My Site-Specific Play

My play takes place in the small area behind the theater. I chose that spot because I liked how it seemed hidden from the rest of the room. Usually, most of the drama happens on the stage, so I decided it would be cool for the drama to happen in the opposite place of the theater. Even though I wasn’t completely sure what I wanted my play to about, I knew I wanted mine to be a drama that involved gossip and mean girls, common themes in movies about high school. The only thing is, I’m having a little trouble revising my play. I feel like it’s really uninteresting and won’t keep the audience members on the edge of their seats. The climax is unexciting and the ending is boring. Over the summer, I saw this short play (written by a high school student) about a wife trying to get her husband to move his recently deceased brother’s things out of the house, and during the scene she was working on getting him to bring out the last box. Towards the end, when she finally convinced him to do it and they began to lift the box up, it broke and all the brother’s things fell on the floor (which resulted in the husband getting extremely upset). I remember, as an audience member, how brilliant that moment was because it shocked me so much and completely changed the play. I think my play lacks that kind of climax and shock. I wish I could find some way to have a moment that completely surprises the audience like that play had. I also feel like my play has not point or lesson (does a play always need a lesson learned?) and it just ends. Since I’m writing about teenagers in high school, I also feel like the characters in my play are a little too stereotypical. There’s the mean girl, the unpopular girl, and the boy who really doesn’t do much except keep the conversation rolling. It seems too typical, so I think I should work on that. Like Montana, I’m excited to revise my piece and make it better, but I know it will definitely be a challenge.

Site-Specific Plays

My Site-Specific Play takes place in the small nook near the commons. When we were all walking around the building, I wasn't exactly sure what I was looking for in the different spaces. I figured I would just have to pick between the ones that were left over after everyone else had chosen. However, I started trying to think of ideas so that I wouldn't be completely blind going into writing a play that was going to be performed in front of the whole class. However, once I got to the nook I was relieved that I had an idea! It was great to know what I was going to be writing about. However, I ended up writing something completely different. I wanted to write about two people who were hiding from some people who were following them, but they didn't know each other. However I ended up writing about two teenagers who both wanted to get out of their apartments, but with different motives and for different reasons. I started out wanting to write about something that doesn't have to do with my life at all, but I ended up writing about something that is pretty directly related to my life. I think I probably chose one of the hardest spaces in terms of space, since there practically isn't any, but I hope that I can make it work. My play ended up being a lot about the words because there is little space to move around. We will have to see how the blocking goes. Unfortunately, my group and I didn't get to talk about my play because class had finished, but from a few of their comments I am very excited to work on it. I can't wait to continue revising. I really can't. I thought this piece would be something that I wasn't interested in, but I am pretty devoted to it.

Exercises!

I agree with a lot of what everyone has been saying on here--boot camp has definitely been more fun than its name let on. The exercises have also certainly made me think a little bit more outside the box of realism, especially (like Sophie said) when the prompts were very specific. For example, the Mysterious Woman/special umbrella/etc. play that I wrote was very unlike any of the other products that I've churned out, and I feel like this might be because the prompt was so detailed.

That said, I'm still a little disappointed with the way many of my exercises/pieces overall have turned out. I definitely get that the purpose of an exercise is to take us somewhere, and then give us the freedom to go wherever we want to past that point. However, most of the plays that I've written feel very hollow to me. Of course, this could totally be due to the fact that they are, in fact, the first drafts of a very very very novice playwright...but it's been frustrating.

I've really enjoyed the "writing during class" aspect of boot camp. I love that when I come home, I'm finishing something I've already, rather than starting afresh again and again and again. This has made me feel like I'm building something because it does give me the time and opportunity to pause and think about where I'm going, rather than just write for the sake of writing.

Writing Exercises

I really like the writing exercises we've done so far. At first it seemed hard to have to include all these images, ideas, settings, etc., in a play and make it make sense, but as we kept doing the writing exercises, it became easier. The hardest part of writing a play for me is coming up with the story. With these exercises, this was a lot more doable. Many times the directions for the writing exercises would be to include certain things in a scene, and I found this helpful because it gave me some direction on how to form my story. For instance, it would be a lot harder to write a scene that could be about anything and had no rules attached than to write a scene that had to follow a few guidelines.

