Welcome

Welcome
John William Tuohy lives in Washington DC

*** OPPORTUNITIES FOR PLAYWRIGHTS ***

 



TEDxAsburyPark’s 1act.1idea is accepting submissions of short plays (8- 18 minutes run time) with a big idea worth sharing. We seek original work that focuses our hearts and minds on any of these themes: Collaboration, Determination, Democracy, Diversity, and/or "All Together Now".

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The «Neem» award was created to support and identify underground dramatic waters.
Nominations: Awarded one prize in the nomination «A play that no one will ever agree to stage»
The author of the play-winner will receive a cash prize: 20£.

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SPIDER®, a literary magazine for children, features fresh and engaging literature, poems, articles, and activities for newly independent readers. Editors seek energetic, beautifully crafted submissions with strong “kid appeal” (an elusive yet recognizable quality, often tied to high-interest elements such as humor, adventure, and suspense).

We seek fiction of all kinds: fantasy, folk or fairytale, sci-fi, historical, humorous, or realistic. Whether the setting is long-ago or contemporary, or the protagonist is a shy newcomer, clever trickster, class clown, fantasy creature, or superhero, characters and the worlds they inhabit should be complex and believable. Plays should have 2–6 characters so that a child could feasibly perform the play at home with family or friends.


*** FOR MORE INFORMATION about these and other opportunities see the web site at https://www.nycplaywrights.org ***


*** REWORKING ***

The most controversial issue in the theater today (1988) continues to be the reinterpretation or ''deconstruction'' of celebrated classical plays. There is no theatrical activity that more inflames purist sensibilities in criticism and the academy - nothing that stimulates as many caustic generalizations about the debasements of modern culture. Perhaps because ''deconstruction'' as an assonant noun if not as a method, is so perilously close to ''destruction'' and ''desecration,'' the standard purist posture is like that of Switzers before the gates of the Vatican, defending sacred texts against the barbarians. The paradox is that both sides are really devoted to the same esthetic purpose, which is the deeper penetration of significant dramatic literature. The difference is in the attitude. Is classical reinterpretation a reinforcing or a defiling act - a benign or a malignant development in the history of modern theater?

My own position is a qualified vote of support for conceptual directing. I have long believed that if dramatic classics are not seen with fresh eyes they grow fossilized - candidates for taxidermy. Even the most harebrained textual reworking may open up new corridors into a play, while the more ''faithful'' version is often a listless recycling of stilted conventions. That is why I continue to echo Artaud's call for ''No More Masterpieces'' - great plays can be ''desecrated'' by excessive piety as much as by excessive irreverence. Although I champion a radical auteurism in directing, however, not all examples of this process have the same integrity of purpose. One can support the idea of classical reinterpretation without defending all its forms or ignoring the fact that what passes for originality is sometimes merely another kind of ego-tripping.

Let me refine my position by distinguishing between two common methods of reworking the classics - one that depends largely on external physical changes and another that changes our whole notion of the play. It is a distinction that can be illustrated through analogies with figures of speech - the prosaic simile and the poetic metaphor. Directors who are fond of similes assume that because a play's action is like something from a later period, its environment can be changed accordingly. Directors with a feeling for metaphor are more interested in generating provocative theatrical images - visually expressed through physical production, histrionically through character and relationships - that are suggestive of the play rather than specific, reverberant rather than concrete.

More...
https://www.nytimes.com/1988/11/06/theater/stage-view-reworking-the-classics-homage-or-ego-trip.html

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It’s happy-making that the generally acknowledged living sovereign of musical theater has been open to smart tinkering with his work. Fiasco — which emerged from the Brown/Trinity MFA Acting program and is known for scrappy, energetic, steamer-trunks-and-scavenged-props takes on classics — have turned to lean double-casting to streamline the 1981 musical, which originally flopped mightily but, over the years, has received lots of reworking from its creators (Sondheim on music and lyrics and George Furth on book) and has become a cult classic among highbrow musical-theater lovers. The company has also done a bit of fleshing out of the script’s arc, most notably adding a scene from the musical’s source, the 1934 play of the same name by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart.

