I’m still out there, writing and teaching.
It would be nice to write more. I should. Writing would be nice for 2019.
Sadly, I write less when I teach about writing.
Showing posts with label writing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label writing. Show all posts
Monday, December 31, 2018
Monday, December 18, 2017
Randomly Returning to Inklings
I haven’t posted to this blog on anything close to a regular basis, and nobody reads it since it was meant as a place to experiment and record random thoughts. I have a lot of random thoughts. Somehow, I missed all of 2016 on this blog. Not much of a shock, since I was finishing an MFA and writing a thesis.
Random thoughts for today, to post something because I want to post something:
- Snow stinks. It is beautiful from inside a house, for one day, maybe. Then, snow becomes the original Hell of various mythologies.
- MFA programs are a scam, but not entirely, but they are. There are lots of MFA programs, and they exist primarily to make money on non-traditional students with a desire to be artsy.
- Blogging was killed by the death Google Reader.
- Cats and tea make most days better.
Maybe I’ll most a real blog entry soon.
Friday, June 5, 2015
Unemployed = Full-Time Writer
The only way to be a full-time writer is to be unemployed.
Writing means spending hours skimming online postings of contests and other submission opportunities. Screenwriters and playwrights have to network, too, which means attending events and meetings with directors, production companies, actors, and other writers. You have to pursue pitching your works almost with the same energy you invest in writing.
Treat writing like a business, if you want to earn a living at it.
Last September, I declared my intention to become a published, real paid professional playwright. I was going to clean up the existing plays and submit things to various producers and publishers.
And then reality happened.
Nope. Nothing publishing.
I did have a new show produced, after swearing I wouldn't write a new script, and it was a good experience… but I'm still not published. Still an amateur, I suppose.
Writers and other artists have to be the most secure insecure people on Earth. We don't stop trying to pursue our crafts, confident we have something worthy of being shared. We also never stop doubting the very convictions that compel us to create.
My passion, as the post from last September indicates, had waned after mixed reviews and no publications. By the time I started to want to write again, I was teaching an overload schedule with no time to read through submission opportunities. Now, I have time to pursue writing again. For better or worse, I'm not planning to teach full-time in the coming school year.
Without other work to distract me (or to pay me), I should be pretty motivated to make this writing thing work. At least, that's the plan for now.
Writing means spending hours skimming online postings of contests and other submission opportunities. Screenwriters and playwrights have to network, too, which means attending events and meetings with directors, production companies, actors, and other writers. You have to pursue pitching your works almost with the same energy you invest in writing.
Treat writing like a business, if you want to earn a living at it.
Last September, I declared my intention to become a published, real paid professional playwright. I was going to clean up the existing plays and submit things to various producers and publishers.
And then reality happened.
Nope. Nothing publishing.
I did have a new show produced, after swearing I wouldn't write a new script, and it was a good experience… but I'm still not published. Still an amateur, I suppose.
Writers and other artists have to be the most secure insecure people on Earth. We don't stop trying to pursue our crafts, confident we have something worthy of being shared. We also never stop doubting the very convictions that compel us to create.
My passion, as the post from last September indicates, had waned after mixed reviews and no publications. By the time I started to want to write again, I was teaching an overload schedule with no time to read through submission opportunities. Now, I have time to pursue writing again. For better or worse, I'm not planning to teach full-time in the coming school year.
Without other work to distract me (or to pay me), I should be pretty motivated to make this writing thing work. At least, that's the plan for now.
Friday, September 12, 2014
Hitting Pause on (New) Playwriting
It's nearly 1 a.m. on a Monday night in August, and I find that insomnia is yet again winning the nightly battle that is my quest for sleep. Although much of its power is derived from my physical situation (back pain beyond words), the real power of insomnia is self-doubt. Used against a perfectionist, self-doubt crushes the spirit and causes emotional paralysis.
It was about two hours ago that I realized I needed to reboot my writing. It was time to accept what I've been denying for a couple of weeks: I need to hit pause on writing any new stage plays and devote more energy to the other unfinished works in my life. And, if I do feel the need to start a new project, it should be a screenplay, a short story, or something other than a stage play.
Theater was good to me this year, with three full productions locally. The shows have been good, and the actors, crews, and house teams put everything into making the shows successful. The audiences seemed pleased, even when a critic wasn't. (And one critic not liking the shows isn't too bad, when ticket sales were okay, especially for one show.)
But, I only enjoyed the process sporadically. I haven't loved what I'm doing — and that's a problem. My health, my schedule, and not being more assertive earlier with the shows left me feeling disconnected from my words and the shows. Stretching myself too thin, and not just for theatrical projects (I did too many things, period), and pushing my body too hard was a problem this summer.
Theater is a collaborative medium, especially the development of new works. When that collaboration feels "off" in some way, it is like a relationship you know isn't working out and won't be saved. You realize you were better off as friends rather than teammates on a production. I share the blame for not being a constant presence during new show development, something I should have made a clear, non-negotiable aspect of developing new works.
If I cannot be present for the majority of development, working to fix issues with the script and to improve it, the process isn't fulfilling for me. This is something I feel about theater, exclusively, because of the nature of the medium.
I'm not abandoning theater, nor will I stop trying to get my existing works staged, but I'm going to follow a different path. And because that path won't be easy or likely to lead to many stagings of my works, I'm going to invest my writing energies elsewhere.
Film, I can handle the idea that you sell the script and that's life. Theater shouldn't feel that way. At least historically, it's a writer's medium. You listen to actors and directors, and you might take their suggestions, but the script is yours, as a playwright. You have the final say.
I'm not a great playwright. I'm good. My works need to be workshopped and revised. But, time and energy haven't really permitted that process. Short of directing or co-directing my own works, and self-producing, the limits of local theater aren't going to give me the development process I want or need.
Over the next few years, I'm going to finish and revise some play scripts. I'll send them to contests and theaters, hoping for productions. With more than 30 unproduced works, it isn't as if I lack for scripts to submit. Some are pretty good, and they should be produced. Ideally, I'll get to develop them and make them what they can be.
New works, though? No more plays until other projects are complete and my passion returns. If it isn't at least started, as little as an idea on a piece of paper or in a computer file, it isn't going to be a stage play.
