Thursday, October 04, 2007

 

A letter from Dorothy Lemoult aka Dorothy FreedomSpice aka P’tit Boo:

Are you familiar with National Novel Writing Month?
Are you wishing you could write a play instead of a novel ?
Are you wishing you could write a novel *and* a play ?

Come join NaPlWriMo!!!

I started it last year as an alternative to Nanowrimo. It began as a joke but so many people took it seriously that I had to follow through!!!

We had about 20 playwrights last year ( ranging from professional published playwrights to high school students) and it looks like we will have at least twice that amount this year.

Naplwrimo's mission is to nurture playwrights of all levels while fostering community and the creation of new theatrical works on a global level.

We run in November at the same time as NaNoWriMo and our speciality is plays. A lot of our rules are the same, though we are a much smaller operation and we are run a bit differently.

Note: no screenplays. Plays only. You'll have to wait for June so you can do Script Frenzy !!!

If you want to sign up for NaPlWriMo, visit us on the site or on myspace or facebook and sign yourself up !

NaPlWriMo Website
NaPlWriMo myspace group
NaPlWriMo facebook group

Thank you for reading and I hope you'll join us or pass this on to others who might!

See you in November!

Dorothy Lemoult
NaPlWriMo Conspiratrice

Labels: plugs, theatre

posted by Dan 11:45 AM
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Friday, August 31, 2007

 

Call Me Irresponsible

Inquiries here and elsewhere as to whether or not I found the edge of the Earth, and dropped off it. If by “Earth” we mean “the Internet,” then this is true. What’s in the chasm?

• The workshop of Early Poe at Utah Shakes. Great actors and a good working experience. I’m finally comfortable with the play, in that I’ve accepted (though I’ve known for a while) that it is not the sort of play that fits in with the NYC off-off-scene. It feels like I’ve found peace with a wayward child.


• Five plays are fighting for attention. I need to spend time realizing them.


• One million application deadlines, as most playwrights know.


• School plans for my eldest, which changed at the last possible second.


• The peace of mind found only away from up-to-the-second punditry and comment threads.

I can’t promise I won’t vanish again, but I will try to post something regularly…anything…

Ah, that’s the stuff.

Labels: theatre, true confessions

posted by Dan 1:00 PM
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Thursday, July 12, 2007

 

Followspot

I yammered and yammed in an interview at this Portland theatre blog, followspot.com, but I assure you there's also useful and interesting posts about Portland's vibrant theatre scene. Be sure to check it out on Monday, when Grote gets grilled. You can read my grilling here.

Labels: linkage, theatre

posted by Dan 5:23 PM
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Saturday, June 23, 2007

 

i google myself

I am remiss in my totally venal plug: check out i google myself by my schoolyard chum Jason Schafer, produced by Theatre Askew at Under St. Marks, St. Marks btwn. 1st and A, NYC. It's a delightfully evil play, with porn stars, hot air balloons, and googling. Runs through July 7th, Thu-Sat, 8pm.

Labels: plugs, productions, theatre

posted by Dan 1:54 PM
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Wednesday, June 20, 2007

 

No One Here Except Us Monsters

a selection from
STOLEN SCREAM
a supernatural noir

CHARACTERS IN SELECTION
NERÓN, male 30s, Colombian, efficient and devoted.
EDVARD, male 40s (played by a woman), old-fashioned in manners, a slight Swedish accent
TIEF, male 20s-30s, a contraband dealer

An empty, abandoned hangar.
Wind howls perpetually outside.
Pool of light, center. An easel, with a canvas, covered by a sheet. A chair.
[NERÓN has been instructed by his employer to receive a painting from a shady dealer, TIEF, who seems insane. NERÓN has also been told not to look at the painting.]

NERÓN (on cell phone:)
Yes ma'am I think it’s here, but you shouldn't come until I
Yes ma'am.

Hangs up.

NERÓN (cont’d, to TIEF:)
I’m taking possession of the painting.

EDVARD enters, wearing a hat, behind NERÓN.

NERÓN (cont'd, still to TIEF:)
If it is not the painting my employer requested, I will

TIEF (singing, taunting:)
You don't know what it is, you don't know what it is, you don't know what it is

EDVARD
Ignore him. He is not well.

NERÓN
Who are you?

EDVARD
Harmless, I assure you sir. I merely accompany the painting.

NERÓN (to TIEF:)
Who is this?

TIEF looks around.

TIEF
Gone, gone, Thank God, gone

NERÓN
Fool, who is this man?

TIEF walks away.

NERÓN
Where are you going?

TIEF
Little walk.

NERÓN
Fool, you haven't got your payment yet.

TIEF
Just stretching my legs a little bit, a little solitude, thank God, I can be all alone in a room as big as this.

TIEF is gone.

EDVARD
Let him take his walk. He is harmless I assure you. I give you my word, as a gentleman. You’re the new owner?

NERÓN
I’m keeping it for her.

EDVARD
I don’t understand, you must be the new owner.

NERÓN
The fool gave it to me, so yes, for now, it’s in my hands.

EDVARD
Ah yes of course.

NERÓN
Answer me now: Who are you?

EDVARD
A good question. I can tell you that this is my painting.

NERÓN
The painting belongs to my employer now.

EDVARD
By which I mean, I painted this painting.

NERÓN
You're the artist?

EDVARD
Essentially, yes. What sort of woman is she, your employer and her husband?

NERÓN
Her husband is dead.

EDVARD
Oh, my sincere condolences. But I would like to know the widow's character, if I may. Perhaps she is a woman that is content. Perhaps she is happy and has always been happy.

NERÓN
She’ll keep your masterpiece safe. Go away now.

EDVARD
Please, reassure me sir, tell me that she has no regrets.

NERÓN
I wouldn’t know.

EDVARD
She does. She has regrets. I can see it in your eyes.
No, no she will not do

NERÓN
The painting is not yours anymore.

EDVARD
You don't understand, I cannot go through this yet again

NERÓN
Let me explain to you: I learned secret torture methods from the police in Colombia. I was taught how a man may lose most of his body without losing consciousness. I can do this unaided by the tools of men.

EDVARD
I have no doubt that you are capable of extraordinary violence, sir, and I am suitably impressed.

NERÓN
I'm only extraordinary when harm is meant to her.

EDVARD
Ah I see. You are a knight, lost in the modern world. There are few left like you. You have regrets but, also great will. I might be most fortunate in making your acquaintance first.
Certainly I may sit until she comes? Certainly there is no harm in that? I am no threat to a man of your physique. As a fellow foreigner to these United States, I ask you, allow me to wait. If your employer can dismiss me, then I shall go, gladly.

NERÓN
This is why I don't like art, the artists.

EDVARD
Sir. May I ask a favor of you? I would greatly appreciate it, if you were to look at my painting.

NERÓN
I was instructed not to.

EDVARD
By her? Yes of course. Though, wouldn't you agree, this presents a sizable risk on her part? For these sorts of transactions, you ought to be fully informed.

NERÓN
Why don't you go off somewhere and paint?

EDVARD
All of that is past now.

NERÓN
So you follow this one around?

EDVARD
I am forever with this one.

NERÓN
You're a weird man.

