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John Yearley
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so sorry Rolo. What an awful loss.
This one's personal. Some1Speaking tonight.
In November 2020 one of the most important people in my life finally lost what had been an incredible 11-year battle with Stage IV Ovarian Cancer. At the time of her initial diagnosis one of the docs she consulted urged her to "get your affairs in order. I give you six weeks." And so I've been ...
I love being name checked here! I don't remember saying it but believe it deeply.
Some writers are actually mad at words. They have this idea of the perfect story or play in their head and the fact that they can't build it with the words at their disposal makes them feel frustrated and helpless. This leads to laziness, defensiveness, bad writing.
I know your feeling about individual coaching. It's hard to find the line, what to mention what not. I go big general impressions, smaller unclarities (I made up a word!). Know when to back off. The work will succeed or fail on their work, not ours.
So good to see EC back! I've had an essay inmy head for the longest time...
The Alchemy of Play + Wright (or: Writer + What? = Play)
Years ago, my good pal John Yearley, a gifted writer who absolutely needs to be a playwright because his humanity or his writer soul naturally seeks its expression through dialogue, said the following about a someone who neither of us regarded as much more than a mediocre hack. As we discusse...
It's taken me years to figure that out. It wasn't just impatience when I was younger (though that was part of it). It was understanding the implications of what I was writing and accepting not knowing what to do right away.
What's the Difference Between a Hack and a Master? Patience.
Reading Philip Roth's masterpiece, The Plot Against America and I keep shouting "Genius!" as I read passage after passage. What is it really at the root of his genius? I think it's a matter of time. The enemy of great writing is impatience. The urgent need to finish before the real work of ...
I had some of that playwright snobbery in the past, but no longer. For me all that condescension about McKee and his ilk was self-protective. It came from the feel of, "I don't want to look too rigorously at my script, because I'm afraid what I'll find!"
Put another way, I'm fine with veering from McKee prescriptions IF I'M DOING IT INTENTIONALLY. What made me afraid was that I was doing it unintentionally. That he was right and I didn't know how to fix it. Enter condescension and claims about the artistic purity of playwriting.
Robert McKee is So Much More Than I Imagined Him to Be
All filmmakers know his name. It's virtually impossible to have written a screenplay in this country (or any other, for that matter) without having come across the name Robert McKee because it is McKee who towers over all of us, or the idea of McKee, an omniscient master analyst of any story ...
I am grateful that I had a ringside seat to this first meeting. And your portrait of him is beautiful and moving.
I heard a a snippet of a Terry Gross interview with Albee that played after he died. She asked how he liked the movie version of Virginia Woolf. He said he was disappointed because he had been promised James Mason and Bette Davis. Terry Gross said, "Is that true?" Albee responded, "Of course it's true. I said it. "
Who among us could say that with a straight face?
The Death of Edward Albee and Possibly Some Part of Me
When the news broke that our greatest living playwright was no longer living, my social media filled with people sharing it. And as I watched the comment threads on facebook unfurl I did not add one word. Why not? Hard to say. Certainly anyone who knows me knows that I adored both the man and...
That story is so wonderful, Rolo. Teachers are the great shapers of the world, totally unsung. Rest in peace, Christine Robinson.
Christine Robinson: My First Unimpressed Teacher
The news this week of the death of Christine Robinson, brought tears to my eyes. And yet, truth be told, I hardly knew her. So, why then, would the death of this eccentric English teacher at a prestigious East Coast prep school have left me spinning in a kind of hazy grief? Close friends of mine...
Lovely piece, Bruce. Something Rolo wrote reminded me of Mary Oliver talking about the relationship of discipline to creativity. She said that writing every day helped her muse learn to trust her. The muse knew she would be at her desk whenever she was ready to come out.
On Creativity and Art
There is creativity. And there is Art. Every person is creative. I have had friends tell me, “I can’t sing”. And then I coach them a little at my keyboard. Once they learn a bit about breath and muscle relaxation, and they become a little less nervous and insecure, they can sing. They may no...
Good luck with your production, Mike. Maybe producing your own version will make you more sympathetic to the difficulties of the 2011 revival. There are so many plates spinning in Blue Leaves, the range of emotion is so great, there are so many wonderful and difficult parts to cast - part of what makes it so great is what makes it so difficult to do well!
House of Blue Leaves (and the magic of less critical viewing)
When I was a kid, I saw the PBS telecast of The House of Blue Leaves by John Guare on American Playhouse. The production, a Lincoln Center revival, starred John Mahoney and Swoosie Kurtz. I didn’t know it at the time, but it was one of the seminal moments of my theatre life. There was somethin...
