 And we've been doing it ever since, because I wanted to encourage people on their creative journey, or even if you're not doing anything creative, if you're just like, you know, I don't know what, an accountant, although accounting can be very creative, but I just want to encourage people and it's been fun. So we want to thank the Public Theater for allowing us to do this show for 11 years, and also thank HowlRound for giving us the opportunity to be all fancy-ass digital and shit. What we do is we work together for 20 minutes, and then we talk about your work and your creative process. And if you have a question, Audrey will tell you how to get in touch. Go, Audrey. Thanks, SLP. So if you're inside of the Zoom and you have a question, all you need to do is click on the Participant tab, likely at the bottom of your screen if you're on a laptop or the top if you're on an iPad or a tablet. If you can, inside of that Participant tab, there's a little button that says raise your hand and you click on it, raise the little blue hand, we'll call on you if we have time. And then if you're watching on HowlRound.tv, you can tweet at us at atwatchreworkslp with the hashtag HowlRound, H-O-W-L-R-O-U-N-D, or you can tweet at the Public Theater Twitter, which is at Public Theater NY, or you can write to the Public Theater's Instagram. And that's it. That's pretty much everything. So we're going to do what we always do. We're going to work together for 20 minutes and then we're going to talk. Okay, have fun. Here we are. Here we are. We've got some questions already. Oh my goodness. Melania, you're up first. Hey Melania. Hello, this is Ann-Larie. Thank you, Audrey. How are you? I'm good. Happy to see you. Happy to see you too. I have a question about something that is not happening to me right now, but I know that it's coming and I would like to know your opinion. Today, here in Miami, we listen to the people from school and it seems that the first part of the, at least one month, it's going to be again a school at home, all the situation. And I know the craziness that this, I have the experience now, so I think it's going to be better. But what I would like to know and for you to remind me is how to be, there's happened so many things around in the world. What I just did, all these people deciding what to do with schools and life and things. And in the middle of that, I am trying to write and with that writing, I am trying to, you know, to have this knowing myself and trying to really don't be drowned. I try to, what I try to do is to show up to my work. Here, I do my working, my yoga, meditation, but here, anything else that I can learn to, you know, to be in this situation with a wise attitude, I pray of course, but you know that because what I noticed that happened is that when these things get very crazy, the first thing that goes away is my writing. I get so anxious that I can't write or I get stuck and I don't want that anymore because it's not nice. It was, I had years of experience in that and I don't want that. That's the reason why I say, okay, today I want to tell this and I want to ask so I am not alone in this, you know, that is coming. That's great. That's really a great, great question, Melania, and it's something we can revisit, you know, in days ahead and weeks ahead as we go forward. I would say in your kids, they're, they're teenage, jury, tweens. We have Sophie's 12, Chloe is 9 and Casey is 5. Oh, okay. Oh, five. Okay. Okay. Well, we can say this. It's never too early to hip their children to what's really important to mommy. Right? I mean, you know, with Durma now we have one kid, so my experience is, you know, not like yours. Three is a lot. I mean, three is a lot, would be a lot for me, like, ah, because one is a lot, but it's, it's a great opportunity to remind, I mean, your kids already know this, but to remind them how important your writing is to you and how, how it's really important that mommy gets her writing done. So, I mean, would I tell Durma, you know, I say, when you see mommy sitting at her desk, you know, when you see mommy with the timer, you know, and we see mommy writing or, you know, the computer knows she's working, you know. So, he, you know, he'll come in and maybe if he really needs something else, so he knows how to respect my writing process, you know. So, you continually encourage them and ask them to respect your writing process. So, you get that from outside, right? And then comes the bigger foe, if you will, you, because you have to respect, you have to continually respect your writing process and continually remind yourself of how important it is, right? So, you have to do things like set a time, you know. You have yoga, you have meditation, which is great. You can tack it on to that, you know, so that in the more, you might need to get up a little earlier, that's what I'm finding, because now I'm in my mom's house and my son, my mom, everybody's here and swirling around, you know. So, I have to get up a little earlier in the morning. That's helpful. Connect it to things that you do regularly every day, your yoga practice, your meditation practice, your writing practice, or you can write first and then do meditation and yoga, you know, clump them together, right? And make sure that you're getting something done every day. It doesn't have to be 10 hours of writing, you know what I mean? It can be 20 minutes. It doesn't have to be great writing. It can be writing. I'm saying it doesn't have to be heroic. You don't have to climb Everest every day or tame the child within or whatever, you know what I'm saying? You just have to show up and be there for your writing, right? Like your meditation practice, like your yoga practice. Some days, like in my yoga practice, oh, I can get that pose. Other days, I'm like, forget about it. Don't