Featured Post

1100 Playwright Interviews

1100 Playwright Interviews A Sean Abley Rob Ackerman E.E. Adams Johnna Adams Liz Duffy Adams Tony Adams David Adjmi Keith Josef Adkins Nicc...

Stageplays.com

Mar 16, 2015

I Interview Playwrights Part 725: Mary Elizabeth Hamilton


Mary Elizabeth Hamilton

Hometown: Brielle, NJ

Current Town: Brooklyn, NY

Q:  What are you working on now?

A:  I'm working on a play about prostitutes in Dubuque, Iowa, and a play about my hypochondriac aunt, and I'm collaborating on a play about Mickey Mouse. It's not really about Mickey Mouse. It's about these women who play Mickey Mouse in Disney World. It's really just a bunch of middle aged women in Orlando gossiping with Mickey Mouse heads on their laps…but that one's in an early stage.

Q:  Tell me, if you will, a story from your childhood that explains who you are as a writer or as a person.

A:  I was a big nerd in high school. I played bass guitar in the marching band and thought it was the coolest thing a person could do. My high school boyfriend and his brother made up the rest of the rhythm section and sophomore year their mom sewed us matching capes and hats that said "The Rhythm Bandits" in gold sparkly letters. I don't know how this explains who I am as a writer except to say that as seriously as I'd like to take myself as an artist there will always be a small part of me that would walk down the main streets of my hometown toe-heeling in a cape and beret while meticulously plucking out the baseline to "Louie Louie."

Q:  If you could change one thing about theater, what would it be?

A:  Accessibility.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  I grew up seeing my uncle act in a bunch of Shakespeare plays and, like, early 20th century comedy of manners type stuff, and then when I was 12 I saw a college production of Orpheus Descending and it blew my mind. I went to my middle-school library and they didn't have any Tennessee Williams' plays so I thought I had uncovered this really obscure writer that no one else knew. I found some collections of his plays in a used bookstore and became completely obsessed, but I still thought for a long time that it was this secret I had discovered. Then a high school teacher recommended Beckett…then in college I took a class on Brecht, Caryl Churchill and Pinter, and wrote my thesis on Suzan-Lori Parks. So my theater education was pretty chronological, actually, but also kind of completely on accident.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  The kind that makes me forget I'm sitting in a chair in a theater, or that I'm sitting in a chair at all, or that I am a person with the ability to sit in chairs.

Q:  What advice do you have for playwrights just starting out?

A:  I will give a piece of advice I just received myself the other day, the gist of which was: find a way to stop your brain from getting in the way of your instincts.

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  Go see my roommate Tony Meneses's play Guadalupe in the Guest Room, playing very near my hometown in NJ. It is excellent!


-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Enter Your Email To Have New Blog Posts Sent To You

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Support The Blog
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mailing list to be invited to Adam's events
Email:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Books by Adam (Amazon)

Mar 15, 2015

I Interview Playwrights Part 724: Larry Phillips



Larry Phillips

Hometown: Brick, NJ

Q:  Tell me about your upcoming show:

A:  "Learning to Skip" is a comedy that begins in a Kindergarten classroom. Jill, an Alpha Mom discover that her son Preston, might not be as perfect as she had hoped.

Feeling that a weakness in her child is more a poor reflection on her as a parent then on the actual child, Jill is mortified. This tiny flaw of Preston's sets off a chain of events that unravel the lives of his parents, his teacher, and her poor fiancé. As each of them tries to rebuild they all are forced to look their own flaws, and soon a battle for power, perfection, persistence, patience, and peanut butter overcomes them all. Did I mention it's a comedy!

Q:  What else are you working on now?

A:  I have 2 plays that are in the workshop phase that I hope to see productions of over the next year or so. "Arbuckle Syndrome" which is a look at Asperger's. And "Last Chance for Mama", which is Hollywood satire about getting
a TV show green lite.

Q:  Tell me, if you will, a story from your childhood that explains who you are as a writer or as a person.

A:  When I was in the 2nd grade, my teacher left half way through the year to adopt a baby. At the end of the school year, she came back one day to visit the class with the baby. For some reason, the class sang lullabies to the kid. After the third lullaby, I or reasons I do not know, shouted, "Geez kid, go to sleep already." It got a huge laugh from both kids and the adults in the room. It's my 1st conscious memory of what it was like to get a laugh...and I'm still chasing that feeling to this day.

