Holidays: 1, Writing: 0

Great gluttonous gods, you guys. The holidays.

Between the many logistics and ever-changing variables of planning a holiday season with two families, plus a move to a new place and all the requisite unpacking that ensues, the writing has been not so much.

The ambition, though? STILL STRONG.

To wit: There's a two-year playwrighting fellowship I really want to do, and they need from me, by January 30th, a full-length play.

I don't have one of those.

(Well, okay, I do. But wrote it between 2003 and 2004, and it wouldn't at all be the best representation of how I write now. However it is I write now.)

So I need to write a full-length play, which is something I've been wanting to do for awhile anyway, but I'm only just getting comfortable with ten-minute plays. Full-length ones are a whole different beast.

They're much longer than ten minutes, for one. For another, the ten-minute plays people have been responding to lately feature characters who are kind of open to intrepretation, placed in a funny/tense situation that I know the director and actors will exploit to the fullest. If I've succeeded, there's a gut punch of earnestness and truth admidst all the bwah ha ha, and then it's over.

I could do that in a longer format, of course. But the pacing will be very different, and maybe the characters have to be more fleshed out, less open to interpretation. (For one, I'll probably have to give them names...)

Or maybe not. Maybe I'm just overthinking things, per usual. Maybe I should just do what I do and see what happens.

After the holidays. I swear.

Week Thirty One: Story about God's favorite who falls...

Don't panic: the quotation marks above stand for "Story about." The scribbed idea before it also started with "Story about..." and so I was trying to save myself the agony of having to write it twice, which I have now done anyway, lo all these long years later.

So the complete prompt reads:

Story about God's favorite who falls, but doesn't know it.

I think originally I wanted to do some kind of epic/badass tale of a fallen archangel who's gone rogue and is still inflicting Old Testament wrath (now that I type all that out, it sounds suspiciously like the Kevin Smith movie Dogma), but this gives me an idea for a short play that could be both funny and meaningful. Pointed, even. 

Who else wants to attempt this one?

Week Twenty Six: Use objects instead of showing them

Heyyyy welcome back! Hope your Labor Day weekend (if you celebrate it) was relaxing and such.

For those following along at home, I cranked out five short plays in just over two hours for my 31 Plays in 31 Days challenge, bringing the total to (YES) thirty one on Friday afternoon, just moments before leaving for Vacationland. 

Wooooo me! Read 'em here if you dare. I was surprised by how much fun I was able to have with them, and I think there's at least a few keepers in there worthy of revision and then... production? WE SHALL SEE.

So anyway, back to the task at hand. Quit showin' yer objects, wouldja? Use 'em—that's what they're for! The gun is not sleek and cool in your palm—the gun goes off. 

It's more of an imperative than a writing prompt, but I think some interesting stuff could come of it. 

300 words by Sunday (September 8th) at midnight.

Where is Week Twenty Six?

Okay, time to fess up: I'm blowing this week off to crank out the last of my 31 Plays in 31 Days effort. I'm off to Vacationland as of Friday afternoon, so I need to post and upload six more of these suckers between now and then. CAN HE DO IT?

Check 'em out if you haven't! My favorites are probably Bad Day, Eh and How to Eat a Fresh Maine Blobster. Going Viral is also pretty funny.

In the meanwhile, here's a beautiful and eloquently stated piece about art and life and work and passion and also dinosaurs.

What are you working on?

My anti-resume

In response to my post about Monica Byrne's tracking process, Independent Clause says:

I love the anti resume! I do not have anything near the math skills to figure out what my personal rejection rate is, but I'll try some awkward poet math and see what I come up with. I'll post mine if you post yours.

Heh, you're definitely going to win this one. Prior to this year, I submitted pitifully little: Agni and maybe Ploughshares right out of grad school. Some random online things: something called My Geek in the House that paid me $10 minus PayPal fees and then went bust. The Boston Theater Marathon off and on for several years.

But as of this year...

Boston Theater Marathon XV:
Accepted!
Hovey Summer Shorts Festival 2013:
Accepted!
Moments of Play Ten-Minute Play Festival:
Rejected
VisionFest 2013:
Rejected
Blue Slipper 10-Minute Play Festival:
They cancelled the festival indefinitely...? Not sure how to classify this.
Hit & Run VII:
Rejected
New Works Festival 2014:
Rejected

So that's two of out seven: ~28% acceptance? Or 33% if we're not counting ten-minute play festivals that died before their time through no (apparent) fault of my own. However, it does seem that I'm driving my average down by continuing to submit...

I actually had to look up several of these to find out whether or not I had been rejected. Turns out I've been so busy writing that I haven't had the time to compulsively hit "refresh" on all those festival websites.

That's a good thing!

Alright, Indy Clause. Your turn. Be gentle.

Week Twenty Five: Order'd!

This 'un is mine!

It's another cross post with my 31 Plays in 31 Days effort. You can see that I am a little behind. Excited by what I've come up with, though.

Now that I have showed you mine, I entreat you to show me yours.

Week Twenty Four: Planned!

Yep, another play. Last last week, I'm doubling up my Unwritten Word prompts with my 31 Plays in 31 Days challenge. 

Read it here. Read it, I say!

So, whatcha got? Where izzit? 100 words! Write 'em now if you haven't. Anyone can write 100 words. Especially you. You moreso than most. 

Give 'em here!

Week Twenty Three: Intelligent'ed!

I decided to use this prompt in conjunction with this August's 31 Plays in 31 Days challenge I'm attempting.

Synergy!

You can read my stab at Week Twenty Three's prompt here, and you can read the other plays I've completed so far here at my professionalish website.

(Because one impossible writerly challenge is not enough—he needs two.)

But back to Week Twenty Three: Share 'em! Link 'em! Write 'em! (Possibly not in that order.)

Reflections on Week Fourteen

[Read the completed play here.]

So the final result is not quite dreams mixed with everyday life. I don't know if I'm clever enough to pull that off in a way that is both deep and compelling. Instead, what I decided to focus on was the idea of something that is not your life mixing so deeply with your life that it's not clear where one begins and the other ends.

Yes, folks: smart phones.

[I don't have a vendetta or anything. Mine is an artist's detached interest.]

Once I figured out the setup, my fear with this play was that it would be too slice-of-life: no story, nothing for the audience to relate to. Pretty quickly, however, my problem was the opposite: these characters wanted to banter with full abandon, and it was all I could do to hold them back.

The play didn't really come together until I realized that I had written the second half of the play before the first. I went back and tried to show how the technology had mixed with and even co-opted their lives, and took the time to work toward a more gradual build of conflict. And, though I was building up Dan's crush on Jenn, I expected what ultimately happens between Jenn and Ashley to be the climax—I didn't even see Dan and Jenn's parting moment coming until it was right there. 

It's that moment, for me, that makes this a play. Relationships will always be more interesting to me than making a statement, I guess. The best I can hope for is to express meaning through the relationship. 

And hopefully I have done that here.

Next up, Week Fifteen!

Week Fourteen: Dreams - mixed with everyday life? Premonitions?

Little smudgy, this prompt. Maybe smudgy enough that you didn't notice how Freshman-me mispelled "premonitions"? 

Sounds like I was reaching for something pretty "deep" with this one. Do I remember what, exactly? I do not.

However! Given my recent successes with playwrighting I've been hungry to try my hand at another ten-minute play.

This seems like a decent place to start.