What Next?

7 Minutes to Midnight
Rehearsal at Bellevue College

I think its reasonably safe to assume that I must be having problems writing if I'm back on this blog.

My apologies for the hiatus of a few months off but its been a busy year...what with moving into a new house, juggling the new job, and also being absorbed by the show CAMINO in September.

But I promise to be once again more vigilant in posting my random thoughts on all things theater.

As for my writing, well, its not so much that I'm blocked as I have many ideas, but I feel that ever since the end of the run of CAMINO, I have been contemplating, what next?  If you saw me on facebook, I contemplated between doing the epic big show (aka the shows I really love to write just for me) or doing a single set, four character show, which is basically more likely to be read by and produced by theater companies.

Then I thought to myself, yeah, but, I want to write a play about robots.  Real robots.  Real scientists working on robots and how our relationship to technology (cell phones, computers, etc) is changing at an ever rapid pace.

That's probably not an easy sell, regardless.

I also think there is a balance there somewhere...between writing the play we love and care about and writing a play to get it produced.  It's ideal when both of those things get combined.


Somehow, many of my short plays I wrote "just for fun" ended up being produced several times over, which should be a lesson to me.  Even BURNING BOTTICELLI got produced and that has dozens of characters, a talking parrot and someone gets burned alive on stage.

Burning Botticelli
PR image for NYC production

I feel like as I've grown older and grown as an artist, I get choosier with my projects and my time.  The danger is that I end up avoiding the difficult choices.  The life of an artist should never be the easy route. It never has been.

So.  What's next?

Fight the stereotype

There’s this stereotype that artistic people are “scatterbrained”.  They’re wild and chaotic—like children running around in a zoo—and all this frenetic energy is part of their brilliance.  They create by inspiration, not by planning. 

Only thing is, that’s a myth. It makes for a good story, sure, but it’s not the whole story.

We artists secretly embrace this stereotype when it suits us, don’t we?  We love to create mystique, that we’re tossed by the waves of inspiration and our minds and souls can’t deal with menial tasks.  We say things like:

“I’m an artist, I can’t be bothered with contracts”

“I don’t know anything about PR.”

 “I’m not good at grant-writing—my work can’t be neatly summarized”

“I can’t be bothered with contracts.”

“I can’t do my taxes—I’m an artist not a mathematician.”

Even artists have to write rent checks.  And we have to balance our budgets, whether for our personal life or artistic visions.  Part of living as an artist is an ability to embrace all the little things in life as well as the existential things, even if they’re not fun.

Over the years I’ve gotten much better at planning and organizing my work.  It’s not fun to write a play and not get it produced.  It’s no longer romantic to not get cast in a play because I’m trying out for the wrong parts.  

I don’t find planning and organizing to be limiting.  I find it empowering.  Setting specific and measurable goals and then attaining them gives me focus.  Not all goals are possible, but it gives me an idea of what I’ve accomplished, or will accomplish, and how I’m doing in my own eyes (instead of playing the game of measuring myself with others, which is a dangerous trap we artists play).

When you find yourself uttering words like, “I’m an artist, I don’t…”, stop and think about it. What if you tried, anyway?  You might find you can write a grant proposal and get financial support for a project.  You might make a goal to work with a specific company and plan some steps to accomplish that.  Once you connect the dots to how your productivity can make you do more or better art, it becomes easier to do those organizational things.  And then it becomes a habit.

The truly successful artists are driven and ambitious.  They have a vision of the world and plan how to make that vision reality. There’s a lot of organization going on, in the process of making art, as well as behind the scenes.  We may not always see it, but it’s there. 

It’s just too bad that’s not as good a story as the scatterbrained artist who can float on talent and brilliance without any real grunt work.