Fences

I have not been able to put my finger on exactly why, but Fences did not work for me. The dialogue is very good, which came across much more in seeing the play than in reading it. The characters are well developed through the dialogue, there is transformation and growth in the characters, they complement each other well. But I did not feel connected to the characters, I was not moved by them, I did not empathize with them, nor was I invested in their trials and tribulations.

Reading Fences, I think that Wilson did an impeccable job of describing, in words, characters that are recognizable as full-fledged, filled out human beings. It is easy for characters to come across as flat and un-dynamic when reading them on a page, but Wilson succeeded in telling his readers who his characters are.

Onstage I was, if possible, less convinced of the characters than when reading the play. Troy was too angry, Cory too moody and sullen, and Rose, who I was very impressed by when reading Fences and who I had thought was the strongest character, came across as a very weak character onstage. This very well may have been because of the particular production I saw. But even so, I was not convinced. What this taught me was that there is so much more that will be added to a play than what is seen on the page. Like I mentioned in the blog about The Last of Our Boys, one production of a play will differ dramatically from all other productions of the same play. Also, a production that works for one person may not work for another.

What I learned from reading and seeing Fences is that writing plays is hard. Not everyone will ever be satisfied with your production; even if five hundred people think it is brilliant, one hundred will think it sucked, and another hundred will think it is lacking substance, or coherence, or meaning. So I think the take-home message here is make yourself happy—do what you want, use your artistic license, and don’t let other people’s ideas make you think you are wrong (unless the vast majority tell you it is awful, then it probably is).

Bug

Like The Last of our Boys, the set for Bug was visible to the audience on entering the theater, but this time because the seating was all onstage, surrounding the set. I very much liked this choice of staging—it created an intimate atmosphere in which to experience the play.

The realism in this production was the most disturbing, but also the most effective, part for me. In The Last of our Boys I can appreciate that, as a staged reading, it wasn’t going to be perfect and that it did work to have the actors sit to the side while offstage. However, Bug did exactly what I like in a play and made everything seem real. Bug was incredibly daring, another aspect of it that earned my respect. The predictable, unemotional, slow moving, no action plays can work, but a piece as terrifyingly real as this one is something special. When I watch a play that takes me on an emotional rollercoaster, I know that I have just experienced something of substance and talent. Bug not only affected my emotions, but actually made me feel physically ill, which is a very rare occasion. Theater has such an advantage over films in that we are in the same room with the people putting on this entertainment for us; smelling the cigarettes, watching the actors ‘snort’ cocaine and ‘smoke’ crack, the wine bottles, and, most of all, the insect bites and blood—none of these have the same effect when seen on a screen. I think it was incredibly brave for the playwright to write a play that includes such real-life, but not so socially acceptable, features; it challenges directors, actors, and producers, makes them think about how far they are willing to go, makes them meet the writer half way. I like that kind of challenge.

This is a heavy and very, very intense story. I think it was daring to write this content and storyline; it is important to write what is true, important to show that life is not simple, easy, or without tension, conflict, and pain. I imagine, though, that this sort of work is hard to write. But if you can write it, it will look really good onstage.

The Last of Our Boys

The Last of Our Boys

The first thing I noticed on walking into this staged reading was the set. Likely a low budget production, it was not on some big stage, with curtains, the lights low, and a dramatic moment in the beginning where the set is suddenly revealed, possibly with actors already interacting with the set. Instead, the lights were already up onstage, so what we saw on entering was the set as it would be for the production—but without the actors. It created an interesting and slightly unusual dynamic to get to know the set first, memorizing the placements of things, venturing guesses as to the content of the play based on what I saw on the stage, and wondering how each piece would function within the production. Having the set revealed to the audience from behind a curtain is a very purposeful way of telling them “the play has started; it is time to pay attention and become hypnotized by the production you are about to see.” This can add to the experience of going to see a play and I think it is something that the audience expects, perhaps looks forward to, that moment when they know it is time to be consumed by whatever production is about to be put on for them. However, seeing the set beforehand has its benefits as well and, while it takes away a ‘reveal moment’ at the beginning, it also lets the audience prepare a bit more for what is in store in the coming two hours or so. This process is gentler, more subtle, and gives the audience time to assimilate into the theater experience.

