breakinglight11 | Entries tagged with to think of nothing

October Review Challenge, #13 - "What’s an old shame in your writing past?"

So I have only recently gotten to the point in my writing career where I can stand anything I wrote from more than a year or two ago. I suppose it’s a good thing that I’ve grown and improved as a writer as time goes on, but my natural tendency to be ashamed of all my imperfections means a lot of my earlier work is intensely embarrassing for me to look back at. I’m the kind of person who at least once a day thinks of some stupid thing I did when I was a kid and cringes, so you can imagine how painful my more recent bad art is to me.

Most of the stuff I’ve made, at least as an adult— I don’t even try to look at anything made before college —there’s at least something about it that was okay. Even if it was only the idea. But the stuff I included thinking it was good sometimes is intensely embarrassing, like, WHAT WAS I THINKING? THAT IS OBVIOUSLY A DUMB SONG LYRIC YOU STOLE WHAT WAS WRONG WITH YOU?

I can’t bear to look back at my first real play, To Think of Nothing. It’s wordy, it’s a little overwrought with its pseudo-classical diction. I recently looked at Mrs. Loring, the play I wrote for my thesis, and... ugh. The idea’s okay, and there’s some okay moments. But it would need a complete overhaul to not be embarrassing. Even the first Mrs. Hawking play I think needs to be rewritten. It’s not all bad, obviously, but... it’s from eight years ago and it can just be so much better with our current level of skill. But I think the thing I’d have to pick is my first larp, Alice.

Photo by Mark Edwards

It was my goth reinterpretation of Alice in Wonderland. And again, it’s not all bad, and for a first larp, it’s got a lot going for it. But it was written during a really bad period and I put a ton of negativity into it, so it’s a bit on the ridiculous side of grimdark. It has too many characters, some of whom either didn’t get enough plot or got plots that I wasn’t sophisticated enough to realize were not compelling. And I didn’t know enough about content notes and that sort of thing to properly label it for some of the themes and subject matter. I exposed larpers to stuff they probably didn’t necessarily sign up for. I really didn’t know what I was doing, as writer and as GM, in a lot of ways.

I know it’s all a process. I know you have to move through the bad stuff to do the good stuff, that practice and learning from failure is the only way you get better. But still, UGH WHAT WAS I THINKING WHY DID I DO SUCH DUMB STUFF???

Tossing around an idea in my head. I discovered recently there's a theater around that will rent out a small performance space for private people to put on one-night engagements. I could get a thirty-seat theater with basic tech for an evening for the cost of fifty dollars. It's a small thing, but I am thinking of going for it and putting on some little production just to get something put on. I put in an inquiry about a weekend date sometime in late August or so, to see if it's possible, and maybe get myself on the calendar.

The question would be what to put on. I have been looking at Aria da Capo, a strange and beautiful little one act play by Edna St. Vincent-Millay that I've wanted to direct for a while, but I think it might be a better use of the opportunity to get a piece of my own work out there. Still, what would that be? I only have one one-act that I think is worth putting on and that's To Think of Nothing. Since it's going to be such a small event, I will likely only get people I know coming, and most of the people who would come have already seen that. It'd be another thing if I thought I could get more of the public to come, get more exposure for the piece I'm most proud of, but again, it's only a thirty-seat theater for one night. Probably not going to happen that way.

I have a couple of ten-minute plays, and people do present collections of them as evenings of theater, but I'm not sure I like putting them all together given how little relation they have to one another. But one idea I did have-- so remember how I was musing about how neat it was my humorous ten-minute piece Just So could be cast as men, as women, as men in drag, or women in drag? I thought that maybe it could be played four times in a row, each time with a differently gendered cast, and blocked differently each time to emphasize what was funny about that particular gendering. I would be concerned that it might get boring seeing the same sketch four times, though the piece is short enough (I think it actually runs only about eight minutes) that might not be too big a problem. I would also have to be sure I could come up with blocking that was different enough for each piece to make the point and keep the audience entertained.

Or, if I'm not sure I could do that, I could write something new. Maybe something that even better facilitated being run four times with differently gendered casting. Or just something else entirely. Have to think about that.

