Hyde-ing your Jekyll

    I may be a nice guy.  Do nice guys feel guilty about not posting for four months?  Do nice guys keep track of their felony total? (Zero, by the way) How many nice guys turn in lost items rather than sell them on eBay?  I may be a nice guy.

However, writers (and performers) can’t afford to be “nice.”
It fosters blandness, avoids conflict, and leaves your fans wanting more…of something else.

I’m in the midst of a writing project to train corporate folk in spotting (and avoiding) harassment of every sort—basically, presenting the worst behaviors onstage.  This means I’ve got to portray 'natural’ behavior embodied in bigots, sexists, and bullies.

Evil is not foreign ground to me.  In past scripts, I’ve created: a man who feared being jailed more than being accountable; the Zodiac killer’s ‘down time’; and a man who did unspeakable things to his daughter.  Evil is in all of us and when the want or need is strong enough, it will come out.

How to keep Evil on the paper is my issue.  When a normal nice person expresses the darkside, it’s usually a singular act of vengeance or violence.  As a writer, though, you have to inhabit each character—their past, their motives, their physicality—for truth to be told in the work.  Sometimes a lengthy process.

It’s not difficult to ‘duel’ good and bad characters on paper…there’s balance and natural responses from both parties.  It IS difficult to turn on your internal censor at those times.  Letting the djinn out of the bottle, opening Pandora’s Box, and similar metaphors are apt.  You made a choice and now you have to live with it or the art, the work, doesn’t sound sincere enough to create interest, tension, shock & awe, etc.

Don’t get me wrong.  This project has my “Dr. Jekyll” working overtime against “Mister Hyde” tendencies in order to keep the script acceptable and palatable to the potential audiences.  Lessons are still inherent but that doesn’t mean the comfort level has to be at a ‘My Pretty Pony’ low.

*SIDE NOTE: I am curious if people like Dr. Seuss just went off occasionally.  Deep in their closet, you’d find their weekly output of bile-on-paper with puppy-kicking virgin-sacrificing chainsaw-wielding ‘John Doe’s having things their way.    If YOU don’t go to the darkside, ever, is it repressed to be expressed by painting ‘Dogs Playing Poker’?

Actors always say it’s more interesting playing the bad guy (or gal).  You know why? Because the writer did what every performer, reader, audience member, and human being would LOVE to do: Get away with something big…just once.

I may be a nice guy.  I may be a bad guy. 

I may have to think on this some more…

The Doctor is In!

Actors are supposed to be thick-skinned, all the better to deal with rejection at 90% of your auditions.  Actors are supposed to be soft-hearted, all the better to empathize with your character 90% of the time.  These traits would be welcome in a Writer/Playwright as well but…surprise!  Picking up a pencil or laptop to create IMMEDIATELY decreases my skin-thickness down to a cellular level.

However, I also know a Doctor is their own worst patient (Don’t visit the 5-foot podiatrist). So for 20-some years I’ve had a writing partner, another set of eyes, a Yin to my Yang, a "script doctor", if you will.

He (lets call him Gary) is a friend and former college roomie.  When he entered graduate programs in playwriting, I was performing…somewhere.  Despite the fact Gary had peers and instructors dissecting his works, I always got a complimentary look-see, sometimes before and sometimes after the grade came through.

My philosophy in assessing a play-script is: Am I interested?  Am I curious enough to continue?

My philosophy in giving feedback is: Tell it like it is…Positive and Constructive.  The difference between Constructive and Negative feedback?  Glad you asked!  Constructive gives you something positive, something to literally build on; Negative feedback is Not liking and not helping further.

Positive: What works in the script, entertains, keeps me engaged.
Constructive: What could work if not overstated, repeated, or insincere. *I never rewrite someone’s words—not my place—but I offer suggestions, alternatives or questions based on the prior premises. (EXAMPLE = Do you need Seven Dwarves?  Do they represent aspects of the human soul OR are they necessary to combine abilities to meet a physical challenge? etc.)

Getting back to thin-skin…Since my plays have been proofread by just a handful of people in my career, I can tell you my philosophy in receiving script feedback: Military readiness.

My troops (defensive reaction) amass at the border.  Intelligence or weaponry approaches and we (I) agree with it, accept it as ‘ally’, and incorporate it into the work.
    Possibly some stranger attempts to infiltrate my defenses.  They say they’re neutral but there’s no proof…yet.  Questioning and testing must occur before this newbie is assigned ‘friend’ or ‘foe’ status.
    Finally, there is the frontal assault.  A blatant threat to our concept and confidence!  Hearing shuts down; rapid-fire justification shoots forth; and we assess our position after the threat has been silenced.
    I am not a ‘hawk’ in spirit.  If the frontal approach is repeated, I will acknowledge there is a weak spot in the script worth rebuilding—not defending to the death.

A novelist has to satisfy one read at a time, an agonizing fate.  A playwright has to satisfy one reader first, then a mass of hearts, eyes, and ears gathered in the theatre as audience…no less nerve-wracking. That’s why my anxiety runs high in this process; that’s why I’m my own worst critic. 

My partner has the playwriting pedigree, so I trust his words.  He is not all business as I tend to be and I appreciate my friend’s spice of humor.
    I’ve worked with some producers (doubling as script-doctors) who couldn’t find Humor with a map and a rubber chicken.  I’ve worked with some producers who didn’t want a play with dramatic structure as much as a Lesson with educational objectives.  There have been dramaturgs who said to me: ‘Everything I say to you is a gift.  What you choose to do with each gift is up to you.’

Bottom line is all the script doctors are offering a way to make your play better, more successful.  Your cooperation is necessary for that to happen.  Sacrificing your voice, your style, should not be necessary.

That’s when you should get a second opinion…even if it’s your own.

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The Lights are On but Nobody's Home...

Today’s topic is “I Got Nuthin’”.  The chronic disease of most literary creators, “I Got Nuthin’”, is revealed by symptoms like: eye strain from staring at a blank page or computer screen, empty delivery pizza boxes piled like the Tower of Babel, and an aversion to street clothes.

I blame the Greeks.  Sure, the economists are blaming them for everything so I thought—wait.  I meant to say ‘Greek Gods’.  Yeah, the Muses.  Nine daughters of Zeus & Mnemosyne (his 5^th wife) created from nine consecutive nights of whoopee.  Makes you think the muse Cialis had a hand in things, eh?

Anyhoo, these nine daughters didn’t have a huge population to cover in the old days but they certainly specialized—Epic poetry, Lyric poetry, Love poetry, Sacred poetry, Comedy, Tragedy, Choral Song & Dance, History, and of course Astronomy.  Why not throw Math & Science in there, daddy?  Or was everybody talking in verse back in the day?

Frankly, once you used a Muse they owned you.  You couldn’t cross genres—sorry John Tesh.  That was a deal-breaker.  You wrote a love poem to your intended when you’ve got an agreement with Euterpe at Capitol Lyrics?  Your fiancée paid the piper by getting morphed into a tree or a woodchuck.

Granted, the other end of that spectrum was monopolies.  Aeschylus kept cranking out the prizes for Tragedy, and so Melpomene kept collecting the royalties.  Then, one day a tragedy struck…and they’d heard it before.  The Greeks didn’t believe in reruns or syndication.  Your fifteen minutes are up, pal.

Just out of general curiosity, I wonder which author-artist got shafted in this family tree?  I mean, nine sisters?  Triple-Brady Bunch issues.  Who is the eldest, the wisest, the ‘Marcia’?  I would gladly take up that career genre rather than suffer some Grecian Cindy’s hand-me-downs.

I’ve said for a while that there are no new ideas in Hollywood.  Technically, I started saying it after the 1999 Albert Brooks movie, “The Muse.”  However, I don’t hear about Yanni’s Sirius radio program, his Nobel Prize, etc.  If the Muses stayed in Greece, then maybe just Melpomene is getting her jollies.