The actors sat on the side of the stage for the production, not backstage, which was another unusual aspect of this theater-going experience. I think these liberties were taken because it was a staged reading. It says pretty loudly “you are watching a play; we are actors,” which is not a bad thing, but it is a very intentional choice and simply a matter of preference. This part did not work for me because I am very attached to the hypnotizing aspect of theater-going and having the actors enter from a place that I could see them did interrupt this hypnosis a bit.

These two aspects of the production certainly made parts of the experience different from what I think people expect from the theater. However, the play was very engaging, as were the actors, so these differences did not detract from my overall enjoyment of the play. The lesson here, I think, is that a well-written play has the capacity to come across even in a staged reading.

It is all a matter of taste—this is the big take-home message I got from seeing The Last of Our Boys. As a result, every production is going to be incredibly different; even productions of the same play will vary dramatically from one another because of nuances in directing, acting, staging, and so forth.

Revision/Shaffer

That word ‘revision’ so perfectly epitomizes the process of doing creative work, letting it sit for a day, a week, or ten years, and coming back to look at it through new eyes: a re-vision; returning to a past vision to look again and discover what new things there are to see in the old vision. As Shaffer says on page 25: “I was going to have to wait quite a long time before I at last saw on stage a version which pleased me all through.”

These are the things I learned from reading Shaffer’s reflections on revising ‘Amadeus’:

1. When I am more comfortable with my characters, plot, and dialogue the next step is figuring out how to bring out/emphasize motifs and themes, morals—the bigger picture.
2. The beauty of hindsight.
3. With revision, we as authors have the ability to bring a theme to the forefront that had been minor before; the ability to kill off a no-longer needed character—the power of the playwright!
4. How little changes can make the play say something different—with the same overall play, but with some variations, we can put the audience through different emotional, psychological, etc. experiences.
5. By watching the play new ideas come because you can really know what works and what doesn’t work. A play is alive. It is never a finished, perfect product. Also, just writing it and just reading it are not enough for revisions—as a playwright, you must see it on an actual stage to know if it works.
6. Playwriting is an art!
7. Appreciation and respect for playwrights. Appreciation for theater! Also, productions are collaborative.
8. I love playwriting! (Who would’ve thought?)
9. A playwright’s job is evocation.
10. Film and theater are NOT THE SAME!
11. The more revisions, the more complex, multi-layered, and deep the characters can become.
12. Revisions are worth it.

TEN-MINUTE PLAYS: comedy

“Aimee” to me is a statement that the real is sometimes better communicated through the absurd. As we have frequently reminded each other and ourselves in class, everything has been done before, everything is an adaptation of something, and nothing is really original. When we come to this realization, we have a few options: 1) accept that our story will not be original and go with it anyway, 2) try to forget that we just realized we cannot truly be original and live in denial while writing something we keep telling ourselves is original, 3) take a story/plot/idea that has been done before and do something really absurd with it, thus improving our chances of it appearing more original, etc. Erin Blackwell chose option 3 and made the subject of love, a well-used subject, new and interesting by setting up such an absurd situation. This taught me to think outside the box, a problem I have been having with every assignment. “Aimee” is helpful to me for taking an idea and then coming at it from an unusual and unexpected angle.

As I said, nothing is truly original. Yet there are always new ways of saying things because everyone has at least a slightly different take, a slightly different tone or voice than someone else. And beyond that, even the stories that are overdone can always be done more. Love, love, love; such is life. But is it everyone’s life? “Anything For You” got me thinking about how love means something different, well, to everyone, but also something different within varying socioeconomic statuses. It means something very different to someone who has grown up in a tiny, economically tragic coal mining town in Tennessee than it does to someone in San Francisco going to a college prep school, and so on and so forth. I’m not entirely sure what love means to these two women, but I was reminded after reading this that love can seem to be an exhausted subject, but never in fact will be exhausted as a result of its infinity.

“Aimee” and “Anything For You” demonstrate that you don’t need ‘drama’ to get a point across. I like how real and believable these are—they make use of comedy to still communicate an important point, idea, or story.

