Hi Guys
I must confess to having dropped in a few times to the forum to read your inspiring discussions. It's been so comforting (and, in equal measure, terrifying!) to know that there are other people out there going through the same TURMOIL as me about this competition. It hasn't occured to me to 'speak up' before as I've never joined a forum - ah, we forum virgins are everywhere - but after reading your moving 'end of term' debates about the competition, I just had to be included.

It does indeed feel like we may have to bite the bullet and accept defeat...this time, but I must say I've gone through this sort of experience many times before (I'm a professional actress god help me!)and out of the many rejections I've had, something positive and unexpected ALWAYS comes. In fact, if I hadn't had the rejections I've had over the years, I wouldn't have achieved half as much as I have. Perverse but true. The pain generates the fury generates the passion generates the creativity....

Welcome to the forum Sadie.

Welcome welcome Sadie Sadie!

Most of us, I think, have accepted that it's almost certainly over by now. But it won't stop any of us checking our e-mail accounts and the postbox every morning!

A friend of mine runs a telemarketing company (hey, they're now termed 'Call Centres', but what the hell). He teaches his new recruits not to be disappointed by a 'no', because statistically it has to be one call closer to the 'yes'.

I'd rather try and fail and keep trying and failing, in anything, than lie on my deathbed and think 'if only I'd tried'.

Chin up - two weeks left yet!

Hey Sadie Sadie!... Yes, we all moan about the knocks... but if there's one profession that could eclipse the writers moans into the shade, it's acting! You have to have skin like leather - and I'm always so impressed by people that carry on loving what they do despite that!

No one ever said on their deathbed -

"I wish i'd spent more time at the office"

Sadie, I too have checked this forum every once in a while and been comforted by the strange way the regulars band together to face the loneliness of competing and writing.

Why are we so desperate to hear and know? I keep repeating my old mantra - my personal ode to pessimism - that it is better to be pleasantly surprised than bitterly disappointed. Under this mantra, I firmly tell myself there is no need to get involved in the forum, that the forum has had thousands of hits so one must expect thousands of entries and from that they are selecting three plays. As if this did not make my chances of success too slim to take seriously, I am an American. I have never seen an American on a UK reality show.

Thus, we should all be calmly going about our lives not expecting to win. And who is a winner in the realm of the art of theatre anyway? There is something strange about the need to compete fused with the desire to create art. It's not a matter of reason, is it? Pleasing some unseen father figure instead of ourselves.

So it is irrational and unwelcome but absolutely impossible to kill - hope.

That's why I have broken my vow of silence.

Hope.

Hope is a bitch. Isn't it? It's so strong. It keeps sneaking up on me when I am trying to do my day job and next thing I know I am fantasizing about what I will wear to the opening of my play and whether it would be too much to take my toddler to it.

Why can't I get a grip?

In my sane moments (rare) I am grateful that this competition existed because it forced me to move forward on a project that has been languishing for years. It has inspired me to send my TTPT proposal to a couple venues and directors who are now keen to see the finished play. This should be more than enough pay-off.

Anyway, I share your hope. There are signs of great plays all over this forum. You guys are terrific. You talk about self-medication with alcohol a lot, but I guess that's just your culture.

Thanks for posting.

Yours,

Swann1719

Thanks all

It's addictive this forum malarky, isn't it?!

Yes, I too will keep checking my post until the bitter end and, to be honest, I don't think the finalists will hear until next week onwards, so I've still got a spark of hope...

Yes,Ms Minxy I do love what I do and I'd say (to Adman in particular!) that I've gambled an AWFUL lot in my life (turned work down, been really, REALLY stubborn about holding out for what I want and what I know I'm WORTH) and, after a lot of struggle, it's always paid off. For all the extraordinary difficulty of pursuing a career in the arts, when it occasionally works out you do get rewarded with adventure, euphoria, evolution, fulfillment etc. etc. Having said that, I often ache for a stable life, but I'm well and truly glued to my seat on that roller-coaster now and there just ain't no getting off it! Wheeeeeeeeeee.........

