All Eyes on Me

I met with my teacher today to discuss this semester. I'm pretty happy with this plan, and my adviser seems to have good impressions of all my  projects. They are, in the fulfillment of my thesis requirements:

- a new full-length project. This will focus on two famous outlaws featured in The Stand. I've got lots of bits and pieces telling this story, but now I will see what sort of complete narrative I can make out of them.

- a revision of a full-length project. I will be going back over the screenplay of The Tailor of Riddling Way. I love this story, and I did a pretty decent job with this project, but I'm excited to have the chance to make it stronger. It's got some definite problems right now that I want to fix.

- a new ten-minute play. Don't know what this will be yet, but I'm sure I can figure it out. I've been pretty good at generating ten-minute plays lately.

- a seminar to be presented to fellows students at the next residency. My teacher liked the idea of my idea to talk about "writing taking the practicalities of theatrical production into consideration." Stuff like "actors can't change clothes in zero seconds" or "keep track of where the props are" and the sort of things you don't necessarily realize if you've never experienced how theater is put together. 

It'll be a lot of work, but I'm pretty excited about it. I think I can do some good work. 

Tonight is my reading. I'm a little nervous, not sure why. But this is a very cool thing that's happening for my writing, so I need to just enjoy it. Thanks to everybody who comes to support me and make me feel less adrift. 

So off and on I've been working on back-engineering the script for the Tailor audio drama from the first draft of the Tailor screenplay I wrote for last semester. I think I have finished at least a first draft of the third installment, which I'm calling What She Started. Every installment has been a little bit shorter than the previous one, which I'm a bit concerned about, but maybe it doesn't really matter as long as the break points make sense. There will probably be one more episode after this to conclude the story.

If you read the screenplay, it's very similar but visual things are translated more into dialogue here. Instead of the viewer simply seeing a dusty bookshelf of classical texts in one corner of the bedroom, Tom comments on it here. I confess I am a little dissastisfied that I haven't managed to fix certain things about the story that my teacher pointed out. Like, for example, he thinks I should have Officer Crier appear again before the very end, so this episode would be the one for it. But I still haven't figured out how to make him come back. So this script will likely need editing from the version below. If anyone has any suggestions, please let me know. This is something I will definitely need for the second draft of the screenplay, and I think it would improve the audio drama as well.

( Episode 3: What She Started )

All right, it's looking like the Tailor film script is about ten times too long to be posted here in LJ, so I am trying a different tack. I am posting the script in its entirety on Blogger and linking to it here.

Also, check out this neat little title graphic I made by turning a sketch of the Atonement dress blue! ;-)

In an effort to refocus myself on the projects that are important to me, I thought I'd give a rundown of, if not ALL the projects I have in the works, the ones that currently in the forefront of my mind.

The Tailor of Riddling Way, in two forms. There is of course the original audio drama form, but lately I have been working more on the film version that I am making for my Screenwriting grad school class. The story is translating pretty nicely, even working better in some ways because I can show in a visual medium rather than tell everything, and my teacher has given me both positive feedback and very useful constructive criticism. I haven't been posting my film script pieces here because they're not completely different from the audio drama stuff I've already showed you, but when I finish it I think I will post it here in its entirety. It's kind of cool to think that by the end of the next month I will have finished an entire screenplay, even if only the first draft.

I'm also working on my fantasy novel idea, Fallen. I've had this idea since senior year of high school to tell the story of a demon found and raised by a Catholic organization to fight on their side against the forces of hell while struggling to cope with what seems to be the inherent evil in his nature. I've been working on scenes here and there to submit to my Science Fiction and Fantasy study. What I've done has been posted here if you'd care to read it.

Those are the major ones I need to focus on. But there's some other stuff that I've been thinking about lately too.

I would like the first full-length play I write to be Mrs. Hawking. This piece is set in the Victorian era and about a sort of female Sherlock Holmes whose withdrawal from the world and growing distrust for humanity seems to be getting in the way of her good work until she is forced by her well-meaning nephew to take on a young lady housekeeper, Mary Stone, who turns out to be the companion she's been lacking. I love mysteries, I love that period setting, and I love the dynamic between the embittered middle-aged lady and the young woman whose perseverance through her hard luck begins to draw Mrs. Hawking out of her shell. And perhaps it's naughty of me to cast already, but it helps that I am totally imagining crearespero as Mrs. Hawking and nennivian as Mary. <3 There are a couple of scenes from this piece posted here.