even worry about it. So, that's the other thing. So, you get your family to respect your writing and you get yourself, you remind yourself how important your writing is by showing up every day. And third thing, you practice compassion to yourself. So, that if one day you show up and it's 20 minutes and you spend the whole time going, shit, I got to order shit from Instacart. I forgot to order the honey. Damn, I forgot to order the Wheaties. Oh no, what are we going to have for dinner? Like that, if that's what you're writing period, or you spend your writing period making a grocery list because, you know, you guys need your groceries, right? It's okay. That's wonderful too. Yes, yes. But because I have now in the morning that I try to read my Bible, pray, the yoga, the meditation, and but I'm going to add the writing if I that's a good idea. And I love the idea of being compassionate to myself because sometimes I practice that with a lot of people. I try to be compassionate and I say that we have to, but with myself, sometimes I forget. Me too. So, thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks, Melania. All right. Up next, we've got Kelly. Kelly. Hi. Hi, Susan. How are you? I'm great. I'm in Kenya right now. It's midnight. It's after midnight, but I know I just, I love you. I saw the public theater link. I guess I'm the late, I'm just late to the party. I didn't know this was a thing. Oh, you write on time. You write on time. Years later. And so I used to just like read and like direct your work in college and I'm so excited. So thank you to public theater and thank you to you. In any case, so I'm writing a piece. I just want to name some fears and then ask a question. So I'm writing a piece that I think is geared towards young audiences. And like like high school, middle age, and I'm just like middle grades. I'm just like, dude, young people want to watch theater, you know, so that I just want to name that as a fear that I have first of all. And I wonder what, you know, you do with certain fears like that come up like are with the people that I want to see my work, be able to see my work, like is theater still the thing that the world needs, you know, questions like that come up for me, just the relevance of the form. But then I also am wondering almost similar to what Milani was asking, but kind of like a bit back into your history. And maybe you've written extensively or spoken extensively extensively about this. But just before you do, it was a viable career path for you. Like what are the things that you told yourself to keep yourself writing? Like I'm just wondering about like young Susan Laurie, like I was on last night hearing you talk about the New York Recon. And, you know, just like I get the passion and the drive that comes from those, you know, areas, was it being in community that had you keep writing and keep writing like before you knew that you could be you, you know, or did you always know, like what what had you like moving steadily towards that, you know? I hear you. I hear you. Those are beautiful questions. The first thing about, you know, is theater the thing? There's so many things, you know, I mean, back in the day before any of us were around, born, you know, when there were, you know, all we have were campfires and things like that. You know, theater was, it didn't have a lot of competition. You know, it was kind of, you know, you had to work or, you know, it was the only game in town really. So with every new game in town, it does have to, if you, you know, want to think about it, compete with, you know, other things going on like bear baiting or, you know, back and shake, right? So it always had something to compete with. And now there are even more games. I do think children, I mean, I think young people, however you want to call them, get a lot out of the performing arts, whether they're spectators or involved in it, either as actors or writers or directors or what do you call gaffers? I mean, lighting designers, you know, those kinds of, I think they get a lot, yeah, choreographers or dancers, I think they get a lot out of it in my experience. So I still think it's relevant. I think people standing in front of other people and pretending there's someone else is a great thing for, I mean, it's a very beautiful thing that we humans enjoy and we can learn a lot from it. So I still, I think it's an important thing. It's not the only game in town, you know, but that doesn't mean that it doesn't have a lot of power. And we know how much power has just the power of being around people, you know, bodies next to bodies doing things. I mean, there's a lot of, there's a lot of power in that and a lot of beauty and much to be culturally conveyed, you know, regardless of what culture you're from. So I think there's still a lot to it. And how did I, you know, how did I keep going back then? It's funny, Kelly, it's the same way I keep going now, you know, I mean, sure, a lot of it comes from community, but I mean, I enjoyed being in those communities. I didn't necessarily, I wasn't necessarily carried along by any certain community. I was more often than not the weird one, the one who wasn't really in, you know, you know, I tried to get in, you know, I mean, I hung out with a lot of people up, but I was kind of on the outsides all the time. So I had to maybe develop things that, you know, when you're welcomed in a community and buoyed by the community, you get a lot of that. I never really got a lot of that, but I did find, I did grab whatever I could. So my writing teacher was James Baldwin. I held on to that and, you know, I talked to myself a lot, like, you can do it. Keep going. That's beautiful. I would go outside a lot and look at the sky and say, help me, please, help me, please, help me. Like that sounds really weird. If you'd