And I do owe the actors, directors, and theatrical companies that staged my works a great deal. They liked my words enough to present them to audiences. That's really an honor and I am thankful. I learned much this summer, and that's a great thing.
It merely happens that one thing I learned about myself is that I need more control as a playwright. That reflects more on my creative needs and process than on the people producing my works for stage.
Screenplays are not stage works, as I mentioned above. You sell the script, and move on. You have to accept that it isn't "your" work. I've written screenplays and had two that production companies asked to read. Then, I stopped writing screenplays and focused on other projects. It is time to get some more screenplays out there and maybe update the ones that didn't make it to the next step.
When I was in college, I would fill a 70-page spiral notebook with poetry every year. I have nearly 1500 poems in those journals. The last journal was filled in 1998. That bothers me, since it isn't that I lost interest in poetry. I have tried, every year or two, to get back to the journals. Something hasn't felt right in 16 years, though.
I have novels started, lots of them, and need to select one and finish it. Just finishing one would be a good thing. I have outlines dating back to fourth grade that were good then and aren't bad now. It bothers me to see the half-written manuscripts, waiting for some attention.
A friend said that just as I stop writing new plays, the existing ones will start to find homes. I'd be okay with that, as long as I remember to assert more control. A lot of my difficulties with new works would be avoided if I had a more assertive personality up front… instead of waiting until I feel sick about things.
Now, I'm off to write some bad poetry.
It was about two hours ago that I realized I needed to reboot my writing. It was time to accept what I've been denying for a couple of weeks: I need to hit pause on writing any new stage plays and devote more energy to the other unfinished works in my life. And, if I do feel the need to start a new project, it should be a screenplay, a short story, or something other than a stage play.
Theater was good to me this year, with three full productions locally. The shows have been good, and the actors, crews, and house teams put everything into making the shows successful. The audiences seemed pleased, even when a critic wasn't. (And one critic not liking the shows isn't too bad, when ticket sales were okay, especially for one show.)
But, I only enjoyed the process sporadically. I haven't loved what I'm doing — and that's a problem. My health, my schedule, and not being more assertive earlier with the shows left me feeling disconnected from my words and the shows. Stretching myself too thin, and not just for theatrical projects (I did too many things, period), and pushing my body too hard was a problem this summer.
Theater is a collaborative medium, especially the development of new works. When that collaboration feels "off" in some way, it is like a relationship you know isn't working out and won't be saved. You realize you were better off as friends rather than teammates on a production. I share the blame for not being a constant presence during new show development, something I should have made a clear, non-negotiable aspect of developing new works.
If I cannot be present for the majority of development, working to fix issues with the script and to improve it, the process isn't fulfilling for me. This is something I feel about theater, exclusively, because of the nature of the medium.
I'm not abandoning theater, nor will I stop trying to get my existing works staged, but I'm going to follow a different path. And because that path won't be easy or likely to lead to many stagings of my works, I'm going to invest my writing energies elsewhere.
Film, I can handle the idea that you sell the script and that's life. Theater shouldn't feel that way. At least historically, it's a writer's medium. You listen to actors and directors, and you might take their suggestions, but the script is yours, as a playwright. You have the final say.
I'm not a great playwright. I'm good. My works need to be workshopped and revised. But, time and energy haven't really permitted that process. Short of directing or co-directing my own works, and self-producing, the limits of local theater aren't going to give me the development process I want or need.
Over the next few years, I'm going to finish and revise some play scripts. I'll send them to contests and theaters, hoping for productions. With more than 30 unproduced works, it isn't as if I lack for scripts to submit. Some are pretty good, and they should be produced. Ideally, I'll get to develop them and make them what they can be.
New works, though? No more plays until other projects are complete and my passion returns. If it isn't at least started, as little as an idea on a piece of paper or in a computer file, it isn't going to be a stage play.
And I do owe the actors, directors, and theatrical companies that staged my works a great deal. They liked my words enough to present them to audiences. That's really an honor and I am thankful. I learned much this summer, and that's a great thing.
It merely happens that one thing I learned about myself is that I need more control as a playwright. That reflects more on my creative needs and process than on the people producing my works for stage.
Screenplays are not stage works, as I mentioned above. You sell the script, and move on. You have to accept that it isn't "your" work. I've written screenplays and had two that production companies asked to read. Then, I stopped writing screenplays and focused on other projects. It is time to get some more screenplays out there and maybe update the ones that didn't make it to the next step.
When I was in college, I would fill a 70-page spiral notebook with poetry every year. I have nearly 1500 poems in those journals. The last journal was filled in 1998. That bothers me, since it isn't that I lost interest in poetry. I have tried, every year or two, to get back to the journals. Something hasn't felt right in 16 years, though.
I have novels started, lots of them, and need to select one and finish it. Just finishing one would be a good thing. I have outlines dating back to fourth grade that were good then and aren't bad now. It bothers me to see the half-written manuscripts, waiting for some attention.
A friend said that just as I stop writing new plays, the existing ones will start to find homes. I'd be okay with that, as long as I remember to assert more control. A lot of my difficulties with new works would be avoided if I had a more assertive personality up front… instead of waiting until I feel sick about things.
Now, I'm off to write some bad poetry.
Monday, August 4, 2014
Reviews and Writing
Writers, and any other artists, have to be ready to accept the judgments of critics. I was sent a couple of nice notes regarding a negative review, from audience members (and friends) who liked the particular show reviewed, but I have to also consider the power of critics to make or break a work.
Pittsburgh City Paper: New Death... Airless and Deadly
How much do critics influence an artist? For me, that depends on the critic and his or her biases. If a critic has a history of liking a particular genre or a particular set of writers — and disliking others — then I have to ask if I fall into Column A or Column B.
Even when an artist is in Column B, and approval is a long-shot at best, I would still suggest listening and asking what the nuggets of truth are in the review and how to address those. A negative review is valuable, if you're willing to learn what you can and ignore the rest.
From the review above, I am reminded that opening nights aren't easy. Seldom does an opening occur without dropped lines, missed cues, and a nervousness that feels unnatural. That is simply the nature of new shows. Add in a new, untested script, and there's more reason for unease and mistakes.