EDVARD
My whole life has been spent walking by the side of a bottomless chasm.

A cry from the darkness.
Silence. NERÓN tries to see out there.

NERÓN
Who's there?! You, fool, is that you?

Silence.
NERÓN exits.
NERÓN returns.

NERÓN (cont’d)
That fool is dead.

EDVARD
That is unfortunately not surprising.

NERÓN
How?

EDVARD
Very likely a heart attack. He was not a well man.

NERÓN
What's going on?

EDVARD
I would like to tell you. Sir, I would like to.

Beat.
NERÓN removes the sheet, looks at the painting. Yes, he knows it.

EDVARD
People always ask the artist, "Where do you get your ideas?" Very often there is no answer. But in this case. I was walking along the road with two friends. Below me was the fjord. The sun set. I felt a tinge of melancholy. Suddenly, the sky became a bloody red. I stopped, leaned against the railing. And I looked at the flaming clouds that hung like blood and a sword over the blue-black fjord and city. My friends walked on. I stood there, trembling with fright. And I felt a loud, unending scream piercing nature. That is what I painted, you can see, the clouds like real blood. The colors, themselves, scream.

NERÓN
I've seen this.

EDVARD
My name is Edvard Munch. This is my painting, "The Scream."

end selection

Labels: dialogue, theatre

posted by Dan 5:38 PM
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Tuesday, June 12, 2007

 

Dee-del-Lee-Del

Normally I don’t bring this stuff up. But the theatre-weenie luminaries in my hometown gave me an award last night: Outstanding Original Script, for Jingle Spree. It warms my neglected weenie fuzzies, in a way that other awards can't. It's like a pat on the back from Sarge. I miss Portland so bad it hurts sometimes.

I have to credit the cast (Eric Reid, Deanna Wells, Bill Barry, Barb Klansnic, Harold Phillips, my homeslice Adrienne Flagg), Director Tony Sonera and crew, for the good that came. Amazing. Especially since the reviews were mixed. And especially since eight people actually saw the production.

Okay, enough onanistic horn-tooting. Time to Toot the Horns of Others!

I went to the Grote reading last night, and it's a tribute to the writer that I was very involved in the play, in spite of the fact that I was not so much listening as poaching in the sweat of a hundred strangers. Seriously, it was hot. Henceforth my readings will always feature eunuchs with large straw fans.

Labels: theatre, true confessions

posted by Dan 5:26 PM
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Thursday, June 07, 2007

 

The Mummy Comes to Richmond

[From Act 1 of Early Poe]

(Richmond, 1823.
The Senate Chambers of the Capitol.
An open sarcophagus on display. EDGAR stands with FANNY, looking in.)

FANNY
Putrid.

EDGAR
He smells sweet.

FANNY
They’ll have to air out the chambers. Don’t breathe it in too deeply.

EDGAR
He’s a mummy, he’s not poisonous.

FANNY
I simply can't bear to look at it anymore.

(She looks at it some more.)

FANNY (cont'd)
I suppose it's cultural. What does it say on the coffin?

EDGAR
Sarcophagus.

FANNY
What does the mummy sarcophagus say?

EDGAR
No one knows. No one reads hieroglyphics.

FANNY
Don't keep the salacious Egyptian story from me. Is it savage? Is it a scandal?

EDGAR
Yes of course.

FANNY
Men always brag. I'll wager it says “My penis was huge.”

EDGAR
Ma, what are you - ?! Someone could come in here!

FANNY
You’re in a mood. Very well, let’s have one of your inventions, then. Please don't make it morbid, though.

EDGAR
He is dead.

FANNY
Have him meet a milkmaid behind a pyramid. But these are the Senate chambers, so don't go into too much detail when he bends her over the sphinx.

EDGAR
Ugh! for God's sake!

FANNY
Why are you so precious about natural activities?

EDGAR
I don’t like vulgar jokes.

FANNY
You must hear them all the time in that little cadet group -

EDGAR
The Junior Volunteers, and we're not a little cadet group, we’re soldiers.

FANNY
You can’t march with soldiers, if you don’t want to hear -

EDGAR
I have to do something with my time now!

(Beat.)

FANNY
I know I’m a poor substitute for a tutor. I’m glad we could come down together, to see this.

EDGAR (re: the mummy)
It says he was a Count. He wrote a book. He wished to see if it would become a classic, so he had himself embalmed alive in order to wake up five hundred years later -

(JANE enters. She is in her bedclothes, but wearing a hat. Several ribbons are tied on her arms.
A long silence. EDGAR and FANNY: what now?
JANE stares right through them.
Finally:)

FANNY
Mrs. Stanard. It's been so many months -

JANE
Months, months, months, months, months...

FANNY
The Judge said that -

JANE
You’re behind on your lessons, Edgar.

EDGAR
I didn't need any more lessons -

FANNY
Eddie, let me please. Mrs. Stanard, I'm afraid there's only one group allowed in here at a time -

JANE
Did you know that mummies have their brains and bowels removed? Just like our neighbors. Neighbors on their high horses. They call them neigh-bors, nay nay never play in the red river river red...

I'm sorry. I only came to -- a book. One quick book I brought him.

FANNY
Very well, give it.

JANE
I've forgotten it at home.

EDGAR
Ma, perhaps I should escort her -

FANNY
Mrs. Stanard, where is your husband?

JANE
No you can't take advantage of my weakness.

EDGAR
She lives right outside, on the Square.

FANNY
My son is busy.

JANE
Please, Robby isn't allowed around me. Edgar -

FANNY
Edgar won’t be joining you in such a state, Mrs. Stanard.

JANE
Ah, yes, protect him, wrap him in bandages -

FANNY
Oh, I apologize for protecting him. But you see, I have to do that sort of thing myself. I'm not married to a judge. Oh, I wish I had my own carriage to ride around in, letting myself fall apart. How many servants do you have? Eight? Ten? We have none of that. We're orphans, my family. My husband. My boy. They thirst for affection. You have taken advantage of our weakness.

JANE
Yes. I did that.
Ophelia's over me every day now. In her red. Doctors say it's a fever. But she's grow growing and show showing her red gown in my head dead marble-led in red marble -- I'm sorry sorry -

EDGAR (over:)
Jane.

FANNY
She’s not your concern. She can find a negro to escort her.

JANE
No! When they see her, with blood running down, they'll help her kill me!

FANNY
You’re imagining -

JANE
Ophelia told me last night. Over my bed she hovered as I lay uncovered...she told me Mrs. Allan’s afraid of her, because of what she stole from her.

FANNY
Eddie, we're leaving.

JANE
She stole you away from your real Ma, Edgar. With apples. She had none of her own to feed, so every day, she brought an apple to the boutique you were rooming above, and fed it to you little love. While your ma was sick, you ate it up quick, yum yum, come come away with me little boy, she said, come home with me, chew on a bone, while upstairs alone, Ophelia chokes awhile, on blood and bile.

FANNY
No. It wasn't like that.

JANE
Edgar. Come. Ophelia and I require you.

FANNY
It wasn’t, angel.

(Pause.)

EDGAR
Mrs. Stanard...perhaps someone outside might be employed to assist you.

