Saturday, March 8, 2008
A reading of this play I didn't write?
I inadvertently had my first Chicago reading today. On January 22, I was offered one of the oddest jobs: ghost-rewriting another playwright's play. In this play, three goddesses come down to save the planet from, firstly, environmental destruction, and then, secondly, a nuclear holocaust. They intend to do this by inspiring three activists to do...well to do what they are already doing...only better. They want to convince them to embrace their inner "god" or "poet", as the original playwright put it. Only these gods accidentally allow human emotion to consume them and they fall in love with the humans they are attempting to assist. Whoops.
Not my thing really. Although, I realized half way through the ghost-written rewrite -- for which I would receive no credit or royalties but had attached to it a commissioning fee that would pay my rent for the three months to follow -- that I started my own playwriting experiments with gods, goddesses, and spirituality. My first full-length play was about a son and a father in the afterlife who could travel to visit the living on a horse; one of my first completed one-acts was about the three Fates and what happens if they just quit; an early ten-minute play for a 24 hour play festival examined a couple in the Elysian fields. So I can deal with that crap. Mythology's just my cup of tea.
Activism though? Really? Me? I'm fairly moderate. More over, I'm a libra. The idea of getting passionate enough to do, well, just about anything seems foreign to me, as did writing a play about characters who are passionate enough to fight. But I did it and it's done and I've been paid and after Monday's meeting with the original playwright and his staff (his alter ego is the President of the Center for Cultural Interchange), I don't have to have anything to do with it...
Except I probably will. There was a reading today. I hadn't been invited: this was either a) an oversight, b) a decision based on the assumption that I would not want to come because I wouldn't be paid for my time and because it says quite clearly in my contract that I will have no association with the play after Monday's meeting, or c) a decision based on the idea that it would be easier to criticize the play if I was not present. But Chicago's off-loop theatre scene, though vast, talks. And word got 'round.
I talked to Lois Smith about what to do. She is the lead in the Goodman's Trip to Bountiful and one of the lovely actors I am driving around as part of my current day-job as the Company Manager's assistant. I asked Lois if I should warn them that I was coming or just show up. Just show up, she said. I forget her reasoning. It was something simple and true and I wish I could remember it. So this morning at 11am I just showed up.
I was surprised to learn my name is attached to the script. I thought that part of our contract was that it wouldn't be. I don't know if I feel strongly either way...or maybe I feel strongly both ways. Of course I would like to get some recognition for the changes I made, and believe me I changed quite a bit. All of the character development, the majority of the dialogue, and a few key plot points. The intentions of the script and the basic structure of the original plot are all that really survived. And I am pleased with it. I am pleased with what I did to it within the parameters that surrounded me.
But at the same time it is not a play I would have written, and I am not sure how I feel about people thinking that it is a play that I would have written. It is didactic, but also campy. It requires 10 actors. These rules made for a fun exercise, but they are frankly not my style.
This was clear in today's reading. Oh yes, there are problems with the script still. Thankfully we had one of the most helpful talk back sessions I have ever experienced. Critical but constructive. Honest but polite. And articulate. Incredibly articulate. Many talkbacks consist of people wanting to blather about themselves. "Well I liked that a monkey popped out of the microwave because that reminded me of this time my husband..." "I hated when she kissed that boy because I would have never kissed that boy because his eyes aren't pretty." But the few audience members who accepted the invitation that I never received were brilliant: this isn't working and here is why. That can't happen because then it betrays that. I liked the old beginning from the last draft because this, this, and this...
So now I have these ideas on how to fix it. But it's not my play anymore. And not how a director's production is not his production anymore once the show opens and it becomes the actors' play. I mean legally it's not my play anymore. If it ever was...
So odd. So so odd.
Not my thing really. Although, I realized half way through the ghost-written rewrite -- for which I would receive no credit or royalties but had attached to it a commissioning fee that would pay my rent for the three months to follow -- that I started my own playwriting experiments with gods, goddesses, and spirituality. My first full-length play was about a son and a father in the afterlife who could travel to visit the living on a horse; one of my first completed one-acts was about the three Fates and what happens if they just quit; an early ten-minute play for a 24 hour play festival examined a couple in the Elysian fields. So I can deal with that crap. Mythology's just my cup of tea.