Q:  If you could change one thing about theater, what would it be?

A:  It's not something I would change as much as something I would love to see more of: "Paying it Forward". When you find yourself in situation where you can help a playwright, a director, an actor, a designer find work, please do. On each show we try to bring someone in that we have worked with before and really liked. They may not be making a lot of money (or any) but each opportunity to work and meet new people is an open door. People have done it for me, and am forever grateful.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  At 12 years-old I was introduced to work of Neil Simon and David Mamet, and I become obsessed with both of them. Two very different men, yet 2 playwrights who write in very specific rhythms. I am fascinated with rhythms; how people speak, how they write, how they sing. When I write I always think about each character and his/her rhythms of speech, and I have to think Mr. Simon and Mr. Mamet played a huge part in that education for me.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  There isn't one specific type that excites me. My general rule is, just please don't bore me. I'm not saying everything has to be outlandish, or have twists and surprise endings. Just assume that your audience is as smart as you are. I get very restless at a show when I'm 2 steps ahead of what I'm watching.

Q:  What advice do you have for playwrights just starting out?

A:  Save everything you write and every now and then revisit it. I don't care if it's a entire play, a scene, or four lines of dialogue. You never know when something you wrote six years ago might trigger a new idea.

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  "Learning to Skip" plays April 23rd-May 3rd at The Bridge Theatre in Shetler Studios. If you come and don't like the play, you may see me afterwards and I will give you your money back.
Tickets can be purchased at RandomlySpecificTheatre.com


-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Enter Your Email To Have New Blog Posts Sent To You

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Support The Blog
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mailing list to be invited to Adam's events
Email:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Books by Adam (Amazon)

Mar 12, 2015

I Interview Playwrights Part 723: Nina Louise Morrison




Nina Louise Morrison

Hometown: White Plains, NY

Current Town: Newburyport, MA

Q:  What are you working on now?

A:  I am devising a play with Project: Project about a folklorist who, while researching an obscure Grimm's Fairy Tale, falls Alice-like into the story of The Boy Who Went Forth To Learn How To Shiver. It's been such a fun process to work with my four brilliant collaborators; we improvise, visualize, physicalize, and invent new ways of working every time we meet. The Grimm's story is about a boy who can't feel fear, and our protagonist is a woman with a lot of fears – so we have done a lot of research and development around fear, work/creativity and gender, and unlocking your own creative mojo – and it’s a story about storytelling, so it’s pretty meta. It's been a total dream to get to work as an ensemble to devise this play for a year and a half. And there will be puppets! I'm also directing a play at Mount Ida College – Jonathan Rand’s Law & Order: Fairy Tale Unit. I have really been enjoying mentoring my team of enthusiastic assistant directors and stage managers there. I’m planning for the Mad Dash, a 24-hour play festival produced by Fresh Ink Theatre and Interim Writers. And I’m working on my own writing of course, but I’m at the beginning stages of a couple of things that are so early in the process I’m not ready to talk about them. But I’m writing every day, which is a new thing that has been really great.

Q:  Tell me about the fellowship program at Huntington.

A:  I go see all the productions, attend special events, and we meet every couple of weeks. The Huntington is a big institution, with big resources, the most important of which to me is the people – the fellows and the literary staff – they're all incredibly smart and also hilarious. It’s a really honest, challenging and supportive environment to be developing work. There are opportunities for readings and workshops, and many alums have had their work produced by the Huntington. But being produced by the Huntington isn’t the goal of the program - developing our writing is really the focus, and for me just being around productions on that scale is exciting. And my cohorts are incredibly brave, smart, and kind of on fire right now, so it’s totally inspiring to get to hang out with them and talk about writing. I just saw The Second Girl which had a gorgeous and incredibly detailed kitchen set with a working sink and the smell of cooking bacon wafting out into the audience. It’s always a little bit of a miracle to be able to sit in the audience and be reminded that new plays need not necessary be built for shoestring budgets. So I think the fellowship will push me to dream a little bit bigger and bolder.

Q:  Tell me, if you will, a story from your childhood that explains who you are as a writer or as a person.