(Beat.
JANE takes the ribbons off.)

JANE
I won't protect you from myself. No, no more.

FANNY
Leave us alone.

JANE
We’ll drag you down with us, yes. We’ll tie you up tight and pull you down with our bandages -

(She pushes the ribbons into FANNY.)

FANNY
Get off me!

(EDGAR pulls JANE off.)

EDGAR
That's enough! Now you go, you go on home now! Pa and I, we decided. You're -- I don't want to play this game anymore. You don't see my mother. That's all made-up. I was playing a game with you.

JANE
Ophelia -

EDGAR
She's not real.

JANE
You told me she was your Ma.

EDGAR
This is my Ma.
Go on now.

JANE
Thus spoke the chief executioner.

(She exits, slowly.)

EDGAR
God forgive me...

FANNY
Look at me. Look at me here, look.
You will meet a lovely young lady, with curly brown hair. You will wave your handkerchiefs at each other. You will sing beautifully as she plays the pianoforte. You will marry her, and treasure her always, and have lovely curly-headed children. I've decided.

Labels: dialogue, theatre

posted by Dan 5:22 PM
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Friday, May 18, 2007

 

Poe in Utah

I’ve been off-line, in part preparing for this:



The New American Playwrights Project
@ The Utah Shakespearean Festival
presents a workshop of

Early Poe
by Dan Trujillo
Directed by Charles Metten
August 16, 17, 30
Death, mystery, disease, insanity, blood, poetry: It’s not one of Edgar Allan Poe’s stories. It’s his life, and he’s only just turned thirteen. Struggling with his severe foster-father, Edgar escapes into fantasy. But when one of his fantasies becomes flesh, it could destroy him and the only father he’s ever known. It’s a weird tale of the wild visions and macabre realities of the young poet.

For information and tickets, go here.

Labels: productions, theatre

posted by Dan 12:57 PM
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Tuesday, May 08, 2007

 

Thoughts At the End of a Revision

The following is writer-y, so consider yourself warned.

I’m tinkering with my play Early Poe for a festival (more on that soon). During this tinkering I have instinctively avoided posting and reading the blogs. There’s something about the atmosphere of revolution in the blogs that I find appealing, but it also can be destructive to my work. At least with this play.

Early Poe will not explode anyone’s ideas of theatre. It does not blaze a new path. It does not speak for an unspoken multitude. It does not take the form and change it irrevocably. As I’ve worked on it, I’ve watched it shape into a recognizable drama, with scenes, conflicts, characters, about the dead guy and the dead people in his life. As I’ve watched the play grow, I’ve thought to myself, Maybe I’m messing up. I should be Breaking Boundaries. This play should be like The Incredible Hulk, an angry green smashing goliath. Then this other voice says, But that’s not what the play is. Then I’d get angry at myself for being so conventional. Then I’d have trouble working on the play, and want to withdraw it, and burn all the copies.

That’s no way to work.

I love playwrights that challenge the form. Caryl Churchill’s a favorite. I am inspired by the writers on the left that effortlessly revolutionize with their plays (I won’t embarrass them with a public mash note, they know who they are, or will).

But sometimes I can’t help but love the plain vanilla playwright in me. Early Poe, regular ol’ play that it is, means something to me. I know the characters, the dilemmas, the heart of the play, even though it takes place in 1823. It’s something from an open vein. I won’t disown it because it’s not the looniest piece of political/structural/formal bizarreness I’ve ever written.

This concludes the self-indulgence. Sorry. Funny to come!

Labels: theatre, true confessions

posted by Dan 3:34 PM
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Friday, May 04, 2007

 

Old Photo

Of interest to me anyway:



Richard III, directed by David Levine, @ Expanded Arts' Shakespeare in the Parking Lot, August 1999. It featured a throne mounted to the roof of a car. My wife (sprawled on the hood) played Queen Elizabeth, and in her big scene, the car-enthroned Richard (our friend Josh Stark, psyched to splatter someone's brains) pursued her around the lot, chasing her up a street lamp and smashing into it repeatedly. During the run, an actor dropped out and I had to fill in, and I got to drive the car some. But I didn't get to chase Julie. Probably for the best.

Also Julie lost her voice two days before opening. And were getting married as soon as the show closed. But this photo appeared in The New Yorker, so it was cool.

Labels: photos, theatre

posted by Dan 11:30 AM
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Monday, April 23, 2007

 

It's All Theatre's Fault

Remember when I said this a few days ago, about the tragedy at VT and the involvement of plays:

...when Woody Allen got involved with Sun Yi, people started saying that you could see his perversity in his movies, and therefore you could find the perversity of any artist in their work, and therefore artists are perverted and their work should be monitored for deviancy. I'm afraid of another round of that.

I looked at the post later and thought, Trujillo, you're being hysterical.

I wasn't being hysterical.

In the wake of Monday’s massacre at Virginia Tech in which a student killed 32 people, [Yale] Dean of Student Affairs Betty Trachtenberg has limited the use of stage weapons in theatrical productions.

...

According to students involved in the production, Trachtenberg has banned the use of some stage weapons in all of the University’s theatrical productions. While shows will be permitted to use obviously fake plastic weapons, students said, those that hoped to stage more realistic scenes of stage violence have had to make changes to their props. (h/t The Agitator)

Nothing like a tragedy to inspire pointless gestures.

Strangely, I am inspired. In the past few weeks we've had this, the banned high school play about the Iraq war, and the Mike Daisey incident in Cambridge. Suddenly theatre seems not only still relevant, but still dangerous.

Labels: news, theatre

posted by Dan 3:30 PM
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Tuesday, April 17, 2007

 

Ugh.

The Virginia Tech massacre just took an uncomfortable turn.

UPDATE: What I mean is: when Woody Allen got involved with Sun Yi, people started saying that you could see his perversity in his movies, and therefore you could find the perversity of any artist in their work, and therefore artists are perverted and their work should be monitored for deviancy. I'm afraid of another round of that.

Labels: linkage, news, theatre

posted by Dan 5:10 PM
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Monday, April 16, 2007

 

Quick NYC Plugs

• Suburban Peepshow by James Comtois has been noted all around the interweb, so they don’t need my additional scrawl. But here it is anyway. Comtois promises you fun, like Hank Williams in a hot-rod Ford with a $2 bill. Info here.


• George Hunka sets off in a new artistic direction with a reading of his work-in-progress States of Exception (along with an earlier short piece In Private) at manhattantheatresource, tonight and tomorrow night only. George got some great, game actors to explore his work, Jennifer Gordon Thomas, Jason Howard, and Abby Royle. George has burned a lot of biscuits (including mine) with his organums, but whether or not you agree with those, States of Exception does illuminate many of his principles. Info here.
  
  By the way, George will be altering the text based on audience suggestions at the end of the evening.*
  
  
  * false

Labels: theatre

posted by Dan 3:12 PM
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Wednesday, April 11, 2007

 

More Class

Class has been the big theatre meme theme this week. For the spine of the discussion and links to varied opinions in the posts and comments sections, go

here,

here,

here, and

here.


