Bug - Living on the other side

I really liked the originality of Bug. I would never have thought of writing about either aspect of what made Bug so dually creative.

1) Bug was largely about the lifestyle of the fairly happy white lower classed. I may be wrong, but I think every play I have seen about the lower class has featured unhappy individuals struggling against an oppressor for freedom. Bug seemed to show that people like this could still be happy, and that the were taking somewhat good care of themselves (aside from the drugs). The whole concept of living an entire life in a hotel is somewhat foreign, and I thought it worked very well. It allowed the audience to vaguely think someone from management might come in or the maid service might knock to come in and clean. The character dynamic between members of this class was also very original and compelling. We’ve seen plenty of scenes about abusive husbands, but never quite in the way Bug was able to show it. They went to parties, smoked crack and some kind of meth, and were generally enjoying the life they had carved out for themselves.

2) The mental illness aspect of Bug was taken on in a whole new way, and that allowed the play to burst out from underneath hundreds of other plays about similar mental illnesses. This is a good side note – meaning that even a subject that has been done to death can find new life in an examination of it from a different angle. Bug found this angle by allowing the insane people tell the story. Instead of seeing the two for what they genuinely were – mentally ill people – I started to actually see how they could be right. What not? They seemed so convinced of their conspiracy theory that everything started to make complete sense to me. This is the take home message that a play can take characters that appear completely crazy to everyone else, and flip the whole world on its head simply through point of view.

Perhaps Bug is a good reminder of the importance of characters and perspective. No one in the audience liked the abusive character, but even when he tried to save his ex-wife, the audience was completely against him. I know I was happy for the two when they engulfed themselves in flame at the end of the play. The girl’s last monologue was a nice crowning moment for the character because with her understanding of the situation came the audience’s wondering if that situation was actually real. Of course it wasn’t real, but everyone questioned it just for a moment. Powerful writing.

Big Ideas in little places

Watching Terra Nova, really changed the way I will write in the future. I began thinking about what people write plays about and it made my head hurt. There are plays on almost every topic from the seemingly inane to the incredibly gut-wrenching. Terra Nova showed me that there aren’t plays about inane things because the play proves why a thing isn’t insignificant. Everything, no matter how small, has a story and affects people. The magic of playwriting is to find that significance in the subject and make it compelling. I would never have dreamed that someone could write an entire full-length play about the south pole, but as I sat I became more and more aware of the drama that the expedition experienced.

In Terra Nova there were lots of moments that harbored hugely emotional pieces. The one that I can remember most clearly was Matt reading in his journal about the three surviving men. It must have been one of the only times in history that a group of three people have known that they were going to die, but couldn’t admit it to each other. It resonated with everyone in the audience because they have all been in situations where everyone involved knew it was hopeless but no one would be the first to give up. With a few lines of dialogue, Terra Nova was somehow able to marry such a specific and rare feeling with a fairly common one and bring the audience further into a play that they couldn’t be more geographically or chronologically removed from.

This play was harbored an interesting lesson in characters. I really loved the expedition portion of the play, but some of my female friends did not. I realized that even though I may really connect to a group of characters, many other people would not. It was additionally one of the first times that I have felt such a strong connection with a group of people instead of just one character. They banded together for the whole play, and allowed nature to act at the antagonist. It is nice for an audience member to not have someone to hate because it frees him or her from the burden of judgment. Joey’s character was probably one of the most interesting characters that I have even seen in a play. I think he was perfect for the role, but also he had wonderfully dynamic and spectacular writing. He was neither an antagonist nor a friend to Matt, but his presence was always eerie and interesting.

I guess I touched on this before, but a play like Terra Nova is easy for an audience to connect to because they are inherently bound to the actors. In a play whose conflict and villain are rolled up into the harsh environment, everyone watching the play is able to side with the actors completely. There isn’t really anyone to hate in this play, so subsequently the characters become very loved. Each may have a flaw, but the audience is able to blame the harsh weather for their faults and root for the underdog humans until the villainous Antarctic kills them. I want to try writing a play with no antagonist.

