Working Backwards

It is interesting to me how well this little concept worked. This concept feels like cheating because its transition from directing to playwriting is a large transition and in the directing world this seems to rely solely on the presence of a script in very clear ways. However, all of the transitions to playwriting concepts are large, and this one proved to be helpful.

What I'm noticing is that the way plays are analyzed in terms of performance (what I'm doing), rather than in terms of the scripts like Aristotle and most playwriting texts, is of extreme value in getting past the idea that you are writing for some sort of perfection on paper. I never before realized that I was too focused on the page. Even when I was writing stage direction after stage direction to focus on what I felt were important elements to performance what I was really doing was slowing my process down (another nod to the directorial SPEED-THRU) and hindering my writing because my focus was on the page clearly communicating what I wanted rather than on the souls of the characters doing that for me.

I realize that this is a small shift in perspective, but for a guy who started out as an actor and migrated towards the idea that playwrights have the greatest impact on the theatre this shift is positively groundbreaking. I suspect that most people who are involved with the theatre began because of an interest or experience with acting. This shift in perspective is quite compelling for my writing process and may aid them as well.

The most successful part of this concept for me was the writing of significant lines. I spoke with Rodney, who realized that he already does this to a certain extent, though for different reasons. Rodney wrote monologues which explored the characters' pasts in their own words. He was able to successfully integrate these monologues (more or less) into scenes. I wrote single lines. What I realized was that these characters are 1) different, 2) concerned about different things, and 3) their direction of those concerns is clearly to different people. These lines were basically answering the question: What would these people say if they had to tell the truth about something that had changed for them?

What I started with was a scene between Lawson & Ted without the concept and I ended up with a scene between Ted & Henry with the concept. The scene between Ted and Henry is much better than the scene between Lawson and Ted. The “character relations” and “significant lines” made it obvious that the major conflict of the general content of the scene I was working on was between Ted and Henry and had little to do with Lawson. My fear of making Lawson anything but the main character led me (try) to include him in every scene and I realize now that this is unnecessary. His tragedy is no less severe if it is coupled with other tragedies surrounding him. In fact, after writing the scene between Henry & Ted I realize that the scene between Ted and Lawson will be much stronger simply because of the build up to it. There is a more (and less) effective sequence of events.

While I do not feel that the Henry/Ted scene is in a completely finished form (it still needs work, probably in the context of the entire play) I do know that it is better, more theatrical, and more revealing than the first piddly scene that emerged from my head. Is this planning? Perhaps. If nothing else it is an experiment in perspective and I'm finding it quite successful.

Journal 5-30-2009 Speed-Thru

I think that due to a playwriting I class I recently took that I've been trying to "force" my play to have a definable "story" in a rather cause/effect & linear mode recently. Not sure if this is a problem yet. I've been having difficulty keeping ALFRED as the main character (because he is) with only an internal conflict with which to build an entire story. HENRY, his right hand man, has a arguably more outward struggle with the revelation of his past betrayals (although this, too, is inward). At one point I restructured the story to reflect HENRY's struggles. This, I realized, only served to take away the primary reason for writing the play: ALFRED and the images with which he is associated.

This has been rather fluid. I've written somewhere around 70 pages by this point. The first 40 or so with the initial ALFRED story structure, the next 20 or so with HENRY as the main before realizing this would be detrimental to the reason to write at all. The next 10ish pages have been re-devoted to ALFRED but focused differently. Whether I end up deciding on a structure for the play or not prior to actually writing it the exercise of thinking about various structures has been helpful simply to purify the quality of what actually needs to happen in the play for it to both be effective and what I want it to be.

Just completed my first SPEED-THRU. Sat, wrote, didn't stop, didn't fix, didn't punctuate, didn't think about structure, character, voice, story, etc... just wrote and didn't stop for 30 minutes in a fury. This exercise produced some rather interesting effects. The first reassured me that my journey to incorrect versions of my script had been a good thing. The first scene (what it ended up being) is significantly more clear about what is going on and about the conflict which will emerge. It is, however, less theatrical than the originally thought and planned out version. The original is rather methodical about rhythm and sound, but to a detriment of story. So, while the initially planned writing is more theatrical the SPEED-THRU is more concrete. It will, indeed, be a blending of the two which will be required for success.

While I am insanely interested in what I call "actor candy¹" I am hardy convinced that it, alone, is valuable within an entire script. There must be some sort of unifying function (even if it is disunity). This has been a central problem of mine and one which I imagine will take an entire lifetime to correct (meaning never). I wouldn't trade this problem for the gift of perfect cause/effect structure as I believe there are other strengths I possess and hope that cause/effect is a learnable/trainable strength.

Speaking of cause/effect... the two first scenes I've written are equally possessive of future items, qualities, and habits which will, I believe, serve the future of the play in a cause/effect way. Traits will reappear, items will become more important, etc. It is interesting that this is the case. Perhaps I am coming to know these characters better, even if they do have actual historical counterparts.

1Words, ideas, images, meters, rhythms that simply beg to be spoken by someone with talent and patience. Valuable in and of themselves regardless of any larger context of story or meaning. While poetry may be a close approximate to "actor candy" ... what makes the candy special is the actor. It provides all sorts of marvelous words and rhythms and ideas for the actor to play with and is therefore fun and endearing like a children's game.