As a playwright, I have to ask what I can do to help a cast and crew make the best of their talents. Did I tighten the dialogue enough? Did I balance the action with exposition? Did I make the most of the medium, especially as stages have serious limitations. Did I balance humor with whatever else I'm trying to convey?
I don't write farce or sitcoms. I don't aim for a joke or two a page. I write serious plays with lighter moments. When the audience starts to consider the work a comedy, that's a failing on my part to balance the early pages well.
As this production winds down, I'll look at the script and compare my notes with reviews, audience feedback, cast and crew notes, and whatever else is available. All my plays undergo endless revisions. A negative review, or a positive review, can influence the choices I make revising.
A fellow playwright say, "Not every play is for every audience." That's also something to keep in mind.
Never let negative marks (grades, reviews, audiences) stop you from taking chances. Take the feedback and move forward with the next idea. What you shouldn't do is try to please the negative voices, item by item, because then you aren't creating your own vision.
Pittsburgh City Paper: New Death... Airless and Deadly
How much do critics influence an artist? For me, that depends on the critic and his or her biases. If a critic has a history of liking a particular genre or a particular set of writers — and disliking others — then I have to ask if I fall into Column A or Column B.
Even when an artist is in Column B, and approval is a long-shot at best, I would still suggest listening and asking what the nuggets of truth are in the review and how to address those. A negative review is valuable, if you're willing to learn what you can and ignore the rest.
From the review above, I am reminded that opening nights aren't easy. Seldom does an opening occur without dropped lines, missed cues, and a nervousness that feels unnatural. That is simply the nature of new shows. Add in a new, untested script, and there's more reason for unease and mistakes.
As a playwright, I have to ask what I can do to help a cast and crew make the best of their talents. Did I tighten the dialogue enough? Did I balance the action with exposition? Did I make the most of the medium, especially as stages have serious limitations. Did I balance humor with whatever else I'm trying to convey?
I don't write farce or sitcoms. I don't aim for a joke or two a page. I write serious plays with lighter moments. When the audience starts to consider the work a comedy, that's a failing on my part to balance the early pages well.
As this production winds down, I'll look at the script and compare my notes with reviews, audience feedback, cast and crew notes, and whatever else is available. All my plays undergo endless revisions. A negative review, or a positive review, can influence the choices I make revising.
A fellow playwright say, "Not every play is for every audience." That's also something to keep in mind.
Never let negative marks (grades, reviews, audiences) stop you from taking chances. Take the feedback and move forward with the next idea. What you shouldn't do is try to please the negative voices, item by item, because then you aren't creating your own vision.
Wednesday, July 9, 2014
New Play: A New Death World Premier
This is why I haven't been blogging a lot this summer. I've been working on several new plays…
A NEW DEATH
A World Premiere
By C.S. Wyatt
Directed By Kaitlin Kerr
Assistant Directed By Sarah McPartland
Presented by Throughline Theatre Company
July 18 - July 26
The Grey Box Theatre
3595 Butler St, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15201
TICKETS:
Featuring:
Andy Coleman
Chelsea Faber
Hazel Carr Leroy
Eric Leslie
Tonya Lynn
Sarah McPartland
Jared King Rombold
John Henry Steelman
Thursday, July 3, 2014
Breaking Rules
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| P writing blue (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
"You can break the rules after you master the rules," I respond. "And then, only break them when you can defend the choice."
Imagine my frustration when a play was rejected because it lacked the "journey" of the main character.
When I decided to write a play without a complete Hero's journey, it was an intentional act (pun), a choice to parody a genre. There are characters in myth and legend that do not change. They don't mature. Mocking that notion of the invariable being seemed promising.
One of the readers providing coverage clearly didn't get the joke. The comments on the coverage sheet indicated the story needed a clear journey and transformation. Oops. My choice must not have been obvious.
There are two lesson: 1) breaking the formula is risky; 2) if the reader doesn't know the original story, parody doesn't work.
The other reader did like the script and scored it "highly recommended," but you need to run the gauntlet to be produced.
Both reviewers liked the dialogue, the wit, yet only one got the joke. That isn't good. I'm not sure following the traditional formula would have helped.
Will I break the rules again? Of course. But I also understand the risks.
Wednesday, June 25, 2014
Media and Stories
Stage is not screen, and screen is not stage. Telling the same story in both media means thinking about the story in different ways. I could tell the same "story" (major plot line) in poetry, song, short story, novel, movie, and play… and it would be different in each.
The "tools available" aren't the same from one medium to the next, so the results cannot be the same.
The "tools available" aren't the same from one medium to the next, so the results cannot be the same.
Sunday, June 1, 2014
Writing More than 'Necessary'
My wife commented that I'm always writing several new scripts, adding to the pile of un-produced works. Her question was why I keep writing more than will ever see the stage (or screen), and all I can say is that maybe the sheer quantity of works increases the odds of production.
If I write four to six scripts a year, maybe one or two will move forward. Plus, writing is what I do, so I might as well write things that could end up produced.
If I write four to six scripts a year, maybe one or two will move forward. Plus, writing is what I do, so I might as well write things that could end up produced.
Saturday, February 15, 2014
Writing is Planning
As I finished the draft of a short play, a colleague sent me a message asking how many new manuscripts or adaptations I have written in the last twelve months or so. It seems best to list them:
That would be six new works, with another two or three outlined. My goal is to complete seven new works in the 20-minute or longer range during 2014. Most of my plays run 70 to 80 minutes, not counting intermissions.
Friends say it seems like I've done more. That's because older works that had been collecting dust are now finding homes as I dedicate myself to completing them, too. Older plays that have been revised or rewritten in the past year:
I have at least ten scripts I hope to revive by 2015.
These counts do not include scripts I edited, revised, or completely wrote for other individuals as a consultant.
I don't sit around waiting for ideas and I've stopped trying to perfect my old ideas. Now, I aim to get as many good scripts to producers and directors as possible. A good scripts becomes better, or even great, during the development process. Trying to perfect plays by editing alone for ten years was an ineffective approach to writing scripts.
Writers write. It's that simple. Some of what I write will never be produced, some of it will be. You can't write one or two manuscripts and then spend years and years trying to craft perfection. Write, and write some more. You never know when a script will find a home.
