I just (finally) saw Clybourne Park.
I walked away thinking that it was a smart, well-crafted, well-constructed play...but not a capital-g-great play.
So why spend time writing about it? First, because smart, well-crafted-well-constructed plays are rare enough that those qualities alone are worth examining. Second, because it made me question what is, in fact, the distance or difference between "SWCWC" (oh, let's call 'em "swick" plays, like "slick" only different) plays and the Greats. And third, because Clybourne Park inhabits a very specific (and quite popular) space in the theatrical universe: the play-in-conversation-with-a-canonical-play.
I'm gonna attack these three ideas eventually, but just one today. First -- the "conversation" play. What is it? Why does it exist? Is it a good thing or laziness or what?
Clybourne Play is essentially a thought-experiment, with two acts that bookend the events of Lorraine Hansberry's classic "A Raisin in the Sun," where the Younger family (black) moves into a white neighborhood in their pursuit of the American Dream (which is real estate? oy...). You can enjoy the play, as I did, without having read "Raisin" (I know, I know -- I'm reading it this weekend). I missed a lot -- like the fact that some of his characters are from "Raisin." Like the fact that it's the same house as in Raisin. Like the fact that the whole plays was answering or toying with questions set up in Raisin. And perhaps it is only in the interplay of canonical text and this text that the text itself is elevated. Me, I just saw a play where people were trying not to talk about race (as they talked about race). Essentially, it was like when I listen in to HALF of a phone call. I get the gist, but miss a LOT. Hansberry's play can be appreciated in its own right, but the intelligence or genius or point of Norris's play relies on the cultural literacy of his audience. Which isn't wrong...but if you've got someone with a hole in their cultural literacy (a BIG one. I KNOW. Forgive me -- I know. I'm on it).
Norris is following in famous footsteps. Think of "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead," a play that is ALL about the interstitial shit happening in Hamlet, a play that relies not just on passing knowledge of Hamlet but on deep DEEP familiarity with it, and with a ton of other stuff besides. Funny though it may be, it's a play that will lock you out COLD unless you've done your homework, recently, with several different colored pens and your desktop opened to wikipedia.
Stoppard, of course, is part of a veritable ARMY of people in conversation with (or making homage to) the Bard. We've got folks like Dietz who rework Chekhov ("The Nina Variations"), we've got The Rude Mechs playing with Tennessee Williams ("The Method Gun")...in more subtle ways, you've got Tracy Letts in "August: Osage County," planting both feet in the American literary-theatrical tradition of the multigenerational hard-drinking fucked-up-family-saga (the fingerprints of Williams, Inge, Miller and -- especially - O'Neill are all over the damn thing).
So one question is: "Jesus Christ -- WHY?" When the originals are so good, when you could write about anything on earth, why try to have a conversation with those existing stories?
A few possible answers:
(1) The crass pragmatist: "Name Recognition." Familiarity might breed contempt in some places, but in the theater, it often breeds ticket sales. It makes people feel safe to hear the name of a play they know...it makes them feel cool to go to a play that is that play but NOT that play.
(2) The starry-eyed student: "To Learn." These plays are great for a REASON. Craft, theme, surprise, depth -- it's all there. The truly great plays are the ones that you learn from every time you return to them -- what better way to apprentice yourself than to spend a year (or two) reading and rereading and mulling over a great play? It's the reason I love teaching Hamlet (and can't imagine ever getting sick of it), the reason Curt Columbus, I'm sure, always assigned a scene from The Seagull. A "conversation play" is a way of not just returning to the well but setting up shop next to it.
(3) The egoist: "To Improve It." Okay, not to improve the original...but to update it, or to talk back to it, to tell the original playwright (even if he or she is long-dead) what they missed the first time around. And so maybe I was being harsh to say "the egoist." Writing is a lonely business. If you can pretend that your hero is in the room with you for a while, if you can truly imagine that you're saying "hey Lorraine...you missed a spot"...maybe it makes the lonely work of writing feel a little more congenial.
(4) The obsessive: "To focus on a detail." This is truly the "Hey Lorraine, you Missed a Spot" answer. Maybe you've had (as I often do) the experience of going to see a show and finding yourself fixated on some minor character or detail or "what if" question that is CLEARLY not meant to be the center of the story. Ophelia in Hamlet (Svich's "Twelve Ophelias"). "What happens when they grow up" in Charlie Brown (Dog Sees God). "What ABOUT the neighbors" in Raisin (Clybourne Park).
You know what? Any of these reasons is enough. Anything we can do to keep theater in the conversation, anything we can do to entice people out to see new work, anything we can do to learn from our old masters, to interrogate how the plays and their themes are relevant to us as writers, to us as citizens of this particular moment, but in conversation with that one -- huzzah and hurray. I think my favorite aspect of Clybourne Park may, in fact, have been the thing I was least equipped to appreciate -- its connection to a Great Play, its attempt to play in Hansberry's sandbox, its pragmatism, obsession, idealism and impudence all at once.