So I think there has to be some sacrifice made to bring them to the fore again.  The Muses shall reappear as a team if we suffer…what?  A year without “creating” reality TV, perhaps?  A year without a single worldwide blog posting?  There’s certainly no daughter of Zeus shining in that realm. 

I call myself a ‘writer’ with a small W.  It’s a part-time avocation.  My passion fuels me but that is a finite and fickle source.  It’s like being on an internal treasure hunt; the equivalent of going into my attic and discovering I STILL own 24 lava lamps.

 I want some help.  I want the external spark, the accident, the inspiration.  I want to see a bicycle built for two and then invent synchronized swimming…Too late? 

My latest story projects have been prompted due to an occasion, a promise or contract I needed to fulfill.  Somebody else’s work now re-visioned or re-revealed to a modern audience.  Now I’m working on a play where I had a short list of desired scenes…and the list (not the play) is done.

So I’m being pro-active in my Muse hunt.  I’m placing ads in high-visibility areas and hoping my SOS will be answered.

CRAIGSLIST: Need a woman in toga (or modern dress) to do anything I ask…for a literary project.  Must be flexible, tolerant, creative and modern thinker willing to go halfsies on Zingers & Diet Coke marathons.

WALL STREET JOURNAL: Need literary consultant with Pulitzer, Obie, and/or Nobel credits on the CV.  MFA or equivalent required.  Commission-only position; First year signing bonus; movie rights to first project negotiable.

MAXIM: Raw unadulterated mind orgy participants wanted.  Throw out inhibitions and any notions of normal intercourse, uh, discourse.  Send glossy pictures from latest book jacket or magazine layout.

I’ll let you know how this saga turns out.  I have to go now.  Pizza guy’s here…

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Right Place, Right People, Right Time...

Unless there’s a career renaissance for me as a grandparent in on-screen roles, I don’t expect to have the chance to win an Oscar and publicly thank all the people that made my creative career possible.  So before senility (real or assumed) kicks in, here goes…

Although neither of my parents had vocations in the fine arts, genetics created a winning formula.  Ma and Pa accepted, encouraged, and endorsed my steps and choices along the way.  I am most grateful for the freedom and love.

Excluding the wonderful stars I saw in movie and television shows at their peak (Carol Burnett, Red Skelton, Johnny Carson), it’s the personal encounters that made the biggest difference.

Between 5^th & 6^th grade I took a summer school package that included a course with Michael Hennessy.   All the kids were of an age, the age where art was only important if it was on TV or the big screen.  Then Michael “introduced” himself non-verbally and proceeded to enact a safe-cracker’s worst nightmare—entirely in pantomime.  We were enthralled, entertained, and hooked on the idea of telling a story without words. 

Michael was inclusive in his teaching, and guided us toward staging a little haunted house adventure we produced for our families (I was the floating skull).  Since then, he’s trained with Marcel Marceau, clowned with the New York Goofs, performed at the Guthrie Theatre and San Francisco Opera (among other prestigious venues),  and gone on to produce mime plays designed for educational and social justice messages.  And at age 64, he’s now heading “Actions Speak Louder”, a group consulting corporate employees’ use of body language and non-verbal expression.

I thank him for fanning my creative spark into a flame. 

In the fall of 1979, I enrolled at Anoka-Ramsey Community College.  A year later, I jumped into their speech--aka forensics--team.  Greg LaPanta was the head coach.  I had only participated in three plays in high school, one category (Discussion?!) of speech competition, and felt pretty nervous about ‘having what it takes’ to meet the ARCC record of forensics success. 

Greg had coaching conversations, not lectures.  He was Socratic in questioning, used peers as performance models--but didn’t like ‘cookie cutter’ styles, and encouraged best efforts.  He even had fun!  Due to his influence, the team succeeded nationally during my time at ARCC as well. 