- Billie's Girlfriend, written in early 2014 and submitted to Acting Out! Pittsburgh Pride for consideration. It might not be selected, of course, but it is a new play.
- Twists of Choice, written in early 2014 for The LAB Project, premiering in 2015.
- Women Say F*ck, Too! written in late 2013 and premiering during the Pittsburgh Fringe Festival in May, 2014.
- The Fertility Dance, written in 2013 and submitted to a regional contest. The company passed on the script, but it found a home for 2015.
- The Cat Lady, written in 2014, about to be submitted to a regional contest.
- Under Development, written in 2013, received a staged reading by Organic Theater Pittsburgh.
That would be six new works, with another two or three outlined. My goal is to complete seven new works in the 20-minute or longer range during 2014. Most of my plays run 70 to 80 minutes, not counting intermissions.
Friends say it seems like I've done more. That's because older works that had been collecting dust are now finding homes as I dedicate myself to completing them, too. Older plays that have been revised or rewritten in the past year:
- A New Death, my oldest unproduced script was rewritten and submitted to Throughline Theatre and will be premiering in July 2014.
- The Gospel Singer, premiering in August, 2014, received as staged reading in 2013 as part of the "In the Raw" festival of Bricolage Production Company.
- Clown and Mime, revised in 2013.
- The Garden, which was produced in 2012, has been revised for a future production. (I can dream.)
I have at least ten scripts I hope to revive by 2015.
These counts do not include scripts I edited, revised, or completely wrote for other individuals as a consultant.
I don't sit around waiting for ideas and I've stopped trying to perfect my old ideas. Now, I aim to get as many good scripts to producers and directors as possible. A good scripts becomes better, or even great, during the development process. Trying to perfect plays by editing alone for ten years was an ineffective approach to writing scripts.
Writers write. It's that simple. Some of what I write will never be produced, some of it will be. You can't write one or two manuscripts and then spend years and years trying to craft perfection. Write, and write some more. You never know when a script will find a home.
Sunday, December 22, 2013
Pencils and Pens... My Favorite Writing Tools
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| fountain pen (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
Why do I write with pencils and pens? What is special about these quaint, simple tools with no "undo" or "spellcheck" features? Why do I believe they produce better writing in some situations than any word processor? And why don't I have the same desire to use a typewriter?
Typewriters are great, especially the classic portables. I owned a Smith Corona manual and a Brother electric typewriter. I liked them, and I wouldn't mind having a typewriter in my office as a work of art… but pencils and pens still win out when I want to write.
I write most of my poetry and many of my script drafts in pencil. I use a classic Pentel mechanical pencil. My wife bought extras because I'm so attached to the design of the Pentel Quicker Clicker model (http://www.pentel.com/store/quicker-clicker-mechanical-pencil-1640) and you know a good design will be discontinued. Thankfully, they remain a popular model. It's just a great pencil (0.5mm HB lead).
My journals, collections of short poems and prose, are in pencil. The initial drafts are jotted down on orange-yellow unlined paper that is several decades old now. I write the poems on these sheets, letting them gather until I am ready to sit down and recopy the poems into the lined pages of ruled notebooks. When I do copy the poems, it is a slow process. I write in cursive, slowly and carefully, erasing my mistakes and rewriting as necessary. I want to lettering to be as perfect as possible.
The journals are not meant to be revised and edited. The only editing occurs during the copying process, from the unlined sheet to the lined college-ruled notebook. I fix minor errors and sometimes try to improve the poetry a little. The journals cover my life, from elementary school (fourth grade or so) through the present. The college years were the most active, those years of "angst" and self-absorption. I toss the drafts once I rewrite the poems. Those drafts have never meant as much to me as the final journals.
The journals capture moments in time. They capture my experiences. They are not meant to be revised forever, updated and tweaked by my improved "skills" as a writer. Perfection of form or craft is not the point of a journal. The journals are exercises, yes, but they are memories captured for later reflection.
I need to return to the journals to make up for years of neglect — something I vow to do from time to time over the last six years, and yet I still neglect the notebooks. I hereby vow that 2014 will be different. I will get back to all forms of creative writing, now that we are settled into our new home.
My scripts drafts are in pencil, too. I write on legal pads, numbering the pages. I transcribe the pages from the legal pads into the computer, usually every few scenes. I still have stacks of pads I have yet to migrate to digital form, sadly. Again, I need to focus on my creative writing with my "spare" time. When I type the pages, I keep the legal pad pages. The draft pages of a script are mine, while the final production of a play or film is never going to be the same as the first draft. There's something special about the legal pad pages and the pencil scribblings.
When I have time to think and ponder, I write slowly with a pen. Ideally, a good (not great) fountain pen. The scratching of the pen as it crosses the page, leaving ink on the page, is a great sensation. It is as if I can feel the words being created, taking form on the page. It's not like the sensation of a pencil. But, a pen is less than ideal for drafts and I lack the confidence to use a pen for my journals — I hate sloppy mistakes and would panic if I made an error in ink.
A fountain pen is best for letters and other artifacts we wish to share with others. You do not write a letter in pencil! No, a good, personal letter is in pen. A letter, a note, written in pen has more personality than an email or a post shared online. To me, the fountain pen also represents one of the greatest teachers I knew, a man who favored a Parker Sonnet Ciselé (http://www.parkerpen.com/en-US/pens-inks/sonnet). He critiqued my stories and poems with that pen, and graded countless thousands of student assignments.
Computers are wonderful for writing. They have made editing and revising easy, changing how we write. I can rewrite and rewrite endlessly. Sadly, I do just that. With my journals or with a letter, once I am satisfied with the page, that's it. You can't erase forever with a pencil — and you can't cut-copy-paste — and you can revise even less with a pen. Writing slowly, carefully, and thoughtfully is the result of the technology I select as a writer.
And yet, these are digital words… about which I should write a journal entry!
Tuesday, July 9, 2013
Mnemonic was 'Too Good' for Me…
Sunday, I went to see Quantum Theatre's production of "Mnemonic." I give a lot of credit to Quantum Theatre for taking a chance. Performing another company's work was risky, and it didn't quite work for me. This was a play devised by an entire production company, written by the actors and representing that original production company.