Friday, August 31, 2012
Wednesday, August 15, 2012
Pushing The Envelope Without Emptying Your Wallet
A couple of film-makers and I were talking the other night, about making movies, financing movies, and the challenge of reeeallly wanting to make something, but feeling like a full-length project might be out-of-reach because of the budget required to make anything.
This got me thinking...both philosophically, about the merits of Cheap Art (I hate feeling like my friends -- and I -- are locked out of making something because we can't get to money), but also much more PRACTICALLY.
My question:
How do you create a beautiful movie on a non-existent budget?
How do you "push the envelope" without emptying your wallet?
A few initial ideas (and PLEASE, more welcome!):
(1) Start by reading Fast, Cheap and Under Control by John Gaspard (which I still need to get my hands on).
(2) Invest in Story -- write a story so compelling that it doesn't need "bells and whistles" in order to captivate audiences.
(3) Push the technical envelope -- Think of Hitchcock's Rope, which was contained to one room...and one long shot (or at least, so it appeared).
(4) Push the envelope in terms of what your movie is willing to discuss.
(5) Use limited locations to your advantage -- create a story where claustrophobia is one of your themes, or the claustrophobia works to your story-telling advantage.
(6) Shoot in a place that is remote and beautiful -- so that the natural scenery can do some of your heavy lifting in terms of keeping things visually interesting.
(7) Create characters compelling enough that actors will kill each other to get to play them -- or at least work for next to nothing. Consider that less-established actors are usually willing to work for less, but that you want to write roles that can be played by people who are experienced (i.e., it's harder to find a terrific 11-year-old than a terrific 22-year-old). I mean, you should do this anyway, no matter what your budget...
(8) Really spend time thinking about what will make this project different and compelling. If you're reaching into your own pocket to fund the thing, you can't just make a "good, solid" movie. The world is full of expensive, good, solid movies. Figure out how you're going to work on every level to create something new, something that will challenge you, challenge your collaborators, and challenge your audience (artistically, intellectually, morally...).
This got me thinking...both philosophically, about the merits of Cheap Art (I hate feeling like my friends -- and I -- are locked out of making something because we can't get to money), but also much more PRACTICALLY.
My question:
How do you create a beautiful movie on a non-existent budget?
How do you "push the envelope" without emptying your wallet?
A few initial ideas (and PLEASE, more welcome!):
(1) Start by reading Fast, Cheap and Under Control by John Gaspard (which I still need to get my hands on).
(2) Invest in Story -- write a story so compelling that it doesn't need "bells and whistles" in order to captivate audiences.
(3) Push the technical envelope -- Think of Hitchcock's Rope, which was contained to one room...and one long shot (or at least, so it appeared).
(4) Push the envelope in terms of what your movie is willing to discuss.
(5) Use limited locations to your advantage -- create a story where claustrophobia is one of your themes, or the claustrophobia works to your story-telling advantage.
(6) Shoot in a place that is remote and beautiful -- so that the natural scenery can do some of your heavy lifting in terms of keeping things visually interesting.
(7) Create characters compelling enough that actors will kill each other to get to play them -- or at least work for next to nothing. Consider that less-established actors are usually willing to work for less, but that you want to write roles that can be played by people who are experienced (i.e., it's harder to find a terrific 11-year-old than a terrific 22-year-old). I mean, you should do this anyway, no matter what your budget...
(8) Really spend time thinking about what will make this project different and compelling. If you're reaching into your own pocket to fund the thing, you can't just make a "good, solid" movie. The world is full of expensive, good, solid movies. Figure out how you're going to work on every level to create something new, something that will challenge you, challenge your collaborators, and challenge your audience (artistically, intellectually, morally...).
Cheap Art Can Change the World
Cheap Art Can Change the World.
There, Bread and Puppet, there's my contribution to your Cheap Art Manifesto. But I might be willing to go further than that. I might be willing to go out on a limb, to go so far as to say that
Cheap Art Can Change The World In A Way That Expensive Art Can't.
Expensive Art, by definition, requires financial resources. Those resources can come from many sources: individual or corporate donors who believe in your art enough to back up that belief with checks, subscribers who believe your art (or your taste in art) will be "successful" or "good" or of interest to them on a consistent enough basis to invest in several of your endeavors up front (which requires that you acquire or maintain the resources to create or curate said art on a regular basis...that you create a satisfactory supply stream), grant-making institutions who buy in to your mission, your message and/or your track record. Expensive art usually requires you to make choices to "earn back" your investment, be that in the form of ticket sales, positive publicity, the attraction of more wealthy donors.
