I Interview Playwrights Part 649: Ryann Weir

Ryann Weir

Hometown: Wilmette, Illinois

Current Town: Brooklyn, New York

Q:  Tell me about DEBUTANTE.

A:  DEBUTANTE. is a play about a group of heiresses who are expected to debut into high society but turn out to be pretty bad at it. They ride bikes late at night, overdose on TAB soda and Jazzercise to the famed soap opera "Dynasty" all while studying at Ms. Peasgood’s School for Etiquette and practicing deep, lady-like curtsies. They also dig through the trash to find their retainers when necessary.

Q:  What else are you working on now?

A:  In June I’m doing two shows at Ars Nova’s ANT Fest, which is going to be super fun!

The first show is called I Heard Sex Noises, which I co-authored and perform in along side superstars: Andrew Farmer and Claire Rothrock. Direction by my theater-making-partner-in-crime and dear pal: the incomparable Annie Tippe. I Heard Sex Noises is about a coup d’etat in the Roosevelt Island gardening society. High drama. Hydrangeas.

The second show is called Sketch Tragedy, written by comedy wizard: Matt Gehring. I’ll be acting in that show which is structured like a sketch comedy show but sketches end in…you guessed it…tragedy!

Q:  Tell me, if you will, a story from your childhood that explains who you are as a writer or as a person.

A:  I grew up in a kind of idyllic, stuffy suburb of Illinois where the neighbor kids played kick the can on Summer nights and rode bikes in the day. The kids ran things in the Summer because in that part of the mid-west, winter lasts for 90% of the year so by June everyone was mental.

Lauren Wiscomb was my next-door neighbor and childhood best friend. We had matching bowl haircuts and listened to Ace of Base songs more often than we didn’t listen to Ace of Base songs. We made our own fun.

Particularly in a game we invented called CASE. Inspired by a heavy diet of Harriet the Spy and Nancy Drew novels, CASE was a game where Lauren and I made up crimes that happened on our block and then walked around trying to solve them. We were like two little Jerry Orbachs hovering over a crack in the sidewalk, trying to get to the bottom of it. Many cases involved a neighborhood cat called Poon who subsisted primarily on Kraft singles. But then there were more mysteries involving our poor siblings Abby and Dylan. We had a book where we recorded everything in- leads, suspects, evidence et al.

When Case had been exhausted for the day, Lauren and I would create harnesses and bungee jumping cords for our stuffed animals and throw them out the window. We always had a spotter downstairs knowing full well the detrimental consequences of bungee related stuffed animal fatalities. We thrilled at their daring and lived vicariously through pink bunnies and monkeys with button eyes who had more courage than we did.

Q:  Who are your theatrical heroes?

A:  Oh Will Eno is my favorite. And everything David Cromer does. And Cherry Jones and Amy Morton. Rachel Chavkin, Anne Kaufman, The Debate Society. Too many to count.

Q:  What advice do you have for playwrights just starting out?

A:  One word. Plastics.

Q:  Plugs, please:

A: 

Debutanteplay.com  

Ryannweir.com

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I Interview Playwrights Part 648: Jeremy Gable

Jeremy Gable

Hometown: Post Falls, Idaho, a town without a theatre company. I had to drive out to Spokane, Washington to see my first play produced. Not that Spokane isn't nice, but I'd love to see a working playhouse in my old stomping grounds.

Current Town: Philadelphia, a town with more theatre companies than you can shake a stick at. If shaking a stick at theatre companies is your sort of thing.

Q: What are you working on now?

A: I am currently in the midst of the Core Writers Residency at InterAct Theatre Company. While there, I've been working on two plays. One is about the Amazonian Guard, the women who guarded Gaddafi during his time in Libya. The other is about an indie game developer dealing with the absurdity and misogyny of the video game industry. I also have an upcoming commission for a children's show that I can't really talk about right now because it's not officially announced.