As a writer and audience member, my wife can attest that I like some "odd" things. I respect adventurous writing and innovative staging. I've seen plays in which the actors never take the stage, and some that were immersive media experiences. I've enjoyed plays that are in multiple languages, reminding me that good actors and staging transcend language barriers (but I still tried to translate what I could). I've written plays in which mime was essential, and some that are surely abstract.
But you must never forget that people need to feel engaged by a play. Writing shouldn't push the audience or readers away. I don't fall into the camp that "art must offend" nor do I believe that "challenging" the audience has no limits. You can overshoot the challenge, and then you're left with empty seats.
Reviews such as this are a problem for theatre:
As a writer and audience member, my wife can attest that I like some "odd" things. I respect adventurous writing and innovative staging. I've seen plays in which the actors never take the stage, and some that were immersive media experiences. I've enjoyed plays that are in multiple languages, reminding me that good actors and staging transcend language barriers (but I still tried to translate what I could). I've written plays in which mime was essential, and some that are surely abstract.
But you must never forget that people need to feel engaged by a play. Writing shouldn't push the audience or readers away. I don't fall into the camp that "art must offend" nor do I believe that "challenging" the audience has no limits. You can overshoot the challenge, and then you're left with empty seats.
Based on a small random sample of audience response, I might say "Mnemonic" is too good for its audience, except that the Quantum audience is as good as it gets in Pittsburgh (adventurous, intelligent, willing).
— Stage review: Quantum traces memory, mysteries
When you consider a work "too good" for an educated, informed audience including professors from excellent universities, it might be the work that is the problem. The acting was solid enough and the staging was excellent, but the play didn't speak to me — and judging by others, it didn't speak to them, either. The play feels like it was meant for a specific place, time, and production company. It didn't make the move, and maybe that's an interesting question in itself.
I can't say it was a bad experience, watching "Mnemonic." I can't say it was wonderful, either. It was "okay" — which isn't going to expand the audience for theatre. I'm not suggesting theatre has to be pop to be a success, but it can't be "okay" and thrive.
When someone like me, a fan of the surrealists, modern art, and experimental music, is left wondering "What was the point?" that's not theatre that's "too good" for the audience. (And yes, absurdist theatre makes the point that there is no point… but "Mnemonic" wasn't an absurdist work.)
When someone like me, a fan of the surrealists, modern art, and experimental music, is left wondering "What was the point?" that's not theatre that's "too good" for the audience. (And yes, absurdist theatre makes the point that there is no point… but "Mnemonic" wasn't an absurdist work.)
Friday, July 5, 2013
On Being 'The' (or 'A') Pittsburgh / Visalia Playwright
It was a brief discussion after a play with a director about to read one of my scripts.
Director: What is your goal, as a playwright?
Me: To be The Visalia playwright or even A San Joaquin Valley playwright. Maybe a dozen people will know my name! Or at least the name of one of my plays. Maybe.
Director: And then what?
Me: To be one of The Pittsburgh playwrights. That might be a bit harder….
Director: And then what?
Me: There's a "then what" after that? I hadn't thought about the next step. I'm still at the first step!
Director: This is Pittsburgh. Off-Broadway and Broadway aren't creatively far away. You need to think about that.
Me: I need to get something produced and fully staged in Pittsburgh before I worry about—
Director: Always think ahead. You never know who will be in an audience.
It was a good point. In Pittsburgh, you might have a Broadway actor, director, or playwright in an audience. I've met several, now, and worked with a couple of Broadway veterans. When I think about that, it gets a little overwhelming. It's also a reminder that every script has to be the best it can be.
I was only slightly joking about being one of The Pittsburgh playwrights. There are some towering historical figures and current dramatists in the Greater Pittsburgh region. By comparison, I cannot think of a major playwright — a major writer — from my native Visalia, California. That means I stand a better chance of being the best-known writer from Visalia. (I do know some amazing artists from Visalia, especially photographers and illustrators.)
Here's the list of Pittsburghers:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_from_the_Pittsburgh_metropolitan_area
Recently, I wrote that writers have to be unrealistic. You need big dreams. Maybe I shouldn't joke about being among the Pittsburgh greats. Maybe that should be a goal. Seems unrealistic enough…
Director: What is your goal, as a playwright?
Me: To be The Visalia playwright or even A San Joaquin Valley playwright. Maybe a dozen people will know my name! Or at least the name of one of my plays. Maybe.
Director: And then what?
Me: To be one of The Pittsburgh playwrights. That might be a bit harder….
Director: And then what?
Me: There's a "then what" after that? I hadn't thought about the next step. I'm still at the first step!
Director: This is Pittsburgh. Off-Broadway and Broadway aren't creatively far away. You need to think about that.
Me: I need to get something produced and fully staged in Pittsburgh before I worry about—
Director: Always think ahead. You never know who will be in an audience.
It was a good point. In Pittsburgh, you might have a Broadway actor, director, or playwright in an audience. I've met several, now, and worked with a couple of Broadway veterans. When I think about that, it gets a little overwhelming. It's also a reminder that every script has to be the best it can be.
I was only slightly joking about being one of The Pittsburgh playwrights. There are some towering historical figures and current dramatists in the Greater Pittsburgh region. By comparison, I cannot think of a major playwright — a major writer — from my native Visalia, California. That means I stand a better chance of being the best-known writer from Visalia. (I do know some amazing artists from Visalia, especially photographers and illustrators.)
Here's the list of Pittsburghers:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_from_the_Pittsburgh_metropolitan_area
Recently, I wrote that writers have to be unrealistic. You need big dreams. Maybe I shouldn't joke about being among the Pittsburgh greats. Maybe that should be a goal. Seems unrealistic enough…
Thursday, June 27, 2013
Finding Me
Through 1991, I had filled six journals with poetry and short prose. Then, it took me seven years to fill the seventh. The eighth journal has been less than half-filled since 1999 or so. This summer, 2013, I have vowed a return to the poetry journals just as I have returned to playwriting after too many years.
There is a box marked "Scott's Writing" in the basement. For years, it was a paper box, a Staples red box to be precise. Our first house in Pennsylvania flooded and I moved the writing to a clear plastic bin. While I know the bins can crack and leak, let me pretend that my writing is now a little safer.