Fences? FENCES? Fences.

If seeing a play is like watching a movie, then reading the script is like listening to the director commentary. I very much enjoy reading plays, but I think the fact remains that there is a huge chunk of a play that you don’t get from the script alone. The one big thing I will take away from seeing Fences is the simple fact that so much is inserted and changed between the page and the stage. So many little nuances are either added or removed from the page that the production that we saw in the theater might be considered a different show entirely.

My initial thought is to get mad about the interpretation on a stage. I had all these ideas for characters in my head (i.e. the father, the strong mother, Gabriel, ect.) and the people on the stage simply didn’t do what I wanted them to. As a person who wants to write plays, I am immediately thinking about how I can write everything so clearly as to ensure my vision is carried out. My next thought, and by far an easier and more open one, is the idea that a play is supposed to be changed from the page. A production isn’t merely the writer’s vision, but a huge amalgamation of a hundred creative minds together. Perhaps instead of pigeonholing a play that I write into my own mind, I might leave a character open ended and allow the director and actor to fill in the blanks.

I wonder what kind of touch is best for a writer to have. Too many stage directions, too-wordy character descriptions, and too much writer presence may spell death for the creative malleability and growth of a play. If a play is written in a way that it can only be produced in one fashion, what is the point of a company putting it on again? On the other hand, a play with no writing touch at all lacks everything that makes the play unique. I wonder what percent a production is the writer, what percent it is the actors, what percent it is the director, and what percent it is everything else? Is there a number range that most successful and engaging plays fall into?

Like many discussions of plays, this one will revert to Shakespeare. His plays can be set in almost any time period with any actors and any director and still work. Do they drip with their writer because of the flowery language, or was Shakespeare simply able to write in such a way that by simply saying the words, his vision was achieved? I suppose he is so stylized now compared to modern English that he will never be forgotten, and his voice will only grow stronger as our days increase. This is not so with contemporary playwrights, and subsequently they must find different ways and percentages with which to affect the final production.

I think now I leave too much to the rest of the crew. Even when I write sketches and see them performed, I find that the writing isn’t clear enough to get my point across even in a staged reading. I will endeavor to write in a way that is clear and personal, and perhaps once I have done this I won’t mind so much when the rest of the play diverges from the way I saw it in my head.

10 Minute Plays, Round two

Reading these four plays probably set me back farther than I had already been about writing only because it opened up a lot more options than it seemed to close. Though I did not like these four plays as much as the first batch, their themes varied greatly, and really showed me that people will watch 10 minutes of almost anything. The characters need to be quick and dirty, but if you have good dialogue, your play will almost always work for some audience somewhere.

The play I liked the least was Aimee. I felt that in 2003, it’s point may have been that homeland security is an overbearing organization, but in 2010, we’ve seen quite a few jabs at homeland, and all of those jabs were more clever than this one. The only character I liked was Larry, and that’s because he seems pretty absurd and goofy. Everyone else was stiff. Even the ending bugged me. The turn happens far too quickly (even for a 10-minute play), and the last lines are begging to be cut. In all, not my cup of tea.

I liked the Philadelphia, because it sounds the most like sketch comedy to me. There really wasn’t much of a point (an in 10 minutes a phenomenal point is typically hard to come by), but the action seemed quick and enjoyable. People are also very interested in labeling situations, so Philadelphia was good for that type of comedy. Really not much else to say about Philadelphia besides the fact that I’ve seen almost the same exact thing a hundred times on How I Met Your Mother or any number of good sitcoms. There is definitely a market for this, and just because it may not have a serious message or make the audience cry doesn’t mean it’s not good writing.

Anything for you had a neat style to it that I am curious to explore. Lynette was able to say the craziest things, and less than two lines later I completely bought it. I am still not a hundred percent sure how she did it, but I think it has something to do with the fact that she just blurted out a secret without any lead-up. Her following lines acted as rationales, and after she was done explaining once, I took for granted everything she had previously stated. Anything for you was a little predictable, but not without its merits of being a witty and quick comedy.

