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Edd
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Posted: Sun Oct 1st, 2006 06:55 pm |
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The October challenge promises to be great fun and a beneficial exercise for the playwright.
Write a single page play that must contain the following 5 words: DIAPER, GIRAFFE, ASH TRAY, GRANDMOTHER and FRENCH FRIES (yeah, yeah, I know those are 7 words).
PLEASE DO NOT RESOND TO THE ENTRIES OF OTHER MEMBERS. JUST POST YOUR ONE-PAGE PLAY ONLY. POST WHAT YOU'VE WRITTEN UNDER A "NEW TOPIC" SO EACH PERSON HAS THEIR OWN THREAD. I WILL THEN REMOVE IT FOR BLIND AND IMPARTIAL JUDGING.
There will be two runners-up who will receive Honorable Mention, but only the author of the 1st place entry will win a prize. Thank you.
AND NOW FOR THE SEPTEMBER 2006 WINNERS!
September’s interviews were the closest yet. Only one or two points separated one from the other. Paddy, mac and I gave each interview points from 1 to 10. The following is our list of winners.
First place: MOZZ
Second place: KATE
Third place: SHANAHAN and LEON
MOZZ, please choose your prize from the following titles in hardcover, Racing Demon by David Hare, The Speed of Darkness by Steve Tesich, Beyond Therapy by Christopher Durang, Company by Sondheim and Furth, Mrs. Klein by Nicholas Wright, Arcadia by Tom Stoppard, The Cryptogram by David Mamet, A Shayna Maidel by Barbara Lebow, My Children! My Africa! by Athol Fugard or an autographed published copy of Tough Cookies by yours truly. Send me a PM with a postal address so that I can mail you your prize choice.
______________________________________
INTERVIEW WITH MOZZ (first place)
Mozz: Hello, How are you?
Mozz: Mozz, I’m fine.
Mozz: You’ve been putting off this interview for some time. How come?
Mozz: Well, Mozz… can I call you Mozz?
Mozz: Please, but only if I can call YOU Mozz…
Mozz: Of course Mozz, Thanks Mozz. Well, Mozz, you scheduled this interview for September, my Septembers are a little difficult.
Mozz: Because of the new television season?
Mozz: You know me so well. Yes, the new TV season starts, I’m looking forward to watching the new TV shows. Heroes, studio 60, America’s Next Top Model, I try to keep up. Springs are for Theatre, Winters for Movies, Fall for TV. Summers are for Mozz.
Mozz: Do you always live by those rules?
Mozz: I live a life of regimentation.
Mozz: and you’re a writer?
Mozz: I am? Thanks for telling me. I should go get a pen.
Mozz: a pen?
Mozz: Do I use my laptop? I always imagined that I would write with a pen first, and then type it in, it would probably help me self edit.
Mozz: I know writers that write that way.
Mozz: So do I.
Mozz: So, you became a writer because…
Mozz: I wanted to be a superhero. Then I realized that I couldn’t fly, climb walls, hear people’s thoughts, see into the future, fly, walk through walls…. Thank god I stopped at walking through walls, cause well, stabbing myself to see if I would heal would have probably hurt.
Mozz: Big fantasy life.
Mozz: that’s what they told me at the asylum.
Mozz: so, no stabbing yourself.
Mozz: No that happened later. But before that I discovered the super power of words. And so I decided that would be my super power.
Mozz: Interesting, how did you come to this conclusion?
Mozz: Well, I was learning English.
Mozz: Learning?
Mozz: Yes, I arrived on U.S. Soil from Puerto Rico when I was fourteen. So, the first thing to do was learn English. My mom was the youngest out of eleven children, so she never went to school. I think by the time she was supposed to go to school, she was completely lost amidst ten other kids, so they never sent her, she never learned to read or write.
Mozz: wow...
Mozz: it's a shame, cause my mom was a brilliant woman. She just had this instinct and this creativity; she’s a great storyteller. When I got to college, I declared an English Literature Major; I just wanted to read everything. But I always remembered that I came from a proud history of storytellers.
Mozz: or a sad one of bald face liars.
Mozz: it’s a fine line, isn’t it?
Mozz: so, you read a lot.
