A Critique of Critiques: A Short Primer

While working on something else, I ran across these "official" critiques of a script I submitted to a contest a few years ago:

"This appeared to be a different take on "Ghostbusters", but it really did not work. The story goes all over the place, so there's no direction and we aren't engaged as there is no reason to care about characters or situations."

"Have you thought about changing the main characters to kids and making this into some type of cartoon for Nick or some kids network? I think the kids would seem cool doing the same thing that adults are boring at and because they're kids, the actions would seem more believable. Right now, the story is flat with no place to go and the reader ends up disinterested."
 

To be fair, this was a script I threw together on the fly, and while I liked it, I never really beat it into super fine shape or anything.  I did some editing, gave it some space, then decided that I liked it well enough to leave it alone.

Now, I can't say whether the criticisms are valid or not.  I'm sure they came from two different people, to be sure.  But somehow, it's always thrown me that the two different approaches to this were so... different.  One person is all, "This didn't work.  No one cares."  As far as I'm concerned, that's a pretty heavy handed critique.  It's just one slam short of being a Simon Cowell dismissal.  And hey, I would almost expect as much from some random screener in some contest that probably got hundreds (if not thousands) of submissions.

But on the other side of the coin, the other reviewer thinks it might be cool if kids did it?  Really?  It doesn't make sense or kick if adults do it, but a bunch of kids might make it more compelling?  I actually spent time pondering a rewrite for a day or so before it occurred to me that the kid suggestion was ludicrous and I should just let it go.  I can't fathom a world where a child doing something is more entertaining than an adult.  The only example I can think of is when people deliberately misplace kids into adult roles, and that's a one-trick pony of a joke that gets tired quick.

Lesson being, it's okay if people don't love your work.  But you can't let them get too into your head along the way.  Take some criticism.  Apply it if you can.  But if you can't, then don't lose any sleep over it.  I hardly doubt that my submission was Academy Award winning work, but at the same I certainly didn't get a lot of enlightenment from the people that chose to give feedback on it.  This is probably why I don't bother with paying extra for feedback when I submit to contests and the like.  Sometimes, it's just not worth it.

My Letter to Possibly Nobody

Because talk is cheap and people always say that they will but often don't, I decided to actually attempt to contact my local legislative representative to express my opinion. This took a great deal of time and personal introspection, as I wanted to express my opinion without sounding overly rude or disrespectful. After all, it makes no sense to share your thoughts if they end getting dismissed as insane ramblings.

That said, here is the finished draft of the e-mail I shuffled of to Rep. Jack Kingston.  I share this not to toot my own horn, but because after almost a week of trying to find the right words to express how I feel about this situation, I think I found quite a few of them here:

Dear Mr. Kingston,

I am writing with regard to the current shutdown that is taking place in our federal government.  I am not sure exactly why I am writing this, except that I do sincerely feel that you have the right - no the duty - to hear my opinion on current matters.

I have been a citizen of Savannah, Georgia and thus this Congressional district for practically all 37 years of my entire life.  I have lived with many things, and seen many legislators come and go.  Rarely have I thought to express myself directly to them (or to whomever chooses to monitor things in their proxy), but I feel that this is an important issue, and that it is time.

While I understand the position(s) of you and your party with regard to the Affordable Care Act, I cannot support the actions you are currently taking.  As part of the legislative process, I would expect you to respect the process which put the law into place enough to use the systems provided in a positive way.  Using a procedural loophole to hold thousands, possibly millions of people's jobs and well being hostage while you jockey for leverage against this law is, frankly, beneath any legislator, especially one as experienced as you.

If you genuinely cared about the many people that are currently without the jobs and/or financial support that they would have if not for your porturing, then you would pass a rider-free resolution to approve a budget for everyone.  You ask why your opposition would refuse a piecemeal bill to help sick children.  I ask why you feel a handful of sympathetic interests is more important than the good of everyone.  The sick children and so many others will be helped when you start the government again, so why won't you consider them as well?  Or does it even matter to you?

I have seen several of the posts and images produced by and for you on your Facebook page.  And I know that many people will consider you a "hero" and a "patriot" for what you are attempting to do.  But respectfully, sir, you are neither to me.  I do not support this, and I do not support you.  In this regard you are not representing my personal interest, the interest of so many of my friends and family members that have and will continue to be affected by this shutdown, and the common interest of the country in general. 

I am embarrassed to have your name associated with representing the interests of my region on a national scale, and come next election cycle, I will do everything in my power to make sure that you do not continue to do so.  If every voice counts, then consider my voice counted against you.