Activism though? Really? Me? I'm fairly moderate. More over, I'm a libra. The idea of getting passionate enough to do, well, just about anything seems foreign to me, as did writing a play about characters who are passionate enough to fight. But I did it and it's done and I've been paid and after Monday's meeting with the original playwright and his staff (his alter ego is the President of the Center for Cultural Interchange), I don't have to have anything to do with it...
Except I probably will. There was a reading today. I hadn't been invited: this was either a) an oversight, b) a decision based on the assumption that I would not want to come because I wouldn't be paid for my time and because it says quite clearly in my contract that I will have no association with the play after Monday's meeting, or c) a decision based on the idea that it would be easier to criticize the play if I was not present. But Chicago's off-loop theatre scene, though vast, talks. And word got 'round.
I talked to Lois Smith about what to do. She is the lead in the Goodman's Trip to Bountiful and one of the lovely actors I am driving around as part of my current day-job as the Company Manager's assistant. I asked Lois if I should warn them that I was coming or just show up. Just show up, she said. I forget her reasoning. It was something simple and true and I wish I could remember it. So this morning at 11am I just showed up.
I was surprised to learn my name is attached to the script. I thought that part of our contract was that it wouldn't be. I don't know if I feel strongly either way...or maybe I feel strongly both ways. Of course I would like to get some recognition for the changes I made, and believe me I changed quite a bit. All of the character development, the majority of the dialogue, and a few key plot points. The intentions of the script and the basic structure of the original plot are all that really survived. And I am pleased with it. I am pleased with what I did to it within the parameters that surrounded me.
But at the same time it is not a play I would have written, and I am not sure how I feel about people thinking that it is a play that I would have written. It is didactic, but also campy. It requires 10 actors. These rules made for a fun exercise, but they are frankly not my style.
This was clear in today's reading. Oh yes, there are problems with the script still. Thankfully we had one of the most helpful talk back sessions I have ever experienced. Critical but constructive. Honest but polite. And articulate. Incredibly articulate. Many talkbacks consist of people wanting to blather about themselves. "Well I liked that a monkey popped out of the microwave because that reminded me of this time my husband..." "I hated when she kissed that boy because I would have never kissed that boy because his eyes aren't pretty." But the few audience members who accepted the invitation that I never received were brilliant: this isn't working and here is why. That can't happen because then it betrays that. I liked the old beginning from the last draft because this, this, and this...
So now I have these ideas on how to fix it. But it's not my play anymore. And not how a director's production is not his production anymore once the show opens and it becomes the actors' play. I mean legally it's not my play anymore. If it ever was...
So odd. So so odd.
Monday, February 25, 2008
Saturday, February 16, 2008
My two brains: 5 Rehearsals in Ink
It is fitting that I first embraced my doodling addiction in Jami Ake's Shakespeare class Freshman year of undergrad. I should say that I shouldn't have even been in this Shakespeare class, it being an upper level course, and I being a lower underclassman; I would later find out, furthermore, that this 300 level English course could not and would not count towards my 200 level English requirement, and that I would have to take one of the survey courses I was avoiding by focusing on the bard. The bogus logic of academia.
I have been drawing since preschool, and though I don't know this for sure, I assume that I have been doodling since at least high school if not middle school. But it was while debating Desdemona and talking about the twin-cherries in Midsummer's Night Dream, that I first started using two notebooks: one for note-taking, and one (now far more interesting to revisit) for doodling. This was much more practical than it was artistic: my doodles had begun to dominate my notes when they shared the page, and I wouldn't hesitate to draw over the fact that Shakespeare was born in -----------.
As I simultaneously pursued a drawing/woodcutting minor and a psych minor, my artistic brain and my analytical brain strengthened in unison. Great, right? Right. Sure: I think so. But with this, like the valley between two active volcanoes, the divide between these two brains became more pronounced. They can work together, sure. There was no fall-out. No schism. They are like brothers who play well together; but they are also like brothers who both constantly want dad's attention and when dad is playing frisbee with the analytical brain, the artistic brain is jumping up in down in the window until dad finally turns his attention to him, leaving the analytical son alone in the backyard wishing his frisbee was a boomarang. Pretty soon the analytical son drops the frisbee altogether and chases after his brother and father, leaving the frisbee forgotten and unattended, lost in the tall grass for eternity.