Hi'y'all Swann

quote:

You talk about self-medication with alcohol a lot, but I guess that's just your culture.

When you self-harm with hopes and dreams you have to self-medicate with something - it's legal, cheap, beneficial for the health (in moderate doses, which I'm sure everyone monitors!) and doesn't frighten the horses.

To you, and Sadie Sadie; drop in more often and let the insanity out with us - better out than in!

Hiya Swann
Hiya Sadie Sadie (are you a married lady?)

Good to have you here as we near the final hour of truth. The more the merrier as we huddle together in comfort.

.... mmmmm! Unless you've heard! And you've joined us to secretly snigger down your sleeves while we nibble our nails.

Paranoia! Oo Oo! Paranoia! Oo Oo!

Welcome to the forum Swann1719.

Let me ask you this, then, forum insiders: Have you finished the play that was in the proposal that you submitted? Do you write every day? Do you aspire to trade in your day job? Anyone seen the new Mike Leigh play yet? Anyone go to Edinburgh this year?

Inquiring newbies want to know . . .

Thanks,

Swannie

Swann

In order;

Two plays submitted; one already complete, one I definitely intend to complete either way.

I write every day commercially, and as a result of this experience I write just about every day creatively.

I'm actually in the process of changing my day job to give me more creative freedom of mind to write.

Nope, not seen the Mike Leigh effort yet.

Wanted to go to Edinburgh again but couldn't. And forgot!

Adman, thanks for answering. Have you ever had a play performed?

I do love the quote at the bottom of your posts. Most excellent.

Sorry about the direct questions, but that's an American for you.

Swann

Not a play - but I've written and performed stand-up comedy, and written and performed sketches for reviews - all unpaid! I'm also one of those dreadful amdram luvvies who's on the bill in something every year! Currently doing 'Boing Boing'!

As you're an American, I'll drop into the conversation that I handled the UK publicity for Las Vegas for a few years!

I've entered 2 plays, both unfinished, which I will continue to work on as I want to see them finished.

I write every day. If I'm mainly editing, I also try and write something new even if it's just for 10 minutes.

Don't have a day job as such. (long story) I freelance when I want to, so not really an issue.

I have a long list of plays I want to see at the moment. The Mike Leigh is there but not at the top.

Didn't get to Edinburgh this year. I would like to produce a show there, probably in 2007.

I haven't had a full play performed (the 2 for TPTT are my first) but I have had short sketches written especially for my amdram group performed in past review shows.

quote:

Originally posted by Adman 1961:
I handled the UK publicity for Las Vegas for a few years!

Vegas is fab! When twice last year.

Man, I love playing craps in Vegas. But after three days there I can't take any more . . . no clocks or natural light kind of freaks me out after a while.

Twice a year I had to go to Vegas for 2 weeks at a time and research all the shows, hotels and attractions, staying in different properties around town, all expensed.

It was a dirty job, but someone had to do it!

Nice. Did you see Segfried and Roy before the accident? What about Wynn's new hotel? And how did you like the Liberace museum?

In answer to several of the questions posted: Yes, The play I submitted was finished last year and I've completed another since. Ready to start writing a radio play now - apparently that's one of the best ways in....

As for having a play performed, I've had rehearsed readings for everything I've written (perks of being an actor - knowing lots of other actors!). It's by far the best way to judge what works and what doesn't and SO thrilling to see your play on its feet. There's an Actors and Writers Group in Hammersmith that accepts play submissions, then casts the chosen plays with professional actors, who volunteer their time. They rehearse on the Sunday, then the reading is on the Monday evening, followed by a chaired discussion about the play. It's one of the most terrifying but useful experiences. If you don't have a group like that near you, START ONE!