There's also my short humorous larp idea, Break a Leg. My fourth (FOURTH!) metatheatrical piece to date, this humorous two-hour larp will have eight players as members of a dysfunctional theater troupe whose leading lady has been found suddenly dead two hours before the curtain is supposed to go up. I have already bid it for SLAW in November and Intercon in March, but I am planning on finishing it way before then. It's small enough that I could probably get several runs in beforehand. It will involve an interactive environment and sides for in-game performance opportunities... which I will have to write. :-)

Those are the majors ones. There's other things I plan on working on eventually, and though they are not currently at my mind's forefront, sometimes I noodle on them as well. Imperium, my Ancient Roman larp. Sundan, my Shakespearean-style epic tragedy about a man who destroys himself and everyone around him when the woman he loves marries another man. And a possible project for the next semester of school that is percolating in the dark recesses of my mind...

But these are the ones you can expect to see more of in the near future.

I was a productive little worker Bee over the last few days. I set several goals for myself to accomplish this weekend and I believe I managed every one of them. What I have done includes:

- Finishing my first assignment for screenwriting
- Writing an additional scene for Tailor
- Incorporating ten thousand steps of walking into my routine
- Making headway into my sewing text
- Starting the first Hipster Feminist plot line
- Cleaning my room

I have also consumed several gallons of apple cider in an effort to stave off my chronic dehydration, but that's probably not an accomplishment so much.

Still that leaves a number of things. First and foremost, I need to do my first assignment for science fiction and fantasy. Unfortunately I put this off a lot in favor of the screenwriting assignment, so I don't have a ton of time left for this. I'll chunk this out better for the second round of assignments.

I also really have to edit that additional scene for Tailor. In my desire to just get it done, I broke with my usual pattern of tweaking as I go and instead just banged out the scene from start to finish. Jared and Kindness were the first to read it, and they both gave the extremely spot-on criticism that there isn't enough conflict in the scene. There needs to be more of a struggle for the information to come out, as it is information Kenneth would want to conceal. Plus, conflict raises tension, always necessary for drama. Kenneth is the character Jared is playing, and in the course of developing his performance he tends to internalize a very well-defined idea of who his character is, and Kenneth just spilling his guts wasn't in the conception he'd gotten of the man. Kindness is a man of excellent artistic taste, who I thank for being Palamon-like enough to give it to me straight, both on the positives and the negatives of what he sees in my pieces. I was lucky they were my first responders to the scene, because now I know what I have to do to fix it.

Now that I've taken the plunge and begun the first-ever tweet chain plot for Hipster Feminist, I need to be on top of where the action's going. I am now two tweets in, so there's no going back. ;-) I haven't done as much working out of the storyline or the tweets illustrating thereof as I would have liked, so I have to get on it. They tend to come out funnier when I come up with them in advance and I can tweak them into optimum shape.

For the second round of Festival I got into Folding the River. I was torn very much between it and High Rollers, but I'd already told the GMs I would be signing up, so I decided to let that decide for me. Neither Paranoia or The Stand have filled yet, but neither are in the time slots that people tend to prioritize, so I am hoping that once signups go open on Monday night we will get our full complements. Paranoia was in theory supposed to be modular, so it might be able to work if we have to excise parts, but frankly I think that fell by the wayside enough that we'd have to do a lot of fixing to make it work. The Stand is not really able to work without pretty much the entire cast-- I could maybe cut out two roles, max, without having to do major surgery --so I really really want it to fill.

In other news, I have finished my first screenwriting assignment and have decided to declare my afternoon and evening free. I am now making a list of things I'd like to do with that open time. I would like to take a walk into town, maybe run an errand or two, maybe just walk. It occurred to me recently that even if I get back to going to the gym as often as I did in undergrad, back then I was also walking across campus three or four times a day in addition, which I am definitely not getting now. So I am determined not only to make time for workouts, but also just get off my lazy ass and walk during the day. It means a significantly greater time commitment, unfortunately, but I think if I schedule correctly I can make it work. It would be worth it to shape up a little. 