Duet for Bear and Dog was a nice piece that I thought was probably my favorite of the four, as well as the one that expanded my subject matter the most. The take home message from this play is actually that any character can be on stage for 10 minutes. The audience comes to a theater to watch a show. They are there to watch and listen, and they are willing to do that almost without any withdrawl for about 10 minutes. After that, if you haven’t hooked them they may start to check out, but for that 10 minutes you have them. Bear and Dog’s two main characters were animals, which would drag down a full length play, but was lovely and quaint this time. I may try to put an animal in my next play, we’ll see.

It's not the size of your play

I had a generally good experience reading these four plays. I am a huge fan of sketch comedy, which is basically a series of very poorly written short plays. This makes legitimate short plays a real treat because they are usually pretty well written. Of the four plays, I liked each of them for different reason (except for A Bowl of Soup which I didn’t like and thought was a crock of something else). The plays were generally good representations of the writing tenants that we have been learning about in class.

I really liked The Man Who Couldn’t Dance because it gave us little bits of the plot at a time. It started out with an odd and strained relationship that gradually opened up to become a huge and romantic picture. The characters were immediately likeable, and there was no point that I didn’t believe their words. Oddly enough, I performed the “I can’t dance” monologue for a class, but I can’t remember for what class and when. I don’t think it was at U.P.S., but as I was reading the play I knew something was familiar and when I came across the monologue I was really enthused to read it. The Man Who Couldn’t Dance also had a good build and plot that was interesting and fairly easy to follow. Like we have been learning, each line of dialogue both furthered the plot and increased the characterization rather than taking two lines to do the same thing. I really liked Gail’s line near the end of the play, “I remember thinking how strange it was to be in this wedding gown. On my wedding day. Dancing with you. And you weren’t my groom.” This line gives a lot away without doing anything too overtly. In all a little sappy, but a nice short play.

The Roads That Lead Here was definitely my favorite, and I have the least to say about it. I guess this play was a concept that I found immediately very interesting. I thought the brotherly relationship was well done, and I liked the quasi-absurdist nature of the play. I found myself very easily picturing all the characters and the action.

That Midnight Rodeo was a good piece along similar lines as the dancing play. This was a very strong character play, and once the relationship and situation was established, the play just rolled itself out. I was happy with the play because it wasn’t obvious at any point. Every line was realistic, and I found myself taking a side I don’t normally take on children. It was nice not being force-fed the plot, and even though it took a long time for me to catch on to what was happening, I would prefer to not know rather than to know and be disappointed by it.

I was not a fan of the Bowl Of Soup play. I read it as something of a monologue play, and always found myself losing interest. I kept thinking that perhaps Eddie might have killed Rob, or some other plot twist, but there wasn’t really any of that. Even the part about AIDS sounded forced without any other characters to help it out. I guess soup seemed like a monologue masquerading as a play, and I wasn’t really buying it. This could stem from my liking realistic dialogue, and monologues almost always sounding forced.

I think the thing I am taking away from these readings is the slow and gradual reveal of the plot. The plays that did a great job of this were That Midnight Rodeo and The Man Who Couldn’t Dance. If the plot comes out all at once, it is almost certainly because it is forced out. I think making strong characters allows them to fend for themselves for a while before the audience catches up with the plot, and once they do they will appreciate the characters all the more. Maybe there is something inherent in really good characters that audiences recognize immediately and understand. Perhaps writing a character as compelling and realistically as you can will allow the audience time to fully comprehend what they are seeing regardless of how slow you let the plot out.

The things that I liked about fences were the characters. I liked the fact that they seemed so real. I often find myself wondering if a character I am writing for would really say any of the things I am forcing him or her to say. August Wilson did a good job of writing legitimately for his figures because I didn’t get the sense that any of the characters would have felt wronged in Fences. Even through their aging, the characters maintained what made them unique. Unlike Eurydice, almost every line of dialogue seemed wholly realistic, yet the characters continued to be somewhat interesting for the entire play.

