How to Put on a Play: The Last Lesson

The run is now finished.  It's been a very tiring, but very exciting and satisfying three weeks.  It's hard to believe it's over.  This last week saw sell-out houses and enthusiastic audiences.  There lies one part of this last lesson, and this is a part I often forget.  Ultimately, the point of the exercise is getting "bums in seats." You put on a play so people can see it.  In London, at least, you need to run a minimum of three weeks in order to get reviewers to come, reviews printed, word spread.  That much we know.  And it is ultimately the responsibility of the producers to do all the marketing and pr that ensures that those bums find their way into our theatre.  Ticket sales for the first week are rarely a problem.  Everyone's friends and families come and the excitement of the opening carries you through.  But then comes the second week. Word hasn't yet spread around.  People think they have plenty of time to get there.  And then you have the theatre sending you emails asking what we are planning to do about those audiences of 4 people.  It gets scary.  But you do live through it and week 3 , the final week, arrives.  The audience picks up, you're playing to sell-out crowds, and you start to ask yourself why you didn't book in for a four week run instead.  Well, we  haven't yet taken that risk.  Perhaps if ever we have enough of a cushion in the bank account we will.  But for now, we are left wondering how much money we might have made if we had been able to do it.  It's frustrating, to be sure, but I suppose there's also a lot to be said for leaving them wanting more.

And so our run is over.  One of the highlights of the last week was when playwright J.D. Smith flew over from the States to see his show on its feet.  Watching his face while he watched his show was priceless.  Happily, he was thrilled with what we did with his play, as were a group of other local writers and friends who came out that night to support him.  Two of them, Vanessa Gebbie and Tania Hershman, were fellow alumni of the Irish writers' retreat, Anam Cara, which I've mentioned here quite often.  Here's a picture of the four of us outside the theatre...

J.D. came to two further performances as well, so he had the  chance to experience the show without being nervous, and see the subtle changes that occur from one show to the next.

Then came the last performance, and although the show is over for the cast (but for the drinking), there is still more to be done, namely "the get out."  This is where the production team comes back to the theatre and works well into the night and over to the next day to break down our set, get it out of the theatre and carried away to wherever the various bits and bobs are going, and then repaint the entire place black so that it is left in the same condition we found it in three weeks earlier.  By noon on Sunday, the next show is being moved in and the entire process starts all over again.  But not for me.  Now I take a breath, head off to the States for my summer holidays where my writing shack awaits and I can get down to the business of completing final edits and beginning new research. Every year I struggle a bit with this transition from one part of my life to the other,  but this year is especially difficult.  After five years and  four CurvingRoad productions,  I'll be saying goodbye to my co-founder, Executive Director and dear friend, Sonja Rein, who is moving on to a new life in the States.  I'm thrilled for her, but rather devastated for me.  Of course our friendship will live beyond the distance soon to be between us.  But CurvingRoad will now be taking it's own next curve, moving into a new phase, and that sort of change is always painful and frightening.  We will continue, of course.   Come September we will be involved in an exciting Fringe project which I'll tell you about later.   But I'll be doing it without Sonja.  And I'll be looking for someone new to join me in this crazy and wonderful part of my life.  Someone who longs to be a part of the theatre.  Someone with lots of creativity, lots of drive, some extra available time, and the ability to work for nothing (at least for now). If anyone out there is interested, or if anyone of you know of someone who may be, do let me know.  But for now, we've put this baby to bed.

Jane Smiley, "Private Life"

I have been a huge fan of Jane Smiley since "A Thousand Acres," her novel based on King Lear published in 1991.  That novel stayed in my mind as one of my favourites for a long time, although I didn't read much of her other work, until I stumbled upon "Moo," in the late 90's.  Then I lost track of her until she came out with the marvelously useful, honest, funny and erudite "Thirteen Ways of Looking at the Novel," which grew out of her sudden inability to write novels after years and years of work.  In that book she uses her block to read 100 of the best novels ever written, review them and try to discover why, for her, some of them work and some don't.  Jane Smiley is a stubborn and creative problem-solver after my own heart, so when I read that she has now published a new novel, I bought it and placed it on the very top of my tbr pile.

"Private Life" is wonderful.  As a story, it is quiet, truthful, straight-forward, moving.  As a piece of fiction, it is inspirational.  A small, ordinary life is set against the epic sweeps of early 20th Century history.  But in Smiley's hands, the small becomes crucial and the epic secondary. On the cover, under the title, the publishers (I assume) have written "Marriage can sometimes be the loneliest place."  Yes, "Private Life" is about a woman lost in a passionless marriage to a self-absorbed, misguided though well-meaning man.  But it is about much more than just that.  It is about choosing to adapt -- or not -- when the world goes crazy.  It is about the role of friendship.  It is about choosing to know yourself or not.  Choosing to be true to yourself, or not.  Choosing and the consequences of those choices.