A:  I was always performing as a kid, and I wanted to be an actor – my father was an acting teacher. I think I was about eight or nine and I saw some of my fathers’ students perform at the New Actors Workshop. I was so energized by the performers and the emotional risks they were taking - I particularly remember a man delivering a monologue sweating and spitting, you know, like really emoting. I have no idea what it was about, or whether he was good or bad, I probably didn’t know then either. But afterwards I stood alone on the stage in the dark in the red glow of the exit sign and kind of had a moment where I was like I want to be an actor, I want to take this seriously. And then I went home and wrote a poem about it! I recognize that moment now as not - aha, I want to be an actor - so much as aha, I want to be seen, and I want to be heard like that, I want to almost sing my feelings at that level - and then my actual method for doing that was to write about it. I think the writing impulse came because I identified with this male protagonist, but I wondered even then – where are the parts for women where they get to swear and sweat and spit? So it was as much as wanting to be seen and understood as it was about wanting to expand the possible narratives I could identify with – this complex mix of empathizing with the “other,” wanting to share some authentic self, and to be able to imagine myself as a woman with agency. I did end up training as an actor in college and at the National Theatre Institute, but as I was doing that I began to fall in love with cold reading new plays, so similar to the adrenaline rush of improvisation. Playwriting has become a method for both questioning existence and celebrating it at the same time. And it allows me to listen to and see others who are crying out to be heard and seen.

Q:  If you could change one thing about theater, what would it be?

A:  5050 in 2020. http://theatrewomen.org/programs/5050-in-2020-parity-for-women-theatre-artists/

Playwrights can’t create in a vacuum - they need great collaborators in order to be great. And female writers have historically been excluded, marginalized and misunderstood, a fact I must acknowledge but not allow to hinder my own impulse to create. Because I do have hope – for my own career, and for the future. I believe strongly in the next generation of theatre makers, critics and leaders, and that the biases of previous generations will gradually fade out. I love teaching because my students want to know the why and how of everything – it means I can’t stay complacent – not in my teaching or in my writing practice.

Q:  What advice do you have for playwrights just starting out?

A:  Go to the theatre. Observe deeply, question everything, dream bigger than you think possible. Be proud of your rejections because it means you’re doing the work of putting yourself out there. And be good to people – to your collaborators of course, but also your family (that you make or are born into), and yourself. The same people who came to your shows and brought you flowers when you were young are the people who will be important supporters of you and your work when you are older. Develop your patience, let go of past failures, keep redefining your own success. Ask for what you need. Cultivate relationships with people you can trust to read your work and give you both encouragement and smart constructive feedback. Feed your curiosity; write about the things you wish you knew. Read everything out loud, including the stuff you scrawl in the margins that you think is nothing – keep listening to the stuff you write that you think is nonsense – you never know what it might be, it may be where something important and authentic lies hidden. Write towards the scary, ugly, lumpy stuff. Make up your own writing exercises. And definitely make your own list of advice just like this one: then try to live up to your own advice!

I wrote a blog for GrubStreet about the three things I can’t live without as a playwright. https://grubstreet.org/grub-daily/three-essential-ingredients-for-being-a-playwright/

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  Project: Project's SHIVER will go up at Boston Playwrights Theatre in June, 2015! http://www.projectprojecttheatre.com

The Mad Dash https://24hpf.wordpress.com

More about Nina: http://ninalouisemorrison.wordpress.com


-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Enter Your Email To Have New Blog Posts Sent To You

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Support The Blog
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mailing list to be invited to Adam's events
Email:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Books by Adam (Amazon)

Mar 4, 2015

I Interview Playwrights Part 722: Max Baker



Max Baker

Hometown: London

Current Town: New York City

Q:  Tell me about Live From the Surface of the Moon:

A:  It's set in 1969 - the first act is the night of the moon landing, the second act is the last day of the decade.

Single set, six characters. Verbal abuse, group dynamics, electric can openers.Think Bill Cosby meets Revolutionary Road.

Q:  Tell me about your band, Eelwax Jesus:

A:  Excellent question! eelwax jesus have written some of the best songs you've never heard.  I implore you to go to YouTube, type in YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR (eelwax jesus) -
and experience the very tip of the eelwax iceberg.

Q:  What else are you working on right now?

A:  Oh gosh. I'm trying to crank-start a new play by diving into Conspiracy Theories -
They're such a great resource for writing: how to construct plausible, structured narratives from
random pieces of fact. It doesn't matter whether those narratives come from the paranoid, the lonely, the curious or the Government, there seems to be a strange trait in humans to seek out something we call The Truth - which really just means agreement. I find this interesting because if everyone really did agree on The Truth it might be great for us as a species, but it'd be pretty fucking dull for us individually. Okay, maybe I went on a little bit of a tangent. I'm working on a new play!