So what does that mean? It means that, as a rule, you're asking for the buy-in of the people who control financial resources in order to make your art -- whatever your art. May I suggest that if you're asking for money with your right hand, and making art with your left, YOU are the medium, and have, at least in the long term, at least from a macro-perspective, some seriously limiting factors on your message?
All of this seems patently obvious, but it's worth remembering when you hear an artistic director's musings on "creative risks." Because there are CREATIVE risks (ooh, a raining elevator onstage! ooh, DEVISED! ooh, we're sitting on CUSHIONS instead of SEATS!) and there are social/cultural/political risks -- risks like queering the stories you put on your main stage, risks like telling "women's stories" in more than one of your five plays in a season, risks like taking "icky" issues like abortion head-on, risks like pointing out the deeply flawed, and even dangerous, practices of a faith community with which your theater has a relationship, risks like drawing connections or parallels between the business practices of your biggest corporate sponsor and human rights violations half a world away, risks like telling stories from perspectives that might not sit well with the dominant political views of your subscriber base. And you can tell me that directors/writers/artistic staff are brave enough and committed enough to do these things anyway, but they're doing them "anyway" -- they're hitting the pause button and deliberating the consequences (for their community, sure, but crucially for their institution) before they give a particular project or choice the green light.
And the more expensive the art, the more resources required by "outside" parties, the more power those outside voices will likely have. And the more money is on the table (especially the more money/resources/power any one outside party has), the more likely that voice has some vested interest in the status quo, because it is through the social and economic status quo that you have accrued the power to invest in the first place.
So. There are limitations, significant if surmountable, to the "change agency" of "Expensive" art, whether it's a Broadway musical, a Blockbuster Film, Shakespeare in the Park, or hell, even the Lincoln Memorial (which, after all, was intended, like his most famous speech, to dedicate, to consecrate, and to hallow). Even if tons of people see it for free, it's still Expensive Art -- art that required Investment.
That's one of the reasons I like Cheap Art.
Cheap art, and I'm talking VERY cheap art, isn't bound by those constraints. Does it have other constraints, significant ones? Absolutely. Cheap art, like expensive art, must consider its audience, must consider time and place and impact on its audience, needs to think about creative and artistic integrity and quality. But Cheap Art's ability to put on the next show, the ability of the "cheap art" institution to put on the next show, isn't bound by its ability to pay for the current one. Because where Expensive Art combines money and imagination, Cheap Art gets by on imagination. Cheap art, in my experience, might reach a smaller audience...but it's also more likely to reach a less traditional audience...the teenagers wandering through the park who are distracted by, and then drawn into, a live music performance, instead of the teenagers who have been loaded into a bus and driven downtown to sit in a "real" music venue. The hung-over executive who wanders into his local coffee shop for a quick morning fix, only to be confronted by, possibly moved by, a painting or photograph by a local artist co-opting the coffee shop walls as her "gallery." The inner-city kids who see their park transformed into a stage for a one-night-only free performance by a bunch of college kids.
One of the things I like about Cheap Art is that is that you find it in the damnedest places. You turn a corner -- and there's a beautiful piece of graffiti. You go for your morning coffee...and are confronted by a figure study that makes you pause. You go to the park to throw a frisbee around...and find a drum circle, 50-people strong, and you stop to dance, or listen, or gawk.
Cheap Art is defined, in other words, by its accessibility. By that, of course, I don't mean that you can necessarily "understand" it (in fact, given that much cheap art is significantly less vetted/developed than its expensive counterpart, odds are higher that it'll be less digestible), but that it's easier to GET TO IT. You don't gotta pay Twenty Bucks to go look at it, $75 to go listen to it, $125 plus the cost of the subway to go watch it. And the "you" in question is, ideally, more broadly defined -- it's the homeless vet who knows he'll get snacks along with the show, the harried parents who can't afford a babysitter but CAN afford to haul the stroller to the park.
Cheap Art Doesn't Wait for You To Find It -- It Finds You.
Cheap Art Transforms the Ordinary World, The World We Live In.
Of course, much expensive art has the
There, Bread and Puppet, there's my contribution to your Cheap Art Manifesto. But I might be willing to go further than that. I might be willing to go out on a limb, to go so far as to say that
Cheap Art Can Change The World In A Way That Expensive Art Can't.
Expensive Art, by definition, requires financial resources. Those resources can come from many sources: individual or corporate donors who believe in your art enough to back up that belief with checks, subscribers who believe your art (or your taste in art) will be "successful" or "good" or of interest to them on a consistent enough basis to invest in several of your endeavors up front (which requires that you acquire or maintain the resources to create or curate said art on a regular basis...that you create a satisfactory supply stream), grant-making institutions who buy in to your mission, your message and/or your track record. Expensive art usually requires you to make choices to "earn back" your investment, be that in the form of ticket sales, positive publicity, the attraction of more wealthy donors.