Any ideas?

After a great deal of wrangling, adapting, and making hard decisions, with the release of the Margaret list I was able to nail down the cast of Merely Players. Our ragtag but intrepid troupe The Walking Shadows shall be portrayed as follows:

Cornelia, the Director - Stephanie Karol
Sylvia, the Ingenue - Gabrielle Geller
Dionyza, the Diva - April Farmer
Malcolm, the Lead - Ben Federlin
Orlando, the Lover - Andrew Prentice
Arcite, the Fool - Lenny Somervell
Valeria, the First Chorus - Jenna Schlags
Cressida, the Second Chorus - Emma Lieberman
Charmian, the Third Chorus - Miriam Goldman
Audrey, the Stage Manager - Carolyn Daitch

As always, I had more people than I could use, which meant some talented, awesome actors could not be cast. And since I'd made a promise to prioritize those with smaller roles or no roles in Margaret, or even those that weren't booked up by other shows, that meant certain poeple who I would normally leap to work with could not be chosen in fairness to the stated mission. *sigh* Let it not be said that I am not a woman of my word, even when it requires me to make some cuts that pain me. It was really important to me to do right by the club, and I feel like I can say that I did.

Looking at the complete list, it strikes me how little overlap there is with this list with those of the previous shows I've directed. To Think of Nothing had three actors in common with Hamlet, probably the three that struck me the most with their particular abilities, while this show has none. There's only one actor from To Think of Nothing in it, though not for lack of trying. Much as I miss them, it does kind of make me feel good that I was able to use a number of people tried out for To Think of Nothing that I wasn't able to cast that time, not for their lack of talent, but just because I didn't have room. I assured them once that I still though they were worthy in my estimation even though I had no parts for them, and it's kind of nice to be able to make good on that assurance now. And it's good to work with new people, to vary up your theatrical experience. It may help me improve and grow as a director.

The first read through is tonight. As I did for To Think of Nothing, I plan on cooking dinner for all those lovely souls who will be contributing their time and effort to act out this play. I think it's a nice way to start off the working relationship. Got to win goodwill from your actors straight off, and God knows if you feed those creatures you've won their loyalty for life.

This is the first part of what I submitted for my blank verse assignment, in which my beloved Palamon critiques his actor brother Zephyrus's acting arms. I'm not a hundred percent pleased with it, as the language is not perfect. I had to make a lot of concession in word choice to fit the meter, and in word choice and structure because I've been warned to not use "archaic" diction. :-P Not sure this is how I want characters in this universe, specifically the one in which To Think of Nothing takes place, to talk. Not sure Palamon sounds enough like Palamon. But for an early attempt at writing in this form, I think I managed relatively smooth lines of poetry. Judge for yourself how well I did.
( Read more... )

So last night I did some serious work on my blank verse writing assignment. I don't know how good it is, but it's something, it's an honest effort with some substance to it. But I kind of like the topic at least, because I am writing about the conflict between Palamon, the fan favorite character from To Think of Nothing, and the younger brother of his who craves his approval.

There is a quick mention of a person in To Think of Nothing named Zephyrus as someone who attended an earlier show written by Cassander. Zephyrus is, in fact, Palamon's younger brother, who, to create contrast with his sibling, I decided is an actor who wants and never feels he gets the approval of the renowned theater critic he's related to. With that in mind, stuck for something to write about, I decided to write about the brothers working their crafts against one another.

I love the character of Palamon, It's weird to say about your own character, who hopefully ends up as whatever you designed him to be, but I find him so fun and charming and funny with an honesty that cuts through the bullshit to the bone, and I love it. This is shaped not only by my own intentions but by the fabulous performance of

morethings5. Nobody could have played him more perfectly than Kindness, whose rendition made the character loveable, amusing, and yet still with that sharp incisiveness that gives him weight in addition to his comedy.

There you have it, the only one with the guts to sit in Cassander's chair. I just want to write reams and reams about him, so I've been craving a chance to use him in something again. And I'm amused by the fact that I'm writing him to speak in blank verse. I will post the results when I'm finished, which knowing me will likely not be before Friday, the last possible day I have to work on it.