Mozz: religiously. Although I don’t read the bible.
Mozz: The theatre department and the English lit department were in the same building, so I went to an audition, and I got cast in my first audition. And I got a lead role, so I followed that through. I ended up majoring in English Lit and Acting. Writing plays seemed a natural off shoot.
Mozz: But you didn’t start writing plays till much later.
Mozz: Not for years. As a matter of fact, I was an actor in NYC and I started writing television to try to supplement my income. It sorta worked, and I wrote a few things here and there, I wrote a couple of pilot bibles. Then someone said, you should write a play.
Mozz: but you didn’t want to?
Mozz: Of course not. That’s serious writing. I had studied Shakespeare, Tennessee Williams, and Tom Stoppard and all the greats, classics, I had read them. I knew that I could never write something that measured up.
Mozz: Yet you didn’t start with one-acts. You started with a full-length play.
Mozz: Yes, Thoroughly Stupid Things, was my first full length and my first play.
Mozz: what is it about?
Mozz: it’s a sequel to the Importance of Being Ernest, while at the same time; I try to write in all theatrical conventions. Written in the standard three act Wilde structure. The first act is a comedy of Manners, the second act is written in Moliere Rhyme, and the third act includes Beckett and an iambic pentameter sword fight. One of the character dies, which is a lot of fun.
Mozz: But it’s with the characters of Ernest.
Mozz: absolutely, Jack, Algernon, Cecily, Gwendolen… Lady Bracknell, Ms. Prism, they’re all there. It was my first play, I was auditioning for very heavy characters, as a Puerto Rican actor I never get called in for comedy, I get called in to play the drug dealer, or the criminal. And at the same time, I was writing sci-fi TV stuff and drama, and it was all heavy… I thought, well, writing a play is serious stuff, so let’s have some fun.
Mozz: is it good?
Mozz: Well, it’s no King Lear. After I wrote that play, the dam broke, I couldn’t stop myself. I attacked the one-act form --- I have about 50 of those now. A lot of them have been staged.
Mozz: and that’s when you knew you were born to write.
Mozz:: No, I still considered myself an actor who wrote. But then, on my first screenplay, I ranked in the top 30 of the Nicholl Fellowship, which is given by the same people who give out the Oscars.
Mozz: Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and sciences. Talk about positive reinforcement.
Mozz: those crazy, crazy people. 2004 was my mad year. I met so many agents and producers, I was young, and I was definitely not ready. They kept asking me what other screenplays I had, for like 2 weeks my career was hotter than a priest at a boys scout convention. But they kept asking to see more movies, and I only had all these plays.
Mozz: did not go well.
Mozz: it went like a person with a cleft palette ordering Worcestershire sauce.
Mozz: what's the difference between writing a drama and a comedy for you?
Mozz: a couple of vodka martinis.
Mozz: Seriously?
Mozz: it's all about mood. It's all about where you are in your life. I write in the moment. Although I tend to think about my characters and outline some of it. I have all these stories inside me, I already know I do, and I just wait for the right moment... sometimes it's a fun moment, sometimes it's thoughtful, and so I just feel my way into it. Moment to moment. I don’t know, I’m very Meisner about life, and try to stay in the moment. And I think some of that reflects in my writing. I also tend to juggle projects. I always juggle three at a time. Play, Film, TV... simply because I learned my lesson from 2004, be ready for anything life throws at you.
Mozz: any advice to anyone who wants to write.
Mozz: Not at all. I just don't think I have enough life experience to give advice on any of it. But I do tend to tell people, live the fullest life you possibly can. Have fun, take care of your body, it will take care of you, enjoy each breath cause life is fickle and it's over before you know it. Have lots and lots of sex, cause someday you'll look back and say, I wish I had had more sex. And remember no failure is a failure if you do your best.
______________________________________
INTERVIEW WITH KATE
INTERVIEWER: How old are you?
KATE: In my infancy
INTERVIEWER: Sorry?
KATE: I’m still learning.
INTERVIEWER: About what?
KATE: Everything.
INTERVIEWER: About writing plays?
KATE: About the Universe, French, how to start the lawnmower, Quantum Physics, how to make sloe gin, Electromagnetic forces, how to find a car park in Brighton, politics, religion, how to cope in a household with a husband, grandma, teenage children and a three-legged cat.
