Word Love

I love words.  I stew over the best words to use in a post, an email, a text… I weigh the rhythm, the gravity, and the depth of words against my intentions and emotional/intellectual need in that particular moment of expression.   Sometimes I make up words when it suits the occasion/situation/or beat, basing my privilege to do so on the fact that I have a very expensive piece of paper in my drawer stamped with MFA PLAYWRITING on it.

Because for me, the written word is an awesome opportunity to recreate genuine human expression in an (hopefully) accessible format.

But sometimes I forget that not everyone shares my affinity for the perfectly selected pronoun or ideally placed hyphen.  I forget that not everyone is as equipped with the gift of verbal manipulation and application as I-who-have-devoted-myself-to-such-things.

I’m right now in a very complicated communique with someone who simply cannot match my verbal-obsessiveness and I find myself having to control my hunger for better words… I want poetry and depth and craft  - what is being given to me instead is genuine simplicity.  My love of/need for “better” words is leaving me frustrated and unable to just accept the letters and dots coming my way as expressive enough.

And I’m wondering if other writers experience this… this need for high articulation in their real-world communications.  Do you ever find yourself searching for excessive verbal depth in debates/conversations?  Do you find yourself mentally trying to script the other person’s dialogue?  Do you get at all hung up on the seeming insufficiency of someone else’s vocabulary in high-stakes moments?

It’s kind of related (probably) to my anxiety about communication (perhaps this anxiety is another reason I’m so drawn to playwriting and the ability to craft dramatic communication on stage).  I’m terrified of the conflict that can arise from miscommunication, and so I’m always striving to be as clear as I can, to offer as much of myself through my words as I can.  But I forget that there are all sorts of ways people communicate – they say things with their actions, with their touch, with their eyes…

I need to learn to trust those things as much as I trust my words.  It’s an interesting thing to think about… especially when I consider how much I incorporate those things in my plays – I mean, I never rely solely on a character’s dialogue to convey a moment… why would I then deny the power of action/physicality in real-world communication?

In any case, I guess you can tell I’ve been thinking a lot this week about my playwright self vs. my human-being self… sometimes I just feel like I spend so much time at my computer, tap-tap-tapping away, that I forget to negotiate a healthy balance with the outside world.

… and I think I feel maybe a real-world vacation might be just what I need to help.  Thank goodness Spring Break is just around the bend!

Fighting the Story Need

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how we (as artists, as audience, and as humans) can sometimes self-program to hunt for dramatic elements - all those important “Gotta Hit This” Rising Action/Climax/New World Order/etc. points - in life.

And how screwed up that is.

Because life is not story.  Even when we think in chapters, even when we impose our own impractical markers – I should accomplish X by graduation, I should be married/have a house/own my car by now, I should travel the world before I’m 60, I should start the New Year (every New Year) weighing less and able to buy more – we are not in control of the overlying structure of our life experience in the same way that a book or film shapes its characters.

Yet, we still try to mark time in story beats… in progressions… in dramatic arcs.

And when those “life markers” don’t happen at the right time, or if they don’t happen in the right sequence, we seize the drama of it!  We grab tight to the conflict, and we try to anticipate where the climax will come and what results it will yield – If I take this path, fight that demon, drink this potion, and climb that wall… I might find that solution and get the girl/boy/new house/great job/pot of gold/etc. and my life will get easier… it will be rosy sunshine happiness and only minor hiccups from here on out!

But the truth is, life doesn’t follow the dramatic arc… it’s life.  It just keeps going until it stops and your job isn’t to try and anticipate the hurdles and pay offs and story-ness of it all, it’s to just live.

Which is why we find ourselves picking up books and siting in the audience along the way – We want to watch someone have a contained experience that we can understand!  We want to feel, for the moment at least, that we understand the human experience a little bit better.  We want to walk away from the story feeling a little more in control of our own world view and the things that color it.

And I think that’s what I love about writing – I love diving in, getting messy, and then closing up shop with some renewed feeling of accomplishment, even if in my own life I often find myself desperately looking up to the big Author in the sky and shaking my fist at her/him for not following the arc I wanted to follow…

Because there is no happily ever after – we keep going – we get married and lose our house, or we get the dream job only to find that it’s awful… We are constantly fighting a thousand little battles that either go our way or don’t, but no matter the result, we keep moving forward into new, challenging situations that merge and swirl and carry us on, ever on, in this world without structure.

