The Brief

We are who we are and it’s time to embrace what that is!

Write a body-positive play and inspire the whole world to love themselves!

Love all shapes! Love all sizes! Love all people no matter what they look like!

Come on, everybody! Let’s make this world a better place with more beauty!

 

The Excerpt

It should be noted… I did a body positive monologue for the truth & art challenge last year that I’m so proud of that I couldn’t possibly touch. So I sort of subverted the brief with this.

ROGER:         No more headache?

AUDRA:         Uh-uh. No more brain, either. (sing-songy) I need a new brain. One that works when it should. One that won’t crave cats. One that feels so good. I need a new bra-ain.

ROGER:         Ah, I see we’ve reached the boudoir cabaret part of the evening. Sleep, sweetie. Fort and I will keep you safe.

AUDRA:         (tired) You won’t let me leave the bed?

ROGER:         We won’t. Not before morning.

AUDRA:         And you’ll make sure Mrs. Fletcher’s cats are safe tomorrow?

To read the entire play…

Click here: 1902.11 – Storm Head

 

The Brief

Pick one of your favourite characters of all time.

Perhaps from a play, a film, a book, a comic… anything.

But pick someone with very little background. Someone we don’t know much about. So probably not a character that is the hero… or one we’ve been following since birth.

Because it’s on you to create this character’s “origin story”.

Who are they? Where did they come from? What made them become who they are? What made them behave the way they did?

Give them the story they deserve! Don’t forget – you love them after all.

 

The Excerpt

MEGAN:        You’re still here, hat and all.

SIDNEY:        (rising to his feet) Well, I don’t often get to share a glass of homemade iced tea with an attractive woman in the moonlight.

MEGAN:        (snorting a derisive laugh) Don’t go there. You’re not even…

SIDNEY:        Human? I am now. As much as you are. Maybe more.

MEGAN:        (handing over the glass) Here. (grudgingly) Anyway, it’s NesTea. (she backs up against the opposite pillar of the porch roof, leaning against it. She sets her own glass on the rail as she listens.)

SIDNEY:        Thank you, anyway. (he takes a long drink, grimaces, and then smooths his features. So.

MEGAN:        So.

SIDNEY:        So…?

MEGAN:        So, are you? The Devil?

 

To Read the Entire Play…

Click Here: 1902.10 – Southern Discomfort

 

The Brief…

So lets do something else.

Lets write a play without logic… without cause and effect and without reactions.

But can it still make some sort of sense (or is all sense attributed to logic)?

Can it still be dramatically interesting (or is all dramatic interest attributed to reactions)?

Is it even possible to make a good play without psychological interpretation?

Well – that’s for you to figure out.

 

The Excerpt

JEANNIE:      Claude.

THOMAS:       Beef Barley?

JEANNIE:      No.

THOMAS:       Italian Wedding Soup?

JEANNIE:      No.

A little girl walks across the stage and pauses.

GIRL:              Chicken and Stars.

The little girl continues across the stage.

THOMAS:       Chicken and Stars.

JEANNIE:      Chicken and Stars. Yes.

 

To Read the Entire Play…

Click here: 1902.09 – Crustacean Oscillation

 

The Brief

So write stream-of-conciousness, and let the words flow, including all the, uhms… and ooohs… and arghs… and anything else that your brain might… hold on, there’s a arm with the…uhm, who is he pointing at? I mean, can I really even be as a … what’s it called? Uhm… Off! Argh! I forgot what he’s.. uhm… you know, the… oh, never mind. I guess it must be because of the… Sorry. I’m back! I mean, just get busy and let the words flow.

 

Write a monologue that’s all coming straight from your head without any censorship. Perhaps be brave and write about yourselves, or be less self-indulgent and write about a friend’s story (though keep it all first person).

 

The Excerpt

But now… now I’m not even hungry before I’m absorbed. So now, I have to set reminders to drink protein shakes so I can take morning meds, and then to eat lunch and then to have snacks, only I just had dental work and mouth is still all weird so I can’t chew much and I’m so sick of mushy things – there are no good mushy snacks that don’t require being spread on crunchy snacks!!!

And fanfic – this epic Star Trek: The Next Generation fanfic  – this Data/OFC romance that I’ve been working on for a decade now – is my escape. I write it between the stuff that’s real. I write it when I can’t focus on the sort stories I’m supposed to be polishing or the flash fic I’m supposed to be collecting or the podcast that literally only two people listen to.

 

To Read the Entire Play

Click here: 1902.07 – Filtered

The Brief

I think we’ve done enough content for a bit so let’s look at structure.

And more interestingly – let’s look at erutcurts!

We are writing a play backwards today.

Or do the Pinter thing from Betrayal and reverse chronology.

if you’re writing in another language);

(or right to left or up to down

so you read it left to right

But still maintain the sentence structure

So that you need to read it from the bottom up

Maybe you want the play to go backwards line by line,

It read to time a at word one backwards go and end the from start to needs just one so, front to back from word for word play entire the write to want you maybe or.

