Elaine Marley - Character Design

Character Design

The original script for The Secret of Monkey Island called for a character simply named "the Governor"; Monkey Island creator Ron Gilbert had envisioned her as a far more ruthless character. The name "Elaine" was created later in development by Dave Grossman, who wrote the final scenes of the game in which protagonist Guybrush Threepwood disrupts the wedding of antagonist LeChuck and the governor. One of Grossman's options for gatecrashing the wedding is having Guybrush scream "Elaine!" in a parody of a similar scene in the 1967 film The Graduate; Gilbert appreciated the reference, so Elaine was adopted as the governor's name. As development on the game further progressed, the character evolved from being a ruthless governor to the player character's love interest.

When the player talks to a number of characters in The Secret of Monkey Island, a close-up portrait of the character is shown. Elaine's appearance in this portrait was based on Avril Harrison, an artist working at LucasArts. Gilbert always felt bothered by these close-up portraits, stating that "while they were great art, I never felt they matched the style of the rest of the game". In the 2009 Special Edition, these close-ups were redone in the same stylized artwork featured in the rest of the game.

In The Curse of Monkey Island, Elaine realises that Guybrush is her true love, and marries him. However, Ron Gilbert did not intend for the relationship between the characters to develop in this way, stating that Elaine "never really liked Guybrush and thought of him as more of a little brother". Gilbert was not involved in the production of The Curse of Monkey Island; while thinking that the new development team "did a pretty good job of capturing what Monkey Island was about", the relationship between Elaine and Guybrush "was the thing that bugged the most about The Curse of Monkey Island".

The Curse of Monkey Island was the first Monkey Island game to feature voice acting; in it, the part of Elaine Marley was given to British actress Alexandra Boyd. Boyd explains that she got the part of Elaine as she had worked with voice director Darragh O'Farrell previously; O'Farrell brought Boyd in to read for the part. Boyd joked that "I figured I got the part because I have red hair like her". Boyd was not contacted to return as the character for Escape from Monkey Island; Elaine was instead voiced by American actress Charity James. Nevertheless, Boyd reprised the role for Telltale Games' Tales of Monkey Island and the later enhanced remakes of the first two games. Boyd was glad to return, stating that the character "is very well written and it’s fun doing all that shouting at LeChuck and Guybrush! Exhausting but fun". Rather than travelling to Telltale's studio in San Rafael, Boyd instead recorded her lines for Tales of Monkey Island in London, communicating with the director remotely with Skype. The development of Elaine's character was one of Gilbert's aims for Tales of Monkey Island; Gilbert wanted Elaine to "be better informed and more capable than most of the other characters".