know me back then, you'd be like, who's that crazy girl walking around looking at the sky? You know what I'm saying? But that's, that's who I was. So I relied on community as much as I could, but Kelly, I also relied on the spirit. And that's, and that's why I'd like doing this watch me work thing, because I want to encourage you all through my presence to connect with the spirit, you know, so it's, it's not a, it's not a, it's a community, but it's more of a, like a, you know, tune your radio, tune your inner radio, set your inner compass to that spirit that you all have, you know. Does that makes, does that make sense? Yes, absolutely. Thanks very much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And I don't want to discount the importance of community like this community is very important, but hopefully this community will encourage you to hear, feel that community inside yourselves. And when I have students come to me and go, I never would have been a writer if it wasn't for you. I say, no, no, no, you would have been. You know what I mean? You were you before I met you. I just encouraged you to look. You would have looked eventually. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. Thanks so much. So thank you for, for tuning in from Kenya because you're far away, sister. So everything okay with you? I mean, you're right. It's beautiful. It's really beautiful. I came in January for some travel and then the borders were closing. And so I had to either rush out or stay and I chose to stay and the borders aren't open yet. The borders are still closed, but, but it's been a really amazing creative journey. So I'm grateful. Now, Kelly, well, we love you all the way from here. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And I love you all the way over here. Thanks, Kelly. Thank you. All right, we're gonna go to Crystal. Hey, how you doing? How's it going? It's, it's, it's going. It's, it's, um, oh man, it's a battle. It's a battle, but I'm willing to fight. Yesterday I was, I was almost ready to give up and I was like, why am I a writer? But, but I thank you for the reminder to, to be passionate, but be compassionate to yourself. Like I'm, I'm learning with this, especially I need a lot more self given grace as I'm praying and working on trying to do this. Um, so right now it's literally like pieces of glass just trying to piece things together. I'm working backwards. Um, I think I'm from working backwards on answering the question, how did Christianity come to hate? I think it's coming because I think the language that I'm using is more of language I heard as a kid, um, in, in churches or some that I hear now, that's used to, um, sometimes used in places to manipulate, um, to manipulate the word of God and to manipulate, um, um, how God works or his love. Um, I think I have the question answered, how do I, how did I get here? Um, what do I hope for? I'm still struggling with and who am I? I'm still struggling with and I don't have a beginning. I feel like the beginning that I had does not work anymore. Um, but I thought that it was the explanation to who she is and why she is the way she is. But I think it, it, it only answers her as a singer, but and a beauty pageant queen, but it doesn't answer her as a, um, I guess an activist kind of person who becomes this demagogue. Um, the action, the action list helps so much. You even said something that spun my whole story around that changed one part that made it more active. Um, I think I have to write another action list because I'm just, I feel like my action lists are not active. They're more like feeling active, like they're, like, they're still things like to do to another person, like to yell or to scream or something like that, but it's not active, like to kind of propel things like, you know, um, in that way. So that's, that's where I'm at. That's where I'm at. I'm, I'm almost, I'm a little over halfway done. Um, but I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm trying to keep pushing, keep pushing, keep pushing. Um, but I am having trouble with that answer. Oh, I can't hear you. I'm just running my mouth, my mute on. You need a beginning that works, right? I need to, yeah, I need a beginning, right? Okay. Um, so tell me this, um, do you, uh, when, when's the last, uh, what, what is the floor? Is that your office right there that you're sitting in? Where are you? You're sitting, you're living in your wife's dining room. It's your dining room. Great. What's the, what's the floor made out of? What is the carpet or is it a? It's carpet. Is there any wood visible? No. Do you have a bathroom in your house? Yeah. Great. Okay. Um, when's the last time you clean the bathroom? Oh lord. Good. That's good. Okay, check it. Okay. This is what I want you to do. Um, because what you, what I want you to do is do some activities and then do some other activities. Okay. So, um, not right this second, but after we're done, I want you to sometime between today and tomorrow, I want you to make another action list, right? Okay. And then I want you to go and clean your bathroom. Huh. Yeah. And then I want you to come back and make a list of 20, uh, stupid or 10 stupid ways that my play could begin. Okay. And then I want you to spend 20 minutes tidying up your living room or wherever it is that you, I mean, your dining room, wherever you write. Do you see what I'm saying? Yeah. I want you to get this kind of out of your head and into your body. Um, a few minutes ago, I was, I was, I mean, a few minutes ago, a couple hours ago, I was writing today. And I, and I took a break and I went outside. I'm at my mom's house, right? She's got this huge giant roomish yard, big garden and a sidewalk with little, you know, she's like, I gotta weed the sidewalk. You know, I went out there and stood up there and pulled weeds. It was like, this is a great thing to do in between. Right. There you are actually doing, you're doing something. Uh huh. Body, right? Like we had, uh, uh, what was his name, Nick? Walk him down the stairs when he was trying to formulate his synopsis last week or whatever it was, a brother named Nick or the beanie cap you were, right? So what I want you to do is write a list of 10 or write another action list, 20 actions, 20. Okay. And then go to your bathroom, then write 10 ways your play can begin and tidy up your writing area. You understand? Yeah. Okay. Even if you make a list of actions that you don't love, you're at least going to have a clean bathroom. Okay. Yeah, that is true. See, we keep you laughing. We keep you. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Got it. Thank you. Thanks, Crystal. All right. Up next we've got Grace. Grace, are you there? Oh, I'm here. Yes. Hi. Hi, SLP. I've been coming since I've started coming in June and this is the first time I've asked a question, but thanks. Yeah. Thanks so much for doing this. It's been like such a great way to show up for writing. I'm working on a play for one character. And like my usual background of making work is like is sort of ensemble devising. So it's like, I'll do writing, I'll work with other people and it'll be a combination of improvisation and writing and kind of creating that way. And usually there are deadlines. Well, right now I'm in a situation where I'm really excited to be working on this piece, but it's there isn't a deadline. I'm really pretty much on my own with it. And I'm struggling because I've been working on it for about like about a month and a half. And I've gotten like a ton of writing done and I'm really, I like the things that I have, but I keep, it's gone through like so many iterations. And I, it's like I can't settle on anything. Like it's hard for me to make a decision and go, okay, now I'm going to go with this because I keep finding new things, but then that changes it. And I know what the theme is and I know the character. But I'm getting, I'm getting basically bogged, I don't know, I'm getting sort of caught up in how many different ways there are to tell this story. And that means that I'm not like settling, I think, and going deeper into like it really being a strong, like a being a thing that is clear, and like, and exists. So I wonder if you could just speak to that. Yeah, that's a really good question. So you're enjoying working alone? Yes, I am. And I actually forced myself to a week ago to bring a trusted collaborator in and I did a staged reading for her. Just a sort of like five scenes. And I've worked with her before and she usually like causes me to really like step my work up. But actually showing it to her this time has kind of the past week, I've actually had a harder time coming back to it. That's sort of a separate thing. But yeah, I've been enjoying working by myself, but then getting this feedback also kind of actually destabilized the chaotic train I was already on. But yeah, so it's also that. Okay, so that's that's, yeah, that is that's kind of a separate thing. So if you know, but it's they're both good questions. So when you read these, so you had enough of it kind of pulled together to read something aloud for your trusted collaborator? Yeah, I had like the whole arc of it and then certain pretty solid scenes and ideas. Do you think it was the presentation of it to your trusted collaborator that made you feel like you were not on the right track? Yes, except I also think that her feedback was really good. So it was not what I expected, but I think it's like I want to take it but I'm also confused because it's not because it feels so different from what I had what I was thinking about. And I guess like maybe it's sort of that I think differently when I'm working by myself versus when I'm working with people because I love collaborating with other folks and like really feel like actually very confident in doing that and I feel less less able to realize something when I'm just by myself. Sure, sure, sure, but it sounds like you've done a huge amount of work all by yourself. It sounds like your trusted collaborator had a maybe a different idea. It sounds like what you want to do in a weird kind of way is revert to your old way of working, which is take the notes of the trusted collaborator, you know that you know sometimes we you know it's like the rubber band effect we go far out you know and then you kind of snap back to the way you ordinarily are or have been for most of your life. It's weird as an experiment is there any way that you could keep going on the way that you kind of set out for yourself by yourself? Maybe it's I could and I actually was really excited like have been really excited about that and what her advice was was what I see is that she's pushing me more towards action and less towards like representing an idea like I think what she said caused me to feel like I didn't like the play was not active enough so so I'm like I feel like I feel like a good strong piece of theater would be to follow her advice whereas to follow what I'm doing means I don't know what will happen and that's exciting but also I might just be so far off on the wrong track in terms of making something that's playable. Well right I hear you so but we're still you're still in the like the making stages of it so have you reached the end of your of your piece have you have you gotten to the end and you said you had the whole arc of it? Yes yeah I have but it's a few different ways too and that comes back to the multiple ways of telling the story. Sure sure so you have you have the whole structure is there anything in getting a second opinion? Uh maybe yeah maybe yeah because if you I mean if you had a really strong sense of what you wanted to