Good luck to you, sir.  God bless you, sir.  And God save us all from the cycle of ego and insanity that you currently find yourself surrounded in.  I do not envy the task that you have before you, but I do expect better of you.

Sincerely.
Thomas Houston

I'm unclear whether anyone will actually see it, but I feel better for having tried.  I strongly encourage anyone who has an opinion, one way or the other, to do the same.  The people who represent us do deserve to know how we feel about them and what they do.  And you'll feel a little better for having made the effort.

Surviving the Big 2-4: Writing in Short Order (with commentary)

(Once upon a time -also known as last year - I wrote a series of articles outlining what I thought were interesting observations and tips for surviving a 24 hour play festival.  In honor if the upcoming Late Summer Night's Play Festival, I've decided to revisit them by reposting them again here.  Of course, I have some new thoughts and perspectives to add this year, which I will note with groovy purple text.)

So you want to write a play, do you? How long do you want to take? A year? Few months?

Oh. A day. You’re insane.

Oh, not a day. Half that time? You’re even more insane. But you are perfect material for a 24-hour play festival like Winter’s Tales. But before you get your laptop cracking and begin a steady infusion of caffeine, let me give you a few pointers to get you going.

Your real reward will be seeing your work take life at the end of the cycle. Your best chance for reaping that benefit is to make sure that you build the proper framework for the rest of the participants to work with.

Know Your Limitations – Time! Part 1

There are two time constraints to keep in mind. The first is a real time barrier of roughly eight hours. That’s how long you’ll have to plot, write, edit, and submit your script. But also keep in mind that that given time frame is overnight during the first day of the festival. So unless you’re a natural night owl (or you just have an out of whack metabolism), consider that you will have slightly less time than that as your body begins to slow down over the course of the morning.

What this means is that your best bet for success is to come up with all of your major ideas and plotting as early as possible. I’m not big on outlining, but if you need it, then go ahead and do it early. I’ll go a further step and suggest that you script several possible ideas/outlines in the first hour or so. Because if an idea goes south on you, you don’t want to be sitting around at 1AM in the morning with no idea of what to go to next.

(I don't know if I can stress enough to first time writers how important an early start is.  If you get a good jump, you can be done in a few hours.  If things go badly, you'll be sitting up the rest of the morning banging your head against the wall to finish.  Having survived this process for several years, I feel comfortable saying that fatigue will definitely become a factor if you don't come prepared for it...)

Know Your Limitations – Time! Part 2

Your second time constraint is a writing barrier. The desired length for your written show is 10 minutes. That translates to about 10 pages of scripted text. I would strongly suggest that you use a piece of formatting software to write your script. That will help put the pieces into proper perspective, make them easier to read for others, and help give the proper spacing/format to actually pan out to ten minutes. There are several free options available if you ever want to make use of them (I’m somewhat fond of Celtx, myself).

(Not much more to say here.  Except please try to format and write for under ten minutes.  Seriously, as a performer, it is a nightmare when your "10-page" script ends up being a 15-minute marathon.  If you are using lengthy or heavy exchanges, consider dropping your page count by a page or two to compensate.  Just saying.)

Find Your Comfort Zone

Every writer will occasionally feel the need to challenge themselves creatively. I will suggest that you pick another time to do so. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that your piece cannot be thoughtful, inventive, or even abstract. But if that’s not your wheelhouse, this is probably the wrong time to indulge that whim.

I know the feeling well. I thought, foolishly so, that it would be a good idea to go with an abstract concept for my writing last summer. How did it go? How many times have I mentioned dumping my first concept, again…?  (Okay, it occurs to me that I haven't said it in a while.  The first time I tried writing for one of these, I had set in my head to create some sort of meta-physical, birth to death, transformative piece that ended up being too meta for its own good.  It took way too long to try to write, and no one was going to get what I was shooting for, anyway.  So I ended up ditching the idea around 1 AM an starting from scratch.  I do not recommend this...)

Just keep in mind that with only hours to work and several other constraints to consider, choosing to right outside of the box is just giving yourself one more handicap. And speaking of other constraints…

Consider Your Directors – Setting the Stage

Naturally, your script should not detail things that will be difficult or impossible for someone to create in under a day. That doesn’t mean that you can’t use certain settings; it just means that you need to consider the environment.

Directors will have access to limited space and resources. Yes, this is their problem to sort out (which I will get into later…), but it can only help them when you don’t start digging them a larger hole to work out of.

