It is disconcerting, like a hall of mirrors. A character in Dickens is a representation of a social role, but a modern movie actress who tries to play a role will seem old-fashioned. To cope with this, actresses have cooled themselves way down, become numb blanks. Thus today's stars are totally tranquilized. The smart thing for a girl nowadays is to play numb.
Dumb actresses used to be in demand, now numb actresses are in demand.
Rigor mortis is de rigueur. The role is now a temporary shift of state produced by a combination of environmental factors, like in a neural network. This possibility has always been latent in the concept of role, but in the machine age this was perceived as a danger, while today it is simply a game - we no longer see shifting roles as dangerous and taboo and therefore theatrically compelling. Rather, we follow these shifts as if we were doing a puzzle or kibitzing a chess game. Yes, the medium is the message, but this does not mean and never meant that the content of the medium is a conscious reflection on itself.