Every Exit, an Entrance Somewhere Else*

I haven't written in this blog for over 6 months.  Lazy... Busy.  Both are true.  I also have wondered if I have the... right (?)... the skill... the credentials to write about writing. <shrug>

I often ascribe my failures to laziness, but a better term is often fear.

I have been busy.  Family...

I have also written a lot.  I complete the rewrite of "The Canard of Vaucanson."  I have a mentor who was a great help.  After weeks of stalling, I went to see him.  He had given my his feedback about my first draft and I didn't like everything he told me.  Some of it just didn't fit what I dreamed of my play being.  Some of it was spot on, but I didn't know how to implement it.  And I really liked what I already had and I didn't want to lose it.

As we talked about my struggles with rewriting, I said that if I shaped it the way we were talking about, that I probably only had enough material for a one act play.  We talked more and I realized that maybe all I had was a one act, but I also suddenly understood what he thought was missing... what is often missing from my plays, a central plot that people could "cheer" for.

I went home and in less than three days, I cut and reshaped the whole thing into a 40 minute one act.  I really like it.

I also saw how to reshape it into a full-length play and I took the next month to do that... And I really like it even better.  I didn't have to cut much anything I really thought was good, and I added stuff that gave it a small but important through line, i.e. a plot.  Ta-Da!

Then I got word that the 10-minute  play I had written for a local forty-eight hour writing contest was picked to be produced at the end of June.  Wow!

I wrote a bunch more shorts for other contests around the country.  I haven't been selected for any of these yet, but... maybe...

More soon... unless I get lazy... or busy... or scared.


*Tom Stoppard - Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead