 Or in some cases, as in Rwanda, they kill them first. So your work automatically has inflammatory possibilities. Yeah. In the applications of the Liz Lerman Method for Talk Facts that I've experienced in theater, they always say, start with something you liked. First, tell us something positive, and then tell us something negative. Yeah, and then have you noticed the big pauses that follow that? Not usually. Oh, really? Well, most of the time when I've been there, it's like, oh, wait, I had a question to ask. And I was confused about something, and now they want me to say something positive first. OK. So again, you want to get what you want, and you only have 25 or 30 minutes to do it. Yeah. Liz Lerman, I know that it's also done sometimes in the course of the projects. Yes. But I know that it's a different thing. But also, on Michael Road, is there a really cool? I love Michael Road. Yeah, which I'm still a theater peep. He asked a couple of questions in the Talk Facts once to the audience that I've been telling of. Windows, they call it Windows in the airs. Where is you as an audience member? Did you see yourself? And then where did you have a window? Were not at a person's perspective that you were surprised by or connected to someone in a way you didn't expect to? That is terrific. But a lot of people these days are writing plays about people that are not particularly likeable. And so if you're asking them to empathize with Lady Macbeth, they don't want to do that. They don't want to go there. So in some ways, the character that is like you, I mean, if you said who's the character that's most like your mother-in-law, that might be a different approach. But I've had post-play discussions where people have said, I've had many post-play discussions like this, where people have said, this isn't a play. I didn't like anybody. Oh, well, you know what? That's kind of the point. And I'd be sarcastic when I say that. What I would actually say in that, again, I would chase the question down in the actual post-play discussion. And I often have a little speech about how playwriting is not about writing people that are likeable. It's about writing people that are interesting. Yeah? If I remember it correctly, when Salisa Culpe was telling me about how the Liz Gherman stuff started being applied to play discussions, it was out in public because they were having a real problem with PC. Is that the public? That's what, if I remember it correctly. Well, Mr. Papp was still alive? No, they were having difficulty with people coming to talk back to kind of outdo each other with destroying the play. Oh, yes, it is. And there was very little that was being cleaned again. It was positive. So they implemented that as a tool to try and get a balance of feedback. So it wasn't just the play. Actually, I know what you're talking about. And it wasn't at the public. It was at the National Playwrights Conference. It was at the O'Neill. OK. That was during the Lloyd Richards era because there were critics there masquerading as dramaturgs who were giving negative feedback. But if you've already got a nurturing environment or the audience is being somewhat civilized and balanced, then it can push it the other way. And then you're only getting positive feedback. I mean, I've had playwrights who don't follow my advice. And they sit up there and they're just doodling. It's because they have to survive somewhere and they'll go nuts. Because sometimes it is. It's too positive. I mean, you guys know how you feel after you've done the first draft. You think it's perfect? No. So you don't want everyone to say, oh, I love this. When are you going to produce it? I've had that happen at the Bay Area Playwrights Festival. One post-play discussion was like, when is the magic going to produce this play? Kill me now. I mean, it's not ready. I know you loved it, but it's not ready. So anyway, yeah. A few times that I've had the talkbacks, inevitably I always forget something. And it's always an important thing. I always leave from the thing like, oh, why didn't I get some feedback about this? And it always eats me up inside. And I just was wondering if, you know. That's why you have to formulate the questions before you have the reading. Because after the reading, every fiber of your being is, you're just buzzed. And you can't think straight. You can't think straight. So you want to get those questions down after the last rehearsal and before the reading starts. Because that's where the peak information is in terms of questions that need to be answered. So, what, Nisha? What are your thoughts about using the talkback as a way to, in essence, educate the audience about how to interact with plays? I think that's very important. Because more and more and more, our audience is aging. And the ones who have been taught, like the audiences at South Coast Repertory, they have been taught over a period of decades to that pushing the envelope is good. And that taking risks is acceptable there. And that, I mean, really, I grew up in Southern California. And they did that from the time they were founded in 1964. Some of the most obscure experimental works. You never want to see. So I do think it's important to educate the audience. And I think if you create those healthy boundaries that I suggested about not coming up so that you're the target, laying out the guidelines ahead of time, making sure that you