From the viewpoint of technique, it is a masterclass.  How to have your character speak a dialogue about one thing while thinking something completely different at the same time....how to find the appropriate narrative voice.....using third person narrative and still getting into all the characters' heads....how to portray the passage of time without leaving your reader to wonder where it all went.  Plus, there's more than a smattering of cosmology and the evolution of scientific thought.

"Private Life" is an extraordinarily generous book.  Smiley is an extraordinarily generous writer. If you don't know her work, it's high time you did.  Buy this book.

Notes instead of Words

Given all the craziness of the last few weeks, with both a play being produced and a new novel to get published, you would think the last thing I would need would be an orchestra concert thrown into the mix.  But tonight  (7.30 pm, Chelsea Town Hall, King's Road London) is the final concert of the season of my orchestra, the Kensington Philharomic -- that is, the orchestra I play violin with.  And thank goodness for it.

Words are always, always in my head. Needless words, annoying words, important words.  I wake up with them, I try to fool myself into quieting them down so I can sleep.  I spend my life composing emails that need never be written or having imaginary conversations or creating interactions between characters that may never get used.  I suppose it's one of the occupational hazards of being a writer.  But it can be exhausting.  And for me, the only time when I am not in an ocean of words is when I am playing music.  Sure, very often, the music is interspersed with words -- mostly conversations with myself lamenting my lack of technique or some horrible lapse in intonation.  But when I'm cookin', when the music is really flowing, then I am literally speechless.  All the words go away and I am taken over by sound.  So I am actually hugely grateful that I have to squeeze two rehearsals and a concert into this weekend.  I may not have the time, but I definitely need it.

The fact that this particular concert is full of such fantastic music makes it even better.  We start with Rossini's Overture to La Cenerentola, his opera  based on Cinderella.  Not my favourite.  I call it cartoon music.  Everyone's heard it without knowing it and its lots of fast notes for not a lot of reason.  But every concert needs an overture to start off with, and this one is par for the course.  But then we have one of my favourite pieces of all time -- the Beethoven Violin Concerto.  The soloist is, Melina Mandozzi, an amazing violinist with a hugely succesful orchestral and solo career.  She loves us for some reason, and books in to play with us each Spring.  Beethoven's one and only violin concerto is so moving and so beautiful -- it's an honour to be able to accompany such a wonderful violinist in such an important work.  Then we finish with Vaughan Williams' 5th Symphony.  This is, for me, the great surprise of the concert.  I didn't know this piece at all. Actually, I don't know much of Vaughan Williams' work.  But I have fallen in love with this piece.  It is gorgeously melodic in a sweeping impressionistic sort of way.  It  completely carries me away out of my head and off into a place where words are not only meaningless but besides the point.  Really, just what I need right now.  Here's an excerpt to show you what I mean. It's Andre Previn conducting the En-Aichi-Kay Symphony Orchestra in the beginning of the first movement (sorry it stops in the middle but you can find the rest on You Tube).  Oh -- and most importantly, HAPPY FATHER'S DAY to all you dads out there -- especially my own!

Planning the Launch

In the middle of all the theatricality this week, I managed to check out a possible venue for September's launch of my new novel, A Clash of Innocents.  I usually am too superstitious to talk about things before they are set in stone, but I have a very good feeling about this.  Without saying names, I have found a cultural institution in central London devoted to all things Asian.  It is one of those beautiful old buildings with a sweeping central staircase and painted ceilings.  I think it will be fantastic.  And I think, this time, I'll also have some entertainment.  I  did love the party I threw for the launch of Tangled Roots. It was in the beautiful library of The Science Museum, with champagne, canapes etc.  But I was advised at the time just to make a short speech and not to read from the book, and I think that was a mistake.  I have since been to several launches of all sorts and sizes, and I know the author's reading has always been the evening's highlight.  So this time I will read, but not alone.

In the yoga world we talk about the universe providing......I have recently had a great example of just that.  I have about 1000 photos of my trip to Cambodia, and I was thinking about putting them together into a sort of slide presentation that I use as a backdrop to excerpts from the book.  Then, out of the blue, I was introduced to a young Cambodian man working in London who is eager to present photographs taken by Cambodian teenagers living in a shelter in Siem Reap.  After a short conversation, it became clear that we could work together to create a really moving presentation of photos and prose, and that this could be the perfect way to launch the book.  The venue that I found will work wonderfully for this -- they even have all the technology, and the personnel, to make it work.  Take that, some Khmer music in the background and a table for me to sign at, and you have the makings of a terrific evening.  I am so excited!  Now hopefully, the demons won't punish me for talking about all this too soon.  Because you know what can happen:
Thanks to Cass2541 for this.