I also need to get started on my regular playwrighting assignment. I was struck today with the notion to use two characters from The Stand, of all places. A PC and an NPC, the one who kind of captured my imagination and made me think there could be all kind of cool stories written about him. I can't work on that until I finish the stuff with the more pressing deadline, but that could be interesting to work on as well. Heh, though I think it would be spoilery for those who have not played the game.

My move is today. After two solid weeks of work, the household is finally ready to go. I am anxiously awaiting the moment when I can get started, but in the meantime am trying to think about something else.

I sent my mom pictures of my skirt that I've been working on, partially to show off, partially to encourage her to send up the sewing machine already. ("See how much labor you'll save me if I don't have to do all this by hand?") When I explained the waistband application tehcnique that I messed up, she knew exactly what I should have done, but said the way I fixed it was a good idea. She's one of those people who's good at everything, particularly artistic or crafty things, and she taught herself to sew quite capably in order to make the various costume pieces that her two theatrically-inclined children required over the years.

Probably the nicest and most labor-intensive thing she ever made was when Casey was cast as Romeo in his school's production his senior year of high school. Unimpressed with the rather slapdash job the woman in charge of costuming was doing, she designed a beautiful blue doublet and made it herself. It's a beautiful thing, totally reversible with blue crushed velvet on one side and a shiny tapestry-like blue and metallic on the other. With my larping and Shakespeare, she gave it to me and I have found a lot of use for it. Brenda wore it when she played the Duke in Comedy of Errors for Hold Thy Peace, and more recently Plesser wore it to play Damon in my show To Think of Nothing. It was quite serendipitous that I had it, because I always knew that I wanted Damon in blue as well as somewhat Elizabethan. (Actually, now that I think about it, it was worn by the original Cassander the first time the play was put on at my high school, which I found inappropriate for a number of reasons, but I didn't have anything to do with that production besides the writing of it.) Here is Plesser wearing it as Damon:

Mom said she learned a lot while making it, and that whenever she came across something in the instructions she didn't understand, she would try the technique out in miniature on separate fabric so that she would make sure she did it properly before trying to apply it to the doublet. I think this is a great idea, and plan on adopting this method myself. It's still short of making full muslin, which is something I think I'll need to move into the more complicated the things I try to sew become, but it looks like a good idea for teaching myself new techniques.

One nice thing about getting into a stage and screen program is that I might just be able to write all the scripts I've been wanting to write for ages but never could justify committing the time to.

You all know I love the classics, particuarly Shakespeare. I've always wanted to attempt a full-length five-act play in the style of Shakespeare, shooting for the poetic blank verse dialogue in iambic pentameter and telling a suitably epic story. Not that I think I am a poet on that level by any stretch of the imagination, but I love the style and would love to try to see if I could make something decent. Though To Think of Nothing was not written in verse, it was an exercise in writing poetic dialogue, and I have always been pretty pleased with how it came out. It is pleasing to the ear, suitably old-sounding, and yet not excessively difficult or unnatural to say. In fact, I found it easier to write good dialogue in that style than I do in modern style. So maybe if I worked hard enough, I could produce something in blank verse iambic pentameter that wasn't half bad. I was thinking of using the story of the Byzantine rulers Justinian and Theodora as the subject. I always liked them and their romance, set against the backdrop of the Byzantine political struggles. I don't know, maybe that's final thesis material.

At the other end of the spectrum, my distaste and dissatisfaction with the Vagina Monologues has made me want to write my own version. Not exactly women talking about their vaginas, but women talking about life, sex, gender, relationships, friends, work, family, motherhood, and other aspects of how living as women intersects with feminism. But, as I see it, more genuinely feminist than the VMs. I haven't thought it out much, but I thought it might be interesting.

There's also some of my previous work, like the screenplay I wrote the first part of for class at Brandeis, or Paschal Moon, the other one act I wrote for Playwrighting. Maybe I could submit it for credit, and work on completing, improving, and revising. I never really was happy with the screenplay, which was inspired by the childhood of my grandfather and I would really like to be good. Who knows? Maybe my teachers will want specific things, or maybe I'll have the freedom to use what I want.