Why not backup the writing to the cloud? Because much of the writing has never been digitized. The writing wasn't created on a computer. I still have poems and plays I wrote in fifth grade, Mr. B's class at Ivanhoe Elementary. I was a playwright and poet then... and I still am. I just got a bit lost along the way. "Books" bound with colored electrical tape and featuring crayon illustrations are meant to be what they are — physical artifacts of my youth.
It's hard to explain the gaps in my writing. There was a shift from poetry to scripts in 1999. Then, I stopped writing for several years. In 2004, I returned to graduate school and my creative writing was once again pushed aside. But why is that? Several of my classmates and a few professors managed to write creative and scholarly simultaneously.
Looking back, I wrote a lot of poetry and short stories while an undergraduate. I wrote hundreds of pages for myself, while writing academic papers, working on the school paper, and working 20 to 30 hours a week. What's my excuse for the lack of productivity in the last decade or so?
Writing well isn't about writing a lot — but the two aren't entirely separate. I'd like to be even a fraction as productive as I was years ago. You can always edit and revise once the ideas are on paper or stored away as bits of data.
As I have posted recently, I believe I was afraid of being "just a writer" instead of having a more secure career. An aspiring writer is like an aspiring actor: one works at Starbucks and the other waits tables, but they both have big dreams. Recently, I was asked if I'd consider acting in one of my stage plays. That would make me eligible for paying jobs as a barista and a waiter!
I wonder what coffee house poets are qualified to do?
There is a box marked "Scott's Writing" in the basement. For years, it was a paper box, a Staples red box to be precise. Our first house in Pennsylvania flooded and I moved the writing to a clear plastic bin. While I know the bins can crack and leak, let me pretend that my writing is now a little safer.
Why not backup the writing to the cloud? Because much of the writing has never been digitized. The writing wasn't created on a computer. I still have poems and plays I wrote in fifth grade, Mr. B's class at Ivanhoe Elementary. I was a playwright and poet then... and I still am. I just got a bit lost along the way. "Books" bound with colored electrical tape and featuring crayon illustrations are meant to be what they are — physical artifacts of my youth.
It's hard to explain the gaps in my writing. There was a shift from poetry to scripts in 1999. Then, I stopped writing for several years. In 2004, I returned to graduate school and my creative writing was once again pushed aside. But why is that? Several of my classmates and a few professors managed to write creative and scholarly simultaneously.
Looking back, I wrote a lot of poetry and short stories while an undergraduate. I wrote hundreds of pages for myself, while writing academic papers, working on the school paper, and working 20 to 30 hours a week. What's my excuse for the lack of productivity in the last decade or so?
Writing well isn't about writing a lot — but the two aren't entirely separate. I'd like to be even a fraction as productive as I was years ago. You can always edit and revise once the ideas are on paper or stored away as bits of data.
As I have posted recently, I believe I was afraid of being "just a writer" instead of having a more secure career. An aspiring writer is like an aspiring actor: one works at Starbucks and the other waits tables, but they both have big dreams. Recently, I was asked if I'd consider acting in one of my stage plays. That would make me eligible for paying jobs as a barista and a waiter!
I wonder what coffee house poets are qualified to do?
Thursday, June 20, 2013
The Conflict: Writing and 'Realism'
What follows is a long, meandering essay on why I haven't been doing what I should have been doing for the last 23 years. Not that I haven't been writing from time to time, but I would stop writing just as I started to hit a good stride. Between "realistic" pursuits, I would write a half-dozen plays, a hundred poems, or several decent short stories. Then, I'd feel like a failure, since I wasn't selling my works, and I'd slink back towards the "realism" that required putting creative writing aside.
Professional (and pro-ish) writers are, by nature, unrealistic. They have to be, since writing leads to a successful career about as often as portraiture, ballet, or professional sports. If you don't imagine yourself good enough to earn a living, you aren't going to keep writing — and writers write. You need a stubborn sense of pride and the hubris to imagine someone is going to recognize the value of your words.
You might not assume a financial value to your words, but you assign them some sort of value. Maybe you write to teach, to persuade, to entertain, or to "change the world" in a grand way.
When someone tells me that he or she writes for "the self" and some manner of (low-cost) personal therapy, I cringe. Really? You write just for yourself? Then it is a hobby and you are not a "writer" in the way I use the word. To me, a writer creates for an audience. Maybe it is only one other person, but there is an audience.
I used to tell my students that writers are engaged in conversations. Leave it to college students to point out that you can have a conversation with yourself (silently, ideally). Still, my point is that writing and all forms of communication are transactions between people. Writing is an interaction with some sort of goal. Maybe the goal is simply to reinforce traditions and good feelings (epideictic rhetoric), but there is always a goal when we communicate.
For professional writers, your words must attract not merely an audience… but an audience willing to pay for your works. Talk about an absurd dream: earning a living as a writer.
I've ended up meandering around writing, because I've constantly allowed myself to be "realistic" about the potential to earn a living as a writer. While some of my classmates never stopped writing, never accepted that they needed "real" careers to pay very real bills — including student loans — I kept trying to earn money, at the expense of being a writer. So, of course, I succeeded at failing and being unhappy. I would have been much happier being unrealistic. I couldn't have failed as a writer any more than I did in other pursuits. Realism drains creativity.
When I headed off to college, my goal was to be a journalist. But, as I watched newspapers and magazines close, I decided to make the ultimate mistake and shift entirely to teaching. After all, teaching seemed like a secure career path. That didn't end well, and I decided to embrace technology. When that didn't work, did I return to writing? Nope, I went back towards teaching. Only later did I briefly focus on returning to college for a graduate degree in journalism… but that didn't work out well, either.
My entrepreneurial efforts might be compared to being an unrealistic artist, but my attempts to "fit in" within corporate or educational settings were soul-sucking disasters. Not that failing as an entrepreneur is good, but it is better than other forms of misery and discontent. Still, writing would have been cheaper and easier than some of my attempts to achieve financial security.
In a cycle I have written about several times, I would start to pursue writing only to panic about financial security. I'd end up doing something that seemed realistic and potentially rewarding, chasing dreams of earning a living at the expense of writing.