When I moved on to a four-year school with new coaches, I had a track record prompting arrogance.  Since two-and-four-year schools competed on the same Midwest circuit, we saw him frequently.  It didn’t take long before he called me out on my attitude and reminded me of what was important (best efforts, fun, the social atmosphere).  I thank him for that.  He used a position of power to empower young people.  The forensics organization Phi Rho Pi recognized this when they gave him a national service award in 1984; the state of Minnesota’s college speech students and coaches value this as they honor teams with the Greg LaPanta Quality Award. 

Greg passed away in 1985 as I graduated into the “real” performance & education world. 

If I was ever hesitant and insecure professionally, my first year out of college was the time.  No scholastic teaching positions fell in my lap, no real-world employers would look twice, so I jumped at the chance to do some non-traditional theatre with an educational company called CLIMB (Creative Learning Ideas for Mind & Body).

CLIMB’s mission is to create and perform creative works that inspire and propel people toward actions that benefit themselves and the community.  They started in 1975 as a company mostly serving disabled groups and audiences.  Peg Wetli & Peg Endres gave me a new skill set and confidence that I could work ‘magic’ in any theatrical or educational setting.  Doing school residencies or working with those special groups showed me the possibilities for more than one career. 

I have been fortunate to work with a LOT of talented personable & intelligent people.  Their influences guide me every day.  I single the few out because they met me at a crossroads and pointed out the path I needed. 

And now, the band is playing, oh crap!  I also want to thank my pet turtle-----!?

STOP ME IF YOU’VE HEARD THIS ONE…

Folktales never die, they just go to sleep until they’re kissed with kindness.

The comfort zone of beginning storytellers is to find the familiar, the sympathetic.  For some performers, they embrace the ongoing saga-length possibilities of Ancient Mythology (see Zeus and his wacky relations) OR Cultural tales they heard at a relative’s knee (see the Ramayana).  For others, ‘familiar’ is the Euro- or Appalachian-folktale.

Greek or Roman myths offer still-relevant symbols of behavior & linguistic analogs for love (Venus), vanity (Narcissus), or war (Mars), among others.  The roots from which all soap operas flow.

Cultural tales carry an emotional weight, immerse you in an unique ethos of a specific culture portraying heroes, villains, and helpers.  The roots from which your roots grow.

As for folktales, I think they get a bum rap.  They are self-contained (unities of Time, Place, and Action), display memorable values (loyalty, generosity, wit), and provide archetypes and action that rivet the attention.  Animated movies and 2011-12 TV shows still love the legendary for those reasons.

Granted, the emotional attachments or environs relevant to the 21^st century audience member may be lacking.  Repeated exposure to a specific tale could result in emotional distance (if any empathy existed in the first place), loss of attention with its predictable plot, and ultimately no desire to read or see it as before.

BUT your exposure to folktales has left its mark on your perceptions and behaviors, I’ll wager.  Those ‘folk’ universal laws & ethics still guide you.

#1: Size does matter.  ‘Third little pig’ or the Mouse of Aesop’s fable proved they weren’t always outmatched.  This law takes on different context in jewelry purchases, of course.

#2: Kissing a frog is not a deal-breaker.   You can’t judge a book by its cover, either,  but making out with one is not a healthy start to a relationship.  The frog, the animal is there to let a personality shine through the warts.  See the whole person, yes?

#3: Names are powerful.  If my name was Rumplestiltskin, I’d conceal it too; or at least do a more effective job so nosy folks don’t get the best of me…via identity theft.

#4: No such thing as a free lunch.  Gingerbread houses are all-you-can-eat tasty until you have to live with the transsexual Gordon Ramsay inside. 

As performers, we also have laws--to help you appreciate the ‘tired’ folktale.

I = Go to THE source.  Many published versions lose something in translation; sharp details and weird customs become diluted or deleted over the years.  Dig deep into the culture and era that spawned the story.  Peruse multiple versions of the tale.  Everything old can become new again.