Earlier this week I received notice that I was accepted into the Writing for Stage and Screen MFA program at Lesley University. :-)

I am really pleased by this. I have been ready to move forward professionally for a while now, and getting into this program will give me a chance to develop my writing as well as work towards an advanced degree. It's a two-year low-residency program, which means I will generate several significant pieces of writing and critical analysis over the course of four semesters and be in correspondance with a professor who will give me feedback and guide a process of revision.

I got in on the strength of To Think of Nothing, since that was the piece I used to apply. All four professors who made the decision liked it a lot, which makes me feel really good. The program also gives opportunities for plays to be staged, and entrances into competitions to have work more widely recognized. That's pretty exciting.

It doesn't start until June, so I have some time to kill before then. I still need to figure out the finances of this, so I'm glad for the breathing room. The amorphous structure of the program means I'll still be able to work part-time, which is good. And thankfully all the larp writing will be finished by then.

So this is a really nice thing. It's nice to have something positive happen, after being so rough for so long. :-)

For my own edification I have analyzed the amount of lines, the frequency of lines, and the amount of stage time each character in To Think of Nothing has to compare the reality to my perception.

"Lines spoken" means the number of sentenses spoken. "Occasions speaking" means the number of times a character speaks before another character speaks instead. "Pages onstage" means the number of pages in the script between the character's entrance and exit. "Line density" means how many lines a character speaks, on average, on each occasion they speak.

There are a total of 702 lines spoken in the play. They are spoken on 339 occasions. The play is 18 pages long.

( Lines, occasions of speech, pages onstage, and their relationships to each other... )

Wow. The first thing I noticed is that the distribution of lines was a lot less even than I perceived it to be. I feel like when you're watching or reading it, it feels much more balanced and every character is just as involved as every other character. I'm glad it feels that way, even if it isn't. I knew Cassander spoke more than anyone else, but speaking a full third of the lines in the play? Whoa. He and Damon are the most verbose characters in the play, and I love how even though Palamon has the shortest amount of stage time, he speaks more lines than characters who spend more time onstage, and his line density is just as high as those others-- when he's onstage, he is often the center of attention. :-)

It also goes to show that part size is not a good indicator of importance. Every character is pretty much equally important to the story, and yet they are not equal in amount of lines they speak or number of occasions on which they speak them. I firmly believe this, especially with Shakespeare.

This is probably not interesting to anyone but me, but I find it fascinating to examine.

One of my favorite small pleasures that comes with directing is getting to put together the curtain call. It's akin to a little piece of decadent candy for me; small, not terribly important, but immensely delicious and satisfying. Curtain call exists pretty much solely as a reward for the actors, their moment to be acknowledged for their hard work. I also like using it as a way of deconstructing the relationships in the show, composing it in such a way as to display to the sharp-eyed audience member how the character relate to the plot and to each other. And while I guess I put entirely too much thought into it, but as I said, doing it just so gives me a great deal of pleasure.

Here is my theory of how curtain calls are best organized. There are two factors to consider, order and grouping. Order is the procession in which the actors appear, with the most important characters emerging later than the others. As an actor, I've always found it's really an honor to emerging in the last three waves of bows, with the coveted final one the most ego-boosting of all. If (n) is the number of waves of bowing, the most significant characters tend to appear in waves (n), (n-1), and (n-2). I firmly believe that the most significant deciding factor on where to place people is how much influence they have over the course of the plot. Role size I do feel is a factor to consider, but I find it much less important than plot significance. I would rather a smaller character come out later if they matter more to the story-- or if they are a particularly notable part, like Mercutio or Palamon --than strictly gauge by how many lines they have, or by how much time they spend onstage.

Groupings, as in, what combination of people come out at what time, I feel should be determined by character-relatedness, the similarity of the service they provide to the plot. Obviously characters who feature together and are roughly the same size parts should come out to bow together. But that also means that if they're doing the same kind of thing for the story, even if they don't interact much onstage, grouping them together makes sense. For example, if there are two parallel figures who both provide support to the main characters but don't deal much with each other, I like to have them come out together. Opposites-- such as Edgar and Edmond in Lear-- also make sense.

