Exits Stage Left and Contemplates Action

I recently read a playwrighting blog about stage directions. This playwright believed it was a great idea to “spice up” stage directions, that stage directions like, “He drinks his tea and silently destroys the universe, in his head”, are a great way to develop characters. It’s the classic debate about whether or not stage directions should be as minimal as possible. Many people say no, that greats like O’Neill wrote lofty stage directions, but I say, yes, keep it concise. Before you disagree, consider your audience.
Ultimately, all writers should be writing to an audience– if you’re not, go get a journal. No writer will ever please everyone, but it is very important to please someone. As playwrights, you have to please your first reader, and nine times out of ten that first reader will be a director. Here is where stage directions really matter. Every director I have ever met is directing because they feel they have something to say, and they don’t want it said for them. Complex stage direction can be considered “directing from the page.” Since a director will probably be the first person to read your play, don’t insult them.
The most valuable thing I learned as a playwright, from a directing course was that directors are taught to ignore stage directions. Almost every stage or set design is unique, and the scene you envisioned in your head will probably look different– if you’re lucky enough to see it. Directors can’t begin to recycle old stage directions because most of the time they won’t work. You can save yourself a lot of time if you just worry about the essential actions. That’s all that will survive, anyway.
So maybe a director will love your witty stage directions and want to direct your play. You have only just started to run the gauntlet. The designer will not care what you think the set should look like because that’s his/her job. They aren’t concerned with custom tailoring the set to your specific instructions, so, once again, don’t waste your time. Okay, so you’re hardheaded. Guess what? Actors aren’t concerned with nuggets of contemplative thought either. It is their job to establish their own set of motivations for every word they say and move they make, and they won’t be looking for help within the stage directions.
The final audience the playwright writes for is the audience. Audience members don’t sit in the house and follow along with scripts in their hands, and ultimately, if the audience can’t see something, it doesn’t exist. Eugene O’Neill is not considered a great playwright because of his stage directions, and no playwright ever will be– no matter what they think. If you can’t get over this fact, and you really want your stage directions to matter, learn to write for the screen.

New Playwrights: Master the Short Form First

Before you start trying to write the next Tony Award Winning play, stop, and consider mastering something smaller first. I understand that the natural instinct for new playwrights is to jump right in head first, that’s great, but you can save yourself a whole lot of time and frustration if you try your hand at the short form first.

 

One acts and ten-minute plays are traditionally thought of as openers. A lot of theaters used to show them before full-length plays, as a warm-up for the main event. Now theaters are producing whole evenings of one acts or ten-minute plays, and with the way people’s attention spans are slowly becoming shorter, it’s no wonder playwrights like David Ives have made their entire careers writing ten-minute plays. 

 

That is not to say ten-minute plays are easier to write — they aren’t. In fact, many playwrights claim they are more difficult to write because they have less space to fit everything a full-length play needs — without the luxury of extra time to warm up. So why am I telling beginning playwrights to start with ten-minute plays? Because if you can squeeze everything a play needs into ten minutes, you will have no problem doing it in two hours. Not to mention the fact that full length plays can take months and years to write and edit. The first draft of a ten minute play can be written in one sitting. They can be edited and revised fifteen or twenty times over the course of a month. An industrious playwright could write and polish twelve ten-minute plays a year.

 

Let’s face it though, twelve plays a year is a bit of a stretch, and that is my whole point. As a beginning playwright, you may find it difficult to sit down and write for at least thirty minutes a day– much less the hours a day it would take to complete twelve ten-minute plays. Twelve ten-minute plays are the equivalent of one two hour play, and the odds of a new playwright putting in the amount of quality time it takes to produce that much work in one year is unlikely, but you can write four or five ten-minute plays a year. 

 

If you have just got to go out and write that full length play then do it – I did, and it’s bad. That idea for the full length play will serve you better if you put it on the back burner, develop the idea, and learn what it will take to see it realized.

Good News

I got news today that my ten minute play Louisville Swinger is going to be published in a volume with two other plays by One Act Play Depot.
One Act Play Depot is a small play press that is publishing a lot of new work. Check them out:

http://oneactplays.net/