“Duet For Bear and Dog” was not particularly helpful to me. I can see that it may be funny in production, but it is hard for me to pick out an actual point here.“The Philadelphia” was more successful to me than “Duet For Bear and Dog” at being strange and overtly funny and still having a point.

Interactions between friends or any people who have an established relationship are most effective to me. With enough attention, these interactions easily present back-story and character development without handing either of these to the audience on a platter. Dialogue between friends is more dynamic than that between strangers and so by virtue of having the characters know one another, you automatically get more interesting, complex characters and a more interesting and complex story.

TEN-MINUTE PLAYS

“A Bowl of Soup”

Having Eddie talk the whole time gives us so much more information about Rob and Eddie’s relationship than if Rob had been participating in the conversation the whole time. It simultaneously provides back-story and shows us the rhythm and habit of their relationship. I learned from this play that sometimes a lack of something can say more than the something itself.

However, since Eddie’s voice is the only one we hear for the vast majority of the play, it needs to be especially believable and convincing. From the character description, we know that Eddie is, at the very least, in his late twenties, but probably in his thirties. He often sounded childish and did not convince me that he is an adult. Perhaps this is part of his character.

“That Midnight Rodeo”

“That Midnight Rodeo” also makes superb use of the unsaid. Particularly by using the close relationship between a husband and wife, Price is very successful in portraying the idea that connections between people do not always require excessive words. Contrary to “A Bowl of Soup,” where the babbling of one character illustrates clearly the relationship between the two characters, “That Midnight Rodeo” uses short, concise statements from Bo and Cindy to illustrate their particular relationship.

I learned that revealing little bits at a time of what is going on keeps the reader interested and still surprises us at the end. The ambiguous ending is exceptionally intriguing.

“The Man Who Couldn’t Dance”

There is a fine line between integrating background information casually, as part of the story, and shoving the background information down the audience’s throat. Mostly “The Man Who Couldn’t Dance” does the former, but a couple of places miss that boat. I learned from this that not everything can be perfect and there may just be some imperfections, even in a finished product.

Rhetorical questions are handy tools for back-story, character development, etc.

“The Roads That Lead Here”

This is a brilliant play of dialogue. The plot develops so seamlessly as the brothers go back and forth about their findings and contributions to their ‘project’. And once Jason joins, he facilitates the additional necessary back-story as seamlessly as Xander and Marcus had been setting it up before he enters.

Like “A Bowl of Soup,” “The Roads That Lead Here” gains a great deal with the surprise ending. It is unexpected, yet also somewhat expected based on Jason’s hints about their father not wanting them to continue their project. The play is brilliant.

What I learned from all the plays: ten-minute plays are very short…and yet a lot can happen and a lot of information can be conveyed in them.

Learning About Playwriting by Reading 'Fences'

As we have discussed in class, voice is difficult to capture and even more difficult to make distinguishable from character to character. Words we write on a page sound different when they are read, and performed, out loud. The characters in Fences have a very distinct way of speaking in comparison with someone we would run into today, which does something for discerning them from the everyday person.

In developing the characters, their beliefs, and their back-stories, August creates frequent arguments among the characters as a tactic for giving the audience this necessary information. Troy is always griping about this or that and with Rose, Bono, Lyons, and Cory to banter with him back and forth, the audience learn about Troy’s character, his job, his relationship with his sons, and his opinions on baseball and white people excluding black people from sports in general. With Bono present while Troy interacts with Rose, Wilson shows the audience their relationship by showing Bono their relationship. The interactions about jobs, school, drinking, death, etc. give us the present, and how Troy is now. For a look into Troy’s past, August uses Troy’s sons as ignorant characters to whom Troy wants to tell a story. Teaching his sons lessons through his own experiences, Troy gives the audience information about why he is who he is, and why he thinks the way he does.

From reading Fences, I learned that the interactions between characters are really the most useful tool for playwriting. The idea of a play is to tell a story, to portray to the audience a situation/life/moral/idea, etc. Your characters are your number one tool because they speak; they use their words, their fictional knowledge, their fictional pasts, their fictional emotions, to tell and show the audience your story. The key, of course, is to make sure you, as the writer, can put your words together in such a way that when your characters get on stage and start saying those words, the words do what you intended and tell your story out of the mouths of your characters. That’s the hard part.