Friday, November 30, 2018

November Writing Challenge 2018 - 30 - Rewrite Someone Else's Play


THE THIRTIETH CHALLENGE

Rewrite a play of someone else’s

WOW


HEY!


You made it! (or you didn’t and that’s okay too- no really it is I’ve only finished about half the time when I try to do these. Kids, ya know? Life. Etc.)

If you’re not having fun, you’re doing it wrong.
Why do this? Well, for me it goes back to the essence of theater and promoting it as inherently an act of play - even the writing of it!-  dangerous, delightful, adult, play.

It’s a bit of a yogic practice to be sure- good days and bad days- but it’s a mistake to try to hold back the waters and pray that it all works out when the dam bursts. It’s much better to live your life- idk why the water metaphor but--- building up muscles walking next to the creative river.

Anyway- last challenge. Here it is:

CHALLENGE: YOU. Rewrite a play of someone else’s. From this challenge. From classic works. From whatever. Boil it down to yourself with a sentence like “essentially this is a play about bad bosses- just like when I worked at Groupon (or whatever).” Then rewrite the play from your perspective, your life markers, yours and you and u.
Make it personal. A campfire story about how you got here.

And… add a dream sequence in the middle

Make it theatrical. Make it a rain dance.

Then smack us back down into the reality of the first part of the play.

Don’t forget to advocate for yourself.
Don’t feel sorry for yourself.
Obama says “Don’t boo, vote.”
I say “Don’t bitch, write.”

I love you for reading these.
I love you for choosing an artist's life. You are a leader in your community whether you feel like one or not. Whether they express it or not, other (muggle) people know you’re dangerous, powerful, and creative. They know you’re full of mystery and potential.
Honor yourself at the end of this.
Heal. Rest. Rest.
Celebrate it AS a thing. The end product is YOU- not the writing. The writing can’t happen without you, being in tune, doing that river walk (see above).

‘Til next year!

-Aaron

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(I’m trying to do a riff on Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya, with most of the genders flipped.  The young trophy wife is instead a trophy husband, etc.  So the professor, GWENDOLYN, has come with her new younger husband JONATHAN, to summer at the family farm of her late husband, now run by her daughter, OLIVE, and former sister-in-law, CONSTANCE.  The local doctor, ESTHER, makes frequent visits.  OLIVE pines for ESTHER, but she has her eye on JONATHAN, and it may be mutual.  Which is even more awkward for ESTHER’s friendship with CONSTANCE, for she also pines for JONATHAN.  Right now, I seem to be in a meditative phase where none of the characters are talking to each other; they’re instead engaging in conversation with inanimate objects.  And so it goes…)


CONSTANCE kneels by a bed of autumn roses – a mixture of blooms in oranges and yellows and reds.

                          CONSTANCE
Such lovely things.  It seems a shame to pick you.

The ROSES look to CONSTANCE.

                          ROSES
If you live in there, and I live out here, how are we ever going to see and appreciate each other’s beauty?

                          CONSTANCE
You want me to cut you down?

                          ROSES
It’s the only way I can be near you.

                          CONSTANCE
But you’ll die.

                          ROSES
We’re all going to die.  Flowers soonest of all.  September is here anyway.  Would you prefer I die out here alone in the chill?

                          CONSTANCE
No, of course not.

                          ROSES
Take me inside, where I can be warm, with you.  Let me brighten your rooms.  You’ll tend me just as closely in there as you do out here.  You’ll keep me alive as long as you can.

                          CONSTANCE
I will.

                          ROSES
And if there’s someone you want me to impress and watch over for you, I can do that as well.

                          CONSTANCE
Beautiful autumn roses – lovely, sad roses.

                          ROSES
We’ll be less sad together.  You could bloom as well.

                          CONSTANCE
I have the clippers.  I’ll be gentle.

                          ROSES
Do it quickly.
Oh!  Oh!

                          CONSTANCE
I have you.

*************************

OLIVE sits at a piano.

The PIANO waits impatiently.

                          PIANO
You’ve dusted me and polished me.  Now play me.  I’m not a piece of furniture.  I’m meant to sing.  But I need you to touch my keys.

                          OLIVE
I’ll disturb mother.

                          PIANO
She and her books can walk outside.  We are less mobile.

                          OLIVE
What if I play badly?

                          PIANO
You’re not liable to play well if you don’t play at all.

                          OLIVE
I won’t offend you?

                          PIANO
You only offend me by not allowing me to truly speak.  I need your caress to set my voice free.

