Does a playwright's age matter?

From The Guardian (London) and The Sunday Times: Much of the reaction to British playwright Polly Stenham's West End debut has centred on her tender age: 21. But The Guardian asks an interesting question: should a playwright's youth (or, for that matter, dotage) be taken into account when assessing the work?

Labels: plays, playwriting, U.K.

 

Havel then and now

From The Sunday Times: Czech playwright Vaclav Havel is one of our favorite subjects here on the Gofer, but how could he not be? After all, how many playwrights have also been the leader of their country? Or, put another way, would you want to see a play by George Bush? Either of them?

This profile takes the long view, catching him at two key moments in his life. The first comes back in 1989 when, as the Velvet Revolution continued to coalesce around Havel, "an aide rushed in to tell him the Communist party had relinquished its monopoly on power under the weight of public protest. Disbelief, wonderment, joy and once again disbelief passed over his features in quick succession." The second is just a few days ago, as he "anxiously read[s] the reviews of his first play in 20 years."

It's comforting to know that even someone as travelled and sophisticated as Havel still worries about his reviews -- all good, by the way.

Labels: Europe, playwrights, playwriting

 

Vijay Tendulkar, 1928-2007

From the International Herald Tribune: He joined Gandhi's independence movement at age 14. When he was 22, one of the earliest of his provocative plays was heckled off the stage in New Delhi. But Vijay Tenduklar persisted as a social critic, and became one of his country's most respected artists along the way.

Labels: India, plays, playwrights

 

Play searches for truth -- literally

From The Associated Press via Yahoo! News: The Internet and live theatre are perhaps as unalike as any two media could be, one existing entirely virtually and the other only in the flesh. Philadelphia playwright Katharine Clark Gray ">manages to blend the two, though, in User 927, a mystery inspired by AOL's oafish release of 19 million search logs two years ago.

Labels: internet, playwrights, playwriting

 

From The Three Little Pigs to Iraq

From The Seattle Post-Intelligencer: Now here's a theatre artist with range. By day, Elena Hartwell is stage manager for a production of The Three Little Pigs. By night, she performs her own play, In Our Name, three monologues about women with loved ones in Iraq.

Labels: playwrights, playwriting

 

Playwrights who hate the Times' critics, please line up to the left

From The Huffington Post: We're all for playwrights hauling off and trash-talking critics, but Jon Robin Baitz's now notorious blog post attacking The New York Times' Christopher Isherwood gives us an overwhelming sense of déjà vu. Isherwood had, pretty benignly, suggested that writers who'd given up on theatre in favor of writing for television use the "opportunity" of the WGA strike to return to their first love. Baitz, as if some hot button in him had been pushed, went off like a rocket.

Great. We'd like to see more playwrights functioning also as journalists. But Baitz's dissing of Isherwood (as well as, more patronizingly, Times critic Ben Brantley), has a certain, almost comical inevitability about it. Those of a certain age will remember when Clive Barnes, as the Grey Lady's first-string critic, was roundly reviled in the New York theatre community, and the sighs of relief and hail-fellow-well-mets that greeted Frank Rich when he moved into the spot. (Were there any in between the two? I don't recall, but that probably means I don't need to.) Rich, it was at first agreed, was much better -- smarter, more sincerely interested in theatre, etc., etc. But, of course, eventually he had panned or ignored enough people that he, too, became the bête noir of theatre people: "The Butcher of Broadway," malicious, too intellectual, whatever.

So it is with a certain wry amusement that one notes Baitz citing Rich favourably by way of comparison with Isherwood -- who now, like his predecessors, moves onto the lepers' island reserved for long-running Times critics. 'Twas ever thus. But wait until the next guy (or, perhaps better, gal) gets the gig. He/she will be much better.

Labels: Ben Brantley, Christopher Isherwood, Frank Rich, Jon Robin Baitz, New York Times, playwrights, playwriting

 

Playwriterly podcasts

From G.L. Horton's Stage Page: This is a great find, and we confess we should have found it sooner, since it's been around for almost a year-and-a-half now. Some of the podcasts on G.L.Horton's Stage Page are Boston-centric, but others, like this discussion at the International Centre for Women Playwrights Celebration about the challenges involved in getting produced (including some insights into the thinking of literary managers) will appeal to dramatists pretty much anywhere. We also think more playwrights should take advantage of the web, as Horton does (with an assist from her husband), to get their material heard -- literally -- by recording and posting excerpts.

Labels: G.L. Horton, ICWPC, International Centre for Women, playwrights, playwriting, podcasts, theatre

 

Playwright doesn't want "help," thankyou

From Mr. Excitement: We've been here before. In his address to ART/NY, playwright Richard (Some Americans Abroad,New England) Nelson presents many of the same arguments against the play development process in North America that others have (perhaps he missed the discussion because he's been off in England). It's fine for a 57 year-old playwright to insist that he's learned his craft and doesn't need any "help," thankyou very much. It may or may not be true, but it's fine. What Nelson's speech ignores, though, is the value of dramaturgy, readings, and workshops to playwrights just starting out, and needing to learn their craft. Done well, the development process can be quite as good an education as, say, attending the Yale School of Drama, where Mr. Nelson currently teaches.

He's on firmer ground when he says the participation system in non-profit theatre should be re-examined. I expect, though, the "I'm the god around here" approach to playwriting has resulted in far more bad plays than works of unsullied genius.

Labels: ART/NY, play development, playwrights, playwriting, Richard Nelson, Yale School of Drama

 

Havel's comeback stymied

From The Guardian (UK): We figure that right about now playwright Vaclav Havel would prefer to be doing something simple, like running the Czech Republic, than working in the theatre again.

Labels: playwrights, playwriting, Vaclav Havel

 

Arthur Miller's cast-off son

From Vanity Fair: This wrenching and, to a guy who thought he knew all there was to know about Arthur Miller, genuinely shocking article about the playwright and the son he cast aside is liable to spur some major reassessing. Can a man who did this really be the great moral artist Miller is put forward as? Before the piling on begins, let's keep in mind that even great artists are products of their age, and Miller's was before mainstreaming of the disabled became commonplace. Still, one notes that Miller's wife, the photographer Inge Morath -- an accomplished artist in her own right -- did not treat their son as a dark secret to be hidden away. Mother's love? Or simple human decency?

Labels: Arthur Miller, Inge Morath, playwrights, playwriting, Vanity Fair