!sdrawkcab gnihtyreve etirw dna erocdrah og nac uoy rO

Don’t use computer programmes or algorithms though to do it for you!

And bonus points if you can make the backwardnessity make contextual sense with the play!

 

The Excerpt

I could hear my offspring singing, ready to break out of my planter, and spread their seed around this world, ready to go out on their own, but all I could think of was that my dinner was repeating on me. The blonde chick had been kinda stringy, with more than a hint of bleach. I shoulda eaten her first. I shoulda…

To Read the Entire Play

Click here: 1902.06 – Vineland Revisited

 

The Brief

So from one end of the world to another…

And as I’m on my way to the Nordics, myself, what better time to respond to someone who, in my own personal eyes, is one of the few people I can call a true contemporary artist.

From the Sugarcubes all the way to Utopia, Björk has been an artist who hasn’t just re-defined herself, she has re-defined her art – constantly pushing the boundaries of what art can do, how it relates to the artist, to her audience and to the world.

So to celebrate her 53rd birthday back in November, your task for today is to pick one of her songs (musically or lyrically), or one of her albums, or one of her videos, or one of her costumes/masks, or one of her interviews – and to respond that that.

And do something different with your play. Change the format. Don’t make it look like all of your other plays. Make this one stand out and look strange and odd and quirky and cool…

Björk deserves all the respect we give her – so for bonus point – make her shine! Make her the star.

And for those of you who don’t believe that bonus points are real… oh they’re real.

If you collect 833 bonus points, you can exchange them in March for 832 bonus points! It’s a bargain! But be warned – if you collect too many, they may melt.

 

The Excerpt

ANNA            So, anyway, he’s a med student at State and he asked me out, but… I don’t know. I’m not sure I want to go.

JEN:                You don’t want to go out with a future doctor? Why not? Is he ugly? Does he have hairy thumbs? Halitosis?

ANNA:            No, I just… I think I’m into him. (She points to MUSICIAN)

JEN:                The piano player?

ANNA:            He writes his own stuff. Did you know?

JEN:                All I’ve ever heard him play is old jazz and lame covers of Bjork tunes.

ANNA:            He plays more than that, really.

JEN:                (observing) He is kinda cute, in that scruffy artsy way.

ANNA:            See…

JEN:                But he’s a musician.

To Read the Entire Play

Click here: 1902.05 – Quiet Conversations

 

The Brief

Yes… it’s Chinese New Year.

So let’s take some inspiration from this magnificent culture and New Year’s traditions.

I’m expecting sea monsters, stove gods, red envelopes, upside-down fortunes, swans, lanterns and obviously – a pig!

For the linguaphiles out there, maybe find a few Chinese words and incorporate them in the play. “Mandarin or Cantonese?” Dealer’s choice!

Oh, and it’s bad luck on Chinese New Year’s to use negative words or to cry and to fight – so make the plays cheerful!

For bonus points, write something for a large cast – no more monologues and dialogues!

 

The Excerpt:

BOY 3:            I heard that our parents go outside the dome to save us from Space Dragons. They fly down to the surface of the moon from outside the Asteroid Belt and wait until after Earthrise to attack!

GIRL 3:           That’s not funny!

BOY 3:            It’s not supposed to be. (makes his hands into claws) RAWR I’m a Space Dragon!

TEACHER:     (clapping hands for attention) Children…!

MEI LING:     Actually, dragons are a part of lunar new year. But in our culture the dragons symbolize nobility, strength, and good fortune, and when we do the dragon dance, we are driving away evil spirits.

 

To Read the Entire Play

Click here: 1902.04 – Sparks Fly

 

The Brief

Pick a number! Any number (as long as it’s between 1-60)

“What? Magic?! No way, dude!”

No! No magic! I don’t like magic! Unless it’s the magic that comes out of your magical fingers as you type today’s genius play!

No… just pick a number, any number (as long as it’s between 1-60)

Don’t you trust me? Just trust me. It’s not magic. I swear.

Just pick it.

The number.

Any number (as long as it’s between 1-60).

Good!

Now… check the link below

Don’t cheat! First pick the number and only then look at the link.

WHAT CAN THIS POSSIBLY BE?!

Good, now find the corresponding thing to your number and write about that!

Go wild!

For bonus points – incorporate the number with the corresponding thing and marry them into something uniquely extraordinary

 

The Excerpt

The number I picked was 19, by the way.

CHARLIE:      I was thinking tomorrow.

MAX:              Your mom’s making pot roast tomorrow, isn’t she.

CHARLIE:      Well… she claims it’s pot roast.

MAX:              (to MARGO) Charlie’s mom is the worst cook. Everything she makes tastes like cardboard. But her pot roast? Her pot roast tastes like regurgitated cardboard.

MARGO:        Oh, gross! (to CHARLIE) You, know, I think it would be better for your health if you had Mongolian beef tonight and stuck to mac-n-cheese tomorrow.

KENT:            And this is why we love Margo. She has much wisdom.

MAX:              Yup. That’s why I love Margo.

 

To Read the Entire Play…

Click here: 1902.03 – Max and Margo