do then I'd say you know go with that it seems like you're you're sort of wavering between the two ways you could do it can you get a second yeah can you can you read it to somebody else? Yeah yeah definitely. Because my sense is I really think it's great that you've written and created something by yourself and I would love to see you take that version of it as far as you can okay you know because you can always go back and do the other version you can have two versions of a similar theme character thing you know you can have two versions okay yeah yeah see see what is another friend you know rope and wrangle another trusted collaborator and see what they think that'd be fun okay and it would give you a chance to air it again you know okay. Could you just speak also really quickly to the question I had the beginning which is a little more um but um of so many different ways to tell a story and then like finding like do you ever find that you get sidetracked with the the like I have so much writing that it means that there are only a couple things that I know that I'm like yes that's it yes that's it and then there's so much stuff that I'm like that's cool that's cool that's cool but I don't know if it's the bones or it's just like yeah I I think you really have to just um keep writing and the things that are supposed to be there will stay and grow and the things that are supposed to be somewhere else will kind of fall away and can be used for other things yeah but until you have a really strong sense of what it is yeah like you know I'm driving to California then you can just be driving your car up and down the bq you know around and around the bqe you know what I mean I mean it can be up and down the 405 or what you don't know so until you know kind of this is where I'm going it's a little tricky to know what you're gonna need okay yeah so thanks grace thank you um all right we've got about 10 minutes left and we're gonna go to Debbie Debbie are you there hi can you hi first time right here I just started last week thanks so much hey Debbie this has been an amazing experience um I hadn't been doing much of any writing in years and years and I just plugged into you guys last week and stared down a blank piece of paper and you know just just figuring out what to do and just kept filling it up just like you said filling it up filling it up then doing that daily you know 20 minutes half an hour and then yesterday in the fill up fill up then um I started hearing something and feeling something and it was like oh gee oh where did this come from and I'm just filling up the page and I was like oh wow you know a character and and senses were coming and I was so excited I was going to mention something yesterday if I figured out how to raise my hand so today um this afternoon I was going back to it ready to type it up to see what I was so excited about and then I'm looking at it like this is what is this crap coming from what am I going to do with this what am I supposed to you know I had no idea something that was so exciting at one point this turns into mush the next day and I'm sure um you you've covered that um you know you mentioned even yesterday writing gobbledygook it's fine baby talk gobbledygook just get it down but how do you break past the barrier of just looking at your stuff like this is this is coverage we're not supposed to be doing this with this yeah it happens to no no well first and foremost Debbie congratulations great that you're taking this you know you're really diving into this this uh way of being that is is you know such a cool thing it's it's really really great so you have to like yay do that um and then the other good thing is you can know that you know artists of renown go through that kind of thing all the time I remember this sunny it because I never remembered this about um James Baldwin he would talk about you know uh writing something in that you know the excitement of writing something in the evening you know and then you know coming downstairs the next morning realizing Jesus you know what is that he wouldn't say Jesus but you know what is this you know that kind of thing um it's like the morning after feeling you know you can say yeah you look good last night but this morning who are you again um so there's that there's um funny I'm so I'm doing a thing on Aretha Franklin and Jerry Wexler her producer from Atlantic used to say you know it sounds good tonight but the real test will be if it sounds good in the morning then we know we've got something um and if not then you you fix it um so the thing is you write something you love it on Monday on Tuesday you're going like I don't know um you keep going you just keep going and know that that um it's a it's a writing process it's an artistic it's a creative process you know so on Monday you might write something that you love Tuesday you might go hmm I don't really love it so much anymore and your choices are either you show up at your writing desk on Tuesday anyway or you quit right and then when you realize that that's the choice you've got what you're going to do you're going to show up at your writing desk anyway and continue working because what you're doing is you're learning your craft and you're you're you're just building your your artistic muscles right and part of that doubt or that misgivings you have oh no I don't know if that's any good that's part of the artistic process that's part of what you're learning to work through or work with you could say that doubt Thomas you know the saint was a doubter doubting is an article of faith so you're in good company when you go I don't know it's okay not knowing is is is a good thing you know okay so we just we just continue we just keep on keeping on you know thank you thank you that's very helpful and then just wondering there might