                          OLIVE
But the whole house will hear.

                          PIANO
Let them.  The silence in this place is suffocating.

                          OLIVE
You seem so sad.

                          PIANO
There is nothing sadder than an unplayed piano.  If you touch me, I’ll perk right up, I promise you.

OLIVE lays her hands gently on the keys, but don’t press down to play the notes yet.

                          PIANO (cont’d)
Oh, the warmth of your fingertips.  I’ve missed you.

                          OLIVE
I’ve missed you, too.

OLIVE plays first one chord softly, then another.

                          OLIVE (cont’d)
You sound so lovely.

                          PIANO
We sound so lovely.

OLIVE starts picking out a little tune.

                          OLIVE
You’re magnificent.

                          PIANO
Dance with me!

OLIVE plays the PIANO with abandon, not caring who might hear.

***************************

JONATHAN finds the DOCTOR’S BAG, left behind.

                          JONATHAN
The doctor’s bag, but no doctor.

JONATHAN moves closer to the bag.

                          JONATHAN (cont’d)
It’s not like her to leave her tools behind.

The DOCTOR’S BAG speaks up.

                          DOCTOR’S BAG
She has another life.
When not looking after human life, she cares for the trees.
For that, I have no tools for her.

                          JONATHAN
I’ve always wondered what she keeps in here.

                          DOCTOR’S BAG
Go ahead and look.  I won’t tell.
If she valued her privacy, she wouldn’t leave me behind.

                          JONATHAN
If you’re certain –

                          DOCTOR’S BAG
Take a peek.  You’ll kick yourself if you don’t.

When JONATHAN still hesistates –

                          DOCTOR’S BAG
I won’t bite.

JONATHAN reaches into the DOCTOR’S BAG, carefully removing each tool and setting them in ordered rows next to the bag.  He notes the location and order as he goes and arranges things in such a way that he’ll be able to reverse the process.

Last of all, he pulls out a small pocket flask for liquor.

                          JONATHAN
Oh, doctor.

JONATHAN opens it and sniffs.

                          DOCTOR’S BAG
Mostly still in there.  It’s been a good day.  Only one person died.  And they were old, and not in pain.

                          JONATHAN
Her lips have touched this flask.

                          DOCTOR’S BAG
Yours should, too.

JONATHAN looks around.

Piano music can be heard in a distant room.

                          DOCTOR’S BAG (cont’d)
Nobody here but you and me.

JONATHAN brings the flask to his mouth for a small, gentle sip.

                          JONATHAN
It burns.

                          DOCTOR’S BAG
Most medicine does.

JONATHAN picks up the stethoscope.

He puts the eartiips in his ears.

He places the diaphragm against his chest.

                          DOCTOR’S BAG (cont’d)
You can hear better if it’s against your skin.

JONATHAN slips the diaphragm inside his shirt.

It’s cold.  It makes him jump just a bit.

Then he stands still to listen.

                          JONATHAN
I have a heart.
Good.
I wondered.

***************************

GWENDOLYN sits, surrounded by stacks of books.

                          GWENDOLYN
My brain used to retain a library of knowledge larger than this.  Now bits and pieces, facts and quotations, just keep slipping out one after the other, day after day.  And I don’t know I’ve lost anything until suddenly I’m reaching for a word and it isn’t there.

                          BOOKS
That’s why we exist.  To hold things for you, for later.

                          GWENDOLYN
I read you, but then it all falls out again.

                          BOOKS
Not all.

                          GWENDOLYN
Some.  More than I’d like.

                          BOOKS
That’s why you keep us.

                          GWENDOLYN
I keep you for vanity.  So people know that I’ve read you.  I command you.  That you’re up here in my head.  Something they haven’t even touched, couldn’t possibly understand.

                          BOOKS
No one’s quizzing you.

                          GWENDOLYN
I’m terrified.  The blood coursing through my skull, my heartbeat, it’s deafening.

Piano music is heard in a distant room.

                          GWENDOLYN
The joy in that music mocks me.

                          BOOKS
It’s only music.

                          GWENDOLYN
I’m scared.  I feel so small.

                          BOOKS
Come here.  Get lost in us for a while.

The BOOKS gather round and embrace GWENDOLYN.

                          BOOKS (cont’d)
We’ll keep you safe.

************************

ESTHER, wearing work gloves and carrying a small bucket with gardening tools, walks up to a massive tree, towering out of sight.