Q:  Tell me, if you will, a story from your childhood that explains who you are as a writer or as a person.

A:  One of my earliest memories (I must have been 4): my older brother had some kind of toy robot
with interchangeable hand devices which I thought was very sophisticated, and I am pretty sure I was told I wasn't allowed to play with it. For some reason I found myself alone in the front room with this robot and something compelled me to pick up one of the interchangeable pieces, a magnet, and put it in my mouth. I suppose that's what 4 year old's do - put things in their mouths. I heard my mother in the other room call my name, and promptly swallowed the magnet. Literally to this day, I can still conjure up the sensation of this lump of metal and plastic going down my throat. Later my brother was looking for the robot magnet-hand and obviously couldn't find it. I kept quiet. Not sure if that explains anything about me as a writer or a person, except I clearly discovered guilt and fear and how to lie about it all at the same time at an early age. I've had images of myself walking around life with spoons stuck to my stomach ever since.

Q:  If you could change one thing about theater, what would it be?

A:  The spelling. I like theatre spelled the British way.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  This question makes my brain hurt.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  The kind where people take off their clothes.

Q:  What advice do you have for playwrights just starting out?

A:  Stop watching TV.

Q:  Plugs for your upcoming project(s):

A:  Come see LIVE FROM THE SURFACE OF THE MOON at The Wild Project.
That way if you think I sound like a wanker in this interview, you'll have the chance to criticize my work.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Enter Your Email To Have New Blog Posts Sent To You

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Support The Blog
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mailing list to be invited to Adam's events
Email:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Books by Adam (Amazon)

Mar 2, 2015

I Interview Playwrights Part 721: Nathan Alan Davis



Nathan Alan Davis

Hometown:  Rockford, IL

Current Town:  New York, NY

Q:  What are you working on now?

A:  I'm continuing to refine my play Dontrell, Who Kissed the Sea, which just began a Rolling World Premiere with the National New Play Network. Dontrell is the story of an eighteen-year-old from Baltimore who makes it his mission to venture into the Atlantic ocean in search of a distant ancestor who was lost during the Middle Passage. Besides the obvious difficulty of such a task, Dontrell doesn't have any idea how to sail. Or dive. Or, for that matter, swim. Yet. It's a present-day folktale and hero's quest that blends poetry, hip hop, mysticism, humor, pop culture and ancient ritual. The first production is now running at Skylight Theatre in Los Angeles (co-produced by Skylight Theatre Company and Lower Depth Theatre Ensemble and directed by Gregory Wallace). Working with Gregory was wonderful and the script has grown in significant ways over the past few weeks--and thankfully that growth will continue in the coming months with the other productions (Phoenix Theatre in Indianapolis, Theater Alliance in DC, Cleveland Public Theatre and Oregon Contemporary Theatre.)

In September I joined the playwriting program at Juilliard. I'm currently working on a second draft of a comedy/drama that features six people representing four generations of a family living in a two-room house in a forest.

Q:  Tell me, if you will, a story from your childhood that explains who you are as a writer or as a person.

A:  Apparently when I was a baby and people would talk to me and smile at me and try to get me to smile back or laugh, I would just kind of stare at them, expressionless. I've since seen other babies do this (including my own babies) so I don't think it's necessarily unique to me. But as a writer (who still often spaces out for uncomfortable periods of time) I do find it crucial to maintain the freedom of silence. To take in the world and reflect on what I'm observing without caving in to the constant demand for immediate responses to everything. To kind of exist--not in a bubble--but a shade or two removed from the dimension of the everyday, even as I'm moving through it. All that is probably a huge stretch at relevancy for the actual childhood story--which I don't even have a memory of--but there you go.

Q:   If you could change one thing about theater, what would it be?

A:  This: http://howlround.com/native-voices-on-the-american-stage-a-constitutional-crisis. I'm so glad this conversation is beginning to happen more widely.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  If I'm being completely honest: Shakespeare.

To name someone still living: poet/musician/actor Saul Williams is a huge influence. His use of language, his vision, his constant reinvention--he's really an artist striving to bring a new reality into existence and you can feel it in everything he does.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  I don't know if I could ever pinpoint it. I love to be transported by language. I love the event of it all. I love it when a play becomes a ceremony. I love grandiose declarations. I love it when a moment is so raw and honest that time stops and everyone feels exactly what's happening and words aren't even needed. I don't think it's about the genre or style of a given piece so much as the honesty and depth of thought/emotion/idea/spirit behind it.