I want to finish another scene for Tailor that I've started but not yet made much progress on. It's the confrontation between Tom and Kenneth where we finally learn why Kenneth's been hanging around with so much interest in the Lorings. We recorded a scene between Plesser and Jared this week, which has inspired me. I would also like to have it for the Artist Meetup morethings5 and I have planned this weekend, where we use each other as accountability partners to keep us working on our artistic projects. Maybe I'll noodle a little on my short-quick-easy larp idea, since I'm feeling particularly engaged in larp production right now.

Finally, it'd be nice to make a little more progress with my new beginner sewing text, Sew Everything Workshop. I've gotten a little ways in and so far it's exactly what I was looking for. It starts with the basics and explains them very clearly. So far I haven't learned anything I didn't already know, but I like things that emphasize the foundation and confirm that I understand correctly before moving on to what I don't already grasp. I'm anxious to get to the part where it actually walks you through a sewing project, which is what I think I really need.

Oh, and one last thing. I recently decided that the first "plot line" I'd like to feature on Hipster Feminist is a story about Rhoda stalking an ex-boyfriend. Not sure how that's going to work yet, but I think it has the potential to be very funny. Maybe I'll do a little work figuring out the storyline and seeing how I can chunk it out into individually funny, one hundred and forty-character pieces.

As you can perhaps tell by the fact that this is my third post of the day, I am feeling ruminative and mentally unsettled. I certainly have a lot on my plate, most of which I put there myself, but I am trying to determine what I should be focusing on that will soothe a certain creative restlessness I'm feeling. I am not sure if I need more things to do to serve as light alternatives to my big, work-intensive priorities, or if I need to not take anything else on so I can balance my project load with relaxation.

Schoolwork is the big priority; my first due date is February 13th, about two and a half weeks from now, so I'd better get cracking. I think this Sunday, which is mostly free, will be devoted to homework. I usually need big chunks of time to really dig into writing. Then there's also The Tailor of Riddling Way. I am proud of myself that I've finished writing the first two episodes, and even gotten one scene recorded. But I think it's going to need two more episodes at least, so at best I'm only halfway through, and there's a ton more recording to do. I am feeling good about and getting satisfaction out of this project, but it's requiring a lot of mental energy. I kind of wish I was working on something easy that gave me the same feeling.

What with all the talk of larps, naturally my thoughts turn to my own larp writing. One of the reasons I got so absorbed in larp writing was that it has a built-in audience and is easy to find a venue to get that "feedback from the public" to give me the validation I crave. So right now, the idea of working on my Ancient Roman larp idea Imperium has become very attractive. But I do not want to let larp writing get in the way of the other writing that I should be prioritizing right now. And of couse this excitement never takes into account the fact that larps too always eventually hit the point where writing it is a slog. It's just something different, something that hasn't become tough yet, that I can imagine the fun of running to player adulation.

I wish I had an idea for a short, sweet, easy larp that I could write without a lot of time or effort that would still turn out well. Sadly, as many times as this has occurred to me, I've never been able to think of anything that I could pull off in that way. If anyone has any suggestions, I'd be open to hearing them. It would be nice to have such a larp that I can run, easy for me and fun for the players.

I think one of the reasons for my restlessness is that I miss acting. I've done a lot of writing and directing recently, two of my major passions, but it's been forever since I've acted in anything, and I'm feeling the deficit. It was looking like I might have been able to go out for a part in Lenny's indepedent study show, Cymbeline, which I was excited about. But it turns out that it goes up the same weekend as Festival of the Larps, one of the most important weekends of my year, so participating is out of the question. For some reason, Titus is also the same weekend as Intercon, making both larp cons happening over shows. I am very disappointed about Lenny's show. I have another audition lined up for this Sunday night, but I'm not optimistic that it will work out any different than the last twenty-odd times before it.

I thought I would post what I have of Episode 2 of The Tailor of Riddling Way. This includes a couple of sections already posted, now just in context. All of Episode 1 is present in pieces by scene, but with some effort and focus I managed to get the majority of the second part written in time for the read through. Here it is now in case you would like to read it. There will likely be at least one more scene to it, which I am currently working on and will post when I finish.

( Episode 2: House Full of Secrets begins... )