More...
https://www.vulture.com/2019/02/theater-fiascos-lo-fi-reworking-of-merrily-we-roll-along.html


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GNIT is a reworking of Henrik Ibsen’s Peer Gynt, a verse epic based on Norwegian folklore and the playwright’s own tortured family life. For audience members who know the source text, Eno’s take will be a hoot; for those who don’t, it might well seem like a strange, jaunty trip through random dramatic tropes. Eno hews closely to Ibsen’s plot, following the self-absorbed protagonist, Peter (Joe Curnutte), as he leaves the miserable home he shares with his despairing mother (Deborah Hedwall), becomes a fugitive, recklessly woos several women and flees his homeland for exotic adventures abroad. There are a number of 21st-century updates—flirty dairy maids are now a trio of DTF grad students—but the play also keeps one foot in a simpler, semi-magical Scandinavian past, complete with trolls.

More...
https://www.timeout.com/newyork/theater/gnit-review-will-eno-peer-gynt-off-broadway

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It cracks itself wide open to the audience; it hits them in the face. The Wife of Willesden – Zadie Smith’s terrific adaptation of Chaucer, gloriously staged by Indhu Rubasingham and triumphantly embodied by Clare Perkins – is shot through with the spirit of its heroine, who leaps across the centuries to proclaim what she thinks it is that women really really want.

The spectators are squeezed by the action before a word has been spoken. Robert Jones has redesigned the auditorium so that it is partly a cabaret space with some of the audience seated at tables in a pub, based on the Sir Colin Campbell opposite the theatre in Kilburn High Road. Jones is aiming to create “that infamous sticky carpet feeling”. Light bounces off shelves of bottles; the publican wears a leopardskin top and big gold hoops; the punters – from church and temple and mosque and schul and utter godlessness – jostle to tell their stories.

More...
https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2021/nov/21/the-wife-of-willesden-zadie-smith-kiln-review-rare-earth-mettle-royal-court

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Ivo van Hove and West Side Story are not an obvious match. The Belgian director specialises in stripping densely cerebral classic works of theatre and cinema down to their dramatic essence. “I Feel Pretty” are three words that would appear to have little place in his austere world.

So it’s little surprise that the chirpy number has been axed from his revival of Jerome Robbins’s boisterous musical pageant (with a book by Arthur Laurents, music by Leonard Bernstein and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim) about racially charged gang violence in 1950s New York.

That excision sets the tone for Van Hove’s boldly reworked staging, which is darker, grungier and more violent than the 1961 film adaptation. The sombre-toned streetwear and tattoos sported by most of the 39-strong cast indicate that the setting has been shifted to the present day. The action still nominally takes place on Manhattan’s now thoroughly gentrified Upper West Side. But Luke Halls’s haunting slow-motion video sequences of deserted streetscapes, which fill a screen covering the entire width of the mostly bare stage, seem to depict the grittier parts of the Bronx, Brooklyn or Queens.

More...
https://www.ft.com/content/8c96682c-53cc-11ea-a1ef-da1721a0541e


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“Life Sucks,” Aaron Posner’s comic adaptation of Anton Chekhov’s “Uncle Vanya,” is a whimsical retelling of the classic play that quite delightfully disrupts the original’s quiet desperation and dark humor. Moving at a quick if dramatically melancholic pace and incorporating ideas pulled from pop psychology, the comedy deconstructs and reassembles the original with myriad clever turns and an ending that is genuinely and surprisingly uplifting. That’s not to say you won’t shed a tear or two, if you’re even a little sentimental the closing scene will likely give you “all the feels.”