Q:  What advice do you have for playwrights just starting out?

A:  For the long haul (which I'm still very much at the early stages of) I think it's important to cultivate an unshakable belief in yourself. If you do feel strongly compelled to become a playwright it probably means that you have important things to say about what it means to be human in this day and age. Things that you may or may not always be able to articulate--but that you can say by creating theatrical worlds and characters and stories. That's awesome. So embrace it without apology. And hold onto the joy of that when things are going not-so-well.

I was very fortunate to study with Ken Weitzman while he was heading the MFA playwriting program at Indiana University. He really encourages a combination of imitation and self reflection, when it comes to honing the craft. Those two things in tandem have helped me come a long way in terms of unearthing my own voice as a writer.

Know that your career will follow its own unique and unpredictable trajectory. Learn from others' experiences but resist the urge to compare your path to theirs.

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  My sister, Bahiyyih El-Shabbaz, is an amazing writer. Check out her most recent fiction piece, Legless and Under Waves.

If you're in LA Dontrell, Who Kissed the Sea is at Skylight Theatre in Los Feliz, through March 29th. Dates/links for upcoming productions of Dontrell are here.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Enter Your Email To Have New Blog Posts Sent To You

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Support The Blog
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mailing list to be invited to Adam's events
Email:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Books by Adam (Amazon)

Feb 24, 2015

Events and Productions

First of all, did you see this interview Rob Weinert-Kendt did of me at American Theatre? I get interviewed sometimes too.

UPCOMING EVENT:

Book Signing at Drama Book Shop in New York!

March 27

Scenes from plays by Crystal Skillman, Qui Nguyen and me.  You should come.



More information here


UPCOMING PRODUCTIONS of My Plays--

Clown Bar

Production #5 of Clown Bar
Indiana Players
Indiana, PA
Opens March 20, 2015


Hearts Like Fists




Production #13 of Hearts Like Fists
Outcry Theatre
Dallas, TX
Opens March 19, 2015



Production #14
Know Theatre of Cincinnati
Cincinnati, OH
Opens March 27, 2015

Production #15
Stephens College
Columbia, MO
Opens April 9, 2015

Production #16
Clark University
Worcester, MA
Opens April 15, 2015


Production #8 of Pretty Theft
City College of New York
NYC, NY
Opens February 26, 2015

Production #9 
Western Illinois University
Macomb, IL
Opens May 10, 2015


Adventures Of Super Margaret

Production #1
Oddfellows Playhouse
Middletown, CT
Opens May 28, 2015.

Nerve

Production #17 of Nerve
DePaul University
Chicago, IL
Opens June 5, 2015

New Play (TBD) 
Workshop production
Chance Theater
Anaheim, CA
August 19, 22, 23

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Enter Your Email To Have New Blog Posts Sent To You

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Support The Blog
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mailing list to be invited to Adam's events
Email:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Books by Adam (Amazon)

Feb 20, 2015

I Interview Playwrights Part 720: Jennifer Schlueter



Jennifer Schlueter

Hometown: St. Louis, MO

Current Town: Columbus, OH

Q:  Tell me about your upcoming show with Available Light.

A:  Last year, Matt Slaybaugh--their fabulous artistic director--approached me about doing what he was calling a "radical adaptation" of Don Quixote. I had never read the book all the way through, but its scope and ambition and sheer weirdness really turned me on. I really wanted to hang on to the book's shaggy, expansive structure and especially its metafictional playfulness--Cervantes invented a false author who narrates the book, and in its second half, the central characters are totally aware of the fact that they've been written about. Anyway, after a few months of small-scale experiments with AVLT's ensemble across the fall, I went away and built a play that is a splintering of Cervantes' massive novel, remixed with a bunch of writing about pilgrimage, exile, and walking more generally. It's called Don Quixote: A Pilgrimage, and its central plot follows a woman, Isabel (named for Cervantes' illegitimate daughter) in her present-day journey along the Camino de Santiago. I've been saying that the play examines the power of pilgrimage, how we get lost, and how, though storytelling, we can find ourselves again. We've just started rehearsals and it's been so great to watch AVLT's whip-smart ensemble just dig in.

Q:  What else are you working on now?

