![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
31 Plays in 31 Days: #13 - "Not Yet"
Aug. 13th, 2013 02:13 pm
Mmmkay, this one is kind of weird. And not written by me so much as arranged by me from some famous quotes of C.S. Lewis. I always loved the story of how he came to faith-- from a kind of furious atheism until he found himself pulled to it in a manner he could not deny. And here I wanted to explore an idea of Lewis's that faith is easier when you are whole than when you are suffering. But still, even when pain and disillusionment pull at you, that doesn't mean you have no chance of someday finding the thing that will give you solace and fulfillment. For you it may not be faith, but there's usually something like that for everyone.
Yeah, I know the staging's weird. It's an experiment.
( Day #13 - "Not Yet" )
This is the ten-minute play I'm working on for school this semester. I just finished the first draft. It's based on an idea I've been turning over in my mind-- I've been referring to it as "Vitality" because the vitality of the human spirit is a major theme --but is a big enough project that will take some time to work out. The character of Sariel, the guardian angel, has appeared before in this scene I scribbled down a while ago. The character of Max is one I thought up based on trying to get some of the bad things in my head right now out in any constructive way possible. My present biggest disappointment with the current state of the piece is that I want Sariel to be extremely cheeky and funny normally, but with turns into a profound serious intensity when it really matters, and I'm not sure it hits that enough. Will have to revise for that. This piece is for school, but I think I can repurpose it to use in the larger Vitality piece.
You know. Just turning my pain into gold. Or something.
You know. Just turning my pain into gold. Or something.
What Everybody Living Gets
by Phoebe Roberts
SARIEL, his guardian angel
( "Is that all you think I care about? Your death?" )
Suddenly OVERRUN with MORE IDEAS
Nov. 13th, 2012 11:50 amOF COURSE I would be overrun with ideas for other projects right when I'm just on the heels of being free of the obligation to write for a while. I should be getting my focus on editing Mrs. Hawking, I only have to do it for one more day, but OF COURSE my brain would become suffused with notions for unrelated projects exactly at this crucial moment.
Being at SLAW whetted my hunger for larp yet again. And now all my ideas for future larps are rising up again, begging for attention. I am currently listed as author for seven larps, which are chronologically Alice, Oz, Paranoia, The Labor Wars, Resonance, The Stand, and Break a Leg, but I have nearly as many again brewing in my head. And I've just been struck by ideas for several more.
I've been watching the second season of American Horror Story, which is set in a Catholic mental institution in sixties New England. It is the larpiest show I have seen in a long time. It has a large cast of main characters, each with their own individual but interlocking goals and journeys, all locked within the setting of the asylum-- a perfect premise for a larp. I would love to write such a game, though I would have to take care not to draw too much from the TV show, or from Jesriah, the excellent mental institution game from Happier Far that debuted earlier this year.
I also want to write a larp set in a circus. Just thinking of the figures one could expect in a setting like that seems fascinating to write about-- the ringmaster, the lion tamer, the acrobats, the clowns, the freaks. A perfect milieu for things not being quite what they seem. I've never played Colonel Sebastian T. Rawhide, which is the only other circus game I know, so I wouldn't have to worry about emulating that too closely. I've heard it's a good game, though.
And I've gotten one more idea that I don't want to talk about yet. But it's been punching through my brain with great insistence recently, so you may hear more of this once I have real time to devote to it.
Being at SLAW whetted my hunger for larp yet again. And now all my ideas for future larps are rising up again, begging for attention. I am currently listed as author for seven larps, which are chronologically Alice, Oz, Paranoia, The Labor Wars, Resonance, The Stand, and Break a Leg, but I have nearly as many again brewing in my head. And I've just been struck by ideas for several more.
I've been watching the second season of American Horror Story, which is set in a Catholic mental institution in sixties New England. It is the larpiest show I have seen in a long time. It has a large cast of main characters, each with their own individual but interlocking goals and journeys, all locked within the setting of the asylum-- a perfect premise for a larp. I would love to write such a game, though I would have to take care not to draw too much from the TV show, or from Jesriah, the excellent mental institution game from Happier Far that debuted earlier this year.
I also want to write a larp set in a circus. Just thinking of the figures one could expect in a setting like that seems fascinating to write about-- the ringmaster, the lion tamer, the acrobats, the clowns, the freaks. A perfect milieu for things not being quite what they seem. I've never played Colonel Sebastian T. Rawhide, which is the only other circus game I know, so I wouldn't have to worry about emulating that too closely. I've heard it's a good game, though.
And I've gotten one more idea that I don't want to talk about yet. But it's been punching through my brain with great insistence recently, so you may hear more of this once I have real time to devote to it.
I just wrote a scene and I freaking love it.
Dolls That Say "I Love You" on Command
(SAM, a troubled former FBI agent, walks down the street. She grips her purse uncomfortably and hurries along. Soon she comes across a park bench where a little girl in a frilly dress sits, holding a baby doll and smiling at her. She recognizes this as a form of SARIEL, her guardian angel.)
SAM: Oh, Jesus.
LITTLE GIRL SARIEL: Hi, Sam. I’m surprised to see you out and about. Since you think so little of these imperfect creatures God made.
SAM: Oh, save it.
LITTLE GIRL SARIEL: No, our conversation really got me thinking. It’s a good question, why God would make you all so full of sin and so prone to rejecting Him and all his love.
SAM: I’m not up for a deep theological discussion right now, okay?
LITTLE GIRL SARIEL: Okay, okay. But don’t go. Since we ran into each other, you might as well come hang out a while.
(Sam looks around nervously to see who might be watching.)
SAM: Why do you show up like this? Why a little girl?
LITTLE GIRL SARIEL: Because it means people are a lot nicer to me when I want to sit around and play with dolls.
SAM: People see me talking to you, they’re going to think I’m a kidnapper or something.
LITTLE GIRL SARIEL: Oh, don’t worry what other people think for five minutes, okay? Just sit down.
(She sits on the bench beside him.)
LITTLE GIRL SARIEL: Check this out.
(He tips the doll forward and back. Its recorded voice box says, “I love you!”)
LITTLE GIRL SARIEL: Nice, huh?
SAM: So?
LITTLE GIRL SARIEL: So, they make these baby dolls who say “I love you.” Whenever you want, they just say it to you. It’s a present for you.
SAM: For me? Why?
LITTLE GIRL SARIEL: You know, since Chris and all.
SAM: Is this a joke?
LITTLE GIRL SARIEL: Well, you were really broken up about having been left by the person who loved you.
SAM: What? Oh, Jesus!
LITTLE GIRL SARIEL: I thought this might fill the void.
(He proffers the doll, making it say "I love you" again. She shoves it back at him.)
LITTLE GIRL SARIEL: What? It doesn’t?
SAM: You’re an asshole.
LITTLE GIRL SARIEL: Oh, I’m sorry. You mean to say, a doll that’s built to say “I love you” on command isn’t worth the same as a creature of free will who loves you of his own accord?
(Sam turns to stare at him, disturbed. Little Girl Sariel makes a snotty face and spreads his hands.)
![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}