To drop the metaphor, my brain wanders to whatever play I am working on or an idea for a woodcut, and once the artistic brain starts wandering, the analytical brain takes its cue and starts wandering as well: revisiting conversations and memories; breaking a part a play I read yesterday; etc. And then Jami asks me what I think of Claudius's prayer to heaven and whether I think words without thoughts ever to heaven go, and I sink and try not to think about the huge intellectual crush I have on this professor and how if I open my mouth I will prove that I have no idea what she's talking about, and I quickly stumble my way to an empty answer that sounds good to everyone but her and my friend Kim because they know it's bullshit just like I know it's bullshit.
The solution has been to doodle. I don't know what the denotation of doodling is, but for me it is a drawing without intention. It is a drawing that is more interested in being visually appealing than meaning anything. No truths are sought. No great mysteries are uncovered. And if you happen to spill coffee on it, so much the better. For me it is a way to engage my needy artistic son while I am playing frisbee with the analytical son. Over this last week, this trick has come in handy. We are at the stage in rehearsals where I am (as dramaturg) most valuable listening to the language of the play and making sure the actors are communicating the intentions of their characters. Greg and Libby - the directors for Girl in the Goldfish Bowl and the director for The Misanthrope - can worry about shape right now, and I will start worrying about it when we move into runs. And at that point my two brains can play together all they want; but not yet.
Of course it appears rude. It looks like I'm not listening at all when I am engrossed in a doodle, but in reality if I am doodling I am listening intensely. If I'm not doodling, then you should wonder where my mind has wandered to.
Rachel had to make a trip the paper store for school, and she gave me some of her scraps of some super swank paper! Delicious. My bank account is thankful she did not take me with her.
Doodles from a week of rehearsal:
Journey To
Dragon
Acorn
Three Wise Men
Systems
I have been drawing since preschool, and though I don't know this for sure, I assume that I have been doodling since at least high school if not middle school. But it was while debating Desdemona and talking about the twin-cherries in Midsummer's Night Dream, that I first started using two notebooks: one for note-taking, and one (now far more interesting to revisit) for doodling. This was much more practical than it was artistic: my doodles had begun to dominate my notes when they shared the page, and I wouldn't hesitate to draw over the fact that Shakespeare was born in -----------.
As I simultaneously pursued a drawing/woodcutting minor and a psych minor, my artistic brain and my analytical brain strengthened in unison. Great, right? Right. Sure: I think so. But with this, like the valley between two active volcanoes, the divide between these two brains became more pronounced. They can work together, sure. There was no fall-out. No schism. They are like brothers who play well together; but they are also like brothers who both constantly want dad's attention and when dad is playing frisbee with the analytical brain, the artistic brain is jumping up in down in the window until dad finally turns his attention to him, leaving the analytical son alone in the backyard wishing his frisbee was a boomarang. Pretty soon the analytical son drops the frisbee altogether and chases after his brother and father, leaving the frisbee forgotten and unattended, lost in the tall grass for eternity.
To drop the metaphor, my brain wanders to whatever play I am working on or an idea for a woodcut, and once the artistic brain starts wandering, the analytical brain takes its cue and starts wandering as well: revisiting conversations and memories; breaking a part a play I read yesterday; etc. And then Jami asks me what I think of Claudius's prayer to heaven and whether I think words without thoughts ever to heaven go, and I sink and try not to think about the huge intellectual crush I have on this professor and how if I open my mouth I will prove that I have no idea what she's talking about, and I quickly stumble my way to an empty answer that sounds good to everyone but her and my friend Kim because they know it's bullshit just like I know it's bullshit.