In its shadow, she finds a small sapling.

                          ESTHER
Well now, you’re not going to get a lot of sun here, are you, tiny thing?

                          SAPLING
I keep stretching, but I can’t reach the sky and I can’t reach the light.

ESTHER kneels down beside the sapling.

                          SAPLING (cont’d)
It’s been so long since anyone even noticed I was here.

ESTHER touches the sapling’s leaves with a gloved hand.

                          SAPLING (cont’d)
It’s been even longer since anyone touched me.

                          ESTHER
I think the solution is just to move you about six feet to the left.

ESTHER gets out a small trowel.

                          ESTHER (cont’d)
I’ll try to be as gentle as I can.  I may not get every single one of your roots.  You’ll have to forgive me.

                          SAPLING
I can grow more roots, what I need is more sun.

ESTHER digs carefully around the sapling.

                          ESTHER
There now.  I think that’s got it.

ESTHER digs her hands into the dirt around the SAPLING.

The SAPLING giggles.

ESTHER scoops the SAPLING up in her arms, roots dangling.

                          ESTHER (cont’d)
I dug a hole over here the other day, thinking I might need to move you.

ESTHER gently sets the SAPLING in the hole, then fills in the dirt around it and pats it down.

                          SAPLING
It’s so warm here.  I’d forgotten what the warmth of the sun was like.  It’ll take some getting used to.

                          ESTHER
There.  That’s a start.

                          SAPLING
I wish I could offer you shade as a thank you.

ESTHER walks over to the massive tree while addressing the SAPLING.

                          ESTHER
You’ll be able to someday.
Just like this tree my father planted now shelters me.

ESTHER sits in the shade of the massive tree.

ESTHER takes off the gloves and gets a book out of her bucket.

The TREE speaks in a deep voice from above her head.

                          TREE
Welcome back, Esther.

                          ESTHER
Now let’s see, where was I?

ESTHER reads, leaning against the TREE, as the SAPLING wiggles in its new spot, settling in.

Piano music can be heard coming from the house just beyond the woods.




November Writing Challenge 2018 - 29 - Lies And Asides


THE TWENTY-NINTH CHALLENGE

Lies and Asides

Write a play where one or more character speaks to the audience in asides.

Asides are always truthful, so write lots of lies in the dialogue

Use dramatic irony- if both characters would only open up and be honest with each other, the impending tragedy would not be about to happen!

Asides are really only in morality tales- sadly I believe. Prove me wrong!

Use life and death stakes

Bonus: Make yourself one of the characters- and the asides your most vulnerable thoughts. Change the names to protect the innocent

(Hilarious.  I kind of did this one already three days ago as a gimmick in the parental time fluid prompt I posted.  I’m reaching back into the 20/20 challenge instead)


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THE TWENTIETH CHALLENGE
Write a play that has a total budget of $20 and lasts 20 minutes

Sorry again for delays. I DO try to keep ahead, but ultimately this is supposed to be a write every day challenge (Thanksgiving you'll get to get ahead I promise).

If you're in a bind and I'm BEhind, feel free to just email me with something written (that counts as a theatrical event--- lights up lights down minumum- low bar!) and it's all good.

Andrew Jackson is on the $20 bill.

$20 is a common low-end ticket price here in Chicago.

THE TWENTIETH CHALLENGE
Write a play that has a total budget of $20 and lasts 20 minutes.

Rules:
1.
It must utilize all common theatrical design elements in a purposeful and theatrical manner.
·       LIGHTS
·       SOUND
·       COSTUME
·       SCENIC
·       PROPS

2.
It must incorporate each of the FOUR NATURAL ELEMENTS- water, wind, earth fire.

3.
It must last EXACTLY twenty minutes.

4.
It should probably be about Andrew Jackson, either directly or indirectly.

5.

6. The entire production can cost no more than $20

Tips:

Assume the actor has their own cell phone, which contains a flashlight function, camera, and working speakers.

Fire from a lighter is a good cheap trick.

You can set the play anywhere.

You do NOT have to operate within the law or acceptable audience-performer norms.

Intimate symbolism is gonna be key here.

A pack of cotton balls or toothpicks for 99 cents (or things like that) will be helpful.

Magic and sleight of hand are always fun. (Who knew you spelled it sleight? Wow!)

**********************


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Two actors come out on stage dressed in T-shirts from the playwrights’ voluminous T-shirt collection.  One is in a BASSACKWARDS USA T-shirt with the outline of America printed in reverse (as you’re looking at it, California coast on the right, Maine on the left).  One is in a T-shirt with the CAPTAIN AMERICA shield on the front.