As artists, we spend so much time crafting and plotting and embracing made up worlds… sometimes we need to remind ourselves to love this one just as much, despite it’s uncertainty –  to stop looking for meaning or the next dramatic “trick” around every corner, and just live.

Progress Shoes

So I hopped on the blog yesterday to talk about my producerly empowerment, and what do I wind up doing?  Complaining about the fight to find space in LA.  Tsk, tsk, tsk!

But the tallying/writing about it brought the truth to the surface of my frustrated mind… I’m still waiting.  On theatres. For space.  I hate waiting.  It makes me feel stuck.

And I hate being stuck.

Which is when it hit me:  Who said readings have to happen inside theatres?

And that little epiphany put me right back on track and in control… because if we stop limiting ourselves to the confines of the current patriarchal/inbred theatrical hierarchy (and I mean that in the most respectful way possible), aren’t we in the drivers seat?

(And totally/terrifyingly responsible for the outcome… but that’s a different problem )

It seems then, that the frustrated female playwright need only some peers, some ingenuity, and some proverbial balls to get things up and running for herself… then she needs some running shoes and some long jump practice so she can bound around and over the flaming hurdles in her way.

I don’t know if I’m in marathon shape yet, but I’ve certainly got the shoes.

Which is one of the things I actually enjoy about producing – the creative problem solving it requires.  And maybe that’s what I like about playwriting too – stirring things up that require Big Answers… not knowing at the onset how I will tell the tale, only that I must tell it.

So, I don’t quite have all the answers for how I’m going to get my Female Playwrights ONSTAGE project the national wings I know it will someday flourish with, but I’m confident that if I keep fighting for it and running with it, I’ll find the festival evolving and developing those wings as we go…

Which is all to say, I figured out where the festival will be read in LA… and it feels perfect and exciting and surprisingly multi-dimensional for where its at in its development.

And that, my dears, is what I call progress.

The Battleground

I have a secret – I’ve become a producer over here in Arizona – I’ve actually produced more shows/events this past year than I’ve written and I don’t know if I’ll be able to stop… because it’s hard out here for a Playwright.

It’s damn hard.

So I created Little Black Dress INK, an organization dedicated to promoting/creating production opportunities for female playwrights.  I invited some talented ladies to put pen to paper (or fingertips to keys) and draft up some plays for a festival last summer and it was a great success!   We didn’t know it would be a great success, we just went for it and crossed our fingers – because it’s better to do that than waste time hemming and hawing over a thing for so long that you forget what it is you’re even considering.

Which is why, when I decided to do it again, I decided to go reach even further… to get the fest to travel.  One hell of a lofty undertaking, to be sure… but so worth the work… isn’t it?

I ask, because I’m finding that while I may be tired of sitting around waiting for someone to produce my work, not everyone else has my same verve for  making-it-happen-ness.

(which may actually be more of a testament to their common sense than my tenacity)

In any regard – I am trying to get the plays some sort of reading in LA… it’s just a reading… no big expense, no set, no props… just a reading… And it’s been a hell of a lot more work than getting the thing fully produced here in AZ.

Which draws images to mind of the Los Angeles battleground I abandoned two years ago – so many theatres, so many artists, so many denizens of the “Industry” running their scrawny-underpaid butts off to get produced, be on stage, be seen, and knock some socks off…

I don’t miss the rat race of LA, but I am definitely feeling out of her frenetic loop.

But what else can I do than keep on keeping on?  I’m a playwright who’s fallen into producing as a means of feeling less impotent against the theatrical unknowables… no one ever said any of it would be easy, did they?  Nope.  Not even for a second.

Jenische (Gypsies)…

They were camped less than a mile outside Cooke Barracks in the empty field on the way to town for months.  The young children would wave at me as I passed by.  I would walk because, 1. I was in tip top physical shape and, 2. I did not have a license to drive in Germany.  Everyone on Base noticed them – the gypsies – camped like something out of a movie. Dark haired, dark complexioned – a beautiful and intriguing people… One weekend, the children waved as usual but the teen-aged girls called me over to have me show them how to put on makeup.  I showed them how to apply eyeliner, mascara, blush, lipstick… losing my stash of course to their giddy “May I haves.”  I asked them if they were gypsies, “No, we are German” they answered.  Adamantly, Wir sind Deutsch.  We are German.”  The next time I walked to town, they were gone…

I think about them sometimes – German, not Armenian, not gypsies – and the freedom I felt standing there in their camp.  I think about their claim to a land, a heritage not expected by outsiders or even by insiders with standardized tests.  They did not look the part but the field settled softly beneath their trailers disguised as carts disguised as trailers.  And the trees hung over them shielding their skin from the penetrating sun as if ordained as covering since the beginning of time.  And when they were gone, the trees sagged and could be heard moaning for the children.

