What's the Big Idea?
Much has been made, for a long time now and by many people, about the phenomenon of “premiere-itis.” This is the notion that too many theaters are overly concerned with being the first to produce a given script, when in fact many new plays need the dramaturgical work of more than one production to find […]
Read MoreWhen I was a young poet, studying in what I now realize was an exceptionally rigorous writing program at Northwestern University, my professors tasked my fellow students and I with getting to know a small number of poets as well as we possibly could. Throughout the first semester, we read every poem ever written by […]
Read MoreWhy do we believe what we believe? If you’re like most human beings, you think you believe what you believe because it’s rational and true. Many, many studies have shown, however, that while the things you believe MIGHT be both rational and true, that’s NOT why you believe them. You believe them, in essence, because […]
Read MoreI am writing to honor my dear cat Helen — my companion of almost 21 years — who died yesterday after a long battle with the only illness for which there is no cure: old age. The last few years of Helen’s life were immensely difficult — more so, of course, for her than for me, […]
Read MoreYou know what I’m thinking? I’m thinking that if Michael Kaiser wants a new model for arts organizations so badly, I ought to give him one. Where am I going to get it? Why, from Amazon, of course. In point of fact, Amazon actually IS the new model (or a part of it)… at least […]
Read MoreI want to tell you a story about my experience watching the estimable production of Young Jean Lee’s CHURCH at Forum Theater a few Sundays ago. My wife and I happened to sit behind a family (we think) of four: a man, two women, and a young boy who honestly couldn’t have been much older than […]
Read MoreA couple of months ago, having shown up early for the first rehearsal for the reading of one of my plays at the Great Plains Theater Conference, I passed the time by thinking about all the new people I was shortly going to be meeting and working with: five actors, a director, and someone to […]
Read MoreIn early 1974, when British progressive rock band Genesis released The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, I was a five year-old kid who had just moved into a new house and begun making friends with the kids who lived near me: three boys I’m still connected with 38 years later, though time and circumstances have […]
Read MoreI would like to offer one really good bit of advice to everyone everywhere running any kind of 24-hour playwriting thing, or anything even remotely resembling a 24-hour playwriting thing, like a weekend playwriting thing or a week-long playwriting thing or even (as I recently experienced) a month-and-a-half-long playwriting thing. You know that thing you […]
Read MoreNote: a significantly streamlined version of the following blog post appears on HowlRound. I offer this more in-depth analysis here for those who might be interested—including, but not limited to, those who have contributed significantly to the effort to build software solutions for the new play sector. There are, roughly speaking, two kinds of technological […]
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