So what does that mean? It means that, as a rule, you're asking for the buy-in of the people who control financial resources in order to make your art -- whatever your art. May I suggest that if you're asking for money with your right hand, and making art with your left, YOU are the medium, and have, at least in the long term, at least from a macro-perspective, some seriously limiting factors on your message?
All of this seems patently obvious, but it's worth remembering when you hear an artistic director's musings on "creative risks." Because there are CREATIVE risks (ooh, a raining elevator onstage! ooh, DEVISED! ooh, we're sitting on CUSHIONS instead of SEATS!) and there are social/cultural/political risks -- risks like queering the stories you put on your main stage, risks like telling "women's stories" in more than one of your five plays in a season, risks like taking "icky" issues like abortion head-on, risks like pointing out the deeply flawed, and even dangerous, practices of a faith community with which your theater has a relationship, risks like drawing connections or parallels between the business practices of your biggest corporate sponsor and human rights violations half a world away, risks like telling stories from perspectives that might not sit well with the dominant political views of your subscriber base. And you can tell me that directors/writers/artistic staff are brave enough and committed enough to do these things anyway, but they're doing them "anyway" -- they're hitting the pause button and deliberating the consequences (for their community, sure, but crucially for their institution) before they give a particular project or choice the green light.
And the more expensive the art, the more resources required by "outside" parties, the more power those outside voices will likely have. And the more money is on the table (especially the more money/resources/power any one outside party has), the more likely that voice has some vested interest in the status quo, because it is through the social and economic status quo that you have accrued the power to invest in the first place.
So. There are limitations, significant if surmountable, to the "change agency" of "Expensive" art, whether it's a Broadway musical, a Blockbuster Film, Shakespeare in the Park, or hell, even the Lincoln Memorial (which, after all, was intended, like his most famous speech, to dedicate, to consecrate, and to hallow). Even if tons of people see it for free, it's still Expensive Art -- art that required Investment.
That's one of the reasons I like Cheap Art.
Cheap art, and I'm talking VERY cheap art, isn't bound by those constraints. Does it have other constraints, significant ones? Absolutely. Cheap art, like expensive art, must consider its audience, must consider time and place and impact on its audience, needs to think about creative and artistic integrity and quality. But Cheap Art's ability to put on the next show, the ability of the "cheap art" institution to put on the next show, isn't bound by its ability to pay for the current one. Because where Expensive Art combines money and imagination, Cheap Art gets by on imagination. Cheap art, in my experience, might reach a smaller audience...but it's also more likely to reach a less traditional audience...the teenagers wandering through the park who are distracted by, and then drawn into, a live music performance, instead of the teenagers who have been loaded into a bus and driven downtown to sit in a "real" music venue. The hung-over executive who wanders into his local coffee shop for a quick morning fix, only to be confronted by, possibly moved by, a painting or photograph by a local artist co-opting the coffee shop walls as her "gallery." The inner-city kids who see their park transformed into a stage for a one-night-only free performance by a bunch of college kids.
One of the things I like about Cheap Art is that is that you find it in the damnedest places. You turn a corner -- and there's a beautiful piece of graffiti. You go for your morning coffee...and are confronted by a figure study that makes you pause. You go to the park to throw a frisbee around...and find a drum circle, 50-people strong, and you stop to dance, or listen, or gawk.
Cheap Art is defined, in other words, by its accessibility. By that, of course, I don't mean that you can necessarily "understand" it (in fact, given that much cheap art is significantly less vetted/developed than its expensive counterpart, odds are higher that it'll be less digestible), but that it's easier to GET TO IT. You don't gotta pay Twenty Bucks to go look at it, $75 to go listen to it, $125 plus the cost of the subway to go watch it. And the "you" in question is, ideally, more broadly defined -- it's the homeless vet who knows he'll get snacks along with the show, the harried parents who can't afford a babysitter but CAN afford to haul the stroller to the park.
Cheap Art Is Less Contained.
Cheap Art is Harder to Control (admittedly, this can be good and bad).
What (the best) Cheap Art Lacks In Production Value, it Makes Up For In Creative Solutions.
Cheap Art has a different Risk/Reward ratio.
Cheap Art is More Abundant.
Cheap Art Is (usually) Personal.
Cheap Art Doesn't Wait for You To Find It -- It Finds You.
Cheap Art Transforms the Ordinary World, The World We Live In.
Of course, much expensive art has the
Television Done Well - Sherlock Holmes
Yes, this is called "Playwrights Notebook," and yes, I am as obsessed with the stage as I am with large and small screen. And I don't know that the lessons I discuss (below) translate to the stage, necessarily...or even to other television shows...but maybe they do.
But. I'm in love with Sherlock Holmes (the new television show). Why?
1. Because it gets the bread-and-butter stuff right: compelling characters working hard to achieve something difficult-but-not-impossible, relationships that unfold over time, suspense, solid story-telling, frequent twists.
