Writing With Thorns

Wow.  It’s been so long since I’ve posted on my blog I forgot my login and password.  Bad sign . . .

As any smart playwright should, I receive Gary Garrison’s ‘The Loop’ newsletter for, yep you guessed it, playwrights.  For any fellow playwrights interested, it is a wonderful resource with submissions, workshops, writing lessons, just about everything you’d need.  You can subscribe at Gary Garrion’s website.

Anyway, the point of this being an article in this month’s issue, on How to Love or Date a Playwright.  After I stopped laughing becuase I wanted to rub it in the face of every exboyfriend I have in my collection (most of which only lasted two weeks), I decided it had to be shared.  Personally, I’m printing it and having it framed.  So here it is, exerpt from The Loop Issues #89 written by Gary Garrison:

TO DATE OR LOVE A PLAYWRIGHT
• When you ask me what I do, and I say I’m a playwright, it’s probably not conducive to the great start of a relationship if you say, “I hate the theatre,” or “who goes to the theatre anymore?” Essentially, you’re stabbing me and my art between the shoulder blades. You can hate squash or beets, but you can’t hate theatre. I mean, you can. You can hate anything you want. But I can’t love anyone who says they hate a large part of who I am.
• For the record, and to get this out of the way EARLY on, being a playwright means months and years of waiting/waiting/more waiting. The only real control I have over my career is to be the best writer I can be and to pursue fruitful business relationships. So you can bust my chops for not writing or not getting out there in the community, but you can NEVER bust my chops for not succeeding any faster than I do.
• When I give you something to read (because you’ve hounded me to read something I’ve written, or, I’ve hounded you to read something of mine), regardless of the fact that I tell you that I really want to know what you think, the deep-down truth is, I want you to like it and by association, like me – particularly if you want to have a second or third date or another year of marriage.
AMMENDMENT: The truth is, I really do want your sincere criticism, but if we don’t know each other very well, it’s a tender area that we both have to be mindful of. So you may have to pretend to like work in the moment, and when the time is right, tell me what you really think.
AMMENDENT TWO: If we see something I’ve written on stage together, just understand that I’m in an altered state after the curtain comes down. It’s probably not the best time to talk to me about much of anything. Just hold my hand; that I’ll probably respond to.
• I am artist of words, so chose yours with sensitivity
and care when talking about my work, my career or my dream.
• [this one is especially important] When you ask me out and I say “I have to write,” I really mean I have to write. I’m not blowing you off. It’s my job, regardless of the fact that I work eight hours a day at Walmart [Nino Salvaggio] in the produce section [café] and then come home to work again. That means, you’re probably going to have to be all right with someone who spends a lot of time either writing or in rehearsal.
• I am designed to be a multi-tasker: I can be passionate about my writing AND you without either of you suffering.
• Don’t look for a pedophile in my personal history if I write one in my play. Just because I can make a sound like a duck doesn’t mean I’m a duck; it means I’m a good study.
• I’m probably going to cringe if you tell me how to rewrite a line. I’d like to be open to it, but you know, I’m just not. Don’t offer.
• Yes, you do have to go the reading of my play that you’ve already heard two readings of. I want you there.  I need you there.  I don’t want to have to ask.

That goes for any writer worth his/her salt.  Spread the word.  And in the meantime, I’m off to the slavepits of Ninos.  Caio, babies!