I remember the first time I looked at a program and saw that the surnames of the executive producers matched the surnames of the playwright, the director, and one of the leads. My friend leaned over, crossed out the word “producers” and wrote in “parents.” It had never occurred to me that ones parents could finance a show. I had produced one show at that point, with my own money, under a split-door deal with a dark theatre. I had taken yellow paint from my dad’s garage to build the set, a double-yellow street line up the center of the stage (you’ll be pleased to know that I no longer design my productions). Staring at that program, I became aware of the disturbing possibility that only rich people could afford to do theatre.

I had always considered myself rich. Rich enough, meaning middle class. My dad’s mom was a single-mom waitress, and my mother was a Navy kid (she wouldn’t like “brat,” I don’t think). They had “made it,” as they say. My dad told me he worked hard so that I could be an artist. Not in the sense of “I will give you money to be an artist,” but in the sense of “You won’t feel like me, like the wolf’s always at the door.” That’s one thing he tried to instill in me, along with the twelve points of the boy scout law. Another truth my parents reminded me of was that we were lucky. And they were right. We were very, very lucky. So I considered theatre a safe venture, in a way, because I was lucky.

I think this is the confidence that growing up economically stable gives you. But it was also foolhardiness. Completely innocent of financial realities, I selected a University that drove me and my dad into deeply into debt. But I went because, as far as I understood, you had to go to a top theatre school if you wanted to be in theatre (this is of course not true but we’ll get to that in a moment). Here was the first price to pay: school. Most professionals will say of course you don’t need to go to school, you just need to be talented, but I have to say I find that statement often accompanied with a wink and a nod: these same people will then turn around, look at a resume and say, “Oh, he/she went to fancy school X! Let’s look at them!” It’s not right or fair. There are many exceptions. But it is a trend, let's say.

The second price is production. Even in places where real-estate matters are not as ridiculous as NY, production is expensive. If an artist doesn’t wish to shoulder that burden alone, then the artist needs to seek a few coins from many, or a few big checks from a few. In either case, it helps to know people, wherever you are. And if you don’t know anybody (like me) then you have to self-produce. The one big show I self-produced drove me deeply into debt.

I’m not complaining about the debt, by the way. I was probably better able to withstand these blows than some, precisely because of my economic background. I give this run-down because I think these hurdles I encountered exist for most would-be theatricalizers. Given these hurdles, how do we arrange so people who aren’t middle-class or wealthy can clear them?

I have some half-formed ideas that I’ll throw out to be ripped apart, like steaks to tigers.

Idea one: start a theatre company that is committed to hiring actors, writers and directors from low-income backgrounds, much like theatre companies that are devoted to work by non-white ethnic groups, by women, and by gays and lesbians. Here one obvious problem: how does the company confirm someone grew up poor? I don’t know. But there’s that.

Idea two: companies, even the penniless ones, need to develop audiences that aren’t currently in the theatre. This is screamingly obvious, of course, and something that many institutional theatres claim to be doing, except they’re not. Audience development for them is about developing audiences that will plunk down for a subscribership. My friend Adrienne reached out to various groups that are not part of the American theatergoing public with her improvisation workshops. Because she deals in improvisation (rather than a more typical type of outreach like, say, Scenes from Shakespeare), the material the participants generate is instantly relevant to their lives. Her most successful work continues to be with kids. Get ‘em while they’re young.

Idea three: Major theaters need to start giving out real apprenticeships again. Not unpaid internships that can only be taken by people with money to live on, but apprenticeships where the organization provides the necessities of life through a wage or a paying part-time job. And these apprenticeships should favor financial need.

Idea four: Universities with theatre programs need to seriously reconsider what their responsibility is to the students they graduate in terms of job placement. It does no good to give kids need-based scholarships, and then toss them into the sea at the end, as if that scholarship reset everything to zero. Providing financial or logistical support for some first self-productions would be a way to start.

Any other ideas?

Labels: theatre

posted by Dan 4:59 PM
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Monday, April 09, 2007

 

Late to the Party

You probably already know this, but here’s two theatre-company blogs to check out: Working Group Theatre and Stolen Chair Theatre Company. Check ‘em out.

Labels: linkage, theatre

posted by Dan 3:51 PM
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Thursday, April 05, 2007

 

Statement of Venal Ethics

To People That Offer Me Free Tickets to Shows:

I talk theatre here, from time to time. But I don’t review plays. I plug the shows of friends, colleagues, and the occasional stranger here, from time to time. I don’t review. I bring up aspects of a script I find interesting, or thoughts a production inspires. I do not review. I’ve tried it, and every time I try it, I feel that I’ve hoarked up a chunk if lungbutter, and decided to show it off. There are plenty of used Kleenexes flying about the interweb. People (including me) open them, and read the slimy contents like tea leaves, hoping to divine whether or not we will find the production worthwhile. There are plenty that are better at filling those Kleenexes than me. So I don’t review. That’s the Venal Scene Guarantee.

I’d love to see your show. If you invite me to your show, I’ll try and come. But I might not mention your show here. If I like it, I’ll tell you, if we meet in a bar or something. But I still might not mention it here. If I don’t like it, I definitely won’t mention it here. If I really really like it, I might send my wife. But I might not (she and I have different tastes -- she likes celery for instance, ew). But I won’t review your play. That’s the Venal Scene Guarantee.

If you give me a free ticket, I’ll probably take it. And because you gave me a free ticket, sure, I’ll feel obligated to write something. It might be about the production. It might be about the script. It might be an anecdote about the décor in your lobby. If it’s an anecdote about the décor in your lobby, you should be glad I don’t review plays. You see, I don’t. That’s the Venal Scene Guarantee.

Labels: theatre

posted by Dan 10:53 PM
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Monday, March 26, 2007

 

volume of smoke

(NOTE: I almost titled this post “Pump Up the volume,” but I didn’t. I hope you appreciate my restraint.)

I really enjoyed volume of smoke when I saw it Saturday (I won’t synopsis-ize the play, you can read about it here). I’m a bit of a fan of Isaac Butler’s directing work, for obvious reasons. But I was really taken with the script, more so than other viewers were.

I’ve only seen Clay Chapman’s work for Rapid Response Team. I responded much more to volume than what I saw there. I think this is not necessarily because of varying quality in his work, but because of the shortened rehearsal period that RRT demands. I think Clay’s work, or let’s say monologues in general, require extra devotion on the part of the actors and director to get to life on stage. A monologue can be a deadly thing. It takes all of the actor’s skills to realize it, because there is no interplay, no surprise inherent in the presence of other bodies, to fall back on. It’s challenging for the director: there is the temptation to “let the words speak for themselves,” resulting in flat motionless oratory that utilizes none of the other thrills of live theatre. It’s challenging for the writer: the use of language must be as precise as eye surgery.

Clay’s got that precision. Some of Clay’s writing is also achingly beautiful, to use an old saw. But it’s appropriate. Some of those lines were so beautiful that I felt a pain in my gut.

I think another reason it worked for me -- and I hate to be so technical about it -- is that it clocked in at seventy minutes. Seventy-five minutes is about the length of time I’ll give anything that doesn’t deploy at least some of the Aristotle-Brand dramatic devices: protagonists, conflict, reversal, etc. If you don’t, and you go over seventy-five minutes, you’ve got to be very, very, very good. The play is a coherent narrative, and you could say it climaxes in a clash of interpretations of its own story. But it isn't dramatic in the structural sense. It's tasty, though.