INTERVIEWER: I see.
KATE What’s the capital of Bolivia?
INTERVIEWER So you have a busy life, then?
KATE Would you like coffee?
INTERVIEWER Yes please. How do you find time to write?
KATE: Time?
INTERVIEWER It must be difficult.
KATE I snatch time, steal it, hide it away. Sugar?
INTERVIEWER Yes please.
KATE How many?
INTERVIEWER One.
KATE Milk?
INTERVIEWER Black. Thanks. Who’s your favourite playwright?
Long pause
KATE Who’s yours?
INTERVIEWER Who’s influenced you the most?
KATE As soon as I think of one, I think of another, and a third.
INTERVIEWER Who do you admire?
KATE I can’t do favourites.
INTERVIEWER Do you like Shakespeare?
KATE Or ‘the most’ or ‘in descending order’. Ask me if I have a favourite film.
INTERVIEWER What’s your favourite film?
KATE Ask me if I have a favourite novel.
INTERVIEWER I see.
KATE Song, colour, breed of dog. Who’s my favourite actor? Am I indecisive?
INTERVIEWER I don’t know.
KATE Am I eclectic, unsure, insane?
INTERVIEWER Are you working on something at the moment?
KATE Yes.
INTERVIEWER Is it a play?
KATE It’s an idea.
INTERVIEWER For a play?
KATE Yes.
INTERVIEWER Great! Can you tell me briefly what it’s about?
KATE I don’t know yet. (Pause,) Sorry.
INTERVIEWER How old is Grandma?
KATE Eighty-three.
INTERVIEWER Is she well?
KATE She’s frail at the moment. After her colonoscopy.
INTERVIEWER Ah.
KATE But she’s a tough old bird.
INTERVIEWER Would you say you are?
KATE Tough?
INTERVIEWER Yes.
KATE No. Are you?
INTERVIEWER Sometimes I have to be. .. my job…
KATE You haven’t written much down.
INTERVIEWER No.
END
______________________________________
INTERVIEW WITH SHANAHAN
INTERVIEWER: We’re here with John Shanahan, the playwright behind such works as “One Before Forty” and “Worst Possible Time for Writer’s Block.” John, how did you first get into writing plays?
JOHN: Why aren’t there any snacks?
INTERVIEWER: Sorry?
JOHN: I was told there was going to be snacks. I don’t see any.
INTERVIEWER: I don’t remember—
JOHN: Because I asked for goat cheese. And grapes.
INTERVIEWER: Must have been a misunderstanding. Now, about your plays.
JOHN: They’re really good together.
INTERVIEWER: Your plays?
JOHN: No, the goat cheese and the grapes. And maybe little triangles of pita bread. Toasted.
INTERVIEWER: Well, as you can see, they’re not here. So let’s talk about—
JOHN: Cheddar?
INTERVIEWER: I don’t know—
JOHN: Do you have a refrigerator or anything here? Maybe they put the snacks in there. Because I did ask.
INTERVIEWER: I can have someone look. Can someone go see if there are snacks for Mr. Shanahan?
JOHN: And some water would be nice. Can I get that? Some water? Cold water?
INTERVIEWER: Why did you begin writing plays, John?
JOHN: Because it’s kind of hot under these lights.
INTERVIEWERS: Plays?
JOHN: Water. I'm hot. Is it always this hot up here? You must be dying in that suit.
INTERVIEWER: No, not really.
JOHN: I would be.
INTERVIEWER: Can we please discuss your plays?
JOHN: I need to eat first. I’m sort of light-headed. I should have eaten before I left, but I was running late. Didn’t want to keep you waiting.
INTERVIEWER: And yet here you are.
JOHN: I am!
INTERVIEWER: And you’re keeping us waiting.
JOHN: But I’m right here.
INTERVIEWER: And we’ve not gotten a single word out of you about your plays! It’s all grapes and goat cheese and water.
JOHN: Yeah, that would be great, thanks. Because, you know, they told me there’d be snacks. Little hungry right about now.
INTERVIEWER: Yes. So you’ve said.
(mumbled voice from off stage)
JOHN: Oh, there’s not?
