If you’re in the Provo/Orem area, there’s going to be a staged reading of my new full-length play Childlight this Wednesday. It’ll be at 5:00 and will probably last an hour and a half, including a short talkback session.
What: Childlight When: Wednesday, Oct 21, 5:00pm Where: Pardoe Theater (in the HFAC) How much: Free
The play is a fantasy, set partly in our world but mostly in another. There’s magic and humor and that’s about all I’m going to say. :)
A short history of the play: it began a couple semesters ago as a one-act play for one of the BYU playwriting classes. I revised it a couple times in that class, then extended it into a full-length for the next semester. It got accepted into the WDA program at the beginning of this semester and I’ve been rewriting it ever since. (I think we’re on draft 11 or 12 by now, all told.) The play has had six or seven names at this point, including Return, Checkmate, Gridlock, and Man of Cloth. (I’m still planning to use “Man of Cloth” for something someday.) (And no, I don’t mind if you steal it. :))
Anyway, I’m mostly just glad to be done with it, since for the last three weeks I’ve gotten up every Monday at an unholy hour (either midnight or 2:00) and written all night/morning. I miss my sleep. ;)
Comments
How did it go?
Fairly well. Smallish audience, which was both good (if the play bombs, you want as few people there as possible) and somewhat bad (larger audiences react better, creating chain reactions of laughs and other moments, whereas smaller audiences are oh so terribly quiet most of the time). And I got some good feedback on how to improve the play — at this point I’m not very good at writing character arcs, having my characters change and grow over time, so that’s what I’m going to focus on next. :)
Cool. What’s the WDA program like? I get the impression that it’s a workshop, but that’s about all I know. (I don’t even know what the initials stand for, but I’d guess it’s something like “Writing, Directing, Acting” . . .)
It stands for Writers, Dramaturgs, Actors, and yes, it’s a workshop. :) Six plays get accepted, with three of them workshopped during the first block and three during the second block. Each writer is assigned a day of the week (mine was Monday) and a dramaturg, and for the rest of the block the class reads drafts of the play aloud, offers feedback, improvises scenes, and helps brainstorm. (Basically, the writer and dramaturg decide what they feel will be most beneficial to the play, and the class does that.)
For example, we read my draft in class the first Monday and everyone else gave feedback (observations, then what they liked, then what they didn’t like). The next week I only had 30 or so new pages written, so we spent half the class reading and half the class improvising scenes. Another time, I didn’t have any new material, so we spent the class brainstorming the magic systems and improvising scenes.
The WDA method works really well and it helped a lot with improving my play. :)
Oh, dramaturgs! Well, at least I was 2 for 3.
That sounds like a very cool program. I wish I could hear more about other playwrights who have participated — it sounds like a lot of up-and-coming Mormon writers are involved.
Lyvia Martinez and Davey Morrison Dillard were the other two playwrights first block this semester. Lyvia doesn’t have a website, but her play was called “Be Normal” and was about a Mormon girl with same-sex attraction. Davey’s does have a website; his play was called “Cycle” and was a religious play about Satan and Job (I think :)).
Throw in your two cents