The cast was excellent too: Abe Goldfarb, Ronica V. Reddick, Brian Silliman, Daryl Lathon, Molly Wright Stuart, and Katie Dietz, who was particularly chilling as a reformer capitalizing on tragedy to win souls. I want to note that many of these actors are Isaac Butler regulars, and someday I’ll post about the superiority of this kind of unofficial rep company model. But not today, because I’m off theatre weenies for the time being.

Beautiful design work too by Sabrina Braswell (lights) and Tim McMath (set).

Hell, everybody was beautiful. I liked the show, okay? I’m sending my wife to see it. I can think of no higher compliment.

Labels: theatre, thumbs up

posted by Dan 3:40 PM
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Friday, March 23, 2007

 

Get Your Meth On in NYC

By checking out fellow NYU Alum and DG Fellow Colin McKenna’s The Secret Agenda of Trees at The Cherry Lane Theatre as part of the Mentor Program, March 20-31. I saw it last night and it’s a solid production.

Colin McKenna,
who peers at you with his X-ray vision,
and he likes your choice of underwear.

THE SECRET AGENDA OF TREES
By Colin McKenna
Directed by Sam Gold
Lynn Nottage, Mentor

In the backwoods of Appalachia, 13 year old Veronica smolders with unrequited love for a boy she met in study hall. When her mother brings home a mysterious stranger and her methamphetamine use begins to spiral out of control, Veronica turns to her powerful dream life to help her do battle with the dangers that have invaded her home.

Labels: theatre, thumbs up

posted by Dan 1:39 PM
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Wednesday, March 21, 2007

 

Testification

Theatre is a perfect religion for an agnostic. It recognizes mystery without attempting to codify it.

Labels: theatre

posted by Dan 3:07 PM
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Sunday, March 18, 2007

 

And I Saw

Blue Coyote's production of David Johnston's The Oresteia, last weekend, and I wanted to pile on additional praise. I'd feel guilty about not mentioning this during the run, but it's not like they weren't selling tickets, so...

I only wanted to mention that I felt it was a fairly faithful adaptation, in a strange way. There was humor, some modern devices, and anachronisms, but I didn't feel like Johnston's take on the material was in contrast to that of Aeschylus. More like continuing the conversation. Though I'd probably rather argue over beers with Euripides.

Labels: theatre, thumbs up

posted by Dan 1:54 PM
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Monday, March 12, 2007

 

Charm School

Over at parabasis, the discussion of the role of the director as helpful gnome or chromatic dragon continues. In the comments, Mr. Excitement asks what they’re teaching directors in the Universities. No one knows for sure, since we have no Jesuit scrawling down the Drama Department Heads’ conspiracy at their annual meeting atop a craggy peak.

I thought I’d add more unscientific data to add from my own experience.

My undergraduate program was focused on actor training. The program also had directors, writers, and cross-discipline artists, but actors made up the majority of the student body, with designers and technicians a strong second. The department geared the actor training for a career in film, television and regional theatre: forms of the Method, naturalism, and traditional classical training. As a result, the productions were the kind that utilized that training. The department encouraged the graduate directing students toward these sorts of productions too, and was less enthusiastic about (for example) one director’s physical all-mask production of Agamemnon. In fairness, I was an undergraduate, and therefore drunk, so I might have misread what was going on.

What was lacking in my program was any contact with new plays. The graduate directors never did them, and neither did the actors, unless they were shanghaied or plied with sex and drugs. They only did material that had some miles on it. This promoted a tendency to see the writer as, well, dead, whether or not this was actually the case.

I think this training promoted a weird combination of conservatism and carelessness. The directors worked on old material as part of its historical continuum. If these directors were to work in the regional theaters, the expectation was that they would present the play, not even with an eye toward authorial intent, but toward its own historical tradition. You could reset Twelfth Night in an English music hall, which underscored the British-ness, the musicality, and the light-hearted nature of the play. Or you could do a “dark” version, with the differences in the ages of the characters emphasized and the abuse of Malvolio taken to an extreme length. Text was altered according to the sense of each of these productions. But these choices are all within the confines of the play’s performance tradition, its critical and dramaturgical analysis. You weren’t going to see Judge Brack spitting tomato juice on Hedda Gabler.

Speculation: Given a new play, without any performance tradition, directors adhering to this sort of training might be at sea. Since there are no agreed-upon themes to pick from, they might feel forced to grab what is most available to them from the text. When a piece of text doesn’t conform or stress that theme, it might appear irrelevant. Could this encourage the tinkering approach that many writers experience with directors?

Again, this is all based on my limited personal experience. I’m happy to be corrected, and to hear other experiences as well. I hear that the New School is integrating its writers and directors much more than other programs.

Labels: theatre

posted by Dan 4:39 PM
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Friday, March 02, 2007

 

Albee Cuts It Loose

I’ve been thinking more about Albee’s recent public cry (go here for the full brouhaha). I’ve actually heard him say it before, in person. And I understand and agree with some of it. I guess my problem comes from the bad faith it assumes on the part of all directors and actors. I’ve butted heads with directors over my scripts. Some I found to be fools. Others I found to be worthy and helpful, even as they said things that drove me nuts. Where do I draw the line of objection?

In the end it’s a matter of respect, I think. I also think that in the case of many erring directors, the fault is not inherent but learned. This is speculation but follow me:

Directing programs focus around learning to direct established plays. This is understandable: they are a known, presumably reliable quantity. The problem is that, with no live writer in the room, directors can and do take the play wherever they wish. At the university level, no one objects. And these students learn or are taught that they have are supreme in the process, which they are, at university.

When directing students get out into the real world, this attitude continues. They revive plays and present them as they please, even if the writer may have thoughts on the matter. I asked a well-known playwright once about a revival where a major casting decision went against the text. He told me that since the play was published, the director and producers assumed he was dead.

I object to directors that make changes without discussing it with me, that make changes over my objections, that fail to include me, that fail to respect me as the parent (for lack of a better word) of the play. But good directors also inspire and challenge with their crazy ideas, and I like to hear them, even if I veto them.

Do I think it’s possible to write a brilliant play without taking a single suggestion or idea? Yes. Do I think it’s possible that some plays benefited from suggestions or ideas? Again, yes. Are these two notions mutually exclusive? No. It’s just up to the playwright to decide what suggestions and ideas, if any, are good. That respect to the playwright, I can support.

Labels: theatre

posted by Dan 1:41 PM
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Thursday, March 01, 2007

 

Anyway, It Meant Something to Me

"...Writing is acting is directing is living your life. I have told you the things I have just told you so that you would know something of my approach to playwriting. I see no difference between writing a play and living my life. The same things that make a moment in my life succeed, combust, move, these same things make a moment in my playwriting have life. And when I move in my writing, I have moved in my life. There is no illusion. It is all the same thing."

John Patrick Shanley,
from the introduction to his Collected Plays, Vol. 1.