Gypsies; part of the world but not confined by the world, always ready and willing to move anywhere to find home – never losing the authenticity of self.  Owning their space and place in time, they drew you into their story…made you look…made you want to know…

Sometimes, I feel like a gypsy (submitting work authentic to me and clearly not on the same-dar as what is being selected).  Sometimes I consider “what if I changed”…but never do because it’s the me way down on the inside that’s got so much to say and there is somebody somewhere who needs exactly what I write, how I write it, because the feeling of freedom when I write is worth the waiting period needed for that gypsy spark to ignite.  It must be the softness of the ground beneath my feet begging for seed during the planting season promising fruit during the harvest that keeps me pushing on head first into the wind and rain…into the fray…because I belong…because I am a storyteller…

When contemplating words and worlds, sometimes I go to the movies to see what other stories are being told.  It inspires/fuels/rouses me to create another day…  On my last such outing, I went to see THE GREY by Joe Carnahan and Ian Mackenzie Jeffers (based on the short story by Jeffers titled GHOST WALKER).  It is a wonderful movie, wonderfully told.  There is a poem in it that made me think of my life as a writer… in this time just before…

Once more into the fray

Into the last fight I’ll ever know

Live and die on this day

Live and die on this day.

— from THE GREY

And all the artists said, “Amen.”

A New Play From The Other Side

Out of nowhere I got a directing job.

The last couple of years I focused on my outreach and writing, with a few small self-produced  projects along the way. I purposely wanted a break from the rehearsal room and it was a good one. The last year I’ve written more than the five beforehand, and in that time fell in love with the whole idea of the new play.

Howlround and the formerly-Arena Stage-now-Emerson-College newplay initiative did a lot for me. So did the myriad of new work I saw during the Hollywood Fringe Festival. Part of my own odyssey involves ongoing class with the LA Writers Center, an inspirational incubator for new works. Not to mention being part of creating genre-defining projects last year while at The Indy Convergence. And of course, finding a community among this group, the Los Angeles Female Playwright’s Initiative.

So out of the blue is this opportunity, and it happens to be a play I really dig. I thought long and hard about what it would take for me to want to direct again, and I’d say 90% of my personal requirements are met.

In between meeting the wonderful playwright and making my decision, I saw friend Brian Polak’s reading as part of EST-LA’s Winterfest. I walked into the large black box with hidden rooms that create magic. I walked across stage and took my seat, turning off my phone. As I got comfortable, saying hellos and catching up with colleagues, I breathed it all into myself. I missed the potential inherent with only a space, actors, music stands, words and people to listen to them.

So here I am, flexing my directing muscles again, bringing a new play to life.

This afternoon I hear a new draft out loud for the first time. It’s more exciting a prospect than I thought, even after I’d made the decision.

Raise a glass to new works, folks. Keep the juices flowing.

The Play I Hate

It started with the title. It was a great title. It was one of those titles that I thought, yes that’s what it’s all about. It was provocative yet mysterious. It was sexy yet full of ideas. It would even look good on a poster.

I started writing the characters. They were all right. They took their time revealing themselves, but I’m not a pushy writer. I gave them their space. There were five of them. They were all humans. They were characters that actors would love to play.

I liked the stage I saw. There was versatility to it, yet it was just realistic enough for an audience to say, ahah, I know that place. It was a good space.

I wrote a draft beginning to end. It was exploratory. I just wanted to see the characters run. It was two acts.

I put it aside for a year. Or maybe three years. Time is not specific in Los Angeles.

Recently, I picked it up again.

And

I hated it.

I hated everything about it. The set was claustrophobic. The characters were awful. The ideas in it were stupid and muddled. Even the title annoyed me.

I didn’t hate myself for writing the play. I just hated the play. What was I thinking?

I have written other plays that I’ve put aside for years. When I picked them up again, I could see my thinking and build on it. But this play was a junkyard of yuckiness. I even started to relish in my hatred of the play, and I knew not to give into hate.

So I put the play back in its virtual little yellow folder.

Then, last week, I started thinking about the play I hate. The title wasn’t so bad. I started making notes to change it. Oh no.

Then I realized that if I push all the things I hate about it further, I might start to like it.

Or not.

Meanwhile, I continue to work on a completely different play that I like.