II = Acknowledge the Source.  It’s tempting to find a good thing and be appreciated for it.  You hold a monopoly on the script and praise…IF nobody knows you’re using a published version.  BUT sooner or later the truth will out & remember what happened to the wolf after Little Red’s lumberjack friend got done with him?  I’m just sayin’.  
    If the audience trusts you for the good stuff, give ‘em more (in quantity by doubling their resource & quality when you ask the author for permission to share this and another tale).

III = Identify with a character.  Many performers do this unconsciously on first read--it’s the hook for their enthusiasm; it’s the empathy that fulfills the character portrayal; it’s the spark for ensuing light bulbs over the audience noggins.
IF you’re running out of gas telling an ‘old’ tale, then find a character in the story whose perspective isn’t fully shared or understood in the traditional version.  Write the storyline (or an original one) in their words, through their eyes.  I’ve had a lot of fun with this method.

“Fractured Fairy Tales” ala the 1960s Rocky & Bullwinkle TV show, Gregory Maguire’s works (“Wicked”, among others), and many recent children’s books utilize the twist to much success.

IV = READ!  Somebody read you the stories when you were younger; then you read on your own.  You can find a lot more material, enjoy a lot more literature, know more of your ancestral culture, and challenge yourself as a writer-performer if you make a consistent effort.

Right now I’m working on a tale about finding a pot of rainbows at the end of a golden nugget.  

Jealous?

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Christmas of Ghosts Past

I was not raised by wolves-- or even lycanthropes.  I did not grow up in a clammy English castle.  But I do appreciate a good horror story.

Granted, I wrote my share in 5^th and 6^th grade, contemplating copyright infringement suits against “The Night Stalker” TV series.  But I grew up amid my father’s extensive science fiction library, an afternoon horror movie series on our local TV affiliate, and a fascination with real-life ghost stories as book report fodder…Thus, my adult predilection for the supernatural scare.

I have my share of fun kids ‘ghost’ stories I perform at schools.  But the itch to give (and get) legitimate scares at the adult intensity-level is too strong to ignore.

Why do audiences (and I) crave a good scary yarn?  It’s primal.  Curiosity is a powerful instinct that makes you journey into the shadows to see what’s there AND your curiosity wants to know if you’re strong enough to survive whatever the dark side launches at you.

I’ve survived 100% of my experiences as a reader & performer.  So far.  My audiences, on the other hand, haven’t complained.  I haven’t scared any individual to death, though it would prove quite the PR conundrum.

Imagination is that other innate motivator to seek the horror story.    “I see a dead woman with two puncture wounds in her neck.    I see an open empty coffin.  I see ______.” 

You filled in that blank, didn’t you?  Audiences love that sense of creating the journey, daring themselves and the story in the process.

Stay in a rural English cottage with a solitary lit candle, a mourning mother, and a monkey’s paw, and you WANT to know what’s possible.

The period literature bridging the 19^th & 20th centuries appeals most to me.  Mostly short fiction created by numerous masters of the horror genre (including WW Jacobs): Poe, R.L. Stevenson,
H.P. Lovecraft, Ambrose Bierce, M.R. James, and Algernon Blackwood, to name a few.

Not all of them were novelists, and not all wrote exclusively for the horror genre.  But they all oozed curiosity and imagination.

In a genre that finally had popular availability, they asked those questions that science, nature, or religion couldn’t answer…and created their own answers.  With each story’s firmly established mythos, here comes the reader thinking, “How scary could it be?” 

The fact that this genre and many of its individual authors (now long dead…I think) have 21^st century fan websites speaks to the staying power of the material.  Ray Bradbury, Richard Matheson, and Stephen King wouldn’t be who they are without their horrible forefathers.         I’m just trying to frighten the unenlightened.

As a performer, I LOVE the public domain system that includes this vibrant period of literature.  No gatekeeper blocks access to the story, no agent asks for their pound of flesh, and dead authors don’t kibbitz over how you tell their tale. That’s WHY I tell them.