It is a simple matter to set the stage without setting the stage, so to speak. You want a scene in a laundromat? That’s fine. But if you want the scene to include an actual washer or drier, you better check and make sure that there’s one available. Yes, there are cheats that can be used, but it’s simpler if you try to keep the workspace in mind. Which brings me to my next point…

(After the mini-chaos of the first few events, the constraints put on writers have been adjusted to make this considerationa  lot easier to manage.  In short, if the item(s) for your script aren't at the theater, then you can't use them.  It's just simpler that way.  And honestly, you shouldn't be weighing down directors and actors with these things to begin with...)

Consider Your Directors – Making the Moves

My favorite part of any script is the dialogue. It’s probably the thing that most clearly reflects itself in my head as I think up ideas. But even with that, I recognize that a script does need some stage directions. This is less a play-by-play of each and every action a character will make and is, again, a framework for the director and actors to work with.

When considering what actions to include and exclude, I tend to ask myself the question: “Is this action important to the scene or my vision?” If the answer is yes, then that action goes in with as much detail as necessary. If not, then I tend to leave it open. The trick is in balancing making a clear picture with tying a director’s hand with lofty descriptions.

(Add to this that your technical directions will also need to remain simplified.  Plays will need to be be lights up, lights down with very little if any technical work in between.  In fact, plan for having no major tech work in your show.  Again, simpler is better.)

Consider Your Actors – Casting Call

If history is any indicator, there will be limited resources with regards to performers. Even if there is a wide berth of performers to choose from (and here’s hoping that pans out…), you still need to keep in mind that directors will be making the casting choices. So don’t go too crazy trying to pen a part that you feel would be suited for one particular person. That person may not be available, and on top of that it’s not your job to make a choice like that.

Now that isn’t to say that you should feel limited in your ability to create characters. People play above and below their age ranges, do accents, etc. all of the time. Feel free to create any characters you want in whatever standing you see fit. It will, however, smooth things over if you give your characters a little bit of leeway. Speaking of which…

Consider Your Actors

This one is kind of a no brainer, but it bears saying. Don’t go crazy when it comes to what characters say or do or how they interact. My main, major general rule of thumb (and a solid suggestion) is to steer clear of heavy romantic interactions. Hugs are pretty safe, but anything beyond that should be left up in the air (or just left out). Seriously, no one is signing up for this expecting a love scene, and those types of actions take weeks (or longer) for actors to develop a comfort level in. Try not to make the performers have to do anything that’s going to leave them with emotional scars.

To Make A Long Story Short (Too Late)…

I would never want anyone to feel limited in their ability to tell a story, paint a picture, or express themselves. But in this particular endeavor and in this environment, it is important that the writer realizes their role. You are making the blueprint for what everyone else is working with for the next half of the festival. And to a certain degree, how well you do that will eventually affect how hard or how easy that task will be.

(It can be tough to balance nursing an idea into a fully realized script, dealing with your limitations, and somehow fighting off late night fatigue.  But the better a job of streamlining you do, the more likely it is that the end product will resemble what you envisioned it to be.)
 

(Next time, my (most likely much shorter) advice for directors. Yes, I’m going to tell you how to do that job that I never actually do. I’m like Dr. Spock that way…)

HouseTV: Under the Dome : Pre-Game

Under the Dome.  I have to admit that when I first heard about it, I assumed that it was some reality show that was a weird variant of Big Brother (as if Big Brother wasn't weird enough on its own... bleh).

Anywho, I eventually learned that the show was a pseudo-scifi drama.  And I learned this because CBS has not shut up about it.  Seriously, if you've watched Senor Eyeball for more than ten minutes over the last two months, you've heard about Under the Dome.

This worries me.  In part because it just feels like they are trying too hard.  Honestly, they've shown so many different little scenes and things.  I'm a fan of bells and whistles, but it really irks me when they're used to pimp a show that likely won't have a lot of bells and whistles.

This is not a new thing.  The networks have a bad history with promoting scifi.  Granted, their options have been limited, as they have shown some really middling to subpar scifi.  The last big show was NBC's Revolution (which I guess someone is watching... maybe...), and that show has plots you can drive a Mack truck through (as opposed to into... again, thank you CBS, for spoiling that visual effect).  Before that was NBC's The Event, which had its faults as well, but seemed a little more forgivable.  I will at least give NBC a nod for not using excessive spoilers at all in promoting either show, which built the mystery of the premise.  But I digress.

Under the Dome has peppered us with a pitch that promises everything: mystery, crime, sex, death... maybe all at the same time.  We don't know.  But should we care?  By trying to appeal to all facets at once, they have created a mishmash that really appeals to none.  Or at least not to me.  Don't get me wrong.  I'm checking it out for perhaps the saddest reason of all: there just isn't an abundance of scifi offerings on network television.