Experiencing failure after failure (personal and financial) as I embraced "realism" over creative writing, guided me towards a doctorate degree. Only an artist could view a career in academia is more secure than doing what he or she loves. It turns out, there aren't anywhere near the job openings necessary to accommodate a fraction of terminal degree holders. Chasing writing would have at least avoided piles of student loan debt and years spent not writing the creative forms and genres I enjoy.
If you want to be a writer, write. I tell my students that, I tell my clients that, I tell seminars that, and yet it isn't what I was doing. I was busy being "realistic" while advising other people to embrace the absurd notion of writing for fun and profit. Why had I allowed this to happen? Why had realism won over my true nature as a writer? I spent six years in graduate school, not engaged in creative writing.
Yes, yes, I know that academic writing, all writing, is "creative" to some degree. But everyone knows what I mean when I describe myself as a creative writer trapped in the world of scholarly writing. Just try to submit an academic paper as an epic poem. Maybe a journal or two will accept it, but most are hung-up on APA and MLA formatting and that horrible language of "academese."
Forget realism. Assume your creative works are good enough. Assume they are whatever you imagine them to be — they just might be that good.
When I write, I know the work I produce isn't "great" compared to the works I admire. But, I also know, without any doubt, that my works are better than 90 percent (or more) of what I read, hear, and see. That's the balance an artist probably needs: the certainty that you're good, the humility to recognize greatness in others. You need a little realism, without being realistic.
Somehow, I need the faith in my works to not be sidetracked by other pursuits. Chasing money has probably cost me money and delayed my career as a writer. I'm not sure how I will avoid being sucked back into that bad cycle, either. How do you not worry about earning enough to pay bills? To take care of family? I need to be unrealistic and convince myself that writing is a career.
If I am going to do anything other than write, it should enable and extend my creative writing. This is going to be a scary transition, and too often I have been scared out of writing full-time. Why do some people pursue their long-shot dreams, while others surrender to realism? The artists must have insane self-confidence and a realization that they are not meant to do anything else.
I keep claiming to be a writer. I make this claim every few years, and then quickly abandon the path required to succeed as a writer. Time to embrace what I tell others and be unrealistic. I must write, write, and write some more, and not only blog posts about why I should be writing….
Professional (and pro-ish) writers are, by nature, unrealistic. They have to be, since writing leads to a successful career about as often as portraiture, ballet, or professional sports. If you don't imagine yourself good enough to earn a living, you aren't going to keep writing — and writers write. You need a stubborn sense of pride and the hubris to imagine someone is going to recognize the value of your words.
You might not assume a financial value to your words, but you assign them some sort of value. Maybe you write to teach, to persuade, to entertain, or to "change the world" in a grand way.
When someone tells me that he or she writes for "the self" and some manner of (low-cost) personal therapy, I cringe. Really? You write just for yourself? Then it is a hobby and you are not a "writer" in the way I use the word. To me, a writer creates for an audience. Maybe it is only one other person, but there is an audience.
I used to tell my students that writers are engaged in conversations. Leave it to college students to point out that you can have a conversation with yourself (silently, ideally). Still, my point is that writing and all forms of communication are transactions between people. Writing is an interaction with some sort of goal. Maybe the goal is simply to reinforce traditions and good feelings (epideictic rhetoric), but there is always a goal when we communicate.
For professional writers, your words must attract not merely an audience… but an audience willing to pay for your works. Talk about an absurd dream: earning a living as a writer.
I've ended up meandering around writing, because I've constantly allowed myself to be "realistic" about the potential to earn a living as a writer. While some of my classmates never stopped writing, never accepted that they needed "real" careers to pay very real bills — including student loans — I kept trying to earn money, at the expense of being a writer. So, of course, I succeeded at failing and being unhappy. I would have been much happier being unrealistic. I couldn't have failed as a writer any more than I did in other pursuits. Realism drains creativity.
When I headed off to college, my goal was to be a journalist. But, as I watched newspapers and magazines close, I decided to make the ultimate mistake and shift entirely to teaching. After all, teaching seemed like a secure career path. That didn't end well, and I decided to embrace technology. When that didn't work, did I return to writing? Nope, I went back towards teaching. Only later did I briefly focus on returning to college for a graduate degree in journalism… but that didn't work out well, either.
My entrepreneurial efforts might be compared to being an unrealistic artist, but my attempts to "fit in" within corporate or educational settings were soul-sucking disasters. Not that failing as an entrepreneur is good, but it is better than other forms of misery and discontent. Still, writing would have been cheaper and easier than some of my attempts to achieve financial security.
In a cycle I have written about several times, I would start to pursue writing only to panic about financial security. I'd end up doing something that seemed realistic and potentially rewarding, chasing dreams of earning a living at the expense of writing.
Experiencing failure after failure (personal and financial) as I embraced "realism" over creative writing, guided me towards a doctorate degree. Only an artist could view a career in academia is more secure than doing what he or she loves. It turns out, there aren't anywhere near the job openings necessary to accommodate a fraction of terminal degree holders. Chasing writing would have at least avoided piles of student loan debt and years spent not writing the creative forms and genres I enjoy.
If you want to be a writer, write. I tell my students that, I tell my clients that, I tell seminars that, and yet it isn't what I was doing. I was busy being "realistic" while advising other people to embrace the absurd notion of writing for fun and profit. Why had I allowed this to happen? Why had realism won over my true nature as a writer? I spent six years in graduate school, not engaged in creative writing.
Yes, yes, I know that academic writing, all writing, is "creative" to some degree. But everyone knows what I mean when I describe myself as a creative writer trapped in the world of scholarly writing. Just try to submit an academic paper as an epic poem. Maybe a journal or two will accept it, but most are hung-up on APA and MLA formatting and that horrible language of "academese."
Forget realism. Assume your creative works are good enough. Assume they are whatever you imagine them to be — they just might be that good.
When I write, I know the work I produce isn't "great" compared to the works I admire. But, I also know, without any doubt, that my works are better than 90 percent (or more) of what I read, hear, and see. That's the balance an artist probably needs: the certainty that you're good, the humility to recognize greatness in others. You need a little realism, without being realistic.