Let's use the curtain call of Romeo and Juliet as an example. I thought having Frances as Tybalt and myself as Paris come out together and fairly early made sense. Even though our characters don't have much to do with each other onstage, we served the same plot purpose-- immediate antagonism --and our roles were about the same size. By contrast, I felt like instead of having the Nurse come out alone in position (n-1) and Friar Lawrence come out alone at (n-3), they should have both come out together at (n-1)-- again, they had the same plot purpose of facilitating the efforts of the two leads, and had about the same time spent onstage. Sacrificing the solo bow I believe would have been worth both of them moved up to acknowledge their significance by the order.

The solo bow is a bit tricky. Normally I only give it to the most important characters (as in, the primary support comes out at wave (n-1) alone, and then the lead comes out at position (n) alone) but it's also a way to acknowledge the uniqueness of a supporting role. I find it appropriate for the fan favorite in a show, such as Palamon in To Think of Nothing, to get a moment for the audience to express their particular appreciation. Sometimes a compromise can be made status-wise by having certain character come out earlier, but alone. The solo bow is kind of an honor, so sometimes you can balance acknowledgement of two different groups' significance by having the earlier wave contain just one person bowing by himself, and the later wave come out with a group. This is what I did with Horatio; he appeared earlier in the order than Laertes and Ophelia, but he got the honor of bowing by himself. And sometimes you just have a character who doesn't go with anyone else in the show, and simply doesn't make sense in any grouping with anyone else.

For HTP, I designed the curtain call for both of the shows I directed, plus King Lear. I only sort of remember what I did with Lear; anyone who wants to remind me is welcome. It was remarkably difficult to design a curtain call for To Think of Nothing because everybody was pretty much just as important to the piece as everyone else. Hell, everyone being constructs of Cassander's brain, everyone literally IS the main character! So I couldn't use my normal formula there. What I settled on was that it would reflect the depth to which each character penetrated Cassander's thoughts. Which meant that even though Damon and Selene are respectively the second- and third-largest parts in the show (at least by line count), I decided they should be the first to come out.

As a side note, I have always been a fan of the "call out"-- when the actor or actors who came out in the previous wave remain just slightly to the side of center stage and make a gesture to "call out" the next wave and sort of present them to the audience as they take their bow. I have used it in the three prior HTP curtain calls I organized, specifically with the last two waves to emerge, with Claudius calling out Hamlet, Cordelia calling out Lear, and Andromeda calling out Cassander. I like it as a concept because it acknowledges the way actors and characters need each other for their plots to be interesting and their performances to be strong. It highlights the fact that Claudius and Hamlet, for example, need each other for the conflict to be meaningful, and the way Frances and Jared used each other's performance to make their own better. The call out allows Claudius to show his gratitude to Hamlet for that, and keeping Claudius present during Hamlet's bow acknowledges his own contribution. It's a moment where the actors actually get to demonstrate out of character, "And we thank each other for working together." I have never actually used it except between solo bows for the last two characters, as a sort of tribute to the lead and to the primary support, but I can imagine other contexts for it as well. Perhaps between a group that is strongly connected to another group, but who's contribution to the show as a whole is of a different nature.

Maybe I am unnecessary overcomplicating things, but I really enjoy thinking about this stuff. It's fun for me. :-)

It occurs to me as I go through Love's Labor's Lost that the most difficult draining thing for me to do is spend a long time onstage doing nothing but focusing and reacting. Having actions and interactions and speaking lines is a lot less mentally demanding for me than staying in the moment reactively. It is especially tough for me to do so in this show, where my character is a bit thin and no personality for him suggests itself to me naturally. I know having to do a lot of that tends to be disliked more the greater the experience of the actor-- I can't remember who said it, but I remember readibg some older theater actor like Richard Burton or somebody said that the ideal role was one with the highest ratio of being the center of attention to time spent onstage. I think I'm starting to agree with that.