The story’s essential characters are present. Vanya, and almost everyone in the show, still pines and moans with love for his brother-in-law’s wife; and he’s still angry with the professor and disappointed in himself. Sonia still yearns for any scrap of affection from the doctor; and she’s still patiently persistent and remarkably tenderhearted.

More...
https://kdhx.org/articles/theatre-reviews/1142-‘life-sucks’-gives-chekhov-a-seriously-funny-and-strangely-sunny-outlook


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The American Repertory Theater's (A.R.T) electrifying production of "1776" is no ordinary history lesson. From the moment the cast steps onstage in what appears to be regular street clothes and then transforms with the pulling up of socks, the donning of brocade jackets and buckled shoes, and the use of elegant choreography by Jeffrey L. Page, it's evident that the opening scene foreshadows an energetic ride down a familiar path.

Typically, I'm slow to warm up to historical founding-of-America fare. Not because it's unimportant, but because it's often exclusionary. Here, "1776" (through July 24 at the Loeb Drama Center) with direction from Diane Paulus and Page differs as much as it can, in all the best ways.

There's a diverse, multi-generational cast, who identify as female, nonbinary and trans, so the people onstage represent America more fully; a colorful "We the People" mural by Artists for Humanity; and a multimedia exhibit where cast members talk about this document and their stories as part of American history. In addition to the complementary happenings, there's an infectious buzz to the performance that might come from the two-year pandemic-induced wait to bring the story to the stage.

More...
https://www.wbur.org/news/2022/06/03/1776-american-repertory-theater-review

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Waving Good Bye A poem by Gerald Stern

Whatever you do, avoid the Radisson in Letterkenney

“I do want to make it very convincing. And the best way to do that is to put most of it in dialogue.” — John Steinbeck


 

Anna Tsygankova


 

Johnny Dodds


 

Giovanni Battista Pergolesi

 



Willie Watson





 

Hollywood scandals: Killing Alfalfa


 

Hollywood scandals: Mary MacNamra


 

Barney Baker, labor goon before Bobby Kennedy


 

A few of my favorite things (Wth Frank "The German" Schweihs


 

Child of the Sixties forever (My other blogspot)


 

A note to my writer friends

 

I just learned that there is a connection between self-compassion and creativity. When we are critical and self-doubting of ourselves our creativity goes down. When we are  self- compassionate we reduce our anxiety and our creativity goes up.




 

Wow


 

I researched this to make sure it actually happened...it did.....nothing happened to the cop


 

Downtown where I live, a town fundraiser for the local farmers


 

Eli, as a puppy, back before we put in the pool


 

The New Haven anti war riots

The great Bessie Smith


Bessie Smith (April 15, 1894 – September 26, 1937) was a blues singer widely renowned during the Jazz Age.

Nicknamed the "Empress of the Blues", she was the most popular female blues singer of the 1920s and 1930s.

She is often regarded as one of the greatest singers of her era and was a major influence on fellow blues singers, as well as jazz vocalists.

Born in Chattanooga, Tennessee, Smith was young when her parents died, and she and her six siblings survived by performing on street corners. She began touring and performed in a group that included Ma Rainey, and then went out on her own.

Her successful recording career with Columbia Records began in 1923, but her performing career was cut short by a car crash that killed her at the age of 43.

 






 

Big Bill Bronzy


Big Bill Broonzy (born Lee Conley Bradley; June 26, 1903 – August 14, 1958) was a blues singer, songwriter and guitarist. His career began in the 1920s, when he played country music to mostly African-American audiences.

 Through the 1930s and 1940s he successfully navigated a transition in style to a more urban blues sound popular with working-class African-American audiences.

 In the 1950s a return to his traditional folk-blues roots made him one of the leading figures of the emerging American folk music revival and an international star. His long and varied career marks him as one of the key figures in the development of blues music in the 20th century.

Broonzy copyrighted more than 300 songs during his lifetime, including both adaptations of traditional folk songs and original blues songs.