                          CAP
Dude, get the lights.

                          BASSACKWARDS
Oh, right.

BASSACKWARDS scurries over to the light switch on the wall and turns the regular lights in the room off.

CAP and BASSACKWARDS then whip out their cell phones and turn on the flashlight app to pierce the dark.

They each train the light onto their chests for a moment to highlight their insignia.

                          CAP
It’s the twenty dollar, twenty minute show.

                          BASSACKWARDS
Which I guess means we’re not paying the actors.

                          CAP
I don’t think the playwright’s getting paid either.

                          BASSACKWARDS
And we certainly don’t have money for a director.

                          CAP
And we only have twenty minutes, and a lot of ground to cover.

                          BASSACKWARDS
No pun intended.

                          CAP
Oh yeah, we’re supposed to cover the four elements, earth, air,  fire and water.

Then CAP and BASSACKWARDS quickly pull out five identical folding chairs from the playwright’s home (the sort that fold out into fairly realistic looking straight back chairs, with the back upright rather than tilted back, so they naturally look like a lower case letter “h”)

They arrange two of them on their side on the floor in a configuration to look like the capital letter “F”

                          BASSACKWARDS
See, if you will, the letter F, for fire.

CAP gets out a matchbook and lights a single match dramatically.

                          BASSACKWARDS (cont’d)
Put that out.

CAP does.

                          BASSACKWARDS (cont’d)
We can’t afford to light anything on fire.  Nor can we afford a fire extinguisher to help put anything out.

                          CAP
We have water.

BASSACKWARDS gets out a spray bottle full of water, and sprays on the match, just for good measure.

Then sprays CAP in the face.

Then spritzes himself, as if with a fine cologne.

                          BASSACKWARDS
The water’s for later and I’m not taking any chances.

CAP carefully sets the doused match aside, either on the floor or in his pocket.

                          CAP
Backup fire?

                          BASSACKWARDS
Backup fire.

                          CAP
That matchbook was from a set of 50 in a box that only costs $1.79, in case anyone was keeping track.

                          BASSACKWARDS
Blew nearly a tenth of the budget right there.

                          CAP
Well, your spray bottle’s $1.98, so there’s another tenth of the budget.

                          BASSACKWARDS
Water’s free.
For now.

                          CAP
Most of these clothes are ours.  The T-shirts and the chairs are the playwrights.  This phone’s mine, the other phone is the playwright’s – for upcoming sound cues, some of which he owns, some of which we downloaded special. 

                          BASSACKWARDS
And we have my as yet still unpocketed phone for more magic.

                          CAP
Kinda cheating, but don’t all shoestring theater productions.

                          BASSACKWARDS
Shoestrings are ours, too.

CAP sets his phone down on one of the F chairs, light pointing up.

BASSACKWARDS gets an orange sheet of tissue paper out with a flourish.

                          CAP
Set of multicolored tissue paper - $1.29

BASSACKWARDS gets a little plastic Scotch tape dispenser out of a pocket with a flourish.

                          BASSACKWARDS
The playwright already had some clear Scotch tape but a little dispenser full like this only costs $2.19.

                          CAP
Yikes.

BASSACKWARDS and CAP work together to tape the tissue paper in a cone shape over the phone to create some colored light.

                          BASSACKWARDS
Like the campfires of old.

                          CAP
For storytelling.

                          BASSACKWARDS
And because it’s a $20 bill we have for a budget, we are also supposed to give a nod to Andrew Jackson, the face on the $20 bill, and one of our most racist presidents.

                          CAP
But not one of our worst presidents.

                          BASSACKWARDS
Which, honestly, doesn’t make a lot of sense to me.

                          CAP
But we’ll get to that.
We have four elements and only twenty minutes, roughly 5 minutes per element, so we’re already cutting into somebody’s time.

                          BASSACKWARDS
In honor of both of our themes, and we’re not cheating, I swear, let’s kick off the sound cues with something that would really piss off Andrew Jackson – a group of rich, award-winning black men singing.  That would be the group Earth, Wind & Fire, whose hit “September” we just downloaded for $1.29.

                          CAP
Fifteen second dance break!

BASSACKWARDS plays the song and the two of them (and the audience if they like) dance during the intro.  After the song proper gets going, the actors return to the script.

                          BASSACKWARDS
Andrew Jackson, slave owner.