I think I must resolve in my future theatrical writing to make characters have to spend as little time as possible onstage when theyre not doing anything. Just to show mercy on them. To Think of Nothing kind of violates this, I guess, but I think all eight characters stay involved enough all the time that the times when they are observing or reacting isn't too onerous. Or at least their characterizations are well enough defined to better inform how they should be behaving at thosr times. Actors in TToN, care to weigh in on your experience with this? Was it tough or easy to be reactive in that show?

I just finished my second replacement character for Labor Wars. That means I have completed all my sheet assignments! Yay! I am actually extremely pleased with how this last one turned out. I shamelessly stole a brilliant structural idea from natbudin (with his permission!) that he used in another sheet, and it turned out to be the perfect mechanism to convey the information. It makes for a slightly unorthodox character sheet, which has never been my inclination, but I found that my typical format wasn't really working for me.

Today will be spent in low-key pleasant things. I will be picking up crearespero around lunchtime and we'll be running some errands together, as I believe the place she needs to be is right next to the place I need to be, so that coincides nicely. And then this evening I have my hot date with blendedchaitea. Way back when she went above and beyond the call of duty helping me with To Think of Nothing, I promised I'd take her out to dinner to thank her, and now, months later, we're finally getting to do it. We'll be meeting at Tom Can Cook, and I plan to dress up pretty for her. :-) I am looking forward to spending some time with her and with Frances, and using it to relax and feel okay.

I've been a ball of stress lately. If I can't fix the source, I can at least do something to manage the effects.

Today shall be very fun. I'm going to meet Steph and Charlotte for costuming for Festival later. They're going to show me what they've come up with already, and I think we'll be hitting the thrift store after in case we need to look for anything else. They're working for LXHS and Oz, while I got my Diamond Geezers sheet! I believe I got the "tough cast" character, which always makes me smile-- it's nice to be trusted to step up into a character the GM is not sure about. I actually really like the character am really looking forward to playing her. She blows stuff up!

Costuming came to me immediately. I have an army background and I'm a demolitions professional, so I plan on wearing my olive-drab cargo pants, a black tank or maybe sports bra, and my stompy hiking boots. For some reason I see my hair put up in outrageous pigtails made to stand as straight out as I can possibly manage. And I'm going to wear that sun-deflecting paint that football players wear and draw tattoos all over myself with Sharpie.

After that, I will be dragging them back to my place to be my kitchen helpers. Tonight is the long-awaited cast party for To Think of Nothing, and we will be cooking a number of lovely dishes for it. I plan on setting up a buffet-style selection of goodies, significantly more substantial than your chips and pretzel snacks. I started off the process by cooking for my lovely actors, so it seems fitting to finish it off by feeding them as well.

Had a very nice Easter yesterday, if a little more work-intensive and annoyance-riddled than I would have expected. My family and I went out to a lovely Easter dinner at this beautiful inn in town called the Glasbern. It is a converted farm with lovely old farm buildings like barns and stables converted into dining rooms and lodgings, with gorgeous landscaping and actually raises a lot of its own livestock on sight. Homegrown chicken is very tasty, it turns out. I also ran into an old friend, a girl, Debbie, working there who went to my old high school, and in fact played Selene in the very first production of To Think of Nothing four years ago. I told her that I got a chance to direct it for myself just recently, and she said she loved the role and had very good memories of putting on the play.

The only problem was that I got quickly and inexplicably carsick on both the drive there and the drive home. Fortunately it wore off by the time dinner arrived, but I was really angry. There was no reason for me to get sick; the trip was short and over easy roads. I'm kind of afraid to get into a car again.

Fighting a very mild remnant of nausea for the rest of the night, I finally checked over and sent out all forty character sheets for my two games. It took hours, and feeling slightly sick did not help. And we had a drop in Oz RIGHT AFTER I sent out all the sheets. We had someone on the waitlist, but if that drop had occurred just a little earlier we could have redone the casting. The character that had to be filled is extremely well-suited to a particular kind of player, and I can think of others who probably would have enjoyed it. Ah, well. It will be fine, and I'm just grateful that the games are still full.

Perhaps because of the rain finally letting up, or perhaps because I am sipping a lovely cup of my newly restocked pretenious chai blend from Teavana, I am feeling light in spirits today. This has translated to my being quite productive this morning, which pleases me immensely and makes me feel even better.