For now.

And on that bombshell, I end my blogging week here. As always, it was a delight. Jen

On Jealousy

Recently, I was talking with a writer friend whom I’ve known a lot of years. We go all the way back to writing craft class.

My writer friend works in a writing related field and makes good money. He also writes scripts occasionally.

We see each other from time to time and usually have a nice writing related discussion. Recently, over coffee, we were talking about the stuff we were working on. I was going through my list of writing to be done (it never will end, ever).

I’m Jealous. You’re so prolific. My writer friend said to me.

I didn’t know how to respond to that. I didn’t want to say, oh you can be prolific too, you just have to write more because that would be just not true.

I was also shocked that someone would be jealous of me. Me???? I have terrible vertigo, and that’s just the beginning.

My writer friend has a lot going for him. His job is good. He lives well. He should not be jealous of me. I do not have the power job. Compared to him, I. . . .

Ahhh-hah. I see.

Maybe we should strive to not compare ourselves to others. In the long run, it all evens out, and if it doesn’t, so what.

 I have seen friends from school go on to be super successful in writing, and weirdly I don’t feel jealous of them. Besides, we were all goofballs in school, and I still think of them as goofballs.

 Besides, I don’t have time to be jealous. I’ve got writing to do.

The Kobayashi Maru Scenario

 Or my Kirkian response to the Who Gives A Sh*t Question

I do read this blog when it’s not my week. Recently, Tiffany Antone raised the all important Who Gives A Sh*t Question. I could also call it, do people really want to see another play about characters sitting in chairs and talking about their issues?

Or I can ask, should I write stuff other people want to see? Should I play to the mob? Or should I challenge audience expectation and possibly never get produced? How do I keep the audience interested? How do I keep myself interested? I’m not interested. I suck. I can’t go on, I shall go on.

The no win cycle of writing new stuff-will the audience dig it-but needing to write it- but no one will get it (I’m paraphrasing) kept repeating in my head.

This led to the inevitable playwriting funk which sent me crawling back to prose-writing while watching movie star interviews on youtube.  

Then I was rescued by basic cable. One night, as I surfing channels, I came upon Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Kahn. Ahah! The Kobayashi Maru Scenario.

In Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Kahn, a Starfleet cadet has to take a simulation test. She is the captain of a starship and receives a distress call from a civilian freighter (called The Kobayashi Maru) in the neutral zone. If the captain goes into the neutral zone, it would mean war with the Klingons. The purpose of simulation is to test the cadet in a no win scenario.

Captain Kirk’s solution to the no win scenario was to reprogram the simulation, so there was a solution. He cheated. But he won.

Maybe the solution to the Who Gives A Sh*t question is not in the answer but in the question itself. Change the question or make the question irrelevant. At the same time, there’s an audience out there in the dark. Show them something.

At the end of Wrath of Kahn, Kirk faced a no win scenario, but Spock saved the day and sacrificed himself (although he came back in Star Trek 3). So another question about the no win scenario, is what will you give up to win? Sometimes, the cost is too high.

Then again, that’s just a movie. And all we’re doing is writing plays. Or are we?

Maybe it’s time to become more Kirkian in the playwriting. Live long and prosper.

The Paper Toss

I love paper.

That’s a good love because I write on a lot of it. Even in this age where I can work on my cell phone, I prefer the pen (black or blue) and paper. I love the immediacy of putting pen to paper. I look at a blank sheet of paper (preferably with lines but I can work on blank stuff too), and I see possibility.

Through the years, I’ve written in notebooks and journals, on legal pads and post-it notes, around envelopes and folders. I don’t write on skin or fabric.

I now also write while typing into a keyboard. However, most of the time, I’m typing in something written down.

I also love doing rewrites on paper. I love crossing out and drawing arrows and making inserts and spreading several sheets on the table as I change around a section.

I have accumulated a lot of paper through the years. Even though my papers are organized in boxes, I felt like I was drowning in it, so this past holiday season, I did a huge paper toss.

Over the course of two nights, I hauled out the boxes and dove into two decades (I’m old) of paper. I swam through pages. Sometimes it was a script, sometimes a story, sometimes a love letter.

Sometimes, the pages were stiff from age and moisture. Sometimes, they were fragile from too much writing on them. Page by page, I kept or tossed, and my toss pile got larger and my recycling bin got fuller. 

It was time to let go. Let go, let go, let go.

It was time for the paper to go, get recycled, and become something else.

I kept the love letters though.