Q:  Tell me, if you will, a story from your childhood that explains who you are as a writer or as a person

A: Apparently, shortly after learning to walk, I would entertain my mother's friends by running into the living room, diving face-first into the carpet, and then taking a bow. I feel like that pretty much explains my aesthetic. Or my desperate need for approval. Or both. I'm going to say both.

Q:  If you could change one thing about theater, what would it be?

A: I'd like to see a lot less living rooms. First off, it's making me realize how much better my living room could look. But also, I feel like most of my favorite plays are the ones that venture out into the world, that take me somewhere I haven't been. When I go to see a show, I want characters who travel, explore, sit on something other than couch.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A: My early playwriting heroes were Albee and David Ives. Reading their plays in those impressionable high school years taught me everything I needed to know to get started. Nowadays, my main hero is Tracy Letts, who proved that you can be a exceedingly talented playwright and actor with only a high school diploma, which is my current journey. I also have huge playwright crushes on Annie Baker and Sam Hunter, Baker for seemingly figuring out this whole theater thing at our relatively young age, and Hunter for mining a lot of amazing stories from his northern Idaho roots. Gem State represent!

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A: The kind that invites me to come along and play. Which is not necessarily to say audience participation, though here in Philly, there's some really cool work that directly engages the audience. But more the kind of theater that creates an exciting playground of looks, people, ideas, and then invites me to come along for the ride. With some of my favorite writers, like Letts, Baker, Hunter, Will Eno, Sarah Kane, Tony Kushner, Suzan-Lori Parks, Johnna Adams, you feel that passion for not just presenting a story, but sharing it. That's the answer right there. I like theater that shares.

Q:  What advice do you have for playwrights just starting out?

A: Two things. First, write what you haven't seen on stage, but always wanted to see. If it's a story you genuinely want to see, chances are other people do, too. Second, get to the end of the first draft. I'm horrible about trying to re-write before I finish the first draft, so for me, most of the battle is just getting to the end.

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  The Private Green, my Amazonian Guard play, will have a reading through the Philadelphia New Play Initiative in June. I don't know the exact date and time yet, but they're on Facebook, so you can check that out. Everything else has yet to be announced, so just keep Googling my name. I know I will.

Crossposted to the Kanjy Blog

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Reading of my play for youth Thurs April 10th

Reading by Primary Stages of

Adventures of Super Margaret
By Adam Szymkowicz
Directed by Michelle Bossy

Thurs April 10 at 7pm
At 59 East 59 Theater (59 East 59th Street, NYC)

(It is intended to be acted for and/or by middle school students.)

Super Margaret is having a hard day. She has too much Geometry homework, and the prom queen and king have been kidnapped. If she doesn’t rescue them from the Nefarious Evil Genius, who will? Certainly not her wanna be sidekick, Louis who won’t stop following her and narrating her life. Certainly not Super Lee who is busy enough at Central High. It’s hard to be super powered and super smart.

Come if you can.

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2 one minute plays

because what else can you do with a one minute play after it's been performed except put it on the internet.

 

WEIGHT

By Adam Szymkowicz

A BIG PERSON is getting a piggyback from a LITTLE PERSON.

LITTLE PERSON

We have to stop

BIG PERSON

One more time.

LITTLE PERSON

I will break

BIG PERSON

I am the broken one.

LITTLE PERSON

I know but

BIG PERSON

I am the broken one. You saw I was destroyed by circumstances and life and mental illness and addiction and love and you picked me up and dusted me off. And you lifted me up.

LITTLE PERSON

I can only do so much.

BIG PERSON

Just a little more.

LITTLE PERSON

No but.

BIG PERSON

I just need a little more.

LITTLE PERSON

Who will fix me when I break?

BIG PERSON

Someone will come along.

LITTLE PERSON

No.

BIG PERSON

Someone.  Onward!

LITTLE PERSON

Ow.

LITTLE PERSON carries BIG PERSON off in the direction they were going.

MEME

By Adam Szymkowicz

A

I don’t understand.

B

I’m going off the internet.