Yesterday was a nice day despite the rain. I went with Bernie to run some errands for Caesar; among other places we hit the fabric store, which I always enjoy going to because of all the neat little notions. My dad is in town for work, so afterward he, my brother, his girlfriend, and myself all went out to dinner at the Union Street Oyster House. I've always loved that place, the seafood is fantastic. Jared sadly could not join us, but it was a nice time anyway. Afterward I attended the Hold Thy Peace coffeehouse for Julius Caesar, which Jared had organized and was emceeing. It was a lovely time spent with friends and HTPers showcasing their talents. The highlight of the evening for me was the guitar playing of Jonathan Plesser. It turns out he's a talented songwriter, who not only composed a hilarious love song about typically awkward Brandeis social interactions, but also a beautiful song from the point of view of his character Damon in To Think of Nothing. I was incredibly touched that he was inspired by the show; it really meant a lot to mean to hear it. So thank you, Jonathan, for sharing that with me. :-)

It occurs to me that now that To Think of Nothing is over, I can talk about an aspect of it I've been incredibly proud of without fear of spoiling it for those coming to see the show. :-)

As I mentioned, I believe all the costumes in a given play have to work together to create an effect. A big aspect of this is color. I don't just mean the colors all have to complement each other, though they do-- I mean I really like it when the colors mean something, separately and in comparison to each other.

( Masturbatory gloating over my costuming cleverness...with pictures! )

God help me, but now that I've finished the show I found myself looking back over my other original pieces of theater. To Think of Nothing is not the only play I've ever written. There are only two that I ever finished, but I actually kind of like both of them. I've always wanted to expand the universe in which To Think of Nothing takes place. I like to think there's lots of different artists of all kinds whose stories can be explored. But the only other piece I've actually written in the setting is a very brief little play called Fountain Thoughts, about the actress who eventually plays Selene in Cassander's play, confronted by her imperious director when she is afraid to go onstage. It takes place in the basin of a fountain, where the two characters pace and splash, overlooked by a statue of a handsome man. It is very quick, as I said, but I always liked it, and I liked the step it takes into the future of the world when Cassander's play is finally finished. Interestingly, in my first draft the director character was originally supposed to be Palamon, but I decided the director made things more dramatic.

I have written a second one act, somewhat longer, a realistic piece I did for my playwrighting class junior year. I am always slightly hesitant to show it to people because they sometimes read too much into it-- it concerns the reconciling of the different religions in a marriage of a Christian woman and a Jewish man, and I am uncomfortable with the assumption sometimes made that it is meant to reflect my own situation in any way --but I actually think it's kind of good. It is tentatively titled Paschal Moon, as it that time period that covers both Easter and Pesach is important to the story, but I've never quite been happy with that, so I'm trying to figure out what else to call it. There's a lot I like about this piece. I feel like I did a good job of setting up a situation where there's a significant, interesting conflict but nobody's the bad guy. I'm proud of how natural the I got the dialogue to sound, since that is something that tends to be very hard for me. Hilariously, I find I have a much easier time writing believable pseudo-Shakespearean dialogue than believable-sounding modern dialogue. I am amused furthermore to note that my protagonist in this play is named Cassandra, chosen completely without thought for the fact that the hero of my only other play is Cassander. I guess I like that name.

Great. Now I'm thinking things I shouldn't with all the other stuff I have ahead of me. But the hunger, it is never really sated. :-) Now I'm fantasizing about painting a kiddie pool, covering someone in body paint for them to be the statue, and then sticking a couple of actors in the pool to splash at each other. I think I need an intervention.

Friday night saw the closing performance of To Think of Nothing. Jared's and my parents came to see it-- I was also delighted to see emp42ress and ultimatepsi made it, so sweet of them --and it was flawless. I was so proud, and my dear ones were proud of me. Afterward, because they wanted it so badly, we did a naked tech run. Now, to say this was superfluous is putting it mildly. The naked tech run's primary purpose is to let the actors blow off steam after the stress of a long tech week, and the secondary purpose is to get in one more cue-to-cue before the show. This tech week had been so straightforward and positive that nobody was stressed, and we certainly didn't need to practice the tech for a show that had finished it's run! But the actors really really wanted it, so we went ahead. It turned out to be really fun and funny, and it didn't totally and utterly hurt my feelings to have my show ripped apart in front of me. ;-) We finished the night with a cast trip to IHOP, which was lovely. I don't know how I got so lucky that all the actors I wanted were not only talented but fun to hang around with. I'm also not sure how "hanging at a dirty pancake place" became the proper way to celebrate a good theatrical run, but it's a tradition that so many theater groups seem to hold dear.