2. Because they've turned what for most shows is a problem (that we live in a hypertext world, one where conversations take place and crucial information is conveyed on tiny devices) and turned it into an advantage or at least a fun visual conceit (the text free-floats in the air near devices, will appear on its own). They then EXTENDED the solution, and show us what Sherlock sees -- the closest thing to allowing us into his decidedly unusual brain, without wasting precious screen time/conversation time on "well, I can tell he has a dog because I see three hairs on his collar, and I can see he's effete and wealthy because he has manicured hands...". And then they have FUN with the solution, pointing out things that are extraneous/ridiculous/fun, or showing where Sherlock DOESN'T see an answer. So free-floating text becomes one of the visual systems of the show, both mirroring and elevating the ways in which the show's audience is now accustomed to using text.
3. Because they JUMP IN and USE the visual medium, the tools that editing provide. Case in point: guy shows up, Sherlock says "tell me what happened," the picture does a 360 and when it lands, we're with the guy his car, in a field...and we simply relive the experience the guy had. We assume he's telling Sherlock the story, but we don't have to sit there and have him REPORT something that the nature of television gives us a chance to see for ourselves. (I love the show even more because Sherlock's other directive, before the guy "told" his story, was "and don't be boring.")
4. Because even the things that seem random/irrelevant end up being for a reason -- Sherlock turns down several cases at the beginning of Season Two, Episode One...all of which turn out, at the end of the show, to be entirely connected -- but that's something he doesn't see until he's told.
5. Speaking of point #4, our main character is both INCREDIBLY INTELLIGENT and FALLIBLE. So often, characters will be one or the other -- the idiot or the James Bond. This show gives us a character who is consistently but not invariably the smartest guy in the room, who we also get to see do idiotic things. We see his humanity and his fallibility, enough to make this otherwise famously unlikeable guy someone we can root for even when he's being an asshole.
6. The show's amazing at "get in late, get out early..." but it doesn't live by that to the exclusion of occasionally having a good time. It moves incredibly quickly, but is also willing to live in a moment of silence, hold a long shot, take a second to get into a scene...it manages to be relentless but not so much so that we can never breathe, not so much so that it feels robotic.
7. Terrific camera-work. Nice twists, like Holmes staying home and Watson trudging around in a field with a laptop, so that we get to have laptop shots :)
But. I'm in love with Sherlock Holmes (the new television show). Why?
1. Because it gets the bread-and-butter stuff right: compelling characters working hard to achieve something difficult-but-not-impossible, relationships that unfold over time, suspense, solid story-telling, frequent twists.
2. Because they've turned what for most shows is a problem (that we live in a hypertext world, one where conversations take place and crucial information is conveyed on tiny devices) and turned it into an advantage or at least a fun visual conceit (the text free-floats in the air near devices, will appear on its own). They then EXTENDED the solution, and show us what Sherlock sees -- the closest thing to allowing us into his decidedly unusual brain, without wasting precious screen time/conversation time on "well, I can tell he has a dog because I see three hairs on his collar, and I can see he's effete and wealthy because he has manicured hands...". And then they have FUN with the solution, pointing out things that are extraneous/ridiculous/fun, or showing where Sherlock DOESN'T see an answer. So free-floating text becomes one of the visual systems of the show, both mirroring and elevating the ways in which the show's audience is now accustomed to using text.
3. Because they JUMP IN and USE the visual medium, the tools that editing provide. Case in point: guy shows up, Sherlock says "tell me what happened," the picture does a 360 and when it lands, we're with the guy his car, in a field...and we simply relive the experience the guy had. We assume he's telling Sherlock the story, but we don't have to sit there and have him REPORT something that the nature of television gives us a chance to see for ourselves. (I love the show even more because Sherlock's other directive, before the guy "told" his story, was "and don't be boring.")
4. Because even the things that seem random/irrelevant end up being for a reason -- Sherlock turns down several cases at the beginning of Season Two, Episode One...all of which turn out, at the end of the show, to be entirely connected -- but that's something he doesn't see until he's told.
5. Speaking of point #4, our main character is both INCREDIBLY INTELLIGENT and FALLIBLE. So often, characters will be one or the other -- the idiot or the James Bond. This show gives us a character who is consistently but not invariably the smartest guy in the room, who we also get to see do idiotic things. We see his humanity and his fallibility, enough to make this otherwise famously unlikeable guy someone we can root for even when he's being an asshole.
6. The show's amazing at "get in late, get out early..." but it doesn't live by that to the exclusion of occasionally having a good time. It moves incredibly quickly, but is also willing to live in a moment of silence, hold a long shot, take a second to get into a scene...it manages to be relentless but not so much so that we can never breathe, not so much so that it feels robotic.
