I've had my head down building a musical. Ariel Aparicio and I did a 29-hour reading of Lf&Tms last week. The fabulous Dan Knechtges directed and incredible Sharon Fallon made it all work. The cast included Dana Watkins, Sheria Irving, Timothy Gulan, Lou Liberatore, Todd Lawson and Raymond Lee. The band included Steve Dawson, David Berger and Pemberton Roach. Stage Management geniuses were Jason Weixelman and Chris Lunar. This was a particularly collaborative group. Every day ideas of how and what to make our show would come from everyone in an easy going, open manner that was a joy to participate in.
What a whirlwind to put a presentation together. You know the whole time it isn't a show and isn't The show, but you want it to be everything it can be. Dan was great at reminding us to let it be raw so folks could see we are working and not all the way there yet. It is also amazing to me as a writer to feel like you've expressed what you want to express as clearly and artfully as you can and then as soon as you come down and start having conversations, new thoughts and ideas bloom. Never done never done. I've read that Tennessee Williams was editing Glass Menagerie the day he died. Never done and always thinking and always open too. Because it is from openness that the best can come.
So post-reading, we are outlining and discussing and discovering what feels like it is missing - mostly missing things and very little sense of anything having been overwritten. So on we go. I love this show. I want this show. I want this show in a theater near you. Here's hoping as ever we get to do the real work.
What a whirlwind to put a presentation together. You know the whole time it isn't a show and isn't The show, but you want it to be everything it can be. Dan was great at reminding us to let it be raw so folks could see we are working and not all the way there yet. It is also amazing to me as a writer to feel like you've expressed what you want to express as clearly and artfully as you can and then as soon as you come down and start having conversations, new thoughts and ideas bloom. Never done never done. I've read that Tennessee Williams was editing Glass Menagerie the day he died. Never done and always thinking and always open too. Because it is from openness that the best can come.
So post-reading, we are outlining and discussing and discovering what feels like it is missing - mostly missing things and very little sense of anything having been overwritten. So on we go. I love this show. I want this show. I want this show in a theater near you. Here's hoping as ever we get to do the real work.
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