 

*** OPPORTUNITIES FOR PLAYWRIGHTS ***

 



The Henley Rose Playwright Competition for Women was founded by Yellow Rose Productions, with permission of Beth Henley, to encourage and recognize the new works of female playwrights. The Henley Rose Playwright Competition for Women aims to give voice to the stories of this generation and to bring into the spotlight important works that have been crafted.

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Theatre Viscera: We accept plays written by queer (LGBTQIA+) playwrights, about queer characters, for queer performers. We have a preference for plays about/by transgender, non-binary, and gender non-conforming folx. You may send us full length plays, one acts, or collections of ten minutes. Total submissions must be at least 30 minutes long when read.

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In November 2022, we will host the 4th Annual Faces of America Monologue Festival.
To submit your monologue for consideration there are just a few simple rules:
Your monologue must be less than two minutes in length.
We can't stress this enough. If we think your monologue is longer it will not be considered. 

Your monologue should represent America's incredible diversity. (BIPOC, AAPI, Latine, and LGBTQIA+ artists are all strongly encouraged to apply). Monologues can be historical or futuristic, cultural or political, comedic or tragic, spoken or signed!
Include the word "kindness" somewhere in your monologue.
If this word does not appear in the monologue it will not be considered.


*** FOR MORE INFORMATION about these and other opportunities see the web site at https://www.nycplaywrights.org ***


*** FIVE ACT PLAY | STRUCTURE ***

Think of the play like a journey; your characters are the travellers, your plot is what happens along the way and your structure is the road. You could write an infinite number of stories which take place along a similar road.

Because the five act structure is so versatile, it’s also a useful tool when analysing the works of others. Almost every film produced by Hollywood follows a predetermined structure, to the point where you can often predict how a film will end. Don’t think of this as a prescriptive or limiting template though, absolutely anything can happen within the confines of the structure. It’s really a way of making sure you hit a series of plot developments which, if used correctly, can add depth to your characters and story.

I’m still getting my head around this structure stuff myself, and there are so many different versions and theories behind it that it can get very confusing. For the purposes of an example I’ll try to stick to a very simplistic version. Forgive me if your knowledge is already beyond this point.

I’m using the film The Matrix* as an example to illustrate each point, mainly because I re-watched it fairly recently and can remember (fairly accurately) how the plot unfolds. If you haven’t seen the film this will be a good excuse to check it out. (*Spoiler alert – plot points revealed below.)

Act I – Exposition
This act is essentially where you set up the story; we meet your protagonist and other major characters, we see their normal situation and see that something needs to change. The protagonist needs to learn something about themselves or their situation in order to resolve a problem. The protagonist is given an opportunity to see outside their normal world at some point during this act, which they need to take (or there will be no story…)

More...
https://londonplaywrightsblog.com/pursued-by-a-bear-i-cant-make-sense-of-five-act-structure/


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From Renaissance to Neoclassical this was the standard. Theatre at this time was based on Aristotle's and Horace's works (as they were understood at the time) since Classical theatre was considered ideal. The five act structure was incredibly strict (especially in the Neoclassical period), it wasn't until Romanticism and Melodrama that this structure fell out of fashion. Few modern productions have a full-length intermission between every act (though they may give a couple minutes to stretch while the scenery is changed), although this wouldn't have been done at the time either. The older five act plays tend to be fairly long, and are often somewhat abridged in modern performances.

Now might be a good time to discuss scenes: The modern convention, and also that used by a lot of older writers, is that a scene change is only marked when there's a change in location, or the time frame moves forwards a significant amount. However, particularly around 1700, during the period known as the Restoration, you get plays such as William Congreve's five-act The Way of the World, where each act takes place in a single location, but every time a character joins or leaves a conversation, a new scene is declared and numbered. This can be very, very confusing if you're used to the more standard model. This is referred to nowadays as "French Scenes."