formulate specific questions, things like that, I think that you do teach them. They do start to understand that they're not part of the process. They're the result. They're part of the result. And a joyous part. And we want to make you happy and all that kind of stuff. But they need to understand that there's only, there's one playwright. I saw some more. Yeah. I feel that reflective feedback. And I don't know if you have thoughts on that. Part of how the field works is the playwright doesn't ask questions. And I remember correctly that's because asking questions sort of directs the audience into what you want them to say. I hope I'm getting that correct if anybody else has done the field. Because it's about the experience of the playwright's work. And voicing that, I don't know if you have any thoughts on that. I'm just, I'm clear on what the question is. What the field is. I didn't know if you had any thoughts on the field. What is the field? It's a process that also came from dance that is similar to Liz Lerman. But it's that the mandate is the playwright, the writer and dancer doesn't formulate questions because that in essence limits what the audience feedback is going to be. And you might miss something crucial because if you have three questions and they get answered, there might be this big old question hanging out there that nobody voices because you haven't asked the right question. It's not the audience giving their experience. It's, and it's specifically again, you don't tell the playwright how to fix it. It's not about, you know, it's good or it's not about judgment. It's about the experience of the work on the world. Is this from dance? Originally started with dance. There are playwriting groups that, and writing groups that use it now. Apples and oranges. Okay, okay. Apples and oranges, that, you know. If they want to talk about the space, then I can, I'll give them the phone number of the scenic designer or something. But I don't understand that concept of, I mean borrowing, changing things from the Liz Lerman from the dance world, that's great. But I don't know that term, the field. So I shouldn't really, yeah. Robert. Yeah, piggybacking on that prior question, is, I've been a lot of really crappy talk backs because I didn't know your technique. Thank you. And often non-professional audiences, and this is really painting with a hugely broad brush, don't have much helpful to say because they haven't been trained. Is there an optimal audience response that you shoot for? Like what kinds of questions do audiences have that you find helpful or useful? Or like what kinds of responses do you get using your techniques that actually help the playwright? Because I haven't experienced a whole lot of that yet. So people actually ask me. I, you know, this is, everybody's different. Sure. You know, Heather MacDonald is different from Nilo Cruz, is different from Marlena Meyer, is different from Derek Laud, is different from Roger Gwimbersmith. I mean, you know, everybody is radically different. So I don't think that there is any universal question. The only thing that I find myself coming back to over and over and over again that I think helps in both ways, in both directions, is this idea of good confusion and bad confusion. Because bad confusion is you get so confused that you give up and you sit back in your chair and you fall asleep or you, you know, check your email or, you know, the posture is one of slumping. Good confusion, you kind of go, what? And it's one of, so that the work is being encountered between the audience and the piece of art. It's being encountered there. It's not anybody lobbing all the way to one side and all the way to the other. It really is, you've got the synergy going between you. So I find that when I say good confusion to an audience, they're like, what? I mean, it's okay to be confused. And, you know, and it helps the playwrights too, especially if they want the audience to do work, to get to the play. Now, you don't always want that. In most of the work that I've done, you want that. So, I don't know. Again, everybody's different. Yeah, sir, in the back. I think I've never seen this, but have you ever tried a round table of audience members talking to each other, just overhearing them? Like a focus group? Yeah. Marketing people do that. Who's that? Marketing people do that, half focus groups. I haven't seen it yet. I've, I've never, I've heard of it. I attended when I was at Berkeley Rep, we had focus groups, and I nearly jumped out of my skin. Because they, mostly because there's just a misunderstanding of what the play is supposed to do for them, which gets back to the teaching thing again. So that's, I'm not sure that, I don't know how productive that would be, but I really don't know. Greg, did you have something? Yeah, can you talk about the ideal, like case studies, instances where you feel an audience feedback session? I'm not talking about a Sundance, artistic staff feedback session, but an audience feedback session really yielded tangible, transformative, for one of the better successful results. That you, you noted that the audience feedback session helped and changed the play. That the one that stands out in my mind, oh, there's two. One of them was at Berkeley Rep, which is a space of 400 seats. And we did a play by Quincy Long called The Virgin Molly. And the story of the play is it takes place in, in