Our Present State of Degeneration*

I'm depressed, so you know what that means...

I'm between projects.  The struggle to create something out of nothing, if you can call a play something, and I do, can be lonely, frustrating, and... depressing.

I finished the play I started this summer and I'm happy with it.  Rewritten and I am pleased.  I also rewrote the first play I ever wrote.  Much, much better.  I think it's a really good play now.

I came back from the writer's retreat with ideas for my next projects.  The rewrite of the above-mentioned old play was first.  Second was an historical screenplay I'd written that I thought I could adapt for the stage.  Been fartin' around with that for a about a month now.  Can't seem to get a handle on it.  I love the pivotal character, but I don't think she's my main character.  Maybe that's my problem.  Maybe she needs to be the main character.  Hmmm.

It's a great weird true story, and the screenplay did well in several contests, but screenplays are so different from plays.  A one line scene - no problem.  A no line scene - no problem.  Travel the world - no problem.  Travel in time - no problem.

I know you can do all this on stage.  I've seen it done.  But modern theater, short of Broadway or Off-Broadway tends to dislike set changes.  Unit set is the coin of the realm.  Certainly we can invite the audience to use their imagination, but there are limits to this.  Too much of the play can be taken up trying to get the audience comfortable and settled in each new imagined setting.  A play becomes slow, forced, or clunky.

Elapsed time can be implied with black outs, but again, making the audience comfortable can take a few seconds.  Do this too many times and the audience will start to have trouble getting comfortable.

And it's not what Artistic Directors want.  I read requests for submissions regularly.  Six or fewer characters and unit set are SOP.

Back to the drawing board... so to speak.

Other things I've been considering:

Marshall McCluhan.  Love his ideas.  The internet is an extension of our id.  The internet has made us all naked, and not just us, the entire planet is naked.  No wonder conservatives the world over are in a dither.

The difference between the movies and the stage - The movies bring the Gods down to earth.  Plays take us into the realm of the Gods.

*Antonin Artaud, The Theater and its Double