A

What do you mean?

B

I’m not doing it.

A

You mean facebook?

B

Yeah.

A

Twitter?

B

Yup.

A

Not Instagram?

B

Everything.

A

I mean, you can’t do that.

B

It’s all just me me me.

A

It’s pronounced meme.

B

It’s a waste of my time and energy.  I’m going to do things instead.

A

I don’t understand.

B

I’m not judging you or anything.

A

You’ll come back though, right?

B

I doubt it.

A

We’ll fall out of touch.

B

No we won’t.

A

I’ll forget about you.  Maybe still think of you now and then and wonder what you’re up to but then less and less until I stop thinking about you at all.

B

That’s crazy. 

A

Is it?  Your shoe is untied.

B bends to tie shoe.  A exits.  B looks up after tying shoe but A is gone.

B

Hello?  I’m still here.

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I Interview Playwrights Part 647: Daniel Glenn

Daniel Glenn

Hometown: Alpharetta, Georgia

Current Town: The great sixth borough that is Yonkers

Q:  What are you working on now?

A:  I am imagining what it would be like if Richard Nixon were reincarnated, and were alerted to his past life by the spirit of Indira Gandhi, now residing in a cow. Can he conquer his demons this time around? It's a think-piece.

Q:  Tell me, if you will, a story from your childhood that explains who you are as a writer or as a person.

A:  Once, while playing with my LEGOs, I swallowed one of them. It was just a little tiny speck of a LEGO, but I was afraid that somehow this was going to be the death of me. So I went to my parents and I told them I had swallowed a LEGO. Only I was crying so hard, from elemental terror, that I was not able to answer their questions about the nature of the LEGO. So they figured I must have swallowed some giant log that was now obstructing my breathing (although I was using a lot of oxygen in my sobbing: parents sometimes have fuzzy logic). My father then took me over his knee and whapped the crap out of my back to try and get it out. This went on for some time, maybe a Spongebob and a half. Finally he gave up. The LEGO had come out, unnoticed because it was so small. So this taught me to be very specific when I choose my words. A small LEGO. A very small LEGO that gives no cause for alarm.

Q:  If you could change one thing about theater, what would it be?

A:  I would make it cheaper, or better. Too much of it is expensive or bad.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  Spalding Gray. I have a huge mancrush fancrush on Spalding Gray, and feel robbed since I never got to see him live.

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  I like anything that stays one step ahead of me. If I can figure out what's coming next, I get bored, and then I get resentful, and then I get thirsty.

Q:  What advice do you have for playwrights just starting out?

A:  Well, I'm starting out, so I'm biased, but I would say keep starting out. Start out forever. I think the more inspirational artists are the ones who keep reinventing themselves, who keep trying vastly different new genres and ideas, rather than the ones who find a niche and fill it for decades. So I'm saying more John Guare, more Caryl Churchill, less David Mamet. Now I'll probably never work with David Mamet. But it had to be said.

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:  I'm scheduled to be part of Pan Asian Rep's NuWorks in June. Or if you're heading South, I'm also performing "Portraits of People I've Never Slept With" at the Atlanta Fringe Festival. Check out danielpglenn.com, or Facebook/com/danielpglenn.

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I Interview Playwrights Part 646: Adam Scott Mazer

Adam Scott Mazer

Hometown: Birmingham, AL

Current Town: Brooklyn, NY

Q:  Tell me about The Tower.