Up and Running

My oh my, what a week!
Monday we did the tech for the show which went all day and into the night.
Tuesday we had a dress rehearsal, and the Opening Night.  Even though it was a preview, the house was nearly full and the performance was completely assured.  Actors are rather amazing creatures -- they seem to thrive on adrenaline and that frisson of fear.  It was great.
Wednesday was the second preview.  I had assumed that we would have a very small audience, but actually it was nearly as full as the first night, and once again, the performance was great and the audience really responsive.
Thursday was Press Night.  Now this is the first real big deal.  As it turns out, there's a lot going on in London this week and so members of the press are coming at various times throughout the beginning of the run.  But Wednesday night still had several reviewers, plus our PR professional with her press packs and introductions and industry chit chat.  Press Night is always nerve wracking, and I was certainly nervous, as was the cast and crew.  But all went well, and there were quite a few post-production drinks celebrating that we had successfully gotten through it.
Friday was the performance set aside for our supporters.  A bit of a "gala,"  if you can call drinks in the pub afterwards such a thing.  The house was nearly full.  The performance was fantastic.  It just keeps getting better and better, tighter and tighter.  And then afterwards (despite the beginning of the World Cup and a pub-full of people there to see that), we were all able to join together, pat ourselves on the back for jobs well done, thank our supporters for allowing this wonderful production to come to life.  But best of all, I finally got to meet one of our playwrights, Michael Hart, who came down from Edinburgh to be there for this performance.  All of us bloggers know what it's like to "spend time" with someone over cyberspace and feel as if you really know them.  Then, when you actually meet in person, it's a bit like old friends.  I felt that way with Michael -- not sure if he felt the same, but.... :-).  But after working for months on bringing his marvelous script to life, to meet him, share a meal, and then watch him as he watched his words come to life on stage was a fantastic experience for me.  He was thrilled with the production (I'm greatly relieved to say).  It really is a great responsibility taking someone else's words and vision and creating something new with it.  As a writer myself, perhaps I felt this even more acutely.  But it's been an honour to give both of these plays their world premieres, and a great thrill for me to watch Michael have his first experience of being the playwright at his own play.  I even forced him to stand and take a bow. 
So now it's Saturday afternoon and I'm writing this for you all to read on Sunday.  I'm totally knackered, but totally happy.  There hasn't been much sleep this week.  Even when I was able to get into bed at a reasonable hour, my brain was working in overdrive.  But I now know that "The Next Curve: 2 One Act Plays" is truly up and running, and the next two weeks will be filled with wonderful performances and, I trust, happy and moved audiences.  But you don't have to trust my biased opinion.  The first review is in and it's a complete RAVE.  Read it here!  And then, if you can, come see it.  Two more weeks full of evening performances and Saturday and Sunday matinees.  I'll be there for most of them.

"Not So Perfect" by Nik Perring

There are many reasons why I'm thrilled to be presenting Nik Perring here today.  He's a lovely, generous writer who I've gotten to know through his blog, here.  He makes me laugh and I believe he has an interesting and rather quirky take on life.  But mostly, he's a fantastically talented writer with a new collection of stories out called Not So Perfect.  Roastbooks' description is spot on:
22 short, short stories; 22 not so perfect lives. Bird watchers come out at night, couples perform love surgery, and a woman is throwing up animals. The extraordinary is everywhere, but an unsettling familiarity pervades.
Nik Perring’s brilliant debut collection demonstrates the underestimated powers of brevity. Intricately crafted and filled with dark humour, his 22 stories examine the conundrums and contradictions of human relationships, and ask us what it is to be human.
Not So Perfect is a masterclass in flash fiction. Each story is a small gem and I found myself sitting and staring into space in amazement after each one.  Luckily, I was able to ask Nik all sorts of questions about his craft which I can share with you now.

