Costume Research- Protagonist

The protagonist of my film needs to be relatable and accessible, so that the audience attach to them. The best ways to achieve this are through dialogue and appearance, and here I will be focusing on appearance.

Most movie protagonists are white males; this is because in society they are considered by many to be the 'default' or 'average' person. While this is obviously not true, as modern society is diverse in terms of gender, ethnicity, sexuality and many other aspects, it is a trope of almost all genres to have a white male protagonist. In terms of costume, having a character dressed too formally of too shabbily will make them unrelatable. They need to be as average as possible without being boring. Looking at other 'average' characters in film, you can see they dress inoffensively and casually. The other issue I will encounter is having the lead be a teenager. Teenagers come with their own stereotypes, many of which negative, so I will have to take into consideration whether I want to conform to or subvert stereotypes such as lazy and violent through costume.

The sort of costume I want for my protagonist will consist of jeans, trainers or sneakers, a t-shirt or collared shirt and maybe a casual jacket depending on the weather the days we film. At the beginning of the trailer, I plan for there to be a scene where the character is in his home at night. For this scene, he may be wearing pyjama bottoms and slippers.