY make sense for someone to direct pulp fiction AND horrible bosses, after all. those two films are just wildly different and the directing styles are inconsistent with each other. so usually, I see people choose the directing credits of an entire director: your character might have all judd apatow directing credits, for example. but i think in most comms, you can mix this up a bit as long as it's realistic!

- here is how i go about finding credits for a character that is an actor. i go to imdb and go to my pb's page. their birthdate should be listed and i click on the year. then i scroll through the list of top actors born that year and i look at COMPARABLE actors (meaning i'm not looking for someone who looks physically like my pb. i'm looking for actors who have a similar style as the character i'm creating.) so if my character is an indie guy, i may skip over the rock or jason statham lol. if my character is going to be more comedy based, i'm zoning in on the james franco and seth rogen types. keeping it realistic of course depending on my pb and what i think that face could have realistically portrayed! (some people get flexible with this and this will vary by what your comm allows. i have seen a black pb as hermione 👏🏽 👏🏽 but i have also seen comms deny a poc pb for a role originally portrayed by a celeb of mixed race irl. in fact, ethnicity is more a thing that people might fight you on than anything else and most comms out of respect for diversity do not allow white washing of credits at all. only once have i seen a mod get picky over a "style" choice for a character's credits.) most comms allow a 5 year age gap meaning your character can have a role that was played by someone irl 5 years older or younger than them. a quick way for me to navigate different age ranges is I go into the url bar and change the current year to the next (or previous) year, then keep going on my search! this has been my easiest, most helpful method, but it does take time if you are really searching and don't have a general idea of what you want for your character.

- for future roles, if you have an imdb pro account, use that resource! i once again start with comparable celebs and see if they have any projects that are in development. if you don't have imdb pro that's totally okay! i use the "year method" outlined above, except this time i search for a comparable film and then click on the release year for the film. this will bring up the most popular films that are being released that year, so for instance, i can easily scroll through all the top films coming out in 2021. if you get really into faux celeb, it helps to use industry resources such as industry magazine websites for latest casting updates and project news, but you really do NOT have to do all of that lmao.

- faux celeb these days leans towards being AU in nature. roles that have not been claimed are assumed to be played by the RL actor. so you can have a character mention tom hanks if they were in a film with tom hanks and hank's role has not been taken in the community. but people don't usually do this OFTEN. it's just a possible choice, but to limit confusion, i think people only do this here and there.

- don't go overboard with credits. you really don't have to and it will make your work of setting up your character much easier. yes, actors work A LOT (it is their job after all!) but this is rp! you can get the point across if you pick a few meaty roles for your character and maybe a couple smaller things here and there and you're set. you can always add to their credits after you've joined the game.

- music credits are the easiest to put together for obvious reasons lol. but they can be the hardest to use as inspiration for your character since musicians' production schedules aren't as transparent as the filming industry. (you may never know if that next rihanna album is ever going to come out 😂😭)

- your character's bio, storylines, personality traits, and life are completely separate from the credits you choose for them. a character with demi lovato credits does not have to go to rehab this year if you don't want that for your character (but maybe you can use that as inspiration for your character's past, since demi has written songs about her addiction issues and therefore your character has written those songs too). the choice is yours and there are many possibilities here! that's the biggest difference between faux celeb and celeb games. using the previous example again --- whatever happens to demi irl does not have to happen to your character in the game, unless you want to use it.

- the only exception to this is professional news. if demi drops an album irl, then your character has a new album! if your character plays forrest gump and the actor who plays forrest wins an oscar irl, your character wins an oscar! but as usual, some comms are flexible on this, though.

OMG THAT IS A LOT I'M SO SORRY! but i have literally been writing faux celeb since it first started in the rp world (back before IJ had even been created! i know i sound old lmao). If you want to write it but just want to get your feet wet, keep it simple at first and base a character after yourself. ask yourself "if i was a celeb, who would I want to be? what would I want to be like? what kind of projects would i love to do?" and then mold your character that way! you can always try out something outside of your wheelhouse later once you feel more comfortable with the game genre. 😎