Thinking specifically about “flash fiction”: I see this as a rather new genre. Why are you drawn to it? Do you think its form can accomplish things that other forms can’t?
Hello! Thanks for having me here, Sue. I think it’s certainly true that the term ‘flash fiction’ is a new one and also that the form (as well as the short story) has seen a resurgence in popularity over the past few years (which is wonderful!) but I’m not convinced it’s all that new a form. I think very, very short stories have been around for a long, long time. Fables, folk tales and fairy tales are often brief. And we shouldn’t forget the brilliant short-short stories people like Hemingway, Lovecraft, O Henry, Chekhov, Vonnegut and Kafka produced.  (Here’s one of my favourite Kafka shorts).  But, history lesson aside (sorry!) I think I’m drawn to writing short-short stories because of their immediacy. Often a piece of very short fiction is no longer than the moment it’s describing and, like those moments – which are often so short – they stay with us long after. I think, also, that flash fiction gives us the opportunity of being more direct, of getting straight to the point, and then out again, quickly.
   Can it accomplish things other genres or forms can’t? I think I’d have to say yes but I’d argue that all works, regardless of length, should all do kind of the same thing – be that affect the reader, entertain them, make them laugh, move them or change them in some way. I think, because of its brevity, flash fiction when done well has a big echo, a long resonance. Flash fiction can be a single handclap in a cathedral rather than the full choir of a novel.

Several stories have magical or “unreal” images, such as spitting up fire, throwing up animals, cutting open bodies to store hearts. Do you think flash fiction is especially suitable to this sort of “magic realism”?
Again, as far as content goes I see absolutely no reason why a longer story can’t have unreal or surreal images. If the story’s good then it’ll work regardless of length – mostly, I think, because a story finds its own length. That’s paramount for me – I never set out to write something of a specific length; that’s for the story to decide.
   I think the key thing I try to remember is that the wacky, surreal images and situations I make up aren’t the point of the story – there’s nothing worse than a gimmick. I work hard at justifying these images and trying to make them relevant and familiar, so they end up not being all that weird after all. One of the last stories in the book (Number 14), for instance, is about a woman whose house is decorated in Post-it notes – and that image of walls covered with them was absolutely where the idea for the story came from. But then I asked why and came up with a reason that, I think, is plausible and human.
   By contrast, and this is going back to the question of whether or not flash does magic realism better than a longer piece: I’d point people to Neil Gaiman’s "Stardust": where the main character is a star who’s fallen to earth. That’s a terrific and very believable story, and it certainly doesn’t suffer from being novel length. In fact it couldn’t be anything else.

When do your pieces begin for you? With an image? A sentence? A concept? Or do you just sit down with your pencil and start to write. I think this is stemming from a knee-jerk assumption that a piece of flash fiction may not require the same amount of planning as a longer piece might. Is this correct?
Ooh good question! Really it can come from anywhere, but mostly: an image or a question, or a situation. I like asking what-ifs? What would happen if a young boy played with a grenade? What if there was some illness where a person literally couldn’t stop? What if a man’s wife threw up animals? You know – how would he feel about that? What would it be like to live with? Why would she be doing that? What does it mean? And then – what could that represent?
   The writing process and the amount of time that takes can vary hugely.  You’re right in that first drafts tend to be written quickly. But my process isn’t a fast one at all. I’ll often write several first drafts until I’ve found the right angle. "Kiss", the first story in the book, was written at least half a dozen times from different points of view – I think a daughter narrated the story at the beginning. And once that’s done there’s considerable redrafting and tweaking, and read-throughs. So a story as short as "When You’re Frightened, Honey, Think of Strawberries", can take a week or two to finish – which could be the same length as something six or seven times as long. But then others come out pretty much already done; "I think Seconds Are Ticking By" was done in an afternoon.
   And as for planning – with me, there’s pretty much none. Just an idea of where I want to go. And a fair dose of faith and/or hope!

What’s the story behind including the illustrations? I do love them and they do add to the atmosphere of the book, but the stories could well stand on their own without them. Are they just for fun?
I love that you love them, Sue! I do as well.  And they were all my publisher’s idea (thanks, Faye!). Faye suggested it might be a cool idea to have someone illustrate the eBook version, which I thought was a terrific idea, and then we saw the illustrations we both agreed that we should try to incorporate them into the paperback. And I am thrilled with them (and the cover) because I think they compliment the stories perfectly. It’s definitely worked out wonderfully well.

Here’s a question close to my heart: when I wrote “Tangled Roots” and had half the book in the voice of a man, I was questioned about whether I thought that was difficult, or even possible. So now I ask you: did you think twice about writing in women’s voices? Do you have trouble doing that ever? I must say, I never thought you faltered when you took on the voice of a woman. I think “Where Did He Go, You Wonder?” is particularly successful, even though it is actually 3rd person, I suppose. I thought you completely got into the head of an older woman with that one. Were you aware of doing something “challenging” with that, or did it just come out like any other story comes out?

