Writing Life – Page 6

A Playwright’s Dream – Trafalgar 24 by Driftwood Theatre

THE FOLLOWING ARTICLE IS ONE I WROTE FOR THE WCDR WORDWEAVER NEWSLETTER, FOR THEIR MAY/JUNE 2009 ISSUE. It describes my very first foray into play-writing. It’s a little aged today, as I have now had 10 short plays produced…6 of them for Trafalgar24. I just wanted to give a little flavour into the experience from a playwright’s POV. It’s an amazing experience.

The extraordinary Trafalgar Castle in Whitby, Ontario. Currently an all-girls boarding school…

The grand entrance hall leading to the staircase to the 2nd story of the castle…

Standing guard in the main foyer of Trafalgar Castle, Whitby, Ontario…

Here’s the article:

A Playwright’s Dream – Trafalgar 24 by Driftwood Theatre

It’s Friday the 13th and we are in a dark basement corridor of a haunted 19th century castle. Out of the eerie silence come the first ear-shattering shrieks.

“Margo! Margo!” A girl runs towards us. She is lost, panicked and terrified.

So begins the unfolding of one of my lifelong dreams. The girl’s shouts are words I penned twenty-four hours earlier when I was locked into that basement and forced to write a 10-minute play.

Forced is an exaggeration. The fulfillment of my dream actually began a month earlier when I wrote a hesitant e-mail to Ruth Walker. I had received a WCDR e-mail calling for playwrights for Driftwood Theatre’s 6th annual Trafalgar24 event and I ruminated over whether or not I should apply. Actually, I painfully agonized. I asked Ruth if I was completely crazy to even consider contacting Jeremy Smith, Driftwood’s artistic director.

When I received Ruth’s encouragement (instead of the expected laughter), I sent Jeremy an e-mail. I began with the truth: I am not now, nor have I ever been a playwright. I followed my confession with much pleading and begging. You see, I had always imagined myself as a playwright. Imagination is a wasted gift when not forced into action.

Much to my surprise—and horror—I received the following reply from Jeremy: I am delighted to inform you that if you still have an interest in staying up all night in a haunted castle between Thursday, March 12, and Friday, March 13, we would love to have you.

Fast forward a month and here I am in the dark basement corridor, in the back row of a standing-room-only, sardine-packed audience. The young woman is lunging toward us, shrieking out her lost friend’s name. I’d like to say I wrote a dramatic play that would move my audience to tears—I went in there with visions of Blanche Dubois meets Phantom of the Opera—but that would be a lie.

When we arrived at the castle twenty-four hours earlier, we playwrights were each given a sheet of paper. Mine included three things: headshots of my actors, the room I was assigned to and the play’s theme—Friday the 13th in a haunted castle. I took one look at my actresses and I knew what to write. I sat on the floor of the basement corridor and attempted to bring my newly acquired vision to life.

Within an hour and a half, I victoriously announced: Done. Comedy. Now I can relax about deadline & edit.

Throughout the hours of edits that followed, I was comforted by one fact: Lucy Brennan was upstairs. I interrupted her and commiserated with her a few times throughout the night. We even went on a Tim Horton’s run with some of the other playwrights. She was my unwitting rock. She had no idea how much comfort I took in knowing she was a mere staircase away.

Come morning, the playwrights were allowed to go home. As we drove to our beds, the actors and directors swarmed the castle. They only had a few hours to read and rehearse the ten plays we had left behind. It was all very The Elves and the Shoemakers if you ask me.

Opening night! The Trafalgar24 play-creation festival is a fundraising event for Driftwood Theatre. What’s special about Driftwood is that they bring professional theatre to Ontario communities for pay-what-you-can admission. Trafalgar24 helps to make this possible. The event had a wonderful silent auction and a dessert table to rival every dessert table ever assembled on this or any other planet. It also had a dizzying array of talented actors and actresses who poured their hearts into roles that did not even exist less than 24 hours earlier.

I was now an audience member. Each person in attendance viewed six of the 10 plays. I saw some incredibly heart-wrenching performances. I travelled from the library to the cathedral to the piano room and beyond—Lucy Brennan’s was my favourite! I was mesmerized by the beauty of the night—flawlessly orchestrated by all—including the stage director, WCDR’s own Nancy Melcher.

I made my way to the basement. In the hushed moments prior to my character’s screams, I noticed the evening’s emcee standing to my left. Neil Crone, the man who has given me years of poignant laughter, was about to watch my words brought to life. I was suddenly more terrified than I had been when faced with the impossible demand of writing a play in eight hours. But I had forced my imagination into action. I was now a playwright.

‘Lucy‘ made her way onto the set and was startled, poked and prodded by the wickedly playful ‘Margo.’ Neil Crone laughed! I will beg Mr. Smith to allow me to be a part of the next Trafalgar24. If he doesn’t grant me the incredible honour of being playwright, I will be there in the audience watching another year of magic unfold. Only a fool would miss it!

END OF ARTICLE

I am Tartuffe – It’s 1664 and the Curtain Rises. Or, the Evolution of a Writer.

I am Green Eggs and Ham. I am Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I am Little Women. I am The Great Gatsby. I am Tartuffe.

I don’t know if all writers are the same or not. But for me, there were always signposts along the way. I know precisely the signposts that gave me direction to the writer I have become.

Green Eggs and Ham
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Little Women
The Great Gatsby
Tartuffe

These are the stepping stones I climbed to get here. These are the cornerstones that support the burden of my creative existence.