Worse than that, all those previews of musicals where there is no singing (Into the Woods, Sweeny Todd). Do they think they'll fool people? Do they think people who don't like musicals are going to like a movie they've been tricked into seeing?
Pet Peeve - A Haiku
Foreign film trailers No dialogue, no subtitles Who are they fooling?
One of the most beautiful places in the world. Can't wait to see this! Thank you!
Sagrada: The Mystery of Creation - A Film Review
Would you like to contemplate time, continuity, community, creativity, and spirituality while seeing beautiful images of an architectural marvel? If yes, have I got a film for you: Sagrada: The Mystery of Creation, directed by Stefan Haupt. Sagarda Familia, the cathedral that began its life...
This is such a smart piece, with so much in it. So much of a story is what it reveals about the teller of the tale, why they are telling it. And I couldn't agree more about telling a story. As soon as you are finding the laugh lines, maybe you are obscuring the telling detail? Fixing a funnier but somewhat less interesting story in place?
Storytelling vs. Story Writing
For reasons that remain a mystery to me but which I sort of expect may reveal themselves in time, we hear a lot about story and storytelling these days. It's not uncommon to hear writers of all forms talk about the fundamental human hunger for good storytelling. And thanks in large part to the...
That is a powerful piece. Really glad to have read it. Thank you, Rolo.
David Dower on "The Scarcity Matrix"
David Dower has an astonishing piece on what he calls The Scarcity Matrix up on Howlround. Here's an interesting paragraph from this must-read post. We used the Scarcity trigger to corral an audience for ourselves and hang onto them out of fear they’ll migrate to “our competitors in the market...
A thrilling piece of writing about something that thrilled you. How apropos. When we love fervently we should shout it from the rooftops. Well done, Rolo! I so hope I get to see it.
I have seen the future of opera in LONDON ROAD
I was in Toronto for a few days leading a Director/Dramatist Exchange for the Playwrights Guild of Canada. You know how I am. When I travel I like to see some local theatre. Purely by chance, during intermission at a performance of a mediocre new musical some friends had taken me to, their goo...
So happy to provide inspiration, Amy, as I have received so much from you!
My Late Night Cinematheque
Movies are the easiest art form to catch up on. If I decide I want to read one of the many classics I’ve neglected (Moby Dick, Remembrance of Things Past, etc.), it’s a pretty major commitment. Even at the rate I read, we’re talking about a couple of weeks. On the other hand, if you want to se...
Thank you, David! You are like an uncredited co-author here, so much did our conversations influence it.
My Late Night Cinematheque
Movies are the easiest art form to catch up on. If I decide I want to read one of the many classics I’ve neglected (Moby Dick, Remembrance of Things Past, etc.), it’s a pretty major commitment. Even at the rate I read, we’re talking about a couple of weeks. On the other hand, if you want to se...
The Executioner's Song is, to me, the greatest example of this balancing act. A "nonfiction novel", Mailer called it. It is truly an astonishing book, one of the best I've ever read. Some gigantic truths are dredged up in that book. I believe the veracity of the characters and the story (maybe because they are verifiable to a degree? maybe that's the difference?) so much that issues of whether a particular conversation is made up, or a particular image is a writer's embellishment, seems irrelevant to me.
Gimme Some Truth: Conversation with Essayist Randon Billings Noble
I met essayist Randon Billings Noble at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. As I remember it, all of our conversations were either about music (she studied classical violin and plays piano) or "nonfiction." That's how it is at residencies, and man, am I missing that now. Anyway, back i...
I'll totally be your date next time, Rolo. I think all of the above play a part, but I'd go strongest with C. Who has any bad feelings about MacDowell? They give to you and honor you and expect nothing in return. I would walk over coals for those people. The mere mention of the word MacDowell gets me smiling and misty-eyed. How could you not have fun?
Why'd I have so much fun at The MacDowell Fellows Party? 5 Possible Reasons.
Just got home from the MacDowell Fellows Reunion party held at Little Airplane in South Street Seaport. Now, I have to admit going in, I was just as apprehensive as I would be walking into any gathering of folks, particularly creative types in New York City. Let's face it, gatherings that pass...
And yet you are reading a performing arts blog. One assumes that if you are reading a performing arts blog you are interested in the work of performing artists. All the piece was saying was that the work of actors deserves to be treated with as much respect as that of other artists. You disagree?
Unless you have acted yourself, and acted very well, you might not know how difficult it is. True, it is not difficult like coal mining is difficult. But what is easy for one person can be almost impossible for another. I am playwright, and I once had a conversation with a woman who ran a children's hospital in Kabul. When I told her how I sent my work out into the world she said, with no irony at all, "You are SO BRAVE." To me the idea that a woman who runs a hospital in Kabul would think me brave is ludicrous. But she wasn't kidding.