be something to in going back over these pages is to glimmer we might be some glimmers to pick out or or not or just at least you have pages to go through exactly at least you have pages to go through your you're building your creative muscles you know you're building confidence you know you're you're building stamina you're opening up your your mind and your heart to the muse and the and the spirit you know all those things are happening no effort is ever wasted so you just continue thank you thanks Debbie um all right we've got about four minutes left we're going to go to Lynn Lynn are you there let's go there you go yesterday we were somebody was asking you were you were high you were telling about um talking about reading Shakespeare uh I just wanted to share just the best app in the world for Shakespeare and it was it was created by a number of people including Ian McKellen and uh it's called uh heuristic h-e-u-r-i-s-t-i-c Shakespeare and the first play they did they did was the Tempest and I'm telling you if you just take a look at this everybody you will love Shakespeare it it it does everything like a letter like me you will know the play backwards and forwards the history the translations of odd um words that is not in our lexicon but in Shakespeare's time was it's just so wonderful and then you it also has really wonderful actors reading the play along if you're reading the play you can hear it too and it's cool and there's amazing artwork and it's just wonderful for everybody so I'd like to share that with you oh thanks Lynn that's so cool thank you um all right so we got two minutes left and we're gonna go to your this person is listed as Fox oh that's me um can you hear me hey hi sorry I didn't change my box my name is Faulkner Fox and Fox is my last name um I have been a writer for a while but I'm writing my first play now and I have a question that relates to some of the questions other people have had which is just about when are you alone and working alone and when in a pandemic are you working with actors on zoom so I just recently thought I've been checking too much stuff out like I've been writing scenes and making them complete in themselves because I knew there were people going to be watching and then I thought but I've lost track of the whole by by checking too much but since this is all new to me I really appreciate how I can steam my words brought to life when an actor acts them and sometimes now I've thought well when I look at the page as itself I can't see it so I'm just wondering if you might speak to that about when do you send it out and watch an actor push it back and when do you kind of hang in there and be internal and quiet in your pandemic house you know my house my pandemic house is not quiet but yeah I hear you I hear you um you mean individual scenes from a play yes yes so like um so because I'm new to it I feel like oh let me check that out with the actors as opposed to so I wrote one whole draft checking nothing and then had people come to my house and acted and I realized that I had written people talking in paragraphs so I figured no that's not good so I'm just I'm just learning and I'm just learning by doing but I'm just wondering about that dynamic between learning in the privacy of my home with the three kids in the background or learning with having actors read it back to me right right that's a great that's a great question um I tend I'm slow to show so I I tend to uh if I write a whole draft and I give it to actors and well I mean but next time you'll know I mean congratulations for trying a new kind of writing after writing other other in other ways other forms but if I um you know get handed to actors and find it out the speeches are feel a little long you know feels a little wordy um that's okay it trains my ear for next time um but I tend to write the whole thing a draft of the whole thing before I give it out send it out um because um getting feedback in the middle of the process to me is not helpful then I'm I'm listening to some actors while they be brilliant and smart and everything I I am more interested in listening to the spirit my internal voice the higher power you know the guiding light whatever you not the subplot for but you know what I'm talking about um you know what I mean so I so I would say I would say um instead of handing scenes to actors over zoom and hearing it back that way I would say develop what I think composers have and musicians can do is that they can hear their work without you know hiring a whole band to play it yeah you know what I mean I mean a band or actors are brilliant amplifiers great speakers right but you as a dramatist um want to develop the ability to hear your work just from your own mouth and so stand up in front of your kids and read your scene you know that kind of or just read it aloud to yourself you know in the privacy of a room you know um I think that's a really didn't you do your ear training also um and I think that could be more helpful in a way I mean since I've been a poet and a nonfiction writer before this I'm very comfortable and familiar I would never think anything was done until I'd read it out loud like a ton of times but drama feels different because they're different characters and so I've got to embody everybody which I could do right that's the fun of it right you get to you get to embody your all your characters I think that's the joy of it definitely you can do it yeah yeah thank you thank you thanks all right it's 603 we've done it again you're amazing thanks everybody yeah okay well as you all know if you sign up by 3 p.m. eastern um Monday to Thursday I will send you a link between 3 and 4 3 p.m. and the signups are on the public theater website and on howl around I'll see you tomorrow bye thank you thanks SLP have a great evening bye bye