(mumbles)
JOHN: No, no don’t go out. That’s okay. The water, though? Can I get that?
INTERVIEWER: WHAT ABOUT THE GODDAMNED PLAYS, YOU POINTLESS, HOWLING DIPSHIT?
(awkward silence follows)
JOHN: It’s uh...it’s getting late. I should probably go. I, uh...I need to get something to eat.
INTERVIEWER: Yes. Well. Yes. Thank you. Thank you for stopping by.
JOHN: You should have snacks next time.
INTERVIEWER: Just go.
_______________________________
INTERVIEW WITH LEON
interviewer: so leon, why do you write plays?
leon: my dad gave me a pen.
I: a pen?
leon: well, a quill pen, and a jar of ink. it had a feather on it.
I: and that's it?
leon: and that christmas, my uncle gave me a thick black leather bound journal. it was just blank pages, not white, but beige, and the pages were thick. when you wrote in it with the pen, the ink would bleed a little. you just had to write in a book like that.
I: so you started writing plays?
leon: no. i wrote sam and diane.
I: sam and diane? the characters on cheers?
leon: well, their names. sam with a capital "s", and a big squiggle. and the biggest "d" you can write on a page, like the "I love lucy" writing. and then i imagined they were cats. and then they were cats in outer space. and then i drew pictures of the cats, and gave them these big whiskers... quill pen whiskers that bled a little.
I: did you write a play about them?
leon: actually, no. actually, i made the whole story up.
I: what?
leon: yeah, and i put cats in it, cause i know a lot of people on this site like cats. i remember someone wrote a play about cats, and everyone loved it.
I: so you're a fraud?
leon: i just like making things up.
I: so people will think you're clever?
leon: i don't psychoanalyze myself.
I: the squiggles? the quill pen? all made up?
leon: i thought people would like that sort of thing. it's visceral.
I: do you see yourself as pathetic?
leon: do you want me to see myself that way?
I: why does that matter?
leon: it matters if i win this contest.
I: does the contest mean that much to you?
leon: well... not really. if edd sends me the books, do i have to read them?
I: it's a free country.
leon: but i won't tell him. cause then he'll be cross.
I: so you write plays so people will think you're clever. and you're really not. and you don't like to read. and you don't like to make people upset?
leon: (pause) hmmm.
I: what? have i hit the nail on the head?
leon: no. i'm wondering that since you're a fictional character, if it's a crime to kill you.
________________________________________
INTERVIEW WITH SUE B.
INTERVIEWER (IN): Hello, Sue. Welcome to the forum.
SUE B (SB): Thank you for having me.
IN: So, today's topic is what inspired you to write.
SB: That's a great question!
IN: We thought so. Please, begin.
SB: Okay, well, I first started writing when I was seven or eight years old, as soon as I could. I was a voracious reader--
IN: Meaning...
SB: That I read every book in the children's section of the Haverhill, MA public library. The Librarian and I were good friends. After I finished, I moved onto the teen section. I even took books to birthday parties, sitting in the corner and reading, while the others were playing pin the tail on the donkey and throwing cake at each other.
IN: So what you're saying is that you were a nerd.
SB: I prefer the term "book worm." Anyway, I started keeping a journal when I was seven or eight. I still have one of my earliest ones: pink, with a little lock on it. I used to write things like, 'I had a good day. School was fun, and then we went to Friendlys for dinner.'
IN: Sounds captivating.
SB: Well, it was a start. In fourth grade, I wrote a play for my Sunday school class, based on T'bishvat (sp?), about the spring and the birth of trees. It was a huge success. Well, the parents liked it, anyway. I don't have a copy of it anymore, unfortunately, but it was fun to write. I felt such a thrill seeing it performed.
IN: So you need at an early age that you wanted to be a playwright.
SB: No, but I knew that I wanted to be a *writer.* When I was 10, we wrote short stories in class. Mine were usually not that short--sometimes as long as 30 pages, though handwritten, and I wrote in LARGE LETTERS--and I finished each one off by having the characters each die, since I couldn't figure out how to finish the story, and I got tired of it.
IN: Do you still engage in that practice?
SB: No, but I still have difficulty finding endings, like a lot of writers.
