Putting the First Draft to Bed

I finished the first draft of Little Monsters tonight. That's a good feeling. I know it isn't done as a play, but the first draft is such a monumental step in the process. I have a hard time leaving it right now, but I know I should leave it until Monday when I hear it aloud. Very exciting, and scary too... I am looking forward to it. For now, however, the voices are quieter.

Jacobean Tragedy

Okay, I have since found out that I got the mords wixed. I meant John Webster--who was alive from the late 1500s to the early 1600s and may have been a contemporary of Shakespeare. During the reign of King James he wrote a few amazing pieces before disappearing into obscurity. I didn't know this BUT  "The Duchess of Malfi." is all about incest, murder, exhumation and total weirdness. 
            Wanted to correct that. Cheers. Jain

Thanks for the memories.

I want to thank everyone for their input last night. It was---Wow! Amazing, wonderful and useful. It will take me time to sort through all the remembered and written conversation that we got into! The evening was on fire. I found the other two pieces very inspiring, complete or not, and everyone seemed to be having a great time.
         I certainly was and (either that or the Spring Equinox)--I stayed awake and wrote until three this morning. Not something I do often. 
         Anyway, hartfelt thanks to all of you. Your responses, feedback and ideas (not just verbal but what I could see and sense) on so many other levels were a great help to moving this piece forward! Do you know the Revenge Tragedies of James I? Lots of blood and total weirdness but I believe takes place offstage or in the past (I am drawn to James Webster). Webster is not literal about his buckets of blood   ( I don't think)--but they are definitely there. Of course, now I will have to go back to them to really see if that is correct or not. Even if it isn't I still would rather not be throwing the buckets around. A time-honoured (?) combination of Sex & Death. Now, for the comic relief.
           I spent some time last night watching some Samuel Beckett and Harold Pinter--searching for a guide to pauses and so on. Mamet's quote: that Rhythm is meaning; is a truth.  And part of the pauses, silences, beats, etcetera. A bit too pat to my way of thinking but true nonetheless. Rhythm plays a part in all of our existence--conscious or not. We move to it even when we don't think about it. Bringing that to the conscious mind is part of making a play and the characters therein. It is essential to building beginning, middle and end and differs with every character; every piece written; and, every playwright. Like the creative process itself--the rhythms in us are as individual as the way we get to the end product--whatever it is. Finding those rhythms and acknowledging them is part of what helps the playwright to speak to an audience. Whether it is Shakespeare, Arthur Miller, or, Mr Mamet. 
            Mamet has never been one of my favourite playwrights. I say this without prejudice (i.e. personal baggage interference). I do agree with him, however. 
             The second question of where the characters' voices come from was beautifully covered by Kristen. Part of my way to absorb and remember new information is to read things aloud a lot. Especially with characters in a piece. That also disengages them from me and then they can be separate and talk to me about what they are and what they need, want, get. It may take awhile and hearing from other folks helps to make their voices clearer to me. No Kristen you are not mad--or, if you are then I am too! You are not alone in this. One of the things about madness is that I believe I am the only one to feel like this. Not so.


Thanks again, everyone. 
Jain

Words, Words, Words...

It's probably because I started as an actor, but I hear the words and often I speak the words as I type them. Yesterday I had to do that, because I was writing a character unlike myself, so I after I wrote what I heard in my head, I had to read the words aloud to see if it tracked. This really ties into character for me, because I do hear voices in my head (no, I am not crazy) and what I hear is the voices of my characters. When the character is not as clear in my head, the words are more practical and less organic, but often I will hear a specific voice with a specific way of speaking.

I love when it becomes a scene with urgency, either a fight or excitement, because I find that affects the dialogue - short, fast, choppy, louder, this word, that one. I like playing with how much one character says compared to another - what does that say about how each of them feels about the situation (it's not about counting lines, that's for sure...). I like it when I can hear the "ums" and the "ers" and I put those in. They feel important.

The proof comes in the reading. I am looking forward to next week, because I will hear someone else say the words and I will see how closely it matches up to the voices in my head. I am nervous, too, because I know this play is nowhere near done... a skeleton, really. But I am looking forward to putting the flesh on it's bones.

