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1100 Playwright Interviews
1100 Playwright Interviews A Sean Abley Rob Ackerman E.E. Adams Johnna Adams Liz Duffy Adams Tony Adams David Adjmi Keith Josef Adkins Nicc...
Aug 20, 2006
Aug 18, 2006
Reprinted with permissionthis is part of a message Patrick Gabridge posted in a discussion over at playwrightbinge yahoo group. Very wise words Mr. Gabridge.
. . .It's not realistic to expect that your early work will be universally loved and produced. Writing plays is a tough thing, and it takes years to get good at it, and even then you still write stinkers (or at least I do). Also, as you build a body of work, it's so much easier to get productions, because you know which work is better and more likely to get picked (and people notice that you have a track record). I have a pretty sizable collection of short plays, but I don't submit them all with equal frequency. Some are stronger than others.
I would think a beginning writer would be lucky to have an acceptance rate of 5% (1 in 20).
Sometimes I talk to fiction writers, and they talk about how they got so many rejections, 15 or 20, before placing a piece. That must makes me laugh. I just added up the numbers in my database, and I've had about 704 rejections of play submissions since 1990. I don't mind getting a rejection, because I know that I'm doing my job (of sending plays out) and the theatres are doing theirs (reading the scripts and making decisions). I'm much more perturbed by theatres who never respond (I've done my job, but they're shirking theirs). The percentage of folks who respond can be quite high.
I must say, I'm a bit befuddled by the focus so much on rejection. Almost all of a writer's submissions will be rejected. That's just the way it is. If it's going to drive you into deep depression, you're better off being in another business, because it never goes away. My rule with rejection letters is: read them once and file them away. I don't dwell on them or study them. If they say something nice, I put them into a file for follow-ups. If they don't, I put them in a file that doesn't require follow ups.
The best way to stop being bothered by rejections is to get lots of them, because you're sending out lots of scripts. This means you're doing your job. A rejection is not cause to need a shoulder to cry on, it's just a sign that you should send out something new.
By all means, if a script is rejected time after time, maybe you'd better get the message. Maybe it's time to stop sending it out. (Not everything we write is pure genius. Except perhaps Mr. Levine.) Write something new. Write something better.
Aug 15, 2006
Back in rehearsal. Back to life in NYC. Back to work. I work in administration. Administering. To the photocopier.
Welcome Malachy Walsh, my former roommate and a hell of a writer to the blogroll. (The Lit Dept) I know i don't alphabetize and that makes it hard to find people even for me but I will continue not to alphabetize or organize the blogroll in any way.
Aug 13, 2006
Dear Readers,
I have been approached to advertise on my blog for cash money. Should I do this? I did not start blogging as a money making venture but god knows the playwriting is not raking it in for me. ( not that this will allow me to quit my day job either)
What do you think? Is it morally bankrupt? I don't think it would affect my content in the slightest. but it is annoying. Ads annoy me. And I don't like capitalism but i do live in capitalist-daddy america and can't and I enjoy having money to pay rent and I enjoy owning things and being able to eat out sometimes.
Also I've been charging Matt Freeman for sometime to have his link on the blogroll. Sorry Matt.
Aug 12, 2006
got to sneak some writing in
Aug 4, 2006
My friend Enrique got into Brown with a play called The Danger of Bleeding Brown. I feel this is no coincidence and so I am writing a new play called
Princess Grace Strolling Down Cherry Lane with Jerome and MacArthur and Eugene O'Neill and Other New Dramatists On The Way to the Summer Play Festival.
I'm off. See you in a week.
Aug 3, 2006
self restraint muscle and you. or why I never do the dishes. Sorry, K.
Aug 2, 2006
thanks to Ripley (RIPPED) for this
http://www.kabc.com/mcintyre/listingsEntry.asp?ID=432586&PT=McIntyre
AN APOLOGY FROM A BUSH VOTER By Doug McIntyre Host, McIntyre in the Morning Talk Radio 790 KABC
"So, Im saying today, I was wrong to have voted for George W. Bush. In historic terms, I believe George W. Bush is the worst two-term President in the history of the country. Worse than Grant. I also believe a case can be made that hes the worst President, period. "
"I believe, as I have said countless times, the two party system is on the brink of a second collapse. Its currently running on spin, anger, revenge, and pots and pots and pots of money."
"With a belated tip of the cap to Ralph Nader, the system is broken, so broken, its almost inevitable it pukes up the Al Gores and George W. Bushes. Where are the Trumans and the Eisenhowers? Where are the men and women of vision and accomplishment? Why do we have to settle for recycled hacks and malleable ciphers? Greatness is always rare, but is basic competence and simple honesty too much to ask? "
Jesus was not pro war?
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/30/us/30pastor.html?ex=1154664000&en=304c373abd2cc406&ei=5087%0A
After refusing each time, Mr. Boyd finally became fed up, he said. Before the last presidential election, he preached six sermons called The Cross and the Sword in which he said the church should steer clear of politics, give up moralizing on sexual issues, stop claiming the United States as a Christian nation and stop glorifying American military campaigns.
Sermons like Mr. Boyds are hardly typical in todays evangelical churches. But the upheaval at Woodland Hills is an example of the internal debates now going on in some evangelical colleges, magazines and churches. A common concern is that the Christian message is being compromised by the tendency to tie evangelical Christianity to the Republican Party and American nationalism, especially through the war in Iraq.
Aug 1, 2006
Jul 31, 2006
Coming Soon
A workshop production of Pretty Theft at Juilliard (no sets, lights or costumes but probably some Juilliard dancers and definitely 7 excellently talented Juilliard students)
Directed by Moritz von Stuelpnagel
Saturday Sept. 9,1PM and 6PM Sunday Sept. 10, 2PM Monday Sept. 11, 7PM
Mark your calendars and tell all your friends.
Jul 30, 2006
Word of The Day
Misodramist (mi SOD ra mist) noun One who hates playwrights
"You can't take that critic seriously. He is a misodramist"
Finally we have a specialized word we can use to shut people up and accuse them of something at the same time. in the past we've had to resort to calling people racist or unamerican or woman-hating or uncouth or pedophiliac.
In this PC world we live in (switch to Mac, people), I believe this term will catch on like wildfire.
Jul 27, 2006
another scene--first draft as always
future of cars
Jul 25, 2006
Jul 24, 2006
An eye for
Bush does what he wants
First draft of something new
I'm not sure what this is yet but it might be the start of a new play.
(Three women in hard hats, A, C and S sit on a steel girder eating lunch from their lunch boxes. Faint sound of jackhammer.)
C What you got?
A Ham.
C You?
S Tuna.
A What about you?
C Yogurt.
S Yogurt again.
C I like yogurt. I used to like yogurt.
S (shouting down below) Hey! You! Let me see you shake that ass!
C And carrots.
S Youre making me all wet! I can barely control myself! Flex it! Flex it! Hey meatboy, where you going?
A He cant hear you.
S Fuck.
C I hate my lunch.
(Pause)
A I have something to tell you.
S Not again.
C Seriously?
A Yeah, Im afraid so.
S Fuck.
A Will you help me?
S What the fuck?
A I know.
C Seriously.
A I know. I know. Im sorry.
C Are you?
A Yes. Will you help me?
S What, tonight?
A Could you?
S I guess.
A What about you?
C OK. But Im not doing any of the heavy lifting or the digging.
S What are you going to do then?
C I could sing.
A I dont think we should sing. Then people will know were out there digging and that wouldnt be good.
C I could hum.
S Shell dig. We both will.