I vividly recall the electricity I felt when, at first, Green Eggs was read to me by my father. I wanted to be this. Whatever this was. I could not yet voice the thing, but I knew. With all my heart, I knew.

I remember first opening Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. His grandparents all in the bed. The family’s squalor and despair. Charlie’s compassion and passion for the world. I wanted to capture that. But I couldn’t yet put into words how I would go about doing that. I just knew that it had something to do with creation.

Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy. I was granted a window into their lives. That window allowed for heartache, sorrow, joy, wonder. That I could feel all these emotions simply by reading words on a page. It was alchemy. I wanted to be that kind of a magician. I wanted to control the emotions of others with words.

East Egg. West Egg. Glamour. Lights. One little light, shining beacon-like across the water. Nick Carraway, the gentle observer of decadence. Removed, enticed, sickened. Gatsby became the template from which I have judged all novels since. None stand strong against it, though a great many have come close. You remember your first. That first moment when you know you have met with perfection. Even flawed perfection is made perfect by your own adulation of the thing. No matter the flaws that have been or will be pointed out to me in The Great Gatsby, it will always be that book. I will forever aspire to write THAT book.

With the exploration of words in full throttle, came the search for the perfect play. I had already read A Streetcar Named Desire. I was pretty sure I would not find another. It was my play. Then, somewhere between ninth and tenth grade, maybe. My memory fades. I stumbled upon a book called Tartuffe & Other Plays. Molière. First performed in the Palace of Versailles in 1664. Scorned by the Catholic Church. French. Paris (my lifelong love of the city drew me to anything in its periphery). I quickly discovered that pretty much ANY and ALL creative works frowned upon by the laughably reprehensible Catholic Church ended up being something I admired and liked. The swirling controversy surrounding Tartuffe made it REQUIRED reading for me. I read more about the play before reading the play than I ever read about anything prior to reading the thing for myself. The controversy surrounding Tartuffe when it first came out, culminated in the Archbishop of Paris announcing an edict warning anyone who watched it, read it, or performed in it total excommunication from the church. That’s serious shit. Then I read the play. And I laughed. And I laughed. And I laughed.

These are the books and creative works that formed me as a writer. My signposts, my evolution, my muses of creativity. I mention them today because of a little incident that happened on the way home from work yesterday. Or, perhaps not even an incident…but a happenstance. As I drove by the Scarborough Music Theatre (and I think Community Centre—I never really paid attention to what the building was) at Markham and Kingston Roads, I noticed a sign that has been there forever. On it was flashing the word Tartuffe. It rose above the din and caught my eye as it was meant to do. I got instantly and ridiculously excited. In all the years of re-reading the play, I had never actually seen it performed. It had never once come to life for me outside the page. Long story, short (too late)…I secured tickets for opening night. 353 years after its original opening night, I am attending a performance of TARTUFFE! Writers are such geeks, aren’t we?

I wonder if all writers have their building blocks to how they got there…to writer. Do they remember each stepping stone? Do they honour those stones? Do they revisit them? Do they aspire to them?

I’m going to TARTUFFE! If you’re in the area, it’s not too late to get tickets. I promise, you will laugh at this farce. Yesterday was a good day. I see a lot of names in lights, but seeing Tartuffe rise up out of the din of my advertising-thick commute was a godsend I’ll not soon forget. It’s silly, but to see a production of Tartuffe has been an almost life-long dream. As Julia Roberts (as VIVIAN) said to Richard Gere (as EDWARD) in Pretty Woman BEFORE their evening out, I will NOW say to the performers at SCARBOROUGH THEATRE GUILD.

“In case I forget to tell you later, I had a really good time tonight.”

As a Writer You Owe Your Words No Less Than Your Vulnerability…

What makes you vulnerable?

Make a list.

Now that you have your list, LOOK AT IT.

Are you writing about these things?

If you are avoiding the things that make you uncomfortable and vulnerable, are you really being the most authentic writer you COULD be? Are you delivering the goods by hiding behind a facade of false emotions and safe-ness? Or are you stymieing yourself by avoiding things and then transferring these avoidances into your narrative.

Go to that place that makes you uncomfortable. Go to the wall you built for yourself but never climb, or to the line in the sand you marked out for yourself but never put your foot over. Go there now. Climb the wall. Put your foot over that line. Make yourself squirm with discomfort. Tackle the issues you avoid.

Only by breaking through these vulnerabilities will you drop yourself down to a deeper level. It will make your writing better. It will make you better.

Writing isn’t easy. Writing isn’t about comfort. It’s about making yourself uncomfortable. It’s about stretching the envelope for yourself, and perhaps stretching the envelope for others…if you’re lucky enough to have readers. Writing is about ideas, exploration, frontiers, change. How are you going to write with authenticity, if you’re avoiding your authentic feelings.

Look at your list. Now go to your writing…and move your foot forward when all of your instincts tell you to stop. Keep writing when you write yourself into a corner that you can’t get out of because you don’t want to breach your own sense of safety and security. Explore those emotions that you’re afraid of confronting. KEEP WRITING. The more you write about your fears, the more you free yourself from their hold on you. Write through your discomfort. Write while vulnerable…

Just a random photo from my collection. The night we took a ferry out on the water to capture the night-time skyline of Shanghai. So much beauty. Imagine if I had a fear of flying!