* submitted by Kristen Finlay

Week #3/4-

I apologize for getting behind on my 'weekly' questions...

Let's catch up here as I post a double-whammy- a question and a statement for you to comment on.

The conversation has been great so far, keep the comments coming!!

OK, many of you went to see the play RACE by David Mamet last week. Here is a quote from him:

"Rhythm is meaning." Discuss

Secondly, my last blog question to you all was about character creation and hearing your characters' voices. Inspired by David Mamet, who is a master at writing dialogue, I have the following question for you:

How do you approach writing dialogue? Do you find that you can hear the voices of your characters and simply let them talk, or do you have a more planned-out approach, plotting out what they need to say for the desired effect for the play?

Looking forward to reading your responses...

Hope the development on your plays is coming along smoothly.

See you soon!

Tracy

Creating the Who...

In the past I have used a variety of tools to create my characters. The thing I do most frequently is STEAL. Sometimes I am more subtle than other times. I cobble together qualities from some people and mix them with qualities from another person. That tends to create a whole new person. When I am writing female characters I usually have their entire history in my head - I know them - I know what made them who they are and why they relate to the other people and the circumstances the way they do. When I get stuck on a moment or a point of plot or character choice, it is usually because I need to go into them and figure out something about their past that I don't know.

I will admit, I find this harder with men. My male characters are more of a struggle for me and I always try to work at that. If I get stuck I STEAL again. I think of actors that I know that I thin would be good in the role and think about what would work if they were playing that character. Usually this is someone I know (a local person), but sometimes it's a famous person (I have used Anthony Hopkins as my muse...). I find that when I STEAL from life I like the results. I get different voices and diction and that helps making it seem like a real scene between people and not just an abstract discussion.

The characters change too - sometimes the way I picture them in the first draft is very different from who they become in the last draft. This is because I have to let things go that do not work. I think that can be tough because sometimes you become really attached to the people you create.

I have stolen a lot in my play writing. The script that I am working on now steals from my own life but mostly I steal from other people's lives... that too helps with the creating the who...

Characters--where do they come from?

Here it is Week #3. I send my regrets for not attending this week. Hugh/Eric, I will read your piece again when I can and send my comments to you sometime this week.
         As to characters--it feels like an organic process for me. I have ideas--sometimes just a title and then as I learn more about what it is I might or might not use I let the characters come to me and tell me what they want to say. These people in this piece have been around for many years but only in the last two have they bothered to separate from me and tell me what they want. They are sometimes from people I have met; from experiences I have had or things I have seen read or written in the past. I like the fact that the group requested that I make each of these characters "real" and "alive." Michelle, that helped me to make connections in the back stories that I didn't know before. And so what you tell me affects what happens in all three scenes--so it keeps evolving.
        I feel like a biographer. It is a bit schizoid but then the other seventy-three of us don't seem to have a problem in here. 
        For anyone who is interested--one of the members of the Firesign Theatre, Peter Bergman, passed away from Leukemia on March 9, 2012. The game show that I had originally wanted to use is from Firesign Theatre "Beat the Reaper." Go to this site to see/hear a cut of this and other off the wall and wonderfully punny stuff:
             Peter Bergman 1939 - 2012. 
I will not be using that particular game show--but that is the idea behind the game I want to use. Thanks to you Hugh/Eric about what questions to use--that has sent me off in another direction.
Okay, gotta fly.
Evam

Characters

"Here is the question for week #2!
Characters- how do you differentiate their voices? How do you choose their names? Do you find that you model a real person when creating a character?"

The answers to all these questions varies based on what I'm writing and where I'm coming from.

Sometimes they just come to me - voices, names, personality, etc. 

Often for my fiction writing I do some research to have the character's names have a deeper meaning; with an idea of the 'journey' the character is on through the story.

I have also modeled characters after real people. In my prose I have 2 characters named specifically after people I know (they wanted me to use their names in stories), however as I work with the characters the personality, and voice, become distinct. The play I produced at the 2007 Fringe was based on real people, names changed, and a couple of the characters were true to form.

