Write what a female playwright writes like. If
you’re a female playwright ALSO DO THIS. I’m not saying to write with the
authority of an authentic female who is therefore an example of what a female
writes like. I’m saying write by participating in the larger thing called
female FIRST and channeling that and letting that be the filter or prism or
echo chamber or amplifier or… whatever that colors everything else. Place
womanhood FIRST.
Change to posting with an alias if you’d like.
Protect yourself. I get it.
Does this make you get writers block? It’s
because you’re trying to be “good” or “correct” and haven’t given yourself any
possibility for an decent inciting incident. Create an imbalance! Or
better yet acknowledge that inside of the idea of female there are things that
are out of balance.
Spoiler. We’ll do males next. You can start in
on them now if you like.
Don’t like this challenge? Write what someone on
the gender fluid or genderless spectrum would write like.
Don’t like THAT challenge?
I hear you. Then write THAT.
Write from a place of and an end product where
all beings are without gender… or age… or race… or culture… or anything that
differentiates them from anyone else. They can literally be played by anyone.
Anyone? Yes. Please keep them human. Aliens would be cheating.
*********
Still doing my own thing -
More new material for a full Spellbound draft - part of the beginning of an
ending -
*********
SARAH,
AUGGIE, MICAH, JEFFREY, and DUNCAN are gathered.
SARAH
Before
I get started, Auggie wanted to say something to Micah.
AUGGIE
Thank
you.
For
not letting me do anything.
For
not trying to do anything yourself.
You
could have really -
And
you didn't.
Because
you knew.
So,
thank you.
SARAH
So,
going forward.
Obviously
we need to have some ground rules.
I
can't forbid you to see each other, much as part of me would like to. Much as any sane person probably should.
It
would just make everybody miserable. Me
included.
You're
not a bad person, Micah.
You
did a bad thing, but I don't believe that's who you are.
But
you took something that is very important to me, and I don't mean Auggie -
You
took a belief system around which I order my life and you abused it.
That's
a betrayal.
And
betrayal's a hard thing to get over.
I
met both of you guys on the same night.
You've
been a part of my life as long as Auggie has.
I
thought I knew you.
Never
in a million years did I think you'd do something this thoughtless and hurtful.
I
haven't known you as long, Jeffrey, but I'm still willing to chalk up what you
did to inexperience. You seem sincere.
But
you're not practicing magic again until you've got a lot more learning and
experience under your belt in terms of the powers in which you're meddling.
Thankfully,
you seem to have a very able and patient teacher here who's willing to help
you out. Duncan, you got us out of a jam
as quickly as you could manage and I'm thankful for that. Keep an eye on this one. Once he knows what he's doing, he could do a
lot of good.
And
maybe that can help make up for the damage.
Just a little.
So.
Back
to Micah and Auggie.
You're
not going to be alone together for the foreseeable future.
I
don't have to be on top of you, watching your every move. I don't even need to be in the same
room. But I'm going to be in the house.
As
ridiculously regressive as this sounds, I'm going to be the one to get the
drinks and prepare or order the food.
You're
going to turn out your pockets when you come in the front door. You carry nothing you brought with you into a
room with the two of you together.
If
you go out, we go out as a trio.
Preferably
a double date.
If
you're not already using an online dating service, Micah, I'm signing you up
for one. Even if I have to pay for it
myself as a Christmas present.
You
need to meet more gay people.
People
you don't have to drug into wanting to kiss you.
As
for the baby -
We
had actually been talking about it a little but -
I'm
sorry, I can't allow you to be the baby's godfather.
Neither
you nor Jeffrey will ever be alone with this child. Which is a shame because we could have used
you in the babysitter pool.
Do
not test me on this.
Maybe,
someday, maybe maybe maybe - right now I don't see me trusting you again, and I
need to be able to trust the people who care for my child.
We
do want you in the kid's life.
We
want our child to know that love and people come in all forms. We want them to feel like whoever they love,
that's OK.
Maybe
when they're older - much older - we'll tell them why these two guys who are
very important to us never helped with babysitting, weren't chosen as
godfather, but that is so far in the future maybe all this will seem like a bad
dream by then.
This is horrible.
I feel sick.
But right now, it's the
only way I know to move forward.
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