what used to be called the queer hut on a marine base. And if they suspected that a marine was gay, they would send this marine to the queer hut and essentially sort of interrogate him to find out if he was gay or not. In this play, this young marine is sent to the queer hut and is put through all of these. He has to march, he has to run with a mattress on his head. And I mean, Quincy, the playwright, actually was in the Marine Corps, so he's not totally making this stuff up. And then you find out that crowds are gathering outside. And then you find out that the marine, Private Molly, is pregnant. He gives, at the end of the play, he gives birth to a child that is gender-neutral. And it is a transformative play. But I remember at a post-play discussion, this man stood up, there was a lot of controversy because this was in, this would have been in the late 80s. So the play was not, you know, it was not easy to take. And I remember this gentleman stood up and he was just angry. And he said, I don't think this is true. I, he's wearing a leather jacket. He says, I was in the Marines and I'm gay and it just didn't affect me at all. And it was just so, I mean, I'm not often at a loss for what to say, but this was one of those moments where you just say, and I said, well, you did have a response. You know, I don't know what it is exactly, but I'm getting response from you. So I think that that was, that was not a play in development, actually. That was during the regular run of the world premiere. But I told Quincy about it. And you know, that was what I considered to be a very important moment for both the audience and for Quincy. But people have been scared of that play and they never did it. Successful for the playwright. I do remember many, many years ago, I had a post-play discussion for a play called Edda Janks by Marlena Meyer. This was in Los Angeles. And it was during a festival. So there were civilians and there were professionals. And in the post-play discussion, somebody talked about the character not being likable because it's a play about a young woman who comes to Los Angeles to be in the film industry and some scumbug that convinces her that the fastest way to become a star is to do porn. And so she becomes a porn actress and actually she becomes very, very good at it. And loses her soul. So we were having a discussion about that and someone did say this, not unfrequently heard remark about, well, I don't even like these people. And I said, well, you know, this isn't Arthur Miller. You are. This is not a story that wants to end happily. This is a warning, you know? So, and that was very, I think that was very important to Marlena in terms of her future work. Because she was writing about, as she calls it, the bugs out when you lift up the rock. She was writing about that. And I think this gave her a little bit more solidarity about continuing to write in that way. Am I answering anything, Greg? Well, I'm just looking for how the standard of necessary evil has become. And has it come to be on ever? Confirming what we already know about the play over. If you keep it going, yes. It really can keep it. But like I said, you have to have a dramaturge or someone who is up there and you have to be in a theater that is willing to perhaps alienate somebody by this dramaturge saying, yeah, okay, that was really good. But, does anybody have another question? So, it's jumping into the deep end. But yes, I think if you keep them going, it's very educational for everybody. And my memory is that the most successful post-play discussions I had were for the Bay Area Playwrights Festival. Again, a mix of civilians and professionals and just keeping it going, playwright, not visible. Not letting the actors, you know, all of this sort of little toolbox I gave you. If you keep it going, if the person, it's like, yeah, you can't have somebody sit back and just be ready to call it at 30 minutes. You need to have a dramaturge or a director. It can be who really loves your play and is gonna ask the questions that you need answered and is gonna pursuit, chase them down. Chase down those responses, even if they're negative. You are the answer question. Yes. Actually, I have a question. Do you think that maybe audiences as we talk about should be a little bit better informed? I had an experience at Los Angeles and Ososofs Theater where I had two plays in competition. And the second night, the second play, somebody had the audience. So this reminded me a lot of a play I saw last night and it was my play, the second night before. And it turned out that he was one of the judges where the competition had fallen asleep during the second play. So I wish that I had a dramaturge there to direct it because I felt like you're judging me and you're not even aware that the same person listed on the program who wrote the play yesterday. So I mean, I was hoping that somebody would have said, excuse me, he's here and it is the same play but nobody said anything. Yeah, I mean, you know, it's very interesting because I've been having a lot of conversations with David Dower about convening that he wants to do around literary managers and dramaturges and how they feel about being gatekeepers. Well, you know, first of all, we don't have any power. We're not a gatekeeper, Brown and Sakes. We're the people who read your play. The artistic director probably never reads your play. Perhaps even