Final installment of quick takes on London theatre shows. At last, the good stuff! [1] Matilda adapted by Dennis Kelly Another musical. Fortunately the songs are few and far between because, with one exception, they add little to the proceedings but some vocal and visual energy. The script is adapted from a short children’s novel […]
Yes, it’s National Novel Writing Month again. After a two-year hiatus, I’ve decided to take the plunge again, and just three days in I’m reminded of my love/hate relationship with NaNoWriMo [2] and why I took a break in the first place. First the love. For all its flaws, NaNo is remarkable at getting beginning […]
More quick impressions of shows I saw on my most recent trip to London, continued from part one. Please excuse my crankiness. I’m discussing these in the order I saw them, and this was a bad stretch As You Like It by William Shakespeare Shakespeare remains the greatest English-language playwright of all time [1], and […]
Every few years, I make a point of traveling to London to recharge my theatre batteries. [1] Here’s my take on what I saw on my most recent trip. Because this is a writing blog, I’ll try to focus on that aspect. Some critiques of the acting and directing will inevitably slip in, but I’ll […]
There’s a recurring debate in theatre about which job is the hardest: acting, directing, designing, stage managing, etc. I’ve tackled just about every job there is at least once, including the best job (fight director [1]) and the worst job (producer [2]), but there’s no doubt in my mind which is the hardest—playwright. [3] As […]
I am small-kine obsessed with YouTube right now, to the point that it has largely displaced Netflix and HBO for downtime viewing. My problem is that the emphasis on short, catchy clips makes it easy to lose track of time. With Netflix, I’ll watch an episode of something and get back to work. With YouTube, […]
As part of my graduation requirements for the Stonecoast MFA program, I delivered a presentation on writing fight scenes. [1] Though it was well received, the biggest criticism was that I didn’t include a handout. I promised to post my notes, and four years later, I finally got around to it on this blog as […]
Last (for now) in a series on writing fight scenes from the perspective of a fight director. In which I rewrite one of my fight scenes according to my own advice. If you haven’t yet read Writing the Fight: Analysis, you’ll want to catch up on that first for context. In that post I picked […]
In which I reveal the greatest book on screenwriting ever published, the greatest book on screenwriting never published, and a couple of runners-up. But first, a history lesson. Syd Field essentially created the three-act structure for screenplays, and most books on screenwriting from the 80s and 90s were devoted to holding up or rejecting “the […]
Every writer at some point entertains the idea of working with a partner. And the beginning-er the writer, the worser the reasons. Ultimately, there’s only one good reason to partner with someone, but let’s start with five bad ones. [1] Spoiler: they all boil down to some variation of you think it will be easier […]
Love, Blood & Rhetoric 