IN: Did you continue writing into your teens?
SB: Yes. I wrote to a newspaper column called Confidential Chat in the Boston Globe, where I posted as "10 Going on 40" and then "11 Going on 40," and discussing the travails of growing up. There was not a term called 'tween' then, but that's what I would have been called. I continued keeping a journal into my early 20s, but I began to find that all I did was complain, so eventually I gave it up. Today, I have a blog, but I try to keep it as upbeat as possible, though that's not always so easy.
IN: Did you write plays in your teens and 20s?
SB: No, for some reason, I just wrote short stories and poetry. I found poetry very cathartic, though most of my poems were pretty bad, I have to admit. The best ones were comic, and I wrote a lot of them when I was in a terrible job at a publishing job in Boston, and had to keep myself amused. I had terrible writer's block in college, though I was an English major, so I wrote as little as possible. I finally rid myself of it just before I went to grad school, b/c I knew I had to be able to write. I took a class called "Freeing the Writer Within," which allowed me to be human, to make mistakes, to work through difficulties without self-judgement. You can't edit until you have something on the page to edit, and when I got a word processor, now an antiquated piece of technology, I always had something to work with, something tangible on the page. I thought I would go to law school--well, my parents wanted me to--but I had written quite a few poems and very short stories at that point, along with some essays, and that's what I showed to the admissions director at Emerson College. I was accepted into their MFA in Creative Writing program in 1991.
IN: But still no playwrighting.
SB: That's right, and to this day I still find that odd. I acted in elementary and junior high school, until I became too self-conscious to do so, thanks to Lanford Wilson's "The Rimers of Eldridge" at Phillips Exeter Academy's summer school and my role as an old biddy (never cast me as an old biddy; I already have a great fear of mortality).
IN: You really need to get over this.
SB (sighing): I know.
IN: Moving on--
SB: Well, I started acting again in my 20s, just for fun. I wasn't particularly good, though I tried very hard, but it reawakened my love of theatre. I was still acting while I was in grad school, and yet the idea of playwrighting still hadn't occurred to me, and I don't know why. I was a short fiction major, but my stories had a great deal of dialogue--I developed an ear for it--and little narrative, and yet I hadn't made the connection. From there, I entered the world of improvisational theatre, but again, found it difficult and wasn't successful, if you determine success by improvement and fun. I had neither. I pushed myself in a genre that wasn't natural to me. I'm not a visual/spatial thinker, I need time to ponder and to edit, and I have trouble staying in the moment, and all of those skills are necessary for strong improv. However, I had begun writing sketches during this time, and that was the beginning of my playwrighting career, if you will. They were often heavy, and not so much sketches as play excerpts (I tried but was rarely funny, a problem if you're involved with most sketch writing), but they felt natural, and that's what I wrote. From there, I moved onto monologues, and that's where I really began to find my niche.
IN: What was the first monologue you wrote?
SB: If I remember correctly, it was about a woman who was trying to find a date, and was willing to convert to Catholicism if that would help. It was actually pretty funny, and the woman playing it did a great job. I felt so alive when I saw it performed; I understood the connection between my feelings and my ability to convey them onto paper and then have them performed, thus forming a connection with the audience. I continued writing monologues, first for a graduate show at Improv Asylum, and then in another acting class at Mass College of Art, where I conceived a one-woman show called "workin' progress.' The show didn't morph well, but I knew that I could write about topics that effected others, and from there it was a fairly natural progression onto playwrighting. I took a class from Kirsten Greenridge on playwrighting, and in the class I developed my first play, a 10-minute piece called "Peanut Butter Sandwiches" that is my most popular work to date, having been accepted by four festivals thus far.
IN: What makes this play successful, if you will?
SB: Well, I think it speaks to a popular issue--the troublesome relationship between mothers and their teenage daughters. Though it is not based on me and my mother, there is certainly a theme of alienation and disconnection that I remember and that others do as well. It is a serious play, which is not that common with 10-minute pieces, but it is truthful, without being overly heavy (there are moments of levity), and I think the audience recognizes the humanity. I'm not trying to overstate this--it's not Mamet or Pinter, by any means--but I'm not trying to be preachy, and yet I do want to have the audience feel for the characters and relate to them. That's what makes a piece work, I think--its truthfulness.