7. Terrific camera-work. Nice twists, like Holmes staying home and Watson trudging around in a field with a laptop, so that we get to have laptop shots :)
Friday, August 10, 2012
TV Drama Template!
I love structure, which is probably partly why I love TV and film.Spent today creating an EXCEL TEMPLATE for one-hour TV dramas.
I'm not so tech-savvy, so I can't figure out how to make it look right on the blog...but if you're interested in a copy of it, hit me up (leave a comment with your email address).
Thursday, August 9, 2012
WRITING A PILOT (What manager thinks vs. what I think)
Here's what my manager(s) think I do:
(1) Send them a 1.5-page idea
(2) Send them a 3-page synopsis
(3) Write a 55-70 page teleplay
(4) Revise said teleplay
Here's what I gotta do in order to write something that doesn't feel like garbage:
(1) Write a 3-5 page idea
(2) Boil it down to 1.5 pages and send it to 'em
(3) Hear back what they think works or not
(4) Do at least a week of research -- see similar shows, read extensively, order books or get books from the library, cover a bulletin board and/or a notebook with notes
(5) Figure out the show's existential questions (what ideas am I interested in using the show to explore, why bother to write it at all) and the "butts-in-seats" questions (the audience will tune in to find out "what happens with X?" -- solve for X)
(6) Figure out the show's protagonist. What does he/she want, why does she want it, what are his/her overall obstacles and "major damage?"
(7) Once that's figured out, who else should be in the world to best create questions, conflicts, drama? Create a full cast list with detailed descriptions and figure out first season's relationship arcs.
(8) Plot the major arcs of the first season. Figure out, for sure, how the first season ends...and figure out how you would set up a second season. The SEEDS of all of that have to be in the first episode
(9) Decide WHERE the show lives -- be as specific as possible. What are the side stories that are inherent to a morgue vs. a university campus vs. a small town vs. an aircraft carrier vs. outer space? Which of those live in the show?
(10) Figure out major events that happen in the first episode. What are the A, B, and C stories?
(11) Figure out which characters and which relationships and which locations need to be introduced.
(12) Do a full outline on index cards. Double-check for A, B and C stories, make sure act breaks end on major turns, double-check for characters and relationships. Make sure existential questions and "butts-in-seats" questions (both for the EPISODE and the SERIES) are introduced.
(13) Write the damn thing.
(14) Revise it.
(15) Send it to manager. Wait for feedback. Be excited, then second-guess every choice you made.
(1) Send them a 1.5-page idea
(2) Send them a 3-page synopsis
(3) Write a 55-70 page teleplay
(4) Revise said teleplay
Here's what I gotta do in order to write something that doesn't feel like garbage:
(1) Write a 3-5 page idea
(2) Boil it down to 1.5 pages and send it to 'em
(3) Hear back what they think works or not
(4) Do at least a week of research -- see similar shows, read extensively, order books or get books from the library, cover a bulletin board and/or a notebook with notes
(5) Figure out the show's existential questions (what ideas am I interested in using the show to explore, why bother to write it at all) and the "butts-in-seats" questions (the audience will tune in to find out "what happens with X?" -- solve for X)
(6) Figure out the show's protagonist. What does he/she want, why does she want it, what are his/her overall obstacles and "major damage?"
(7) Once that's figured out, who else should be in the world to best create questions, conflicts, drama? Create a full cast list with detailed descriptions and figure out first season's relationship arcs.
(8) Plot the major arcs of the first season. Figure out, for sure, how the first season ends...and figure out how you would set up a second season. The SEEDS of all of that have to be in the first episode
(9) Decide WHERE the show lives -- be as specific as possible. What are the side stories that are inherent to a morgue vs. a university campus vs. a small town vs. an aircraft carrier vs. outer space? Which of those live in the show?
(10) Figure out major events that happen in the first episode. What are the A, B, and C stories?
(11) Figure out which characters and which relationships and which locations need to be introduced.
(12) Do a full outline on index cards. Double-check for A, B and C stories, make sure act breaks end on major turns, double-check for characters and relationships. Make sure existential questions and "butts-in-seats" questions (both for the EPISODE and the SERIES) are introduced.
(13) Write the damn thing.
(14) Revise it.
(15) Send it to manager. Wait for feedback. Be excited, then second-guess every choice you made.
On Professional Jealousy
So...
...
...
This has been on my mind for a long time. And I've wanted to write about it. But I'm also embarrassed/nervous to write about it.
I am fortunate to know a lot of tremendously talented playwrights. I met 'em in graduate school, I've met 'em at conferences, I met 'em floating around New York. Some of them are my closest friends, some of them are simply people I am thrilled to see when I see them. I've picked pumpkins with them, hiked with them, given them feedback over Skype when we were separated by long distances, housed them on my air mattress when they needed to crash, suffered hangovers and heartbreaks with them, smeared myself in chocolate cake for them (don't ask), jumped out of cakes for them (again, please don't ask), attended readings in basements and studio apartments and rooftops for them, talked long into the night about love and life and art and hard decisions with them.