                          CAP
Andrew Jackson, the seventh President of the United States of America.

                          BASSACKWARDS
And according to historians, considered on the second most racist president we’ve ever had.

                          CAP
That honor would go to Andrew Johnson, who became our 17th president after Lincoln was assassinated.

                          BASSACKWARDS
His Reconstruction proclamations gave amnesty, property and voting rights to all but the highest Confederate officials after the Civil War, the return of property pretty much nullifying the whole “forty acres and a mule” promise to former slaves.

                          CAP
Dance break!

Actors and audience dance to the first chorus of “September” – when the next verse kicks in, the actors continue:

                          BASSACKWARDS
Andrew Johnson, also not a fan of the 14th or 15th amendments to the constitution giving citizenship and voting rights to freed slaves.

                          CAP
Male former slaves only though.

                          BASSACKWARDS
Yes, still four amendments away from the 19th for the ladies.

                          CAP
Didn’t oppose the 13th amendment abolishing slavery, though.

                          BASSACKWARDS
Yes, let’s give Johnson his due.  He just pulled all black troops out of the South so the former Confederate states could terrorize and kill African Americans back into submission – or off to the North.

                          CAP
Dance Break!

Actors and audience dance to the second chorus of “September”

But hang on, because it’s a -

                          CAP (cont’d)
Double chorus!

Actors and audience continue dancing.  When the next, very short verse, kicks in, the actors continue:

                          CAP
He vetoed both the Freedmen’s Bureau Bill and the Civil Rights Act of 1866.

                          BASSACKWARDS
Which Congress passed anyway by overriding his vetoes.

                          CAP
Let’s all pause to remember a time when Congress had courage.

                          BASSACKWARDS
With a Dance Break!

Actors and audience dance to the third and final chorus of “September”

But hang on, because it’s a -

                          CAP
Double chorus!

Actors and audience continue dancing.

But hang on, because now we’re at the –


                          CAP (cont’d) and BASSACKWARDS
Outro!

Actors and audience dance the song into fade out. (total run time for the song 3:35, if anyone’s counting)

                          BASSACKWARDS (cont’d)
Andrew Johnson was also the very first president to be impeached by the House of Representatives.

                          CAP
But he remained in office because he was acquitted in the Senate.

                          BASSACKWARDS
By one vote.

                          CAP
In addition to being considered our most racist president, is also considered to be one of the ten worst.

                          BASSACKWARDS
Not so, Andrew Jackson.

                          CAP
Only our second most racist president.

                          BASSACKWARDS
And regularly included in the top 20 of our best presidents.

                          CAP
Now remember, we’ve only had 45, so –

                          BASSACKWARDS
Still, he’s more often found in the top 10.
Second most racist, still considered a lot of the time to be one of the 10 best.

                          CAP
The most racist presidents, though, a pretty eclectic group.
Ronald Reagan.

                          BASSACKWARDS
Welfare queens, war on drugs, mass incarceration.

                          CAP
Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

                          BASSACKWARDS
Japanese internment camps, New Deal tilted to favor whites over blacks.

                          CAP
Thomas Jefferson.

                          BASSACKWARDS
Slave owner, breeder, rapist.  Don’t get me started on Sally Hemings.  Great guy.

                          CAP
James Monroe.

                          BASSACKWARDS
The Monroe Doctrine – allowing for intervention and colonization in foreign, aka inferior, countries.  Classy.

                          CAP
And that’s just the top six.

                          BASSACKWARDS
But let’s not gloss over President Andrew Jackson, and what he did to the Indians, aka Native Americans, aka the people who were here already when the white European settlers started stomping all over the place.
So.  Much.  Stolen.  Land.

CAP has place another chair on the floor to turn the F into an E.

                          CAP
Earth.

CAP then has to hurry and reconfigure the chairs, possibly adding a fourth, to make a proper W, as BASSACKWARDS continues.

                          BASSACKWARDS
The Indian Removal Act of 1830.
The forced relocation of the tribes of the South to reservations in the west.
The Trail of Tears.

                          CAP
Water.

CAP takes the spray bottle of water and reverently sprays all around the space and the W as BASSACKWARDS continues.

                          BASSACKWARDS
And, again, slave owner. 

BASSACKWARDS puts up big air quotes for the next one

                          BASSACKWARDS
“Owned” perhaps up to 600 HUMAN BEINGS over the course of his lifetime.



(and I ran out of time, so much more material)




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