A:  I'm heading in to a four week residency with my play, Patience Worth, created for the for/word company. At the turn of the twentieth century, a real woman named Pearl Curran got very into the Ouija board and eventually discovered? decided? that a spirit named Patience Worth was speaking through her. Patience Worth didn't want to tell the future or contact people who had died or other standard seance-ish stuff, though...she wanted to write novels and plays and books. And so that's what Pearl did for her: she stood at a Ouija board and spelled her books out, letter by letter and word by word. To the tune of more than four million words. And Pearl's husband transcribed it all. And they published a lot of it. And then a newspaperman started hanging around...and he fell in love with Patience. And Patience declared that she wanted to be a mother and so Pearl adopted a baby for her. The whole tale is a perfect example of how truth is stranger than fiction, and the play is really about a sublimated desire for fame and the limits of credulity. It's built entirely out of stuff written by Patience/Pearl and stuff written about them in newspapers and other studies.

The play's already had a staged reading at Tristan Bates in London. In this residency, we'll be working in the Motion Lab at the Advanced Center for Computing Design. With Vita Berezina-Blackburn, their Animation Specialist, Christina Ritter (my joint artistic director) and I are going to find out what kind of projected visual environment might work for this piece. The grant language said that we're trying to find out how things like motion capture (of the body and the face) can amplify the remixed aesthetic of my work. I don't know. We're going to get some dancers in some mocap suits and see what we find out.

I'm also working on a commissioned adaptation of my play, North, for BBC Radio 4, and an adaptation of Dorothy Parker's only play, Coast of Illyria.

Q:  If you could change one thing about theater, what would it be?

A:  The terrible habit of thinking of New York as the center of it all. It's not.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  For showing me that scavenging and pillaging and remixing were a viable way in: Chuck Mee and Emily Mann. For thinking really seriously about why and how teaching playwriting matters: Paula Vogel and Michael Bigelow Dixon. For making it happen for other people: Ellen Stewart and Margo Jones.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  The kind of theater where the lyrical mixes with the profane. Gritty and smart and sweaty and fun. And ensemble-driven stuff from folks like the Rude Mechs and Frantic Assembly. And everything created by my students.

Q:  What advice do you have for playwrights just starting out?

A:  Don't wait for permission or until you know enough or until you deserve it. If you do, you are insulated from the failures that you will learn from, protected from the risks you must take. Jump before you think you're ready. Make work. Produce yourself. Don't wait.

Q:  Plugs, please:

A few great reasons to think beyond New York:
  • Young Writers Short Play Festival, Madlab Theatre, Columbus, Ohio, July 10-25, 2015, http://www.madlab.net/MadLab/youngguide.html  One of the smartest young writer programs I've encountered--real mentorship, workshops, developmental readings, and full productions with professional actors.


-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Enter Your Email To Have New Blog Posts Sent To You

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Support The Blog
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mailing list to be invited to Adam's events
Email:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Books by Adam (Amazon)

4 One Minute Plays

Below are 2 one minute plays I wrote for the NY Indie One Minute Play Festival.  And here are the two I posted the last time I did this--the Primary Stages one from last year.

OUR RELATIONSHIP

By Adam Szymkowicz

(TWO PEOPLE one in front of the other, in line, waiting. J and Q enter and reach the end of the line at the same moment. They both motion for the other to go.)

Q
You were here first.

J
No, you.

Q
You go. Please.

J
I insist.

Q
No.

J
I insist.

Q
Well okay.

J
Do I… Do I know you?

Q
No. No? No.

J
You're on the Internet?

Q
Yes.

J
We hate each other.

Q
Yes.





THE CHEESE

By Adam Szymkowicz

(SUE and BETSY seated.)

SUE
I just can’t any more.

BETSY
Oh right. Because of everything.

SUE
I feel like I don’t want to read anything or see anything or experience anything because if I like it, the week after someone will write an article telling me how my experience is wrong and I shouldn’t like it because—

BETSY
I know.

SUE
We could. I dunno. You wanna. Like drop out?

BETSY
Nah. I’d miss the cheese.

SUE
Yeah.

BETSY
The cheese.

(They think about the cheese.)

SUE
Okay so just to be clear… is this a date?

BETSY
Oh. No. I mean. No. Except. Okay. Maybe. I don’t like girls, but okay, yes. Yes. But we’re not dropping out though?

SUE
No.

BETSY
Okay.


-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Enter Your Email To Have New Blog Posts Sent To You

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Support The Blog
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mailing list to be invited to Adam's events
Email:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Books by Adam (Amazon)