I also think these exercises helped me think a little more creatively. The plays I wrote before the writing exercises were mostly set in a similar setting to where we live, and weren't that different from what a BC student might observe in his or her every day life. When we did one exercise, one of the images I came up with was a raccoon with a finger in its mouth. I definitely don't think I ever would have included anything like this in a play if I hadn't done the writing exercises.

The writing exercises also challenged me greatly as a writer. I'm not used to writing things with such limitations. The exercises really made me think hard about how to not only make a good and interesting play, but to do it with certain elements added or taken away. I think my playwriting ability greatly improved just from these exercises.

Writing Exercises

I felt that most parts of the writing exercises we did in class last week were helpful because they enabled me to relate to my plays much more. However, sometimes when I was required to use objects or people in my plays they felt like obstacles rather than pieces of guidance. I guess that was one of the objectives of the assignment though, to push us to write something with specific elements. I really enjoyed the first in-class exercise because it helped me the most with character development. The guidance in the exercise enabled me to go into small details of the characters without me even noticing. I also loved combining the two characters' monologues; it was much more seamless than I imagined.

I think that the first day's exercise was most helpful for me. I had less success in the second exercise. My mind works the quickest it can when I get to say what I'm thinking out loud; I'm much slower with writing things down, so it was hard for me to keep up with the pace of the exercise. I also find that often, I am too embarrassed by what I have written down, to the point where it's hard for me to implement. Perhaps I was not fully letting go in the exercise. When we were asked to describe a place, I was so overwhelmed with ideas that my actual description became a little too general. I also found the fairy-tale aspect of the exercise difficult with both thinking of one in class and writing about the imagery in it later. Writing three entire scenes was a challenge for me. They felt a little redundant.

The dream exercise was odd, but very thought-provoking. I felt the most out of control during that exercise more than any other exercise; however, I soon realized that the people and things I thought of on the journey Ms. Connell took us on were very much a part of me, subconsciously so.

Overall I think the exercises from last week directed me towards better ideas than I had had previously. They were also extremely relaxing (most of the time, looking at the snow and everything) and enjoyable.

Writing Exercises

Like Sophie, I think the main thing these writing exercises have gotten me to do is think outside the box. I had never really thought about writing plays that included otherworldly aspects, but I started to really appreciate doing those types of things after the play with no words, and the following assignment which forced us to turn someone else's play into something fantastical and unreal. I also think these exercises have been beneficial because it's been forcing me to find material in my subconscious...when I read back to the "once upon a time" story that I wrote for myself, I thought, "huh, this is definitely not what I would have said had I had more time to think about it." 

I especially liked the exercise we did on the day it was snowing, where you led us on an interesting journey. And we were clearly all writing plays in our heads, but the most interesting part is that each person was left with a list of objects that they thought up and had to incorporate into a play. So, we were all told the exact same thing, but we'll all have extremely different plays. 

I thought it was interesting when Vicky said in class that her play would have to consist of her mother and Fellini in a sex scene, because as she mentioned so strongly, she would never choose to write such a thing. Except, I can see it coming out very interesting...in a good way. 

I did think that the exercise that including archetypes for people we know was extremely hard, but also interesting in the same way that my "once upon a time" story was. Clearly we all have a lot to say about these people, since they are who we think about most, but to sum their entire personality up in one sentence in a few seconds was extremely difficult but eye-opening because I was surprised at what I ended up with on my paper.

In-class exercises

I started out the course writing contemporary plays with boring teenagers as the main characters, so what I've found most beneficial about these exercises were that they made me think outside the box. That sounds cliché but it's true: I started out writing about a boy having a stupid conversation with his parents to writing about a woman transported to the center of the earth by a bolt of lightning, who knew? The exercises that gave me the best results were the ones where I got the most specific direction: for example, the prompt about a character seeing the last person they would ever want to see, and having the two talking about a common event, which started out with me ranting about a prom dress to talking about a rape. Another example was the play incorporating something our classmates wanted to see on stage, in which I showed live drug use. I felt like exercises that pushed me into the realm of fantasy, or silliness, or ridiculousness, definitely forced me to be more creative, which yielded much more interesting plays. I also got really good results from the assignments that required me to write the least while saying the most (the $100/word play, the play without words), because it made me value each word and stage direction, and also because I am generally a concise writer anyway (as shown by this post, haha). I found that the prompts where we got the least direction (the earlier ones, like the slideshow and the language plays) made me take the most from my life because I didn't really know what direction to go in.