More...
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/OurActsAreDifferent


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The five acts consist of the following, which I have paired with how each act perfectly corresponds to each of Breaking Bad’s five seasons:

Act 1: Something happens to spark the story into motion, and the characters begin making choices that will set everything else spinning along. (In Breaking Bad season one, Walter begins cooking meth and realizes he kind of likes it.)

Act 2: The characters still have a chance to escape their fates, but something in their psyches keeps driving them forward. (In Breaking Bad season two, Walter delves deeper and deeper into the Albuquerque underworld, meeting figures like Saul Goodman and Gus Fring for the first time. The season ends with a “warning from God,” in the form of a plane crash.)

More...
https://www.vox.com/culture/2018/1/20/16910760/breaking-bad-10th-anniversary-birthday-structure


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The three act structure is the most famous in the last 50 years because of screenplay greats like Syd Field who taught that it was the golden mean of simplicity for the writer needing guidance. I've tried this system. I think it doesn't work. It tries to be too simple and leaves an enormous part of the story unmarked as "act two". Act two is then propped up and given a "midpoint climax" as well as a dramatically different character from part one to part two. I think there's a better way. It's the way Shakespeare broke up Hamlet. And I think it makes the process simpler and more effective for the writer. That way is the five act structure. Below I'm going to break down how I see it, using Hamlet as a guide.  

Act 1
Mystery in the wasteland
A scene is set where the main character is struggling to thrive in a mature, decadent place. Things feel unchangable. Like a little person can't make a difference. But a cataclysmic event occurs that demands the hero accept the mantle of "changer" if for no other reason than to restore the status quo.

More...
http://www.davidcarrberry.com/2015/09/the-power-of-five-act-not-three-act-play.html


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For most of my twelve years teaching high school English, I’ve taught a lesson on the 5-act structure of Shakespeare’s plays.
I even put it in a book.
But I don’t think any of it is right.
Two weeks ago, as we waited in a church pew for our oldest son’s preschool graduation ceremony to begin, my wife, Liz, and I got into a debate about the climax of Hamlet, said debate beginning with my above-repeated admission that what I’ve been saying to students about Shakespeare’s 5-act structure I no longer believe to be true.

More...
https://bhjames.com/2018/06/14/rethinking-shakespeares-5-act-structure/


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Many people talk about Aristotle and his treatise Poeticsas the originator of the five act dramatic structure, but anyone who says that hasn’t read Poetics (you can, though, right here). It mentions that there should be a beginning, middle, and end to a story, but says little more about dramatic structure (and even less that makes sense for modern storytelling). That’s okay. Aristotle was a smart person, but that doesn’t have to mean he perfectly understood story structure.
Some claim that Shakespeare was the inventor of the five act dramatic structure. But while Shakespearean dramas have five acts, the act and scene breaks were written in after the fact, in 1709 by Shakespeare’s first editor, not by Shakespeare himself.

It was likely the Roman playwright Horace who first advocated for five act plays. In his essay on drama, Ars Poetic, written in 19 BC, he said, “Let a play which would be inquired after, and though seen, represented anew, be neither shorter nor longer than the fifth act.” Though in the same paragraph he advocates using deus ex machina and a cast of no more than three members, so I’m not sure he’s a good literary role model.

The biggest promoter of the five act structure in modern history, though, is a German playwright and author from the mid-1800s named Gustav Freytag, the originator of Freytag’s Pyramid.

More...
https://thewritepractice.com/five-act-structure/

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WHAT HAPPENED
by Gertrude Stein

A FIVE ACT PLAY

ACT I

(One.)

Loud and no cataract. Not any nuisance is depressing.

(Five.)

A single sum four and five together and one, not any sun a clear signal and an exchange.

Silence is in blessing and chasing and coincidences being ripe. A simple melancholy clearly precious and on the surface and surrounded and mixed strangely. A vegetable window and clearly most clearly an exchange in parts and complete.

More...
http://ustheater.blogspot.com/2010/08/getrude-stein-what-happened.html