Intermission
a creative coffee break from writing the play

Thanks to Malachy for alerting me that my eMail was down. Believe it works. Apologies to all who tried to write and were met with the dreaded bounce-back.

Cheers, my dears.

Twice last night, I had to get up from bed to write down ideas I did not want to lose. A good thing, too, as I had forgotten these important ideas completely until I walked into my office this morning, saw my scribbles on the white-board, and two emails I’d written myself in my inbox.

I’m in the middle of finishing up a re-write of another play, written a year ago. It’s been a year of something nagging at me, telling me something was not quite right. As a staged reading for this play has been looming, and I was struggling for how to approach the re-write, I sent the play to an accomplished playwright. In fifteen minutes, I had the answer for how to find my way into the re-write. Whether that was her wisdom, or my willingness to hear, doesn’t really matter. I suspect both. The problems she pointed out, made me laugh at myself, and she noted that a dramaturg is often a kind of therapist to the script. Well, that’s a paraphrase of sorts. Worked for me, and I am grateful to her.

The re-write meant I combined two characters into one, and brought another character into more prominence within the story. These changes strengthened the main character, and I believe, the play as a whole. As a result, some of the mysticism present in the script had to go, and I was very sad about that. Also, an idea about family formed through friendships was necessarily diluted. And, yes, a lot of little things changed, and minor moments even became bigger ones. I found several areas where choices made were given to secondary characters instead of main characters, and those areas were also corrected. (I hate that I do that! I think I’m finally learning…)

The night before I left for London, I sent the re-write to MBH. This is the testament of a friend, who in the midst of his own projects and great time pressures, read my play and gave me detailed notes on my return home. I could tell, while he thought the re-writes were good and strong, he missed the mysticism of the last draft. (And so he told me.) I miss it too. It no longer is the same script, and the mysticism does not fit the story.

MBH pointed out a couple of places where I ended a scene late, and diluted what the characters were going for. I kept a log of his notes in my Notetaker file for the play. In the process of transcribing those notes, more inspired ideas came to me and I tracked those as well. At this point, I keep a check-off list in Notetaker, to ensure I hit all the notes I want to hit.

I’m excited about the new version of this play, the nagging feeling now
put to rest. It is the play I meant to write the first time out with it. Here’s hoping the theatre putting up the staged reading
will feel the same way, after I send them the revision in a few
short days.

It is easy to remove beloved ideas, lines, characters from one play when you know they can be resurrected into another.

So it always feels whenever I see theatre outside of my beloved home town. Although in this case, the grass literally was green everywhere. With the impending rains, our grass soon will be.

Entering London, the inspector (you know that person at the airport you must speak to and explain why you want to be in their fair country), when discovering we had theatre plans, opined the current production of Tom and Viv was not as good as the original. I pondered the likelihood of someone entering the US and having a similar encounter.

London is my new favorite City, after New York. And, okay, San Francisco, as we still know how to stage things up here, if only on the streets at Halloween. For a history buff, wondering the streets are a joy. Visiting off-season, there were no lines anywhere we went. At Westminister Abby, I was able to take time to enjoy moments, such as seeing Elizabeth I’s tomb, and her likeness carved from her death mask. I did not expect to be awestruck by Stonehenge, yet I was by this place-looking-so-much-like-an-outdoor-stage.

Standing outside Bow Street Magistrates Court, I could see Oscar Wilde entering this building, on his way to be tried for "gross indecencies." This court shut down earlier this year, and rumor has it will become a hotel. It was at Bow Street, on this date in 1928, that the great Radclyffe Hall found her novel, The Well of Loneliness, banned as obscene. Despite selling over nine million copies during her day, the book would not be published in Britain until 1949, several years after her death.

An absolutely thrilling play was Drunk Enough to Say I Love You, by Caryl Churchill, one of my all time favorite playwrights. I also very much enjoyed Tom Stoppard’s Rock ‘n Roll. A few years back, I dragged the Beloved to a revival of Jumpers, which she, sadly, hated. There was much at stake in proving to her Stoppard was enjoyable and understandable. I am glad to say Rock ‘n Roll managed to purge her previous misgivings. And gave me opportunity, later over dinner, to wax on about Václav Havel.

My Beloved loves musicals, and so we saw Mary Poppins, which was not as bad as (why do people think Elton can write musicals?) Lestat, but close enough. Maybe that’s too harsh. Poppins was awful. I figure the rave reviews for Poppins is a cultural thing I do not understand. *ahem* And yes, there is a double standard. I pay dearly for dragging the Beloved to bad plays, yet she does not pay so in return for dragging me to a bad musical. That is the nature of our relationship.

Okay, and confessing we did see Wicked, which makes five times we’ve seen this show. (You have to, uh, understand, we saw this before it ever reached Broadway.) The London production was the best of the lot, complete with a great, one of a kind, theatrical moment, when the curtain came down abruptly near the end of Act 1. Right after, "One Short Day," for those of you in the know. An announcement was made that Idina Menzel was ill and unable to finish the show. The teenager in front of us, burst into tears at this news, and I don’t think recovered enough to watch Idina’s standby, Kerry Ellis, finish Act 1 with the best performance of "Defying Gravity" ever witnessed. (Well,outside of Idina.) By the end of Act 2, said teenager meekly conceded a standing ovation for Ms. Ellis.

Two things I enjoyed in London theatre. The applause, when deserved (well, except for Poppins, I still do not understand, go see the movie instead) was always enthusiastic delivered. What a joy to sit in a theatre with audiences who do not stand up and cheer actors for showing up and breathing. Also, the pacing of shows, while they did not seem slow at all, did seem to be slower than what happens on American stages. And I could hear every word being said. The productions I saw did not seem to be afraid of silence, or of taking a breath now and then.

My body and brain are still trying to determine what time zone I’m in.

An outstanding post today by Jane Espenson on "too much."

I hoped that it would encourage [gay people] in general to declare themselves, to face up to a hostile world in their true colours, and this with dignity and courage.

Radclyffe Hall, on one of the reasons why she wrote The Well of Loneliness.

My first acting gig was when I was eight years old. I played “The Blue Fairy” in my third grade production of Pinocchio. I was cast for my looks, certainly not my talent. Besides, I wanted to play the puppet boy. Sure, I looked awfully pretty in the blue dress my mother slaved over for me, and I was the only actor allowed to wear shoes because mine sparkled. Looks alone, however, could not carry me through part. Sadly, suffering from grave stage fright, I could not laugh on cue. And, it’s true, I still cannot. A few years ago, I hung out with an actors group who got together to read plays. They let me read the stage directions. I’m pretty sure they still meet secretly without me. I am a bad actor, and I remain in awe of those who can bring characters to life.

My first play in a real theatre was circa 1972, on a high school outing to see Cyrano de Bergerac, at ACT in San Francisco. I was swept away with Cyrano, Christian and Roxane, and thought, “I want to do this.” No, definitely not act. “This” as in create the experience for those of us watching the stage. Soon afterwards, I read Albee’s The Zoo Story for the first time, which cemented my desire to write plays. Two very different theatrical experiences, indeed.

It would, however, be many years before I finally turned to writing plays with any seriousness. Is there a contradiction there, somewhere? Plays and seriousness?

Cheers…I am off to London to mark a birthday.