No Respect for Acting
It never ceases to shock (and sadden) me how prevalent in the film world this is. Film directors who have zero regard for the craft of acting, so much so that they believe they have to trick their actors into delivering honest performances. The most famous example of this distorted view, of co...
Fantastic piece, Rolo. You conjure that room so vividly. The fragility of it, the violation when it is trampled on. People like that are pure poison, working out their own dramas while smashing through life oblivious to(or maybe just uninterested in) the harm they cause.
Post-Traumatic Diva Syndrome
The other night I went to see a friend's play at a small theatre in the village. Friends of mine who sit beside me at the theatre know that when I go I never read the Playbill before the performance begins. I like to be surprised. In this case, it was enough that the writer was someone I am fo...
Thanks, David. I had never used the Miller quote in that direct a way before. It was a way of recognizing a feeling I couldn't put my finger on. Feeling like, "Everybody is happy, it is clearly a good play...so why do I feel so blah about it?"
Things That Never Happen Happen All the Time
Note: The play I wrote for young audiences, Fake Flowers Don't Die, is going to be performed in schools, theatres, and community centers in the Cincinnati area throughout the month of October. I was asked by the Education Director of Cincinnati-Playhouse-in-the-Park to write something about th...
There was a similar story in 80s academia. A professor, fed up with utter incomprehensibility of most papers published academic journals, composed an essay that was just jibbersih littered with buzzwords. It was submitted to a prominent journal, and promptly published.
'Steps' of Rejection
I recently wrote a blog post pointing out the obvious: that any writer who has sold 450 million books has a clear marketing advantage over an unknown scribbler. I was comparing J.K. Rowling and an unknown author, Robert Galbraith, after those two writers were outed as being the one and the sam...
I don't think it's an either/or. I think craft augments and jumpstarts inspiration. I don't think there's any reason to take a class, or get a different camera, because you think in some abstract way you will do better, or become a "real photographer". (See my own post about being a "real writer" to know how well I understand this phenomena).
I think you reach out when you start straining against your own limits. When you want to do things you don't know how to do, or create something that is somehow out of your wheelhouse, then you seek new equipment, new mentors.
Your photography now is lovely. It is an expression of the same sensibility as your writing: cool, sensitive to beauty and difference, inquisitive. There's no need to change it unless YOU feel a need to change it.
The Untrained Eye
I just wrote a post on my own blog, titled Plight of the Avid Amateur, spurred by my quest to replace a broken camera. You see, although I consider myself primarily a writer, my writing chronicles many of my adventures and, well, some things you just can't describe properly. You have to show t...
I'm guilty of this, too. There's a certain arrogance about it at some point - "I shouldn't have to submit anymore!" But like most arrogance, it just masks insecurity ("I don't want to be rejected anymore!").
The point about good things happening even if you don't win is 100% true, however, and not just cheer-you-up bromide. The path of my play being done at Cincy Playhouse in 2005 was: submit to NY contest, become a finalist for that contest but not win, successful reading of said play at that theatre, become writer-in-residence at that theatre, have workshop production of that play, director of that workshop production hand my latest play to Cincy Playhouse, latest play wins contest, Cincy Playhouse produces latest play.
They never even would have read me through the normal path, as I was agentless at the time.
Overcoming "Submission Aversion"
I'm not sure how it happened to me but at some point in the last ten years, I stopped submitting my work to places and people I didn't know. Well, not entirely. But virtually so. I'm not sure if this shut-down can be attributed to battle fatigue induced by one too many rejections on the heels ...
It makes me happy this spurred memories for all of you. I am a dad with no time and no energy so I watch many movies at home. But nothing will replace the group experience of cinema for me. Dreaming in the dark.
One Of the Best Things I've Ever Done
In September, 1991, I showed up at a realtor’s office in Brooklyn. The borough was to be my home for the next 18 years, but it was virgin ground to me then. I had graduated from college in June. After a summer at home and a trip to Europe with my girlfriend, I had come to start my new life, my...
I think artists spend so much time feeling like beggars at the door that they internalize this feeling. It's really destructive. I was recently discussing a project with some people who were not writers and were, in conventional terms, much more successful than I. When they turned to ask me a question about something a thought occurred - "Oh, right. They NEED me. None of them can do what I do. So why am I sitting here feeling like I'm lucky to be here?"
Artist = Helpless Child = Not Charming
There are people in this business (You know who you are) who love nothing more than to infantilize the artists they deal with. Sometimes these people are lawyers. Sometimes they're agents or producers or executives. Sometimes they're even D-girls, if you can imagine. And there are artists who ...
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