Spent Saturday hanging with the family and doing chores. My brother and his girlfriend were both in shows in an Emerson showcase this weekend, so my family and Jared's went out to see it. After a lovely dinner at Legal Seafood (must get a recipe for that fantastic red onion jam on my swordfish) we saw Casey in a weird little piece that he was good in but I didn't get, and Sarah as Mrs. Breedlove in theatrical adaptation of Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye. Sarah's a quiet girl in real life, but onstage she has quite a presence, and it turns out she's pretty talented too. I was so tired by that point (after a tech week spent sick) that I wish we hadn't stayed for the last show, which was long and stupid and didn't involve anyone I cared about, but my mom wanted to spend a little more time with me. I was falling over by the time I finally crashed into bed at 1AM that night. I was glad my brother and Sarah did so well, and that my family and Jared's had such a good time together.

Sunday was spent doing a whole lot of nothing. I was so burnt that all I wanted to do was lay around and sleep, so I did. I feel quite refreshed after it, and almost back to full health. It feels so good to have accomplished that play. It's even caught on film to keep as a memento. There's still a few more things left to handle about it-- getting pieces back to the HTP storage room, planning the cast party, things of that nature --but we have achieved what we set out to do. I directed a play I wrote. And it's one of the coolest things I've ever done.

Thank you so much for sharing it with me.

Guess what? I wrote a play, and it got put on, and last night, people came to see it.

It was wonderful. It was doubly wonderful because before it started I got nervous. The tech booth wasn't unlocked, the weather was terrible, and a bunch of people who'd told me they were coming canceled on me. My mood and my confidence started dropping; I was afraid things were finally going wrong, here on opening night, and that nobody was going to come, that the bad weather was going to scare them all off. Jared and Bernie, God bless them, weren't afraid, and tried to snap me out of it.

But when the doors opened, and so many wonderful friends poured in, I realized how foolish I was being. I really need to work on keeping my spirits up better, at not getting down so easily. Because the show was fantastic, and the audience was fantastic, and I felt fantastic through it all. I ran the camera to record the show, and I plan on doing it again tonight, so we get the best possible versions on tape.

Talking to people in the audience-- usernamenumber, natbudin, bronzite, his girlfriend EB, phoenix_rinna, pezzonovante, juldea, lightgamer, twilighttremolo, ninja_report, beholdsa, and wonderful others --made me glow. People enjoy it, people got it, and to hear their kind words meant everything to me. I can't express how grateful I am to everyone who came to see it. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

As an amusing side note, I got almost as many compliments on my outfit as I did on the play-- red skirt with black and white butterfly designs, white wraparound blouse, silver shoes, silver wrap. I am absurdly pleased.

One more show to go. I hope tonight's audience is as good. Jared's and my parents are coming tonight at least. We'll have to do a good job for them.

And once again, thank you all for sharing this with me. You have no idea how much it means.

Tonight is opening night. I'm counting the moments.

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All Eyes on Me

"Do you know why heroes boast? Because it makes them brave."

Entries tagged with to think of nothing

October Review Challenge, #13 - Old shame

Performance opportunity

Merely Players cast list!

Biweekly Theater Writing Challenge #4 - Palamon mocking Zephyrus in blank verse

Let's write more stuff for Palamon

Mom's blue doublet

Scripts I could write

Accepted

To Think of Nothing statistical analysis

Musing on planning curtain call

Being reactive onstage

Completed my sheet assignments!

Cast party and costume shopping

Happy Easter

A song based on the show

Shameless costume design self-congratulation...

My other theater pieces

Long, lovely weekend

Grand opening night

Counting