Labels: theatre

posted by Dan 11:12 AM
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Monday, February 12, 2007

 

NAPLWRIMO Hall Of Fame

Dorothy has posted the ten plays completed for National Playwriting Month, including mine (called Toolbox) I’m already working on my rewrite, so I deny everything.

Labels: theatre

posted by Dan 5:04 PM
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Saturday, February 03, 2007

 

Even My Subconscious Has Gone Weenie

I had a dream there was a new Harold Pinter play opening.

The title?

RePauseItory

Sad.

Labels: theatre, true confessions

posted by Dan 2:47 PM
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Thursday, February 01, 2007

 

They Got Spunk

A couple of photos of the 07 remount of Right On, America!





And there's a podcast interview with the cast at Denverpost.com.

I'm telling you, Denver is sounding pretty good right now. Even with the snow and polar bears.

Labels: productions, theatre

posted by Dan 9:42 PM
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Wednesday, January 31, 2007

 

All Theatre-Weenie signs point to “yes.”

Continue if you dare. I'm really setting it to "blowhard" on this one.

To the discussion on Isaac Butler’s blog regarding authorial intent, I think I can add a little perspective. Isaac believes that the rehearsal process brings new elements to a play that the author might resist, but should not resist. This notion leaves some playwrights cold. They might imagine Isaac as the director prone to setting their play in a nameless Central American dictatorship. Naked. (The actors, not Isaac). Having been through a round of rehearsals on Talk of the Walk-Upwith Isaac, I feel I can speak to this.

Here’s what Isaac never did: Ask me for a rewrite. Ask me to cut swags of text. Set my scenes in places they weren’t set. Add conceptual choreography or devices. Tell me not to talk to the actors. Ignore my thoughts and comments. Fail to consult me on any aspect of production.

Here’s what Isaac did: Request a single line cut. Suggest the device of announcing the scene number and location. Propose the use of live Foley sound. Request that in three scenes, characters be discovered on stage, rather than enter.

The second batch of requests was not directly drawn from the script, but they were used in service of the script. If I had signed Isaac to the standard DG contract, I could insist that my stage directions be followed to the letter, and my precious Star Wars reference kept. But I didn’t, because I could see how he was working hard for my baby. I was thankful that he was finding new ways to serve the play that I hadn’t thought of. It meant the play was blossoming.

Joshua James outlines the Bad Director a writer fears. All playwrights get stuck with The Bad Director at some point. The thing is, the Bad Director can arrive bearing all different sorts of philosophies. They can come with the philosophy that The Concept is God, and all else must bend to its will. This sucks for playwrights. But they can also come with the philosophy that The Script is God, and therefore all we must do is present it. They can come in supplication, intoning that they are only there to serve your vision. This might sound like a good idea, but it isn’t. It’s flattery, and since playwrights never get paid, it’s welcome. But it’s flattery nonetheless, and leads to a dead fish on stage.

I know nobody says they want that. But as writers, we can come to see our perspective on the play as not only supreme but exclusive. This, to my thinking, is dangerous. Perhaps because I’m a parent, I consider the writing of the script to be like the raising of a child. I nurture, I raise, I protect, I am the final arbiter during its first years of life. But I must also recognize that the child will benefit from other perspectives. I may be myopic about the child, like a father who can’t see the brat he’s raising. Somebody else might be able to recognize the flaws, as well as the hidden strengths, and help guide the child toward maturity.

Of course, it is doubly incumbent on me, then, to pick these other guides wisely. That’s why I do think it’s important that playwrights pick their director, or have the right of veto, and (as Laura said) be in the rehearsal space. Every production that I wasn't satisfied with either had the director picked for me, or didn't have me in the rehearsal room. So those are my better-hadn't-dare rules. But given those, I cut my director and actors some slack to work. Above all, I try to listen not to what I hear in my head, but what’s happening in the rehearsal room, because that’s what’s going on stage.

Jules Feiffer, on the original NY production of Little Murders insisted that the play be done absolutely straight. He railroaded that stylistic choice through, and the production was an artistic and commercial disaster. In a subsequent production in another city (I forget where) he let the director and actors produce a more expressionistic interpretation, and he was much more satisfied with the show.

What I think drives this brouhaha over authorial intent is actually rights and money. Whose mark is on the piece, and who gets the dough. That’s another issue, one that is best outlined in the beginning of the process. It’s important, but once settled, it shouldn’t interfere with the writer letting the director do their job. I'm sure some writers will think me insanely lax for this. Maybe. But that's me. Insanely Los Angeles Airport.

Labels: theatre

posted by Dan 5:34 PM
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Insert Clever Use of “Mile High” Here

A couple of events in Denver: Jason Grote’s 1001 is kicking out the serious jams at Denver Center, which is terrific news. The selection I saw of the play was great. It looks like the kind of exciting production that I wish we had around this backwater…

Playing Gleek to Grote’s Superman, my sketch comedy show Right On, America (co-written with Josh A. Cagan) will be appearing late-nite at Avenue Theater, Feb. 2-Mar. 10, Fridays and Saturdays, at 10:30 pm. The show was written in 1999-2000, so it’s odd to have a comedy show that makes no reference to the wars. But hey, some jokes are evergreen. Like making fun of cancer.

Labels: productions, theatre, thumbs up

posted by Dan 3:47 PM
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Friday, January 26, 2007

 

Give Me The Freud-O-Scope

Doing a little research, I came across a review of Ron Fitzgerald’s Cyclone from last year. This paragraph left me scratching my head:

Fitzgerald's greatest challenge is to overcome the dull essence of the slice of humanity he has chosen to depict. While he does a fine job of developing each character and his dialogue is at times superlative, the writing displays a power of observation but not analysis, and I came away feeling a bit cheated. The play shies away from any real insight into Mitch, with an ending that is dramatic but not especially meaningful. We are not prompted to like these people, and in the end, we can't really find much to feel except sorry for them.

A fair assessment, if your expectation of theatre is psychological insight. Is it? I don’t understand a lot of the psychological motivations in The Birthday Party, but I’m not sure that I care. Still, I know I’ve complained before when I felt that a piece didn’t offer any insight into a character. But that’s not why I go see plays.

I put the question to anyone who wishes to take it up: do you require that a play give you psychological insight into its characters?

Labels: theatre

posted by Dan 12:05 PM
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Thursday, January 25, 2007

 

My Caveat

Sweet dreamy theatre-weenie ahead:

I like this epistle from Laura: All theatre is local. Theaters and theatre companies should develop their local talent, especially their writers (and there are several theaters, companies and contests that do that). Laura also has decided that she should not send her work out nationally, at least not until it has received its premiere at home.

My own recent production experience helps illustrate my thoughts on this.

Talk of the Walk-Up is without a doubt my most “New York” play. It centers around a five-story walk-up apartment building and the tenants who tolerate a tyrannical Superintendent because the rent is so cheap. Their lives are piled atop each other -- only one scene has less than three of the characters appear, and most have at least five. The play makes instant sense, in that way, to anyone who has lived in the five boroughs. It might make sense to someone from Boston or San Francisco, where rents are high and the population dense. It probably would be less familiar to someone from a sprawled city like Houston or Phoenix. Hopefully the play ultimately comes, through, just as A Streetcar Named Desire isn’t only for those from New Orleans (although my appreciation for the play grew after visiting N.O.) (Also when I wore a tank top).