HOW  I tell those horror stories is a trade secret.  You could find out at one of my upcoming shows.  They’re popular as a cemetery: folks are just dying to get in.

(Insert evil laugh here)

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This time it's personal!

TO TELL THE “TRUTH”

Greetings, story fans!  Rest assured before we begin, there are two topics you’ll never read about at this blog—Romantic relationships & Bodily functions.  As for the former, six people just breathed easier; for the latter, the world is now a safer place. 

Today I would like to share my perceptions of the Personal Story.  I speak not of the long-winded “joke” you may share at a local night-club or the uninvited confession to your fellow passenger on the bus. 
No, the following is for those of you enamored of stepping into experiences like The Moth, story slams, or just an oral history for your family.

When I first began telling stories, I was part of an ensemble—a tag-team, as it were—sharing mostly traditional or children’s tales.  Then, a client asked for a baseball theme and rather than subject 20^th century kids to a 19^th century sports glossary in “Casey at the Bat,” I delved into my life experiences for an original story.  Since then, I’ve learned some lessons you may value…

Be Yourself.  I am a practitioner of “mutant literature.”  I don’t create Jane Austen zombies, though I do stray from the conventional in letter writing, play writing, and story writing.  I write one letter (emails notwithstanding) a year and it’s “news” for friends, not a journal.  As to plays, the two-act format seems too lengthy for me, so I prefer creating one-acts or a series of character-monologues around a theme or incident.  Stories from another source are sacred but my original anecdotal PERSONAL experiences are the product of a perpetually short attention-span and the actor’s mentality to work ‘moments’. 

As I watched other professional tellers early in my story-career, I saw one relate an incident as a continuous journey over 20 minutes; another found a parallel to their experience in mythology.  I admire those tellers and their methods but my fragmented memories and insular comfort zone mesh best with a ‘connect the dots’ narrative style.

Stories can go on a pedestal, if you’re not already up there. Back to the baseball story…I created an inning by inning lowlight reel—a stand-up routine if you must know.  After a few performances, I got cocky and expected laughs.  When the laughs didn’t come, I tried harder and quickly lost my audience as they became frightened of the desperate dude onstage.  I’m much more reasonable now…

Emotions don’t rehearse (and it shows).  My first story about dealing with death, my grandfather’s, was an effort to challenge myself, become the ‘more-than-stand-up’ guy.  During rehearsals, there was no hint that I’d relive receiving the news: crying the first four times I shared it onstage.  Actor tricks like pausing, thinking of sunshine and lollipops, or open mouth breathing until I regained control didn’t work.

So I fought through it to the less traumatic ‘homage’ section.  Fighting through it a couple times told me what I could and couldn’t do, made me more inured to the predictable surge of adrenalin.  I used to fear the story.  Now I love it again because I keep the homage in my mind throughout the tale.

The story tells you when it’s ready to be told.  The last personal story I wrote blind-sided me.  I signed on for a national workshop to create an original tale that tied to a traditional folktale.  At the time, I had a few folktales in the ‘maybe someday’ folder.  I took one folktale from the folder and forced a societal issue onto it—too cold; another folktale sounded like a sibling’s relationship—too hot; then a third folktale turned my head—just right.  It sounded like my journey through alcoholic misbehavior.  There were natural parallels about warning signs, ignorance, facing the demons, and redemption. 

My story-coaches accepted this darker side of me, and gave objective feedback that made me all the more grateful I tabled the story until its time was my time.  The workshop kicked ass, by the way!

The bottom line with personal stories is--Lessons.  If a story doesn’t have some universal appeal, then it’s time to stop looking in the mirror.  It’s not about you.  It’s about what an individual audience member hears, feels, and lets resonate during and after your sharing of the tale.    Your hindsight becomes their foresight, maybe even lets them finally cope with something similar from their past.

Here’s hoping I get to hear your adventures soon.