 I got a tablecloth, sorry, it's from India. It's from India. Oh, really? Where? Portland. I know. It's what's been worked, and it's Thursday again. I'm sorry. I was just at an appropriate best media event. So I had to restrain myself from saying, power to the people! That's a lot of that energy is in my head. So it's what's been worked with the lobby of the public theater. It's Thursday, the 24th of October, one week away from Halloween. I hope you got your costume. What are you going to be wearing? Yeah, what are you wearing? I'm going to be some smart parts. I'm just going to be myself. So what's been worked is a medical free writing class. I tell people it's just like Shakespeare Park, except it's not Shakespeare and it's not in the park, but it is free. And it's also a play, and we're going to do the action together, and we're going to do the dialogue together. The action is 45 minutes of us working together in the lobby of the public theater, and I'm sure a lot of you are watching this online. You can work anywhere, wherever you are. Homes, offices, whatever. And then we will do the dialogue together, and you guys will ask me questions about your work and your creative process. Your emphasis on your work and your creative process, and any kind of work that's cool to do and any kind of questions about any kind of creative process are welcome. So with that, oh, and if you want to tweet, because some folks who watch online can tweet us questions, and Drew can tell us the address. It's app watch me work, SLP, hashtag new play. At watch me work, at SLP, hashtag new play, really. Hope you got that. If you don't, just send that smoke signal or carrier pigeon, and we'll get it, I swear. Okay, so we're going to send our... She should be on the crew. Like JB, where you are, Molly, do you go? Do you guys go? Molly used to be like on the crew, that's how I met Molly. She's a fabulous director. We had a time. Can you get me a book, please? All right, so... We're going to dive off part. It's like cold in here. Um... Questions about your work and your creative process? Thank you, Karen, for giving me... Thank you, that was so sweet. Thank you. See what happens when you work chocolate? Just appears. See that knife? Mmm. Anybody have any... Yes? I've spent a long time writing prose, poetry, novel, short stories. Now I've been writing play for the last year or so, and I just find that it's such an interesting art form. I mean, the novel you have, different perspective, first and third person, you have description, you have whatever you want, whereas in the play you have dialogue, speech directions, and that's it. And it's so different, and I find it a lot harder than I wanted it to be. So you're just talking about the difference in the power of one used to be written. Have you been... Look to me, you're my favorite name first. So Everett has written lots of prose, novels, short stories. I'm getting it right, right. So he's a writer, written a lot of novels and short stories, and now he's writing a play and he finds that it's different. Yeah? Yeah. And, you know, because it's different, it's difficult. You're experiencing like, wow, this is weird. Where's my long pages of, you know, right, description that I get to... It can be stifling? Yeah. To not have you description? Yeah, I mean, I'll sometimes write the entire scenes out in prose the way they might look just to have in there, and then I'll pick out the play from there. Just to have something like that. Right, so he writes it out in prose and you pick out the play from there. Does it, it seems like it might work? I mean, it has worked. Then as I move along with the play, I find that there's certain circumstances where it just doesn't seem to work, because I don't know, I guess just because when you, as you gain experience with the form and with the fact of just writing dialogue and I think about dialogue, that's all there is. And then prose background is sort of managed. And so while that's always the tool of the play, it's not necessarily the most always the most helpful tool. Right, right, right. So your skills as a novelist while they're useful and you can always pull them out of your pocket are the most helpful things when you're writing a play. It's, yeah, I've written both and they are different and they're both enjoyable. And this is the thing, so when you write a play it might be helpful and you might do this already to imagine it on stage when you see it in your mind. Do you do that when you see the characters? It might also be helpful to and you might do this already to act out your characters. I mean, I'll speak what I've got a mile. Okay, good. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, because if that's all you've got you know, that's all you're using, right? It might be really helpful, sometimes in my head I mean, I acted out without actually moving around at this point, but it's very helpful to act out the dialogue as much as you can, you know. And it's funny because in a novel, and this is a weird coincidence, I happened to be reading a novel that I haven't read in 10 years which is a novel that I wrote. I haven't read it since it came out and I'm like, oh, I think I'll re-read it because it's been 10 years and I can't remember it. And I'm like, wow, there's so many words. There's so many little words because in a novel, in my experience you have to get, you know, you describe the scenes on the cushion, right? Right? Okay, and in a play you say red cushion like something you were finding in the lobby of the public theater. Right. Right, exactly. Yeah, exactly. And that will often result in something wow, magically like that because it's a play. Here we are. The set designer has provided that for us. Right. So, but when I write a novel, I just allow myself to get really detailed knowing that the reader is going to do the casting and the set design and all that in your mind, right? But when you're doing a play, you know that you ultimately are responsible for picking out with the set designer those elements. I find it really helpful to act it out. You know, as much as you can. And if you find that you're writing it out like a novel and you really want to write a play, just put that tool aside. It's discipline. You have to put the tool aside. Right? And just... to people talking. It's a play. It's definitely a play of writing. It's just that I sometimes go back to that and just as I'm casting for something. I understand. I just keep going back to like, if the scene is like a two person scene, you know, two people talking. Three people talking. They're just talking. But is there a specific... I mean, I can go on and on, you know, you just have to like die, then it's like... I know, do you get any solace from like Thornton... Yeah, Thornton, you know, the bridge of Sam and Ray, he wrote and, you know, all the great plays that he wrote or Beckett wrote plays and novels. You know, there's a tradition of people who do both. And I think just imagine as much as you can your play is on stage. The people are in front of you just like this. Yeah, visualize it live on stage as much as you can. You know, a novel I sort of see when I write, you know, I kind of see it more like a movie sort of, you know, because I can see every little thing and I describe every little thing. Does that get you unstuck when you find yourself stuck visualize it on stage? Oh, a play? Yeah. Well, I hacked it out. I sit around like, I'm trying to think of... You know, I kind of wrote a play, blah, blah, blah, and you know, the guy is... he has a feather that he puts in his hat. Walk around like this, and he's talking about his feather. You know, I do a lot of like walking around and acting like the people in my plays. Instead of sitting there and trying to think of what the story is, I try to get into the body of the character as much as possible. You know? And just keep throwing yourself into that that different way of writing. It'll come. And keep coming back, because it's fun to have you as a novelist who is defective. Anybody else? Yes. Playwriting. It's really fun. And since I'm wearing it, I remember what you told me about it. You just told me. You don't have to do it. You don't have to write. It's really so fun. I know about you, Carol, but your playwriting style might be different from someone who just writes plays. Probably. You know what I mean? Because my novel writing style is different from someone who just writes novels. They're more like plays. I mean, they're not plays, but they lay on some of those conventions. Yeah, people messed up saying that they can see the novelties back there. Okay. And that's okay. And that's all right. So don't. It's okay if you lay on some of that or you employ some of those tools. And thanks, Carol, for writing that. You know how to do it. You actually do it. Yeah, but it's good to, you know, we're reminding you today, right? But you do know how to do this. Yeah. And also a reading place. I know you probably do already, but as many plays as you can consume is helpful also just to get your mind in that sort of, you know, like Shakespeare. Like Shakespeare. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I'm an after-cuse. Oh, aha. Well, I'll let you know how to do this. I'll stop. Oh, you spoke out how to do this. Okay, okay, okay. Who else? Yeah, I'm sorry. Yeah. You know how to do this. You know how to do this. I'll play for you. I don't want to finish it. No. Do you mind being with me? No. And yeah, I was having trouble with this one character whether they should live or die. And we suggested to do just bulletproof. And die. And see what that was like. So I said my time remember the rest. And I remember. So then the next day I did it. I did it for about five days. And I found a change over time. But last night when I was looking at sort of the last iteration there was a lot of walking around woods that didn't make sense for the whole time. And I had to fix it because it was interesting. So that was the thing that was important. So that was what I said. Did he live or did he die? He had to die. He died. And see the world bulletproof. Several iterations of bulletproof. Right, right. And how does it, do you have one iteration that feels like actually like it knows on its own like it's not somebody saying you're dragging, you know. But it kind of can move on its own. It works. It has energy of its own. But I have many pages of scene that I can really write it. 40 pages of scene. So can you write, can you write it? 40 pages, 7 days. What is that? Can you write a bit? So we're gonna write it by 7. 