So I'm willing to give it a shot.  And honestly, for better or worse, I'll probably ride the train all the way to the bitter end.  But a bad showing will just be another opportunity to claim that science fiction has no proper place on a major network.  Which isn't true.  It just needs to be good science fiction.

Living La Vida Loca...

Happy Tuesday.

An Odd Sort of Thing

An odd sort of thing happened to me last month.  I wasn't going to mention it, but I felt like maybe it was something important to explain.

I was grabbing my keys to go out just like normal.  I've done it hundreds of times without incident, but on this particular occasion, something out of sorts happened.  My key chain fell off of my key ring. 

Now, I'm sure that it has happened before.  Several times, in fact.  It only makes sense that every now and then, the metal would come a little bit loose and it would fall off of the chain.  And each time, I'm pretty sure that I've just put it back on and gone about my business.  But for some reason, this particular time, I put it off.  I think at the time, I was on my way out the door and didn't really feel like being bothered with putting it back.  Also, I told myself it was concern about breaking the metal by trying to bend it for the umpteenth time.  And that did pop into my head.  But then I had another thought, a different thought.

See, this particular loosening of said key chain occurred right during the first part of December, which just happens to be right around the time that my father passed away.  And this particular key chain just happens to be one of the last things of his that I've held onto.

I can't properly explain how it happened.  I was in his house sometime after he died.  A week, a few weeks... I honestly don't remember.  And there were probably a dozen things I could have taken or claimed (I honestly ponder why I left a few things unmoved, but whatever... I was a  loss-stricken teenager, after all).  But I remember this: a single, simple key chain.  It was sitting on a back shelf or the corner of a table or somewhere.

I want to tell you that I put a lot of thought into it.  That I had some strange epiphany about finding something to hang onto.  And in truth, maybe I did.  Maybe I did make some conscious decision to grab it because it represented something.  It was a gift from his job.  A symbol of a major accomplishment made by the organization that he had worked at for so many years.  A silly little ornament, to be sure, but it seemed cool enough at the time.  And, at the end of the day, it served a practical purpose: I did need a key chain.

So of all of the things that I could have claimed or taken possession of, I took a simple little key chain and pocketed it.

I don't think that it ever occurred to me that it would have any real significance beyond that until I had to change key rings.  I remember at the time wondering if I should keep using it.  Time had not been kind to it, and even though it was still solid, it had gotten cracked and worn over the years.  I think maybe I always assumed that it would eventually fall apart.  The base would crack, the metal inside would drop out, and that would be the end of it.  Still, it wasn't particularly damaged, and I realized that I had put a certain sentimentality into keeping it.

And on thinking about it, I do remember the first time that it fell loose from my key ring.  Because I had a similar thought about the metal possibly breaking if I put it back on and tried to squeeze it tighter.  I also had a thought about leaving it be then.  But I went ahead and put it back on.  No point in rocking the boat, I imagined.  And again, I had grown a little attached to it.

So I'm not completely sure why this time was so different except for the one detail: the timing.  I had honestly spent some time pondering my father's death this year, much in part to it having been exactly 20 years ago.  It seems like forever now, even though I can still remember every single detail if I really focus.

And maybe that's part of the point.  While the memory and the loss are still there, they feel far more distant now.  Like the kind of small print you have to squint to see on a bottle of old familiar pills.  It's there, and it's important, but it's not necessary to check on it every day.  Just often enough to make sure that it's still there and still the same.

And I'm not one for symbolism or messages from beyond - not always - but I couldn't shake this feeling that it was more than a coincidence.  I had gone most of the day without really noticing that it was gone (why would I? it would normally be in my pocket anyway).  So clearly, I wasn't that attached to it.  At least not anymore anyway.

So after taking a day or so to mull it over, I decided to leave it be.  It sits now on the corner of my entertainment center.  If I get so inclined, I may move it to someplace more relevant or less cluttery.  The thought of tossing it out has never once occurred to me, but at the same time,  I'm not quite sure that it's important enough to store away as a cherished memento.  I've never really been one for that.  Perhaps it's served it's purpose, a simple little key chain that has gone on to retirement but not quite to a better place.  Wherever key chains go.

As for me, life goes on.  I want to tell you that it was part of some life altering experience, but really... it was just a thing.  An odd sort of thing that, through opportunity and timing, made me think about some things I hadn't thought about in a while.  Not that that's terribly good or bad, or terrible at all, really.  Just a thing that happened.

Also, I might be on the lookout for a new key chain soon.  Just putting that out there.