The solution has been to doodle. I don't know what the denotation of doodling is, but for me it is a drawing without intention. It is a drawing that is more interested in being visually appealing than meaning anything. No truths are sought. No great mysteries are uncovered. And if you happen to spill coffee on it, so much the better. For me it is a way to engage my needy artistic son while I am playing frisbee with the analytical son. Over this last week, this trick has come in handy. We are at the stage in rehearsals where I am (as dramaturg) most valuable listening to the language of the play and making sure the actors are communicating the intentions of their characters. Greg and Libby - the directors for Girl in the Goldfish Bowl and the director for The Misanthrope - can worry about shape right now, and I will start worrying about it when we move into runs. And at that point my two brains can play together all they want; but not yet.
Of course it appears rude. It looks like I'm not listening at all when I am engrossed in a doodle, but in reality if I am doodling I am listening intensely. If I'm not doodling, then you should wonder where my mind has wandered to.
Rachel had to make a trip the paper store for school, and she gave me some of her scraps of some super swank paper! Delicious. My bank account is thankful she did not take me with her.
Doodles from a week of rehearsal:
Journey To
Dragon
Acorn
Three Wise Men
Systems
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Monday, February 4, 2008
While you were drying.
My clothes are in the drier. Drier. Weird word. Makes you have to make a weird shape with your mouth. "Dry" is fine because you can let it go, but the noun-ifying suffix "er" forces you to make an odd loop because you silently must return to a closed position. Drier. Almost necessitates mumbling. I'm probably overthinking this.
Friday, February 1, 2008
Primary Lament
Damn. Reading Bellwether State Fervently Seeks Choice Who Can Win in the Fall in today's New York Times makes me disappointed in myself for my political laziness. I am still registered to vote in the great state of Missouri (the Libra of the US). Which would be great if I didn't live in Chicago. Or if I had gotten my shit together to vote absentee on Tuesday. As it happened, I procrastinated by watching clips about the debates, reading articles about the rise of McCain (yay!) and the demonization of teary-eyed Hilary, and following who won what states and trying to figure out how the point system works. And I never registered in Illinois. And I never called in to get a Missouri ballot sent to my Illinois apartment.
I honestly believe in this Presidential election, which I could not say about the last election because I didn't believe in Kerry because I didn't believe Kerry and I only voted for Kerry because Bush is, well...Bush is, how do I put this...Bush embodies the worst of politics: secretive, obstinate, inarticulate, closed-minded...we could continue because we all have continued and by this point we are all preaching to the choir because the choir is overflowing the church.
But the world is watching this election as we here in the states are (maybe even closer than some here in the states are). They see it as a reflection of what we value and what relationships we want to foster with Europe and the Middle East and China and Russia. The next president could bring the world together even before yo (apparently the new genderless pronoun?) takes office because of the message we will send by electing yo. By electing Obama or Clinton, we will announce to the world, We agree with you: Bush fucked it.
Damn. I should go home to vote. Because: Bush fucked it. I could catch the megabus. $20 down. $20 back. 10 hours on a bus. Lose time on rewriting that commission. Miss rehearsal. Miss rehearsal again, I should say, since I am going to the opening of Talking Pictures on Monday. I guess I could skip the opening.
God that's a lot of work though! But I guess not as much work as the Revolutionary War.
Damn.
I honestly believe in this Presidential election, which I could not say about the last election because I didn't believe in Kerry because I didn't believe Kerry and I only voted for Kerry because Bush is, well...Bush is, how do I put this...Bush embodies the worst of politics: secretive, obstinate, inarticulate, closed-minded...we could continue because we all have continued and by this point we are all preaching to the choir because the choir is overflowing the church.
But the world is watching this election as we here in the states are (maybe even closer than some here in the states are). They see it as a reflection of what we value and what relationships we want to foster with Europe and the Middle East and China and Russia. The next president could bring the world together even before yo (apparently the new genderless pronoun?) takes office because of the message we will send by electing yo. By electing Obama or Clinton, we will announce to the world, We agree with you: Bush fucked it.
Damn. I should go home to vote. Because: Bush fucked it. I could catch the megabus. $20 down. $20 back. 10 hours on a bus. Lose time on rewriting that commission. Miss rehearsal. Miss rehearsal again, I should say, since I am going to the opening of Talking Pictures on Monday. I guess I could skip the opening.
God that's a lot of work though! But I guess not as much work as the Revolutionary War.
Damn.
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