6? 6 pages a day. Can you write the scene? Can you write it? If you get, that's the thing. If you get a sequence of scenes that feels like, someone's thinking me, that feels like it's got its own energy, right? It's actually moving on its own. That feels good to you. And what I've seen is just jumping and writing. So you'd write, you know, 6 pages a day. It might not be 40 pages. It's just saying 6 pages a day. You're gonna hit it by next week. And this is how you do it. So yeah, we're not talking about quality. We're talking about quality. So it's calling me, oh my god. But this is what you do. So 6 pages a day. And the timer is set for how long? So it's an hour. So 6 pages in an hour. Can you write 6 pages in an hour? In an hour? Yeah. Yeah, it's just like in the macOS web. There's a mask that you can type in. Can you do it? Can you write 6 pages in an hour? Yeah. Good. So this is what you do. You're going to set the timer for an hour. And you're going to start at the first page. Okay, so you have a 2 hour work slot. Great. So in 2 hours you're gonna write 6 pages. This is how you do it. You start like tomorrow on page 1. You're ready with your timer. You go. You just write forward, forward, forward. 10 to 6 pages. Stop. 8 to 6. Don't reread. I'm following your outline. Your bullet points. And then in the second day you just go forward. Because the idea is to get finished. Not to like go back and like rewrite and make it perfect. You should just go forward. And see if you can get to the end of your planning by next week. And we're going to check our quality. And we won't scold you if the grammar has been a matter. If it doesn't make sense. Who cares? The idea is to get to the end. Okay? Okay? So that's what we're going to do. And you have like 2 hours a day to write 6 pages. So that's how we do it, right? Okay? And just write. And if you think it's shitty, keep writing. And if you think it sucks, keep writing. I'm describing myself actually. That's what's great about this. Yeah. Okay? Anybody else? Anybody else? It can be shitty, it can suck. Doesn't it? You can make it better tomorrow. I agree. I can make it better tomorrow. Did you have a... No, you just... Like your best friend. Nobody else? Yes, sir. I just have a good question. I've actually bought this script. And I'm fine with what's in it. Yes. So I like any tips on size. So I like this script. Oh, okay. Thank you. So for now I have to do a short synopsis. Yeah. A short synopsis. Yeah. Right. A short synopsis. I need tips on how I can extract kind of the essence of the script. Yeah. And distill it to the... I need a log line. Okay. And then it's coming out to like a two-paragraph. And a two-paragraph. And page tips. So... So you don't have to shorten anything on this one? I need like a... Yeah. Yeah. One of two paragraphs. And then... Right. Okay. So imagine the short... Which is harder for you? The short one or the long one? The long one. It's harder. Yeah. Oh. Well, that's wild. Let's see. Yeah, because the story I kind of know some of the main beats. Right. And then it's coming out to a minor beat. So that shouldn't be... Yeah. So the longer it... So the short synopsis right now is how long? That's literally the short one. That's a long one. Okay. So I have that. Okay. Then you need like a tune. Now you need like two or three paragraphs long? Right. So can you imagine that you're pitching it? That help? Ah, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So you imagine the, you know, studio of people sitting there and you go, Okay. This is a story about a guy. He's registered already, right? And so he lives in New York. He's registered and he has to write this long line. So he goes around trying to think of, right? To just pitching it. Well, I think there's just record myself. You have the technology. You're like a six-million-dollar man. Yes. You know what I mean? Yes. I know. So you can kind of do it like that and then you can listen to yourself and check it out and then... Yeah. What are your problems? We're going to have to think about it well. And see if it works. Yeah, yeah. And if it doesn't then... I'll try something and I'll be back then. Exactly. I'll be back in a while. Thank you very much. Okay. Thank you very much. Anybody else? It's a satisfaction guarantee with your money back. So this is what your work... Thanks for coming, you guys. We'll see you next week, which is Halloween. So come as you are. Okay. Thank you.