Collaboration: Stage Directions

I went and saw last night's baffling and amazing performance of Radiohole's Whatever, Heaven Allows at PS 122. It had in it, among other things, a hysterical reference for instructions on stage kissing. I googled it this morning, and instead found this great screed on stage directions:

Ignore stage directions?

That’s like putting on a blindfold to drive on the interstate.

Do you want to be a passenger, in that car or on the stage, with someone blindfolded?

I had a good laugh, considering as almost every show I've ever worked on that started with a script has had, as step one, crossing out all the stage directions -- if not actively crossing out, then basically ignoring them whenever the director felt like it. Of course, plot-important stage directions (Exit, pursued by a bear) can't be ignored ("No, I don't think Hamlet should stab Claudius."), but most stage directions are unnecessary or pithy, like "Turns away, crying." And the director or actor will decide whether or not she is actually going to turn away, crying.

To drop my actor hat and put on my playwright hat, I must confess that I rarely write in stage directions for precisely this reason. Having been an actor, I know that they're going to figure out the physical actions to justify whatever is going on. I put in the stage directions that, like Hamlet stabbing Claudius, are important to the plot, but otherwise I leave that up to the actors.

On the other hand, as a playwright I am also not particularly moved by a director who is taking on my work taking different interpretations, changing a few lines, etc. I cannot understand the kind of mentality that breeds a Samuel Beckett, who (even though dead) still won't allow his work to be produced unless it looks exactly like he intended it. Which means that ever since I saw the Gate Theatre performing the definitive Waiting for Godot (one of my favorite plays; they still use some of the original performers, if I'm not mistaken), I have not had any impetus to see it again. I didn't leap up to see Nathan Lane and Bill Irwin; however great their personal flair, it will be choked by the restrictions placed upon them to represent the work "accurately."

But I wonder about the rest of you. How do you feel about a director tossing out your stage directions? How do you feel about an actor rewording some of your dialogue so that it sounds more natural (I'm a terrible paraphraser, and that's probably why I do a lot less acting than I used to...)? Where's the line between other collaborators taking on the work and making it their own, exercising their rights as de-facto editors of the work, and pissing on your play?

This problem is unique to the current division-of-labor model of theater, after all. Collaborational models, where the playwright is in the room working with the actors -- or where the actors and directors are devising the script together -- can simply talk about it. The playwright/creator can say "This is why I did it this way," and the others can say, "Well, this is why we want to tweak it." But if the playwright isn't in the room, they're not going to call him every time a "Turns away, crying" turns into "Turns away, fighting back tears" or "Faces him, defiantly" (because the director doesn't feel like the actor should break in this moment).

I worked on a play in Southern California that was from a playwright in New York. He would get revisions to the script regularly. And once or twice, something that was changed in rehearsal would, four days later, be changed back, because the director had thought a minor cut was minor but the playwright felt it was not as minor as the director thought. It ultimately was not a major drag on the production, but I can see in other contexts, with higher stakes, it might have been.

Anyways, I kick it over to you. Thoughts?

To Orange County: A Minor Apologia

In my last post, I did something I frequently finding myself doing: ragging on Orange County, California. It is not a place I particularly like, although it is my home. The arts scene is rather small. But one thing it does have is South Coast Repertory.

Now, South Coast Repertory is, as Repertory theaters go, actually a fairly good one. It has originated a few Broadway plays in its time, it does fairly good productions of quality plays, etc. But every failing you'd like to accuse Repertory companies of, you can basically accuse SCR of.

When I worked with the Stage Managers there, briefly, they all swapped car notes because they all drove 1984 Volvo Station Wagons. I am not kidding. There were four 1984 Volvo Station Wagon owners, and all of them were fretting that their Volvos would not make the next emissions test and they had no idea if they could afford the fees or afford a new car. The actors almost all commuted from Los Angeles, and one of the actors made his primary income doing English voiceovers of Anime imports.

However, whereas SCR normally either commissions plays from prominent playwrights who've found success in New York, or they're doing standards, I do have to applaud them for this:

“South Coast Repertory is pleased to host this remounting of the Chance Theater’s acclaimed production of Jesus Hates Me,” said Associate Artistic Director John Glore. “This partnership is born of an idea that began to take shape among the members of SCR’s artistic staff almost two years ago, out of a desire to make greater use of the company’s Nicholas Studio (SCR’s former Second Stage), to create stronger ties with other performing arts organizations in Orange County and to offer alternative programming that might attract new theatergoers to both organizations. In presenting this Chance Theater production, SCR has an opportunity to try out an idea which, if successful, may well lead to further collaborations of this kind in the future.”

The Chance Theater’s Artistic Director Oanh Nguyen will again direct Jesus Hates Me, which will feature the same cast that appeared in the 2009 production. Chance Dean plays Ethan, Timothy Covington is Trane, Karen Webster is Annie, Jennifer Ruckman is Lizzy, Dimas Diaz is Boone and Ben Green is Georgie.

Now, the play itself, written by Wayne Lemon, is not indigenous to Orange County. It had its premiere in Colorado (according to his website -- it took me a bit to figure out which of the "premieres" was the first one).

But this is the first time in my personal experience or memory that South Coast Repertory has promoted the work of or partnered with another local theater company -- largely because the Chance Theater (only a decade old, billing itself as "Your Off-Broadway Theater in Orange County") is the only non-SCR theater company that I know of in the Orange County area (I may be wrong, there might be one or two others).

I hope that SCR does more of this. The Chance charges lower prices, has more experimental work--it takes more chances. So I hope that when they hit gold, they get some more transfers to SCR, and that money and respect flows back to the Chance. Maybe one day local people will get interested in the arts and find outlets for self-expression, a community to join...