A:  Where to even start? Hmm. About five or six years ago, I had the idea that someone (I didn't think of myself as a playwright back then) should write a play about the Donner Party, those legendary frontier settlers who got stuck in the mountains and resorted to cannibalism to survive. As I got increasingly into playwriting over the course of the last few years, the idea was always simmering in the back of my mind. After I finished Motherboard, I sorta just knew that its time had come. Early last summer, Philip Gates, Maya Rook, and I ran a developmental workshop for the show, in which Maya - who just happens to be a PhD student in American History - provided us with historical documents that we then collaboratively brought to life. We also played around with character-based improv and hallucinatory dream compositions, and I came away from those couple weeks with an amazing wealth of material and a new understanding of the project. In the fall, we visited Donner Lake, where we met with people at the historical museum and more generally were able to dive deep into the energy of the place. That trip really kick started my creativity, so I took some of the material we had generated along with certain historical documents and used those as sort of guideposts to write the play. What emerged is certainly the strangest play I've written. Both narrative and experimental, The Tower weaves in and out of reality: ostensibly set in 1846 and 1847, the arc of the play takes us not only over the Sierra Nevada’s with the desperate snowshoers, but also into the characters' minds, the future, and possibly even death itself. Titled after the tarot card for chaos, collapse, and destruction, The Tower uses one of America's most notorious myths to explore some of its foundational values: take whatever you can, kill whoever you have to, and above all else, consume, consume, consume. Sounds dark, I know, but it's actually pretty funny too!

Q:  What else are you working on now?

A:  Nothing! The Tower pretty much rules my every waking moment, save for the time I'm doing my day job. The end of this process will mark the end of a yearlong sprint in which I wrote and co-produced this play and illustrated my first book, a graphic poetry collection (with poet J. Bradley, published by YesYes Books). I'm looking forward to taking a couple months to recharge, relax, and see what kind of trouble I can get into.

Q:  Tell me, if you will, a story from your childhood that explains who you are as a writer or as a person.

A:  Oh god, I really hate telling stories from my childhood - not because it was terrible or anything, on the contrary, I have a pretty excellent family, so it was actually quite pleasant. I don't really have any Batman-esque tragic origin stories, but I can recall an event that in part informed the writing of this play. When I was maybe 10, I had a really terrible fever; to the point where I was pretty much tripping balls. I remember very vividly being inside of what I thought was a dream, frantically ripping various shirts out of my closet. After enduring a variety of other strange events and compulsions, I "woke up" in the bathtub, sitting on a bunch of wet shirts, my mother wiping my brow with a cold washcloth. Now that I think about it, that whole thing is at least partially relevant to "who I am as a writer," because so much of my writing is about the permeable membrane between what's real and what's imagined. Nothing like a little childhood fever delirium to expose the cracks in the material world.

Q:  If you could change one thing about theater, what would it be?

A:  I only get one? Way to ask the tough questions, Adam. I have a lot of issues with the current state of theater, but I think the biggest issue - as with most other things in America - is one of money. I would change the system that prohibits those without means from creating theater - grad school costs an insane amount, self-producing requires deep pockets or deep connections, and grant money is incredibly hard to come by. I have no idea how to do it, but luckily you didn't ask me that - at base level, there's something pretty deeply wrong with an "industry" in which the makers of the product - actors, directors, and writers - can reasonably expect that they will never be appropriately paid for their work.

Q:  Who are or were your theatrical heroes?

A:  Ibsen, Ionesco, Thornton Wilder, Richard Foreman, Caryl Churchill, Martin McDonagh, Qui Nguyen, and Robert Ross Parker

Q:  What kind of theater excites you?

A:  Theater that's alive. It's hard to explain what that is, but you can just feel it. Whether it's a kitchen sink drama or some crazy experimental shit, for me there are ultimately two types of theater: living and dead. Does it generate heat, or is it just sitting there rotting? I like it hot.

Q:  What advice do you have for playwrights just starting out?

A:  Oh man, let's see. Don't just network, make friends. Ask those friends to read your work, and do the same for them. Give feedback that is supportive, but honest - if we're not helping each other be the best artists we can be, then why bother? Write and rewrite and rewrite again. Don't wait around for people to give you opportunities because they probably never will: produce your own work and prove to them that you're worth their time and attention.

Q:  Plugs, please:

A:

My book The Bones of Us came out in March:

http://yesyesbooks.com/store/book/0000022/

More on The Tower at http://antimattercollective.org

Prints of my artwork and more available at adamscottmazer.com

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