up to the first day of production. So you want somebody who's gonna fight for you. Champion or college? Yeah, and we are the ones in the theaters that are supposed to be fighting for you. Are you cheap? I personally am cheap, yes. But you're not gonna find a lot of the dramaturges that are coming up now. See, I didn't go to graduate school as a dramaturge. There was no such thing. I went as a director, and then I switched over because I thought playwrights were so much nicer than actors. And I just liked you guys better. But I don't have any training. So nobody ever taught me that I should sit back and just say when the 30 minutes is up. And most of the writers that I was working with early on, primarily at the Los Angeles Theater Center. So this is Arlanda Meyer, Jose Rivera, Milchus Sands, or Scott. You're from Los Angeles, you may remember them. And I was fighting for them to have a career. So it wasn't just about the one play and the one post-play discussion. I valued them, and I wanted to make sure that other people had the opportunity to value their work as well. So I got really mean. Yes, Ralph. I really liked your term, good confusion, because there's always just three questions I want to know. What did I miss? In other words, what gap? Sometimes we were writing, it's in our head. It doesn't get on the page. It didn't get on the page. So I want to know what's the missing gap if there are any? What work, and did anything touch you? And after that, everything else is gravy. But I like the way you get at that by talking about, by having someone talk about confusion and responding to the confusion. Because it gets to, like you said, it gets to my question of what did I miss? What did I miss, yeah. And it also gets to my question of what worked because sometimes I want, oh good, they worked, they were totally thrown by that. They're so confused, that's what I wanted maybe. So I like those terms, I hadn't thought of it. Yes, see, they're contradictory terms. Good confusion, you don't usually think. Which is why the audience, the people who are participating in the post-play discussion are then, there's a little moment of alertness. They're like, what? Yeah. That doesn't make sense. And so they are a little bit more disarmed and can divulge what they like about it. Yeah, back there. Actually, two quick questions. The first one is, is it ever useful to poll the audience if you're managing a feedback session or talk back? Is it ever useful to say, if somebody says I was confused about something to poll the entire room and see if everyone had the confusion? And then the second question is an open-ended question like, what do you think the play was about? Is that a useful discussion starter or is that intrusive? I think if you playwright can bear that. And I have often started post-plays like that. Usually when they are a little bit more experimental in form, or if the playwright has been struggling with the sequencing of the storytelling or something like that, then I have, what is this play about? And you have to sit there for a few minutes after you say that. And I usually, as you can tell, I usually crack a joke and I say, it's been three minutes since the play was over. If you can't summarize it, then I don't know what we're gonna do. So, but I have used that question and it can be very productive, yeah. And what was the first? The poll wasn't confused, then polling the whole room and saying who was confused or? I have done that. I have done that. I think it's more educational, again, it's something that really is more educational for the audience than it is for the playwright because most of the time the person who didn't get it will be outnumbered. And they'll, you know, ooh. Or if it comes up in a way that I don't like, then I say, really? Really? You know, again, it's chasing it down. I sound like some predatory animal. Yeah. How do you follow up after a post-show discussion with the playwright in terms of sort of evaluating debriefing what that was about? Do you have that? This is a good question. And I recognize you. Who's that Chris Gonzalez? Ah! Okay. It's been forever. You know, who many of you will remember, young genius award winner actually, came in, we did his first reading of his first play at LATC. And he came in the literary, you know, we're doing readings of 15 different plays plus three productions. So, Mr. Ong comes into the literary offices and he's just numb. He has no idea where he is or how to process it. And I said, when the dust settles and you go home, read your play very carefully and very slowly and you will remember what people have said and you will remember how it sounded in the actor's mouth. And from my understanding, that actually works. You know, I just was imagining it on the spot. But then much later, when I did write a play, I found it to be true. I found it to be true. So, but you have to really, you know, it has to be in the middle of the night. You can't do it while you're, you know, while your kids are asking you about their homework. You really have to isolate so that you can remember all of that because it's not just about what people said. It's about the energy in the room. So, you have to kind of flash back, I guess. Wait, wait for it. Yeah, yeah. There's a new school, a new act called Talk Backer without the key, available at talkbacker.com and I've been taking a look at it lately. It's nothing I've been