Keeping it Simple... Sam

I recently accepted an opportunity to write a fifteen minute screenplay for some actors who are learning about the craft of acting for the screen. The time limit for this project is forcing me to do what I should always be doing: getting straight to the story. Instead of being deceived by the empty page and seemingly huge white canvas to work on (how will I fill up all those pages?), I am keeping things simple out of fear that there is not enough space and time. Maybe I should start all my projects as if they had to be fifteen minutes long.

Co-Leading Workshops

I have long felt that the best learning environment for a playwright is in rehearsal. I often find myself sharing my experience (either as a writer or a director) in order to drive home a point about a certain element of craft. But why not have an actor in the room who can actually demonstrate this? So, over a year ago I started a conversation with Hope Lambert about this idea. I went to her because she is an educator as well as an actor and she has considerable experience working on new plays. Like composers who understand the instruments they write for, so it is with playwrights: we can only benefit from understanding the actor's process. Not only does Hope provide insight into this process, she gets everyone on their feet with some acting exercises that ultimately generates ideas and inspiration for writers. Nothing beats the process of rehearsing your play with actors, directors and designers, but those opportunities are woefully rare. Our hope is that co-leading a workshop like this moves us from focusing on words on the page to visualizing and hearing what our imaginations are conjuring.

Two Years Later

It's hard to believe that almost two years have passed since the last post. When I first wrote the subtitle to this blog I had no idea how occasional "very occasional" would be. It's been a busy two years, particularly teaching. I have spent a lot of time thinking about how best to run writing workshops and in the last two years I have put these ideas into practice. Fast forward two years and I am now co-leading workshops for playwrights with Hope Lambert, a talented actress from the Washington area. We are currently offering workshops at First Draft in Virginia and the Writer's Center in Maryland. If you have taken one of these workshops (or one that I offer by myself), I hope you will provide some feed back, either here on this blog or by email. I've been writing as well and in the process I have tried to apply what I preach in the workshop. At least I think I do... or I would like to think I do. So, why co-lead a playwriting workshop with an actor? I'll offer up some thoughts on this in upcoming posts.