Splitting the Atom

In considering my suggested division for Rules of the World, Erik points out that the convention of presentation and the rule itself are related.

I agree. Perhaps the distinction is more important when creating a play as opposed to experiencing the play.

Erik's example was that in a particular play the Dead don't use contractions. I find it hard to believe that our imaginary writer was working away at her script, and for some reason unknown to her she had hese characters who just refused to use contractions. She keeps writing and somewhere around scene five she suddenly realizes - Oh! They're dead.

Despite that glib inversion, I hope you see my point that Erik is describing the process of audience interpretation as opposed to playwright creation.

It strikes me that the division I am suggesting between ROTW and conventions assumes a certain process as a writer.

I have assumed that my fellow playwrights first dream up a reality, and then consider how to present that reality to an audience.

It occurs to me that there are likely writers who imagine a theatrical reality: that is, they imagine only the stage event, and not some separate truth that must be translated.

To writers in the second category, my atom-splitting on ROTW is meaningless.

So let's bump this conversation back a step: what is your process? As a playwright, do you create a theatrical reality, or do you first create an internal reality which then must be translated for presentation?

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World Rules Refined

A couple of comments on this post inspired me to refine the concept of Rules of the World (ROTW).

I think there is a distinction between rules that define how world of the play would function if it were reality, and rules that define the conventions of how the play is presented to the audience.

The question "What is the role of women in the 'world'?" and my question "Where do the bodies end up?" fall into the former category. Pookie's observation about time and Erik's thoughts on language fall into the latter category.

I tend to think first about the reality of the world I want to write about, and then what conventions I'm going to use to convey those to the audience.

I recall a day in workshop at Ohio University. I had written a play with a ghost. (Really, its better than it sounds.) The workshop accepted the ROTW that ghosts were real. But Charles Smith went on to ask how the ghost manifested on stage: a special light, a sound, did the ghost always appear from one spot, etc. He said in effect: "Fine, ghosts are real in this play. But how are you going to show that to the audience?"

Is this purely an academic distinction? Or is the line between ROTW and stage convention so blurred as to be useless?

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Rules For a New World

I'm working on a project idea that has a lot to do with scavengers. As a result, I'm reading Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens. The book was published in serial form, and the pace is glacially slow. As one of my friends said, you can tell Dickens was paid by the word.

As I recalibrate my brain to accept the rhythms of this particular work, I've found I have a lot more time to think about the structure of the piece.

Our Mutual Friend, in combination with the scavenger project has me thinking about the concept of "rules of the world" in a slightly different light. I use the term "rules of the world" to refer to the conventions, practices, and behaviors that define the narrative logic of the piece. For an easy example: if you have wizards zapping each other with wands, then one of the ROTW is that magic exists.

Most of the time, I think of ROTW as having to do with fantasy, sci fi, or visions of the future. Our Mutual Friend is set in the past - and I've been reminded that ROTW applies to every play. Even ones set in a time or place supposedly familiar to the audience.

As I work through Our Mutual Friend, I'm going to be posting questions inspired by the world of the book. These questions, taken together, might form an interesting exercise for a writer trying to create their own new world. I suppose its worth noting that "world" in ROTW doesn't need to refer to the entire globe. It can of course refer to the immediate culture your characters inhabit.

Set A
1) Where do the bodies end up? What happens to the dead in your world carries a huge amount of information about economics, value of life, religion, etc.

2) What is the value of education in this world? What type of education is important, how it is attained and who attains it also shape the world.

3) What are the approved libations and intoxications? This also begs the question of what are the illegal intoxications.

What other questions would you pose when crafting your world?

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Why is TV Better than Theater?

John From Cincinnati pulled off the one of the most unique scenes I've seen on stage or screen in last Sunday's episode. You can read the text here.

The scene and the speech is probably generating a lot of discussion by fans of the show --I'm not sure I count myself as one yet. But that discussion is going to be about what the speech means within the confines of the world Milch et al are creating. The question that leaps to mind for me is: why isn't theater doing anything this interesting or this confounding?

Sure - there's plenty of the self-appointed vanguard out there doing opaque work. But my exposure to that world has always included a feeling of "Well, if you don't get it, fuck you." The thing that confounds me about John From Cincinnati is how generous it is as it completely runs itself off the rails. Somewhere, somehow, Milch and company are saying "It's OK if you don't get it right now. Hang in there, come along for the ride."

Part of that is in the way they've built John's character. We've been taught in steps that he parrots words and that he rearranges those found phrases for his own meaning. Structurally, we've been prepared to hear and listen to John's speech. We've been taught the rules of John's behavior over the last four episodes and now the writers have taken those rules and built something suprising and unique.

So perhaps that's one structural lesson to take from the last episode: teach the rules of the world, riff on the rules of the world. In the shows of the self-appointed vanguardists, its often step one that's missing.

But what else is this show doing structurally to make it OK to be completely confounded?

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