Revision

In his preface to Amadeus Peter Shaffer discusses changing the end of Amadeus from something of "high melodrama" to an area "akin to tragedy." For me this really highlighted the importance of continuing "play" even during the revision process. Mentally I've been having trouble revising my plays because the initial writing of them was a creative and exciting process usually fraught with experimentation and giggling. Revision on the other hand seems like an impenetrably different beast––marked by plodding examination of each word. Or at least that's my mindset to it. I think though, that it not need be so. Shaffer here revises in broad swaths, obliterating and performing endings sometimes five different times a week. He even considers genre shifts an important part of the revision process. And indeed, it seems rather pretentious of me to believe my work worthy of word-by-word editing in the first draft, doing so implies that my piece is already thematically perfect. I am now inclined to take even "micro-editing" with a more playful bent. One can playfully add single lines that can dramatically change the whole play. What if we find out that the likable antagonist kicks puppies? Little things can change the audience's whole relationship to the play, but one need not change more than a second of what happens on-stage.

This can also serve to "bring-out" themes. Shaffer refers to any themes exposed by editing as bringing out existing themes, but I'm not so sure he's right about that. It seems as though themes of works can have a progression, not just an exposure. By making certain aspects of Amadeus more blatant, Shaffer notices other things in the play that he could draw out. But I wonder if what is really happening here is that by making aspects of the play more blatant, he is actually uncovering his intentions or own beliefs about what the play ought to be. Essentially, if we take it that when an artist intentionally puts a theme in his work he is leaving something intentionally unspoken for the audience to analyze/find/walk away believing, why not state that explicitly and then see what the piece really becomes about? As if it is left intentionally buried the artist perhaps is not rigorously examining the piece (Though I hate to say that because it's dangerously close to beginning to view creative writing as a spiritual or religious process with actions and changes the artist is required to undertake).

Lastly I'm glad to not be the only one who finds it necessary to add and not cut in my revisions. For some reason my initial creative process can sometimes prove obnoxiously concise. I am of the group that needs to be adding. My first drafts inevitably skeletal, seemingly especially in playwriting, where the writing is essentially economy – just dialogue and a few essential stage directions, but not needing anything else. Now, I don't think there's anything wrong with being concise, in fact I value it, but pacing is important, and I've probably rushed everything all semester. Shaffer decided that the last scene of Amadeus needed to be longer, because it contained all of Salieri's dynamicism.

Comedy

Aimee – I'm not sure I fully understand what's going on here. While reading it it came across as a really surface level political diatribe against the patriot act/ American anti-French sentiment. Which, I mean is cool and all, I'm as anti-patriot act/pro-French as the next liberal arts student, but it seems kind of trite here, maybe it wasn't in 2003. I recognize that on a deeper level this is about love, but that doesn't come out until halfway through the play. I don't know how easy it is for an audience to forgive even five minutes of triteness, even if it is clever. I guess though that if you want to play with that, ten minute plays are the place to do it.

Anything for You – A fun, quick ten minute play with witty dialogue and good realistic character confessions that are heartfelt but not overly dramatic. Stepping away from the playwriter role, I do have to say that I'm kind of bothered by the fact that if this was about a straight coupling, people probably wouldn't find it funny, or the play wouldn't work. The playwright very cleverly plays with this though, starting off with the "humorous" proposition that Lynette and Gail have an affair because it's sort of non-threatening to their husbands, and then ending with the reveal that, yes, for Gail it is serious, and lesbian relations can carry the same weight of straight relations. Very clever of the playwright to anticipate why the beginning of the play is objectionable. Again, this might be something that only works in 10 minute plays, because hey, they're only ten minutes, so you can give your audience something they find objectionable for 8 minutes, and then give them resolution and they're not likely to desert you.

Duet for Bear and Dog – I rather enjoy this one, largely because I've always believed in theater as something of marvelous imagination. Ladder as tree? Check. Actors playing a bear and a dog but talking like regular humans? Love it, I'm there. Interestingly enough, like the previous two plays it ends on a more serious note, but it's even more of quick turn here. I didn't get it till rereading the play, but it seems to be about this contrast and grayed line between the domestic and the wild, as Dog's final line is of wilderness but Bear's is of a sort of wild matronly domestication. I like the contrast. Seemingly the play would be incomplete without this last soliloquy. Which, I mean is weird given that this is a comedy, and a ten minute one at that. We admit that comedies don't need a point, but sometimes they're made better by them. Weird.

The Philadelphia – This is the only one of the ten minute plays that I would argue is comedic throughout. And yes, it's very David Ives, and therefore very witty/poignant/blah blah blah, but somehow in contrast to the other three it seems a little flatter for being more of a straight comedy. (Though I mean, the last line does leave us some philosophic gristle to chew on I guess) It seems like there's a difference between "sketch" and "10-minute comedy play" that's hard to pinpoint, though seemingly crucial.