They are my artistic family.
And yet.
Over the past few years, as we've put a little bit of space between us at the warm (or hot, if you're talking' Austin) cocoon of graduate school, it's been...tough. See, we, most of us, apply for a lot of the same things. Or slightly different things, depending on where we live/what ethnicity we are/what gender we identify with. But a lot of the same development opportunities. And the way things are set up right now, it's pretty tough to move forward, pretty tough to get the attention of the folks who will eventually pay you/produce you/give you access to a wider audience, unless you rack up some of those development opportunities.
And some of us get 'em, and some of us don't.
For me, the world of theater hasn't been particularly welcoming. I was lucky enough to get into Ars Nova during my first year in New York, where I met the kind of writers (Sam Hunter, Amy Herzog, Matthew Lopez) who off-Broadway and regional theaters are just LINING UP to produce (and who, incidentally, are both terrific writers and terrific people). And honestly, I felt like a fraud (or, worse, a lapse in the artistic committee's judgment) the whole time I was there. I've gotten a few readings in NYC, and some terrific productions with small companies in Austin and Chicago. Film and TV opportunities, something I assumed would come much later if at all -- those, actually, I've had luck with (fingers crossed). A first-look deal. Relationships with a couple of production companies. A chance to pitch to networks. All of which have kept me sane, and reminded me that I *do* have things to say, I *do* have a sense of craft, there *are* people I can reach through my writing, and *eventually* hard work will prevail and planets will align.
Oftentimes, I have heard about my dear friends' luck only third-hand, or after the fact. They have downplayed terrific opportunities I know we'd all kill for (PlayPenn! Ojai! Jerome! Hedgebrook!). They have averted their eyes, changed the subject. I have offered an offhand, slightly terse "congratulations" and we've moved onto discussing other friends work, other friends careers, rather than discuss the subject at hand.
When the good news has been mine, the scene has been the same. I feel myself tense up before I mention any good news, I downplay my excitement, couching it always in "probably nothing will come of it," I brace myself for the friendly-but-never-fully-believable "that's great" I know will follow...followed by an interrogation.
Because the thing is, there are only so many opportunities to go around. And chances are, we both applied for whatever one of us got. And in reality, I can't tell you why play X got chosen over play Y.
But what I hate is that these opportunities, and the ways they are meted out, make me feel like the least mature, least generous, least sincere version of myself -- so preoccupied with trying to conceal my own jealousy and insecurity that I'm incapable of fully celebrating the much-deserved good news of a dear friend. And what gets me is we all know what the other one is feeling because we've all been on both sides of it.
Please don't say I'm the only one who feels this duality. I've had too many of these conversations, and heard from too many friends who have just heard a good friends' good news, to think I'm the only one who struggles with it. If you say "no, I'm never anything other than happy for my fellow playwrights," I will think you are Pollyanna and/or a liar and we can't be friends.
The insincerity of those moments kills me -- whatever side of them I'm on. The fact that I am being anything other than my whole self for my dear friends, the fact that I hold back in those moments that are most worth celebrating, makes me feel like a terrible friend. It turns FRIENDS and COMRADES into COLLEAGUES and RIVALS. And there are too many other moments on this long, rocky road (I mean artistic careers, yes, but I also mean LIFE which should, which must take precedence) when we need each other for us to do that. Their friendship means too much for me to do that.
So here's a thought: what if, instead of the tight, brittle "congratulations-i'm-so-happy-for-you,"
what if we embraced -- fully embraced and accepted and acknowledged -- the duality of our feelings? What if the one whose month has been a long string of rejection letters could say, fully and honestly, "I am so freaking jealous right now and I am also so, so happy for you and proud of you!"...and the person with the good news could say "I feel weird even telling you my good news because I know how those rejection letters feel but I'm really excited and proud of my work and I can't wait to tell you all about [insert opportunity here]!!!" And then we can hug and get a drink and have said EVERYTHING we feel instead of just the socially acceptable part?
Of course, the reality is that some of my friends will be more successful than others. Some already are. Some of us (I am convinced) will become the "big names" of our generation. Some of us will move on to other genres less dependent on the kindness of strangers, some of us will find other outlets for our passion and creativity, and move away from playwriting altogether. But the longer I do this, the more I think the important thing isn't "success as a playwright," the more I think it's finding a path, finding a way to create community, to listen and feel listened to.
...
...
This has been on my mind for a long time. And I've wanted to write about it. But I'm also embarrassed/nervous to write about it.