Somehow, I need the faith in my works to not be sidetracked by other pursuits. Chasing money has probably cost me money and delayed my career as a writer. I'm not sure how I will avoid being sucked back into that bad cycle, either. How do you not worry about earning enough to pay bills? To take care of family? I need to be unrealistic and convince myself that writing is a career.
If I am going to do anything other than write, it should enable and extend my creative writing. This is going to be a scary transition, and too often I have been scared out of writing full-time. Why do some people pursue their long-shot dreams, while others surrender to realism? The artists must have insane self-confidence and a realization that they are not meant to do anything else.
I keep claiming to be a writer. I make this claim every few years, and then quickly abandon the path required to succeed as a writer. Time to embrace what I tell others and be unrealistic. I must write, write, and write some more, and not only blog posts about why I should be writing….
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
Dramatist Me
Deciding to be a full-time "dramatist" is not a decision to be taken lightly. Yet, that is the path I am choosing. This probably proves I'm unrealistic and unstable.
Playwrights and screenwriters seldom earn "the big bucks" as writers. Okay, few writers in any genres become wealthy. That's why so many of us split our time between writing and teaching writing to other aspiring scribblers. Consider the logic of struggling career writers encouraging other writers, but don't dwell on it too long.
There are some precautions to take, like preparing for a wagon-train across the frontier.
My wife and I are stocking up on food and water, buying what we can on sale and storing it in our basement. Canned food and pasta are the staples for starving artists, I've been told. Yes, we have our Ramen noodles, rise, and Campbell's condensed soups on the shelves. It isn't enough to stock for the lean months. No, we're mastering coupon clipping, too. Stock up on the cheap!
Next, you have to have good guides, unflinching men and women familiar with the terrain. I've met several such guides, and a few scouts, too. The scouts are great because they've suffered the slings and arrows of production company rejections. Ideally, I'll learn what not to do by listening closely.
Knowing that failure is the likeliest of outcomes, why in the world would I dedicate myself to this path? Because I've always admired dramatists.
I've lived in some great regions for the theatrically minded. I grew up in the Central Valley of California, a region captured by the works of John Steinbeck and William Saroyan. What playwright wouldn't want to be like Saroyan? A bicycling curmudgeon on the streets of Fresno, I can relate to that.
My wife and I moved to Minneapolis in 2006, where theatre and radio plays are at the heart of the region's creative community. I would look at the Guthrie Theater (despite how ugly I believe it is) and imagine one of my works on the main stage. Maybe the second stage, but still… it is THE Guthrie.
Today, we live in Western Pennsylvania. My plays are being read in the shadow of the August Wilson Center. (While he traveled East to West, we've gone the opposite direction.) Another great playwright, looming large in my imagination, reminding me how middling my works might be.
For every Wilson or Saroyan, there are hundreds of dramatists like me. How absurd is it to imagine I might have a play on stage in Pittsburgh, Minneapolis, Chicago… or even New York City? Short of self-production, a path restricted to the more financially secure (or insane) dramatists, the path ahead will be rocky.
Maybe you'll find me in coming months, standing outside the August Wilson Center passing out scripts to passersby in the hopes that one might know someone who knows an agent or producer.
Playwrights and screenwriters seldom earn "the big bucks" as writers. Okay, few writers in any genres become wealthy. That's why so many of us split our time between writing and teaching writing to other aspiring scribblers. Consider the logic of struggling career writers encouraging other writers, but don't dwell on it too long.
There are some precautions to take, like preparing for a wagon-train across the frontier.
My wife and I are stocking up on food and water, buying what we can on sale and storing it in our basement. Canned food and pasta are the staples for starving artists, I've been told. Yes, we have our Ramen noodles, rise, and Campbell's condensed soups on the shelves. It isn't enough to stock for the lean months. No, we're mastering coupon clipping, too. Stock up on the cheap!
Next, you have to have good guides, unflinching men and women familiar with the terrain. I've met several such guides, and a few scouts, too. The scouts are great because they've suffered the slings and arrows of production company rejections. Ideally, I'll learn what not to do by listening closely.
Knowing that failure is the likeliest of outcomes, why in the world would I dedicate myself to this path? Because I've always admired dramatists.
I've lived in some great regions for the theatrically minded. I grew up in the Central Valley of California, a region captured by the works of John Steinbeck and William Saroyan. What playwright wouldn't want to be like Saroyan? A bicycling curmudgeon on the streets of Fresno, I can relate to that.
My wife and I moved to Minneapolis in 2006, where theatre and radio plays are at the heart of the region's creative community. I would look at the Guthrie Theater (despite how ugly I believe it is) and imagine one of my works on the main stage. Maybe the second stage, but still… it is THE Guthrie.
Today, we live in Western Pennsylvania. My plays are being read in the shadow of the August Wilson Center. (While he traveled East to West, we've gone the opposite direction.) Another great playwright, looming large in my imagination, reminding me how middling my works might be.
For every Wilson or Saroyan, there are hundreds of dramatists like me. How absurd is it to imagine I might have a play on stage in Pittsburgh, Minneapolis, Chicago… or even New York City? Short of self-production, a path restricted to the more financially secure (or insane) dramatists, the path ahead will be rocky.
Maybe you'll find me in coming months, standing outside the August Wilson Center passing out scripts to passersby in the hopes that one might know someone who knows an agent or producer.
Wednesday, May 29, 2013
Questions Writers Receive
The most common questions writers receive:
1. I steal the ideas by eavesdropping on conversations around me. People say some pretty amazing things, far better than I could create in my imagination.
2. Submit hundreds of works and query letters. One or two might be chosen. People won't know how much work it was to get a single work published or produced. Maintain the illusion it was easy, just to annoy other writers.
3. No, the idea isn't that great. No, I won't write it for you.
- Where do your ideas come from?
- How do you get your ideas published / produced?
- I have this really great idea! Can you write it?
1. I steal the ideas by eavesdropping on conversations around me. People say some pretty amazing things, far better than I could create in my imagination.
2. Submit hundreds of works and query letters. One or two might be chosen. People won't know how much work it was to get a single work published or produced. Maintain the illusion it was easy, just to annoy other writers.
3. No, the idea isn't that great. No, I won't write it for you.
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