Ralph (Jeremy Shamos)

Character Analysis

This character only gets a couple minutes of screen time, but he sure takes the spotlight…right to the head.

Ralph is just a tragic actor who's in the way of Riggan's path of destruction, and he cannot be spared. Okay, so maybe Riggan didn't actually use his superpowers to make the light fixture to fall and knock Ralph unconscious but Riggan certainly tears up his acting ability:

RIGGAN: […] the blood coming out of his ear was the most honest thing he's done so far.

Ouch and ouch.

In some ways, Ralph represents the stark reality amidst the chaos and absurdity that everyone's hurtling around in during the week before the play. And his reappearance in during the final preview might seem strange and random, but only within the constraints of the movie. In the real world, you would expect that someone who got beaned with a spotlight to get a little lawsuit-happy. Just for a moment, Ralph lets us escape Riggan's self-absorption and think about someone else's problems.