I gotta tell you, it is thrilling to see a play that you've written produced. It's better than winning a trial. At least for me. See, I used to be a trial lawyer in Washington DC. Lost a big case, had a little nervous breakdown where I just stopped going to work. I wrote a play about a single thirtysomething trial lawyer who had a little nervous breakdown and stopped going to work. It was called Baby Love Time (If you do a statistical analysis of the lyrics in Madonna's songs, those words appear most frequently)

Anyway, that and my next four plays were immediately produced, some won East Coast theatre competitions, one was picked up by a real theatre company for a real two week run in DC.

Since moving here (quitting trial work and moving for love) I have stalled out as a playwright. Tried playwright groups, classes (at CityLit - I highly recommend) and can't seem to break the performance barrier. Was shortlisted in a play competition in 2003 (Courtyard Theatre) and nothing since then.

I have learned a lot about life and writing plays since I moved here four years ago. Getting married, having a son, having bipolar disorder. And I agree, there is something so absolutely thrilling about seeing an audience react to your words. You feel not so alone in this world. It's marvelous. Better than a jury coming back in your favour after days of nail-biting deliberation. I just think now that in my glory days in DC and Boston I didn't know how good I had it ...

But I am determined to have something of mine performed in this difficult country and I'm not going back to the States until that happens . . . So I better get to it.

Thanks,

Swann

Ooohh! New members! New people to play with! Welcome all!

If you've been lurking, you've probably seen my inane rambling before - but I'll answer the some of the questions that appeared in this thread...

Yes - I've completed the plays I submitted to TPTT.

Yes - I've been very fortunate and had all three of them produced by amateur companies. Indeed I have been very lucky to have won a couple of awards for them.

No - I don't write everyday. I wish I could say I do, but there are days that the motivation and the ideas aren't there. But on the whole, I write about 4 or 5 nights a week.

No - I'm not pinning all my hopes on TPTT, I think my brain has acknowledged that the competition is now over for me - but my heart wishes it was otherwise, hence I'll keep on checking my emails, running to the phone and waiting for the postman to eventually arrive!

But that's the playwright's lot. The writing is only about 10% of the job. It's the pitching to agents/theatre/production companies, the rejections, the marketing, the... the list goes on.

But that's the challenge - and it one that for some perverted reason, it's a challenge I enjoy.

I can't tell you how great it is to find like-minded people on this forum! Getting glimpses of people's lives (and struggles) is great too. You sound like you've had an AMAZING time, Swann!

Most of my life is surrounded by performers, whose eyes glaze over when I start talking about writing, so it's a real novelty to enounter people like you all. I don't know anyone else with my impulse to write, they just don't come into my orbit. I do however have a lot of friends who are waiting for me to write them a 'star vehicle', while no bugger's helping or supporting ME! I guess that's why I invested so much hope in this competition:- It would have felt Like a nice, big, luxury cruise-liner taking me onboard after I've been alone, paddling away on my piddling little raft for all these years!

Ho hum...I must stop checking this forum and get on with some work...

It's the pitching to agents/theatre/production companies, the rejections, the marketing, the... the list goes on.

But that's the challenge - and it one that for some perverted reason, it's a challenge I enjoy.[/QUOTE]

OK, JaysPlays, but let me ask you this: if you wrote a great play, a play you were really proud of, and it was never produced, would you be a successful playwright? All the ancillary stuff is ancillary stuff, ancillary at least to the art. (truly a horrific sentence, apologies) This is my struggle: what do I want? Is it enough to hone a good story into potential theatre, or do I then have to flog it to the uncaring world? Maybe I do have to flog, maybe we all do, maybe the dialogue we enter into with producers and audiences is the essence of the theatre - it's the thing in TTPT - the relationship.

I don't know. I think that's one thing that attracted me to this art form. Unlike, say, writing a novel, it is only partially the playwright's responsibility to get a play to the stage. We are dependent.

The interconnectedness of all things. Kind of sucks sometimes, don't it?