IN: Are you continuing to write?
SB: Yes, and continuing to submit. I currently have several 10-minute pieces, along with a three-minute play, five one-minute plays, a few monologues, and a one-act. Edd Crosby Wells is pushing me (in a good way) to begin a full-length or longer one act piece this fall, and when I have 10 days off in October, I plan to begin doing so.
IN: What is the biggest challenge you encounter as a writer?
SB: Being willing to accept rejection. I want to be accepted into every festival I submit to. I feel personally slighted when my work is not accepted, instead of accepting that the factors are out of my control, and that it is not a reflection of me or my work when I am not accepted. I realize that I write because I want to and need to, and not because I want to brag to the world that I am a playwright (though I have no qualms about sharing my happiness when I am accepted into a festival) or because I want to write flashy or superficial pieces that I hope will be popular with festival producers/readers. I need to write from the heart, and when I have, I know it. I think I have something to say, and I want to share my experiences with others. I've always felt this way--even in high school, my yearbook statement says that I would be a writer when I 'grew up' (and a lawyer, though that wasn't a profession I chose to pursue)--and I am following my dream and my passion. I won't make a living as a writer, but I will allow my creativity to express itself.
IN: Well, we here at the Playwrights Forum wish you the greatest success in your quest to write the best plays you can and to enjoy the process.
SB: Thank you. That's my goal.
_____________________________________
INTERVIEW WITH SWANN
Interviewer: L.A. or New York?
Swann: New York.
Interviewer: Red or Pink?
Swann: Cerise, baby.
Interviewer: Playwright or screenwriter?
Swann: I’m beginning to think that it’s easier to sell a good screenplay than a good play.
Interviewer: What’s the difference for you as a writer?
Swann: Dialogue is the last resort in a movie. You have to come up with images in your head to tell the story. Plays are half words. Words are easier for me to manage.
Interviewer: Screenwriter or theatre critic?
Swann: Damn. Critic. It’s just so much easier to criticize than to do it yourself.
Interviewer: You recently outted yourself as bipolar.
Swann: The million dollar question.
Interviewer: You don’t even know what the question is.
Swann: Go ahead.
Interviewer: Did you do it to help get your play produced? Sort of a human interest story on the side?
Swann: That’s good. Straight for the jugular. I respect that.
Interviewer: Well, thanks.
Swann: See, I don’t think it helped me get the play produced. If anything I think it hurt my career.
Interviewer: Then why did you do it?
Swann: You know, my brother is gay. It’s part of who he is. No one wonders why he had to come out.
Interviewer: Are you saying that you think being gay is on par with a mental disorder?
Swann: I’m saying that it is part of who I am. The same way that being gay is a how my brother is.
Interviewer: But it’s a disorder.
Swann: Well, when you think about it, we’re all disordered from time to time. I don’t think bipolar is an illness.
Interviewer: You don’t.
Swann: No.
Interviewer: Are you sure?
Swann: Yeah, baby. You know, whenever I get really manic I want to be the Martin Luther King of crazy people and get them all to rise up against the oppression and discrimination of the sane.
Interviewer: Wow.
Swann: Crazy people are very hard to organize. They don’t see themselves as repeat players.
Interviewer: Are you manic now?
Swann: Unfortunately, no. The thing is, bipolar is completely treatable. And you know, the way that it’s treatable is just by paying attention to your life. Paying close attention. To what you eat, how you move, when you sleep, what you feel, what other people feel.
Interviewer: But you are somewhat incapacitated by depression and mania? Right? Our intern unearthed the stat that one in five people with bipolar, ahem, disorder actually kill themselves.
Swann: Aren’t you ballsy bringing up the big S? You are good.
Interviewer: Well, you have in the past compared yourself to Sarah Kane.
Swann: Yes. Even though I’m on the same medication she was, my plays are still shit compared to hers.
Interviewer: Your plays are very unlike hers.
Swann: I know. She had a much keener sense of the way theatre can be used to convey unbearable emotions in a bearable way. I don’t know how to do that yet and I want so much to be able to.
Interviewer: Bipolar or sane?
Swann: I think sane might be overrated.
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