involved with. It's designed to help move some of the conversation that happens in a Talk Back onto, I guess, the internet. Basically, it allows the playwright and the draw-through to work together to formulate those questions in advance, enter them into a little app, and then anyone in the audience, I think with an iPhone, can then answer the question that way. And so, it occurs to me that that could have a positive effect in that it would get responses from people who are not likely to speak up in a room, but also then maybe take some of the conversation out of the room and make it happen digitally and there's nowhere to see what anyone else is saying. Well, a lot of times I think good questions are inspired by people who've asked earlier questions in a Talk Back. So, A, are you aware of this technology if not, there you go. Freak it for me, you. And if, you know, what do you think about that? You share- Well, we have to find a way, as Todd was saying, we have to find a way to cross over into this new multi-platform convergence culture it's called. I also happen to teach television, so. But, and that's what they call it in television, is the convergence culture. So, I think there has to be ways that we find to cross over into that. Or we're gonna get left behind. We just really are, we're gonna be dinosaurs. It's gonna happen very slowly. It's not gonna happen in my lifetime, but it's gonna happen. So, I love that idea. At first I thought you were talking about sort of a computerized dramaturgy. Which they do have, I'm told. There is a software program that asks you about your character arcs and stuff like that. But, you know. I'd love to have you, what do you think? I can be. I can be had. Actually, I was just talking to, I shouldn't tell you this probably. I was just talking to Gary. And, because I think he is just the most terrific person. And my long-time colleague who I call my evil twin, Morgan Janess, who worked for Mr. Papp when Mr. Papp was still around. And while I was working at the Los Angeles Theater Center, and we loved the same work quite often. And so we would use our bosses to play off of each other. So I would say, Mr. Bush, no, you don't do this play. Mr. Papp's gonna do it. And it worked, actually, surprisingly well. Anyway, my evil twin was an agent for a long time. As you know, and now she is essentially a creative advisor for the agency that she used to be an agent for. They pulled her out of the contract negotiations because God knows dramaturgs are terrible at that. And just made her essentially the staff dramaturg for all of the playwrights that they represent. And that is my fantasy. And I am lobbying Mr. Garrison to help me fulfill my fantasy. Because I moved across the country from the West Coast three years ago, and I'm desperately lonely for you all. I have not found a theater to work for in the DC area. And I have two cats, but it's not enough. Oh, and I have a husband now. But it's still not enough, it's still not enough. Yes, darling. So, I just, I don't know, I kind of take a little umbrage to the point that this is a necessary evil. I think as a playwright, you know, this is my way on some level of engaging in conversation with the broader world. And without this talk back, how else do I, you know, how else do I engage? You know, how else am I engaged? I know, I think it's amazing. Oh, you wanted to talk. I think it's amazing. And so that's why, so I'm just, I don't know, I get the feeling a little bit that there's a sense like, okay, you know, like as a playwright, you know, you kind of have to be secluded and, you know, untouchable because you might shatter if someone says, you know, this, you know. Have you ever done a post-play discussion? I have, no, I have. And, you know, the biggest thing for me is I always forget things. But, you know, if someone was to say, you know, this play's soft, I would be like, oh, okay, I'll take that down if they would like, I'd love it. But you are a rare creature. Well, but I just think, I mean, we- I remember, Jose Cruz will remember this too. And the Hispanic Playwrights thing, a colleague of ours named Boy Convoy, who was this fantastic writer, who was a post-play discussion, and it was about, it's in process, right? And somebody started to suggest how a scene should go. And he lost it. He lost it, and he said, don't rewrite the play as he was walking out of the- The comments about society on a daily basis when I'm sitting down at the computer, you know, and they're not always nice, you know what I mean? About all kinds of people. Well, I wish I was still running the theater, because I- But I just, I don't know. I guess I just- You're not fragile. I'm not intending to say that. I'm not intending to say that. It should be beautiful, right? I mean, it should be a gorgeous experience, the way I look at it. It should be, yeah, right. It's not gonna be beautiful. The economics won't let it be beautiful. Can you elaborate? I know you just- No, it's what Todd was just saying. You know, should I be a playwright? No. No, no, no, no, no. And I've said that to my students. I've said it to interns at The Magic. I've said it to many, many people. And if you still become a playwright, then you are the gift of God. And that's incredible. That's incredible. And, you know, I mean, it's just- Then it's beautiful. Then it's beautiful. Any more? Whoops, just stop. Oh my God, Emily Mann is here.