In a play like Fences, the characters are the only things capable of driving the plot. There weren’t a large amount of deadlines or impending circumstances or devices that would push the plot in a new direction, so the characters had to do it themselves. I guess this was another example of a play whose work was done after a serious evaluation of the character list. I am not sure how I think about that style because I have always been a fan of a journey or the introduction of a new and strange character, but this play is a realistic and everyday kind of play. It is useful to think about plays that don’t have constant action because they help to develop your ability to write dialogue that propels a story rather than plot points.

Fences has an interesting structure. The best way I can think to describe it is as a set of yearbooks stacked together. We get to see a few interactions and characters before we have to look at the next yearbook. This structure fits the characters really well, but I wonder how hard it is to write such a play. As soon as Wilson finished discussing whatever he wanted the characters to say he would just move onto a new yearbook and leave the audience wondering.

The thing I am left wondering after reading this play is how does one go about creating the characters that will essentially dictate the plot of your story. Do you begin with a vague idea of plot and then go? Did Wilson start with Troy, then create Rose, then Lyons and Cory, and then added in an affair, then Bono for support, then Gabe to spice things up? I would like to learn how to do create a character string that can completely support a story before the story is written.

I'm Rydice? I'M RYDICE? EURYDICE! THATS WHO'S RYDICE.

Honestly the first thing I thought when I finished Eurydice was that I need to write in more parts for rocks in my plays. I think this play did a really great job with incorporating odd and unique characters, and making them seem completely regular by the end of the play. Thinking back, I would have to say that the strength of Eurydice came almost completely from the characters. They could have said very different things than the script called for, but I still would have enjoyed it because the combination of characters employed in the play was somehow very interesting. I would like to go through them quickly:

Orpheus and Eurydice: From the very start I was in love with them. The setting played perfectly into the idea of two true-lovers going for a dip in the pond, and all their talk about music and promising made the scene really work for me. Eurydice spoke almost exclusively in questions, making her really seem like depended on Orpheus. Their banter and movement really sold them in the first scene, and even though they didn't really have more interaction until she dies again, we know clearly that these characters are in love.
Man: Right away we hate the man. He is unnamed and horrible. In one question, "Are you a homeless person," we know what this man is all about. He perfectly plays up the 'tough-guy' role, and I can't help but detest him.
Father: He is a nice touch. The father's role turns this play into far more of a tragedy than it already is. His love of his daughter is so clear through his careful writings and teachings, and when he dips himself in the river we can't help but be reminded of Romeo poisoning himself when he believes Juliet to have died.
The Stones: With the stones, Eurydice starts to get more bewildering but simultaneously more intriguing. I immediately thought of how the costumes were going to look, but after a few lines it didn't matter. These stones were such unique characters that somehow genuinely told the rock's tale. I was put off at first at the blatant supernaturality of the stones, but once the dialogue got going they materialized so powerfully that they just became natural characters.
Grandmother: She had an interesting role, kind of like Lucky in Godot. I wasn't too impressed with this character, but it tied in the musical theme, so I guess it can stay.
Child: This was another character that became more an more real the more I read. What a fantastic idea though, right? The Child is the lord of the undeworld, I mean. This slight change is unique, compelling, and changes hugely the dynamic between the characters. The child comes onto Eurydice and we feel dirty to even think about it. Like a child with too-small clothes, this character seems to be ironically stuck in limbo between manhood and childhood, and that simple character choice molded a great deal of his dialogue.
Old Woman: This was a strange choice that brought the myth into modernity even more than the 1950s swim suits.

If I learn nothing else from Eurydice, it should be about choosing characters wisely. Eurydice did, and the play was practically written once the character list was. By choosing characters that will inherently attack each others weaknesses, the play has a constant source of tension. For instance, homosexuality paired with heterosexuality creates an instant and prolonged conflict. Different viewpoints on races or having a disease, anything that permanently affects the way a person addresses the world, can be utilized by another character to drive dialogue.