This past fall I had a production of my play Jingle Spree in Portland. I’m not a local Portland artist. I haven’t lived there in thirteen years. But I consider it my home, and Jingle Spree was in part a recollection of the experience of growing up there. I was only able to be there for a few rehearsals, but the actors did a fine job, and I’d rather the play saw the light of day than sit in a drawer. It made sense to debut the play there.

I have an idea for a play swimming around in my head that was inspired by my trip to Montana this summer. I have written plays that take place in Richmond, VA, Laurel, DE, and Laos.

I don’t mean to misinterpret Laura’s statement. I know she doesn’t mean to say that one should only write about where one lives. She is calling for the primacy of the writer’s presence in hot-off-the-grill play-making; of creating a diversity of the art form by fostering a multitude of local voices; and specifically for her need to connect with her work by a vigorous involvement in production, which is best and most practically done where she lives (correct me if I’m wrong on that Laura). But that she is willing to go to other places if they will pay for her brings me to my point: theatre is local, but we are not. We travel places. Bits of our DNA fall off of us and mix with the local ecology. We carry the mites and motes of those places back with us. We become – as the old saw goes – a map of the places we’ve been.

That’s why I’m always happy to travel theaters elsewhere, often at my own expense. I love to get out of the house. I love to see and hear from other places. Fringe festivals (which draw from all over the world) and this series of tubes we call the internet help bring the world to me as well. The best thing I saw at the NYC fringe last year was a company from Vancouver B.C., and I get to read what Laura’s batting about in her brainpan, even though she’s miles away. That’s healthy for me.

And to echo Laura’s wise footer: this isn’t meant as an attack on anyone. It’s just my own thoughts.

Labels: theatre

posted by Dan 4:52 PM
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Tuesday, January 23, 2007

 

How to Answer a Question With More Questions

Because Isaac is an instigator, the topic of the writer’s process and theory bursts out of its inflamed bubo on Venal Scene. Consider yourself warned.

(If you want the full story Story So Far, start here and here; read this comments discussion; hit some responses from Matts J, F, and the irrepressible Comtois; wrap it all up with Isaac’s challenge. It’s a lot to wade through, but should cause a few synapses to fire, which staves off Alzheimer’s, if nothing else.)

As I told Isaac, I’m very protective of how I write plays. I’m a private person, and that’s why I come across as a little coy in the tell-all art form of the personal blog. As for George’s Organums: I found them disconcerting at first. I actually wondered if he was in good health. But honestly, I was only bothered by the fact that among the idols George smashed were a few totems I recognized from my own work, and at the risk of immodesty, I consider that work to be worthwhile.

The challenge posed by an aesthetic theory is almost an ethical one: if one has little theoretical underpinning behind one’s work, there’s the suggestion that the work is somehow corrupt. I think that’s what some react against. Me, I don’t have a theory that I can express as the foundation of my plays. But there is a something from which it all comes, something weird and wild, as Poe said, and best left a little unknown. So my plays often come forth as strikingly dissimilar beasts. As I raise them, I try to listen to their growls and feed them according to their desires.

I can tell you some questions that I often ask myself as I work. They aren’t dramaturgical questions, which are posed later. Some of them are cryptic. Some might seem pretentious. They aren’t to me.

• Music and plays come from the same place. The first sound is not a word but a note. The rhythm, the song, what is it?


• Where is my blood?


• Is that really true?


• Does this run toward fire, or away?


• How is this for bodies, in space, through time?


• Can I make left turns into oncoming traffic?


• If I fail to finish, will I die?


• Where be dragons?


• Am I leading or following?


• What tacks have I set on my own chair?


• Would this make Carolyn proud?


• Have I seen everyone naked?


• Is there something I can steal?


• At the end of the day, what?

Labels: theatre, true confessions

posted by Dan 4:06 PM
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Friday, December 22, 2006

 

Oregon Literary Review

My play The Dog appears in the Winter/Spring edition of the Oregon Literary Review. Thanks to editor Charles Deemer, whose play Christmas at the Juniper Tavern was an early spur into playwriting. He also had a thoughtful post about Jingle Spree, but I can't seem to find it on his old blog. Ah well. Be sure to check out the whole issue, including the plays by OyamO, and the "hypermedia" section, which always contains some of the most exciting stuff in the review.

Labels: theatre

posted by Dan 1:10 PM
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Thursday, November 30, 2006

 

Finish Line

Silenced by the effort, but I finished my NAPLWRIMO play. Here's the 1st scene from Toolbox.

Labels: samples, theatre

posted by Dan 10:41 AM
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Monday, November 13, 2006

 

Venal Scene: Now For Kids!!!

Imagine this adorable rhino plunging its horn through my chest.

That’s what NAPLWRIMO is doing to me: goring me, with big-eyed impunity. Between writing a play in one month, preparing for a workshop production in January, preparing a website, working, and something else…oh yeah, this, I am a bloody mess. But I brought it on myself.

I’m thirty pages into the play, and hoping to finish in two weeks. Does that seem likely?

Labels: theatre, true confessions

posted by Dan 3:49 PM
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Monday, October 30, 2006

 

I Will Now Tell You Why So Much Theatre Sucks (sure)

Crying out loud, I just want to be goofy. But the discussion goes on, with plenty of links to more thoughts.

There’s a lot of passion in here about why so much theatre is so bad, these days or any days. I’m trying to get to the bottom of it, because I think that the authors are in earnest. Here’s where my difficulty with the conversation lies: there’s nothing to agree or disagree with in Maya’s, and by extension Feingold’s, thesis. Or, more accurately, one would have to be some weirdo to argue the position that we should not have magic -- “The Thing,” as Maya calls it -- in a show. We all agree that the show needs it, and we want it. Don’t we? But when we all agree, I think we take comfort, but aren’t hitting the meat of the matter.

Maya and Isaac quibble about whether The Thing is hard to achieve, or easy to achieve in rehearsal but hard to transfer into performance (great speech about that phenomenon in Maxwell Anderson’s Joan of Lorraine). But that’s a quibble. The ultimate problem is agreed on: it’s hard to get the magic on stage in front of an audience. That’s what we ask for. Demand. The Thing. People in the comments seem to get what Maya’s talking about when she says, “The Thing.” They get it instinctively, because it’s hard to describe (set aside whether or not the experience of this magic in a show is subjective -- let’s pretend that everybody always agrees when The Thing happened). Maya asks the question in the middle: “Why do so few plays sparkle with life? Why the un-dead?” Yes, why?

I think her own answer is buried in the post, though it took this bear of very little brain a while to extract it. Let me know if I’m misconstruing, but here it is: The Thing is not getting on stage because of bad faith on the creators’ part. Actors, directors, writers and producers that are “regional theater hacks,” “experimental poseurs,” purveyors of “hyper-naturalist” drama and “pretentious hipsters” fail or refuse to put The Thing on stage. The result is undead theatre. That’s “why.”