I am fortunate to know a lot of tremendously talented playwrights. I met 'em in graduate school, I've met 'em at conferences, I met 'em floating around New York. Some of them are my closest friends, some of them are simply people I am thrilled to see when I see them. I've picked pumpkins with them, hiked with them, given them feedback over Skype when we were separated by long distances, housed them on my air mattress when they needed to crash, suffered hangovers and heartbreaks with them, smeared myself in chocolate cake for them (don't ask), jumped out of cakes for them (again, please don't ask), attended readings in basements and studio apartments and rooftops for them, talked long into the night about love and life and art and hard decisions with them.
They are my artistic family.
And yet.
Over the past few years, as we've put a little bit of space between us at the warm (or hot, if you're talking' Austin) cocoon of graduate school, it's been...tough. See, we, most of us, apply for a lot of the same things. Or slightly different things, depending on where we live/what ethnicity we are/what gender we identify with. But a lot of the same development opportunities. And the way things are set up right now, it's pretty tough to move forward, pretty tough to get the attention of the folks who will eventually pay you/produce you/give you access to a wider audience, unless you rack up some of those development opportunities.
And some of us get 'em, and some of us don't.
For me, the world of theater hasn't been particularly welcoming. I was lucky enough to get into Ars Nova during my first year in New York, where I met the kind of writers (Sam Hunter, Amy Herzog, Matthew Lopez) who off-Broadway and regional theaters are just LINING UP to produce (and who, incidentally, are both terrific writers and terrific people). And honestly, I felt like a fraud (or, worse, a lapse in the artistic committee's judgment) the whole time I was there. I've gotten a few readings in NYC, and some terrific productions with small companies in Austin and Chicago. Film and TV opportunities, something I assumed would come much later if at all -- those, actually, I've had luck with (fingers crossed). A first-look deal. Relationships with a couple of production companies. A chance to pitch to networks. All of which have kept me sane, and reminded me that I *do* have things to say, I *do* have a sense of craft, there *are* people I can reach through my writing, and *eventually* hard work will prevail and planets will align.
Oftentimes, I have heard about my dear friends' luck only third-hand, or after the fact. They have downplayed terrific opportunities I know we'd all kill for (PlayPenn! Ojai! Jerome! Hedgebrook!). They have averted their eyes, changed the subject. I have offered an offhand, slightly terse "congratulations" and we've moved onto discussing other friends work, other friends careers, rather than discuss the subject at hand.
When the good news has been mine, the scene has been the same. I feel myself tense up before I mention any good news, I downplay my excitement, couching it always in "probably nothing will come of it," I brace myself for the friendly-but-never-fully-believable "that's great" I know will follow...followed by an interrogation.
Because the thing is, there are only so many opportunities to go around. And chances are, we both applied for whatever one of us got. And in reality, I can't tell you why play X got chosen over play Y.
But what I hate is that these opportunities, and the ways they are meted out, make me feel like the least mature, least generous, least sincere version of myself -- so preoccupied with trying to conceal my own jealousy and insecurity that I'm incapable of fully celebrating the much-deserved good news of a dear friend. And what gets me is we all know what the other one is feeling because we've all been on both sides of it.
Please don't say I'm the only one who feels this duality. I've had too many of these conversations, and heard from too many friends who have just heard a good friends' good news, to think I'm the only one who struggles with it. If you say "no, I'm never anything other than happy for my fellow playwrights," I will think you are Pollyanna and/or a liar and we can't be friends.
The insincerity of those moments kills me -- whatever side of them I'm on. The fact that I am being anything other than my whole self for my dear friends, the fact that I hold back in those moments that are most worth celebrating, makes me feel like a terrible friend. It turns FRIENDS and COMRADES into COLLEAGUES and RIVALS. And there are too many other moments on this long, rocky road (I mean artistic careers, yes, but I also mean LIFE which should, which must take precedence) when we need each other for us to do that. Their friendship means too much for me to do that.
So here's a thought: what if, instead of the tight, brittle "congratulations-i'm-so-happy-for-you,"
what if we embraced -- fully embraced and accepted and acknowledged -- the duality of our feelings? What if the one whose month has been a long string of rejection letters could say, fully and honestly, "I am so freaking jealous right now and I am also so, so happy for you and proud of you!"...and the person with the good news could say "I feel weird even telling you my good news because I know how those rejection letters feel but I'm really excited and proud of my work and I can't wait to tell you all about [insert opportunity here]!!!" And then we can hug and get a drink and have said EVERYTHING we feel instead of just the socially acceptable part?
Of course, the reality is that some of my friends will be more successful than others. Some already are. Some of us (I am convinced) will become the "big names" of our generation. Some of us will move on to other genres less dependent on the kindness of strangers, some of us will find other outlets for our passion and creativity, and move away from playwriting altogether. But the longer I do this, the more I think the important thing isn't "success as a playwright," the more I think it's finding a path, finding a way to create community, to listen and feel listened to.
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