Generally to help differentiate the voices of the characters I actually visualize them - whether they're based on real people, or not, they become more real to me in imagining them and understanding something of their life or back story. From there I try and bring their voices to the page.

For this play, Joe (Joseph) and Carl (Carlos) were the names from the start (as was Dr. Van der Hauk), though the characters did go through a flip in role. Maria had other names before deciding on her name. All of their voices come from my imagined presence of them. The other names in the play - Maria's classmates, etc, - had only the thought of balancing the alphabet through the play - with a little more thought on a few odd characters (Alyssa, Hugh, Blaine, and Mr. Fordom).

Week #2!

Hello all!

It was so nice to meet you all last night. It is a lovely group and I look forward to hearing about the progress on your plays...

Great discussion was started last week with the question of the greatest challenge- it seems that finding time and getting stuck on a part of your play are two issues that are common struggles...

The fact that you are part of this circle and taking the time to focus on your work is wonderful! Hopefully you can work through any kinks that you have in your plays through this process.

Here is the question for week #2!

Characters- how do you differentiate their voices? How do you choose their names? Do you find that you model a real person when creating a character?

Alright, post your thoughts...

And all the best with the development of your plays!

Talk to you all soon-

Tracy

Thanks

I just want to thank you all for the great feedback yesterday. The comments were inspiring, so much so that I woke up several times in the night with ideas of what to change/add. This is a great group and I can't wait till next week.

Pitching and Playing

I am looking out over the River Valley and it is snow bound and foggy. I enjoyed reading Kristen's post from last week about asking questions regarding our own pieces--how does what happens in the play help Alix to move from misery out into a different life. What does each character do to help her and in turn each other move out of the vortex of despair? Without being esoteric or stretching the "suspension of disbelief" too far. I have been letting those things roll around in my brain for the last week or so. I started keeping my "canada council A grant" book and a pen beside my bed. I sometimes wake up with ideas or have them when I can't sleep and if I don't write it down then it is gone. 
All the new information received last week takes me a while to process. Now I feel like I get it. I am really glad that we did the "pitch" thing this last week--and will be working on two pieces per week. That gives me the opportunity to focus on whoever is presenting on a particular Monday--and to use the points made about other pieces for my own--if applicable. 
I also do not want to forget that, for me, this is literally 'play' writing. Playing is very important and it sounds and looks like I have found some good playmates. I want to enjoy what I and others do. I have always been fascinated by the different ideas people write about and how different the individual creative processes are.
I look forward to this evening.
Cheers.
Evam 

Celtx scriptwriting software information

As I mentioned when I sent my script to everyone to review, I use Celtx software to write my scripts. I thought I could add a blog post for anyone interested in knowing more about the software. This is not intended as a sales pitch for the software, just information on it for those who have never heard of it.

I have been using Celtx for about 6 years, and every time I go to their website it is different (mind you I don't go that often): https://www.celtx.com/

The software is open-source or free-ware. Either way it's free to download and use, however I just noticed as I explored their site this time, that you are suppose to register (for free) to get the download (free), though I found a download link through another site by googling "celtx free download" - if you want to check out the software yourself.

Why I use and like the software:

• There are a variety of preset script formats (Film, Audio-Visual, Theatre, Audio Play, and some others)
• It is more of a project binder than a document, so you can have pages of notes with your script but not part of your script (i.e. more than one 'document' are in the project). I have a page of links related to my research as one page in my project
• There are sections you can add where you can fully define your characters, props, settings, sounds, lighting, and many more (again all kept within the same main file / project binder)
• The script can easily be marked with all the props and settings, etc and a report / list of all of them is generated
• When I first started using Celtx they had free online storage, where you also share your script with others / collaborators. At one point that became a paid feature. With my brief look now I can't tell if they went back to free or still paid
• It is available on all 3 major operating systems (Windows, Mac, Linux).

If you'd like to know more, check out their site or feel free to ask me.