Thank you! I’m thrilled you think so!  I can honestly say that I never thought twice about writing from a woman’s point of view at all. I’d been sitting in a pub, reading, when an older couple came in. And although they’d both made an effort to look nice and to go out, neither seemed happy. They seemed almost annoyed with each other.  That was the seed from which "Where Did He Go, You Wonder," came from. I started asking myself why they could be like that and came up with the idea that became the story. But that theme (or idea) of loss and of being angry with someone for simply being them was something I hoped people would understand and get regardless of their sex. I wrote it from the woman’s point of view because that’s what felt the most natural and because that’s where I felt the story came from. If that makes sense! Sounding convincing as a woman wasn’t anything I worried about until the story was done, and questioning whether the voice worked was part of the editing process – but it certainly wasn’t the only thing I questioned!
   So no. It wasn’t like I’d deliberately set out to challenge myself to sound convincing as a woman, though obviously making it convincing is extremely important: if it’s not believable then the story doesn’t work.  So I think the voice is one of many things that has to work, and work with all the other components: and be interesting on top of it all! And, hopefully, moving as well. I like it when someone thinks something I’ve written is moving. That’s good!

We could chat like this forever.  At least I could.  But I think all that really needs to be said now is buy this book.

Putting on a Play: Getting It In and Getting It Out

We have now finished our rehearsals.  It's hard to believe the three weeks are already over.  Here are some photos from the rehearsal room: Stefan D'Bart and Polly Whybrow rehearsing Michael Hart's "No More, Salvator." And here's our Director, Ellie Joseph, with her Assistant Director, Vikki Alexander, overseeing everything.

Now it's time to get these actors in front of an audience.  But before we can do that, we have to do what is aptly called "The Get In."  Yesterday, my CurvingRoad partner, Sonja Rein, and some of the production team drove a van all over London picking up everything from trees out of a local park, to cables and lights from the electrics company.  Today, everything gets dropped off at the theatre and the get in begins.  The back wall is painted black.  The wardrobe is organized and put backstage,  the entire set is created which, in this case, means a small space will be converted first to a forest outside of Chicago and then to a room in the Louvre.  I'm okay with words, but it's beyond me to figure out how one stage can hold two sets at once, hiding one and then the other.  (Thank God for our set designer, Lucy). Our intrepid lighting guy, Mark, will start programming all the lights along with George, our hugely talented composer/sound man so that our stage manager, Amy, can sit in her booth each performance and make it all happen.   The work begins at noon and will likely go on until near midnight.  Then, comes "the tech" where each moment in each play is coordinated with it's own sets of cues for lights and sound.  That will also take an entire day.  So by the time we open on Tuesday, the 8th of June, the production team will have already been working for days in the space.  It's fun and exhausting and, I must admit, occassionally stressful.
  In the meantime, the publicity machine has been working getting the word out, inviting reviewers to Press Night, trying to place articles and interviews about us. There's a lot of competition for a limited amount of column inches devoted to the theatre in London's papers.  So we were absolutely thrilled to find that an interview I did for The Stage turned into a full-page article complete with (horrifyingly enough) a very large photo of me. Unfortunately, the article isn't on their website yet and I can't figure out how to place the pdf I have here.  So, I guess you'll either have to trust me or buy a copy.
   The next time I'm here with you all the preparations will have been completed, we will have had two previews and Press Night. Wish us luck.  But I won't be talking about the play then.  Then, I'll be hosting a special guest who'll be answering some questions about his work and recently published book.  I know, isn't the suspense killing you?

From the Sublime to the Ridiculous

Thank you all so much for the wonderful birthday wishes.  We had a fantastic weekend in Dubrovnik.  It is a small gem-of-a-city.  You can walk the length of it in 15 minutes, from gate to harbour.  Then you can spend hours wandering up and down ( and I mean UP and down) the side streets knowing it is all equally beautiful and you'll never get lost.  The memories of the 1990/91 war are everywhere.  Everyone continues to be haunted by it, and so the residents all take justifiable pride in how they have rebuilt their city, their economy and their lives.  It's a wonderful place, as the photos (taken by Mr D on his trusty blackberry) clearly show.  Plus, the food's great!

We stopped in this fishing village for lunch on Saturday, during our private all-day tour.  Oh, didn't I mention that we spent a day sailing around the Adriatic, or rather being sailed for?  On this boat:

It was absolutely glorious.  See how happy I was?  And why wouldn't I be happy -- the sun was shining, I was on the water, Mr D was by my side, as were the dolphins:

Oh, and I also had this lovely, young, long-haired Croatian skipper as our guide.  If I had only been able to get the bloody "Gilligan's Island" theme song out of my head.