That’s an actual point to be argued, and argued against. Are theatre-makers failing to get The Thing on stage because of stupidity, arrogance or laziness? Because they sweat under an economic yoke of some kind? Because they worship the false idol of an aesthetic (hyper-realism, emotional pornography or theatre of awkwardness)? Or because theatre’s hard and they’re failing honestly in pursuit of The Thing?

If it’s the first, then who are these sinners? Neil LaBute? Let’s get some names out there. If we’re going to draw blood, let’s draw it. Then let’s talk about why we suspect these sins on their part.

If it’s an economic yoke, let’s define it. How pumped up can one get about another production of Christmas Carol – and yet that dead fish puts butts in seats?

If it’s a kinship with an aesthetic, let’s talk about the aesthetic’s flaws. What do you mean by emotional pornography? Is hyper-realism really always destined to fail?

If it’s the last possibility -- honest artists in pursuit of a muse, who follow her into a barren wasteland -- let’s meditate on the hell of that.

I know. It’s a big subject: “Why does so much theatre suck?” It's not fair, how big it is. Too much for one column, or post. It scares the stuffing out of me, as I am said Bear of Very Little Brain. That’s why I wish smart guy Feingold had tried to be more specific in his analysis, instead of expounding for half his column on givens as obvious as “water is wet.” I think there’s enough questions inside the subject for at least a dozen columns. I myself am thinking, when I’m not chasing wily and evasive muses.

Labels: theatre

posted by Dan 1:15 PM
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Friday, October 27, 2006

 

Velvet Glove

I promised you (or myself) that I would be silly, and I swear to you (self) that I will be. But I just want to add one thing to this conversation on Isaac B’s page. Critique Of Fellow Bloggers’ Work: Do We Play Too Nice? Certainly compared to the political sphere, we do (I know a guy who works for Josh Marshall, and his trench stories could curl your toes). But it is possible to criticize each other’s work on the blogs and keep the conversation amiable and the experience positive. You just need the right conditions. Like any Stanislavski 101 course teaches, people are capable of anything, if the given circumstances are correct. And I have some circumstances to give. I kept them warm for you.

I had another blogger respond critically to my recent production of Jingle Spree. I found it a positive experience. Charles Deemer is a playwright in Portland. I first saw his work as a kid, and I have a great deal of respect for him. Conversely, when we met at my play, he treated me with warmth and dignity. So that helps to start with that: respect. That respect is difficult to establish within the confines of ASCII or HTML. It helps to meet in the Meat World, as the kids say (or I’d like them to say). It reminds you that the person on the other side of the discussion is human.

Secondly, Mr. Deemer showed real enthusiasm for me as an artist and my play, and wrote about it. Sometimes this is cynically called “the compliment sandwich” (a critique between two slices of praise), but it helps to know that the speaker cares about the work. If they’re dismissive, then it’s easy to get nasty. I like a desire to engage with the artist, rather than fire spitballs from behind the rubric of the objective observer.

Finally -- and this is the hardest part for anybody -- Mr. Deemer backs up his assertions in his post thoughtfully, with examples and analysis. Certainly this takes more time to do, and has some pitfalls. It requires technical discussion, and that touches the danger of boring the layman reader. Boy Howdy though, it gives an assertion weight. It adds length to the entry, another turn-off. But since bloggers are self-publishers, they’re not constrained by maximum word count that a paper-writer is, and the reader has fair warning. Going the extra paragraphs to make a solid point should therefore be expected. Also -- and I’m as guilty of this as anybody -- snark is easy and fun. Resisting the temptation to engage in it is a constant battle. I’d say Mr. Deemer never once dips his toe in that.

Also, he put up my picture. I’m pretty.

The whole entry makes me want to respond to Mr. Deemer (privately or perhaps publicly). That’s useful. Dialogue is always preferable to monologue. Aeschylus figured that out a long time ago, and we’re still relearning the lesson. I think Mr. Deemer’s thoughtful blogging approach comes out of his years of experience, something lacking in what is essentially a young person’s medium. Perhaps, as the ‘sphere grays, the conversation will find a way toward civility. Or, it will turn into a bunch of old coots hoarking their phlegm in each other’s potatoes. Either way.

Labels: theatre

posted by Dan 10:42 AM
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Thursday, October 26, 2006

 

You Say You Want a...What?

Theatre Weeniness ahead. Silliness later.

Still recovering from my trip to Portland this weekend. And now I’m going to try and assemble a thought, out of the scattered puzzle-pieces that litter my brain as they do my kid’s floor. I swore I would only be a Monkeyboy from now on. Perhaps there’s hope for that still. But.

I found discussion from MattJ and Maya of Michael Feingold’s broadside at theatre in the Village Voice. I’m all for broadsides, and I got excited. A call to arms, from a major critic! But -- not unlike Feingold’s response to Wrecks and The Prime of Miss Jean Bordie -- I was left cold. It seemed so broad a side that it hit very little.

Is the review a shot against minutiae-driven theatre? That can be dull, yes, or it can be invigorating: Chekhov? Pinter? It depends on who’s holding up the motes for examination. It depends on whether or not an audience has the wherewithal to focus on minutiae. Sometimes people want to get to the blood already. Sometimes they aren’t at a point in their lives where they can comprehend what they’re seeing. Would you send a fifteen year-old to even the best production of Three Sisters and expect comprehension of the thing? Maybe LaBute missed the mark. Okay. Does that mean we trash all minuitiae-driven theatre because it too might miss the mark?

Is the review a blast against wax-museum, corporate, “boring” theatre, as MattJ suggests? Okay, we all hate to be bored in the theatre, but this is about as useful a point as, “I hate shows that suck.” If Feingold was bored by these plays, okay, but “Don’t be boring” is not a banner to gather forces under. It’s a negative, one that can’t be agreed on. I would lay fat wads of cash that there are pieces that this guy would find meaningful and this guy would find interminable, and the other way around. Lots of stuff can be boring. Music. My collection of sweaters. So?

Is Feingold’s first paragraph the salvo?

Why do we go to the theater? Supposedly, it enriches our life, in any of half a dozen ways.We get thrills, we get meaning, we get laughs, we get music and dance, we get glamour and excitement; we get issues framed to raise our hackles and questions raised to make us search our hearts.

I’m sorry, but that’s too general. I could ask for the same from a party, or a relationship, or hell, even food. Yes, we all want that. But how do we get it? That’s the interesting question.

In fairness, I haven’t seen Wrecks but probably won’t based on trusted friends’ assessments. Miss Jean Brodie I saw about a million times in high school, and I won’t be running out for tickets. Feingold could be spot on in his summation of the productions, but I think it’s the prior paragraphs that got folks juiced. And I don't see what's so juicy.

Okay, this is turning into a review of a review ("I also couldn’t stand the sidebar, with American Apparel’s crotch-based ad campaign"). That’s lame. Feingold’s an excellent writer. I just don’t get this one. So I offer a question: what is the revolution that this article calls for?

UPDATE: Maya Gurantz's response here.

UPDATE II: Also, discussion at Mr. Excitement and Parabasis.

Labels: theatre

posted by Dan 1:45 PM
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Thursday, October 19, 2006

 

Premiere of In Public

Some shots.