EXTRA CRITICUM

Transcription of my Zoom classes provides me a fresh perspective on the content and structure of each workshop.

via GIPHY

About a month ago or so, my business consultant Marcy Stahl told me about a new platform that provides virtually instantaneous transcription of Zoom meetings in progress as well as audio recordings of past meetings. [It's called Otter.ai ]

I wasn't sure whether I actually needed this service but the entry level subscription was inexpensive enough to allow me to sign up for a service I wasn't sure I needed. 

As luck would have it, one of playwrights in this year's Self-Production Boot Camp which I'm teaching again for the Dramatists Guild Institute came to me with a request for transcriptions of each class. It's long been understood that some of us learn best visually, others learn best by participating in a group discussion and there are still others among us who will retain new concepts most readily when they're presented in written form. 

And so thanks to Otter.ai I'm not only able to provide my students with a group discussion in class, a video recording of each class, my usual handouts and homework assignments but also now... for the first time in more than 25 years of teaching, I have the luxury of providing a written transcription of every word that is uttered in every Zoom class.

I am so grateful this came up!

And you may be surprised when I tell you why.

Rest in Peace Burt Bacharach

Burt Bacharach has left the planet. Upon hearing the news this morning, my breath caught in my throat and I found it hard to move. I've never met the man. I know very little about him as a person. But I'd be hard pressed to name a composer in my lifetime who approaches his reach and there's something else about Burt Bacharach's music that ensures his legacy will be felt for generations. Bacharach is like the 20th C. Mozart. His craft was impeccable. His compositions all held together so beautifully without any need of duct tape or super glue. Like the finest furniture maker whose tongue and groove construction just holds together on its own, his songs were the closest thing to perfect construction since Mozart. 

And he was almost as prolific as Mozart. 

Here for your listening pleasure is one of my faves, which I remember singing along to in my pajamas at age 7.

 

Now more than ever: Discomfort is your friend.

In the Age of the Algorithm more and more of our waking lives are quietly being orchestrated by machine learning that seeks above all else to clear a path of least resistance between where each day begins and where it's most likely to end.

Given this new paradigm, we would all be wise to make  a conscious effort to introduce a little more discomfort into our daily lives. 

What happens when you stray a ways away from your comfort zone?

If you're like most of us, you may experience some anxiety at first because if, for example, you're attempting to learn a skill that doesn't come naturally or working on a project way outside of your usual milieu, you might worry about... well, about falling flat on your face and the shame that surely would follow.

But if you find a moment to pause and breathe chances are you may consider the possibility that since this isn't really your area of expertise, the world at large very likely isn't expecting much of anything from you.

The freedom that can fill us suddenly when we recognize we're doing something that no one (no person/no algorithm) would ever expect us to do at all, let alone do well, is like no other.

Several years ago, at a Producers Guild Conference, I had the opportunity to sit at a small round table with David Eick, Executive Producer of the brilliant television series, Battlestar Galactica. And I asked him how it happened to be that a TV show was able to weave in so much truly profound and deep thinking on the subject of what it means to be human. His answer surprised me.

"Simple," he offered without skipping a beat. "We were on the SyFy Channel. No one was paying attention. So we did whatever we liked."

When you try something new or something you're not even sure you have the ability to do or you try something on a whim without even knowing for certain why it is you want to attempt this... your uncertainty, your discomfort, the endless horizon of question marks you face can often deliver gifts you had no idea were a thing.

Recent Off-Path Experiences of Mine

That's one reason why I try to take a workshop or a class at least once a year that will encourage me to get out of my comfort zone. Just before the pandemic I took a glass blowing class at Brooklyn Glass and discovered pretty quickly that 2,000-degree flames scare the hell out of me and make it very difficult for my creative juices to flow. 

Every since I saw her astonishing performance in The Fighter, I've kind of been in awe of Melissa Leo so when I heard that  a film festival for which I sometimes serve as a juror was offering a 3-session Zoom acting workshop taught by Leo with a class size of 12, I grabbed my credit card and signed up. What a wonderful little respite in the midst of the first year of the pandemic this was. Leo proved to be every bit as intense, intelligent, funny and insightful as you'd expect and despite her frustration (and ours to a lesser extent) with the idea of acting on Zoom, I learned quite a bit. And I enjoyed meeting some wonderful actors from all over the world.

How Do You Protect and Nourish the Most Precious Commodity Any Artist Has?

The most precious commodity we have as artists is our ability to see things differently. The artist looks at a pile of junk hundreds of others have absent-mindedly walked around on their morning commute and finds within it whole universes. The artist hears the same middle-of-the-road slogans we all bathe in all day every day and finds deep within them or around them or because of them new and amazing discoveries about what it means to be human.

In short, to be an artist of importance, you need a mind of your own and in order to cultivate a mind of your own it is essential that you disconnect from the prevailing narratives which grow narrower and less remarkable every day.

I hate to be the bearer of  bad news kids but as far as I can tell we are living through one of the swiftest and most efficient periods of cultural and intellectual closing ever experienced in modern human history. If the Renaissance was a period of extended and unprecedented opening the early 21st Century is most certainly the opposite. In fact, it's difficult to identify even one controlling force in the construction and organization of our modern lives which does not in ways sometimes subtle and sometimes clumsy nudge our collective unconscious toward greater predictability and mediocrity. 

If you care about your work, about the culture at large and about managing to carve out a satisfying existence in the Age of the Algorithm, you have no choice but to consciously choose everything and anything which might support your quirky, unpredictable, independent and often inconvenient way of looking at the world. 

How do you do this?

Prioritize any input yet untouched by the Algorithms. 

What do I mean by this? Whatever you feed your mind will ultimately nudge your way of thinking in this or that direction. 

Here are some examples of choices you may find yourself making. Get in the habit of asking yourself how each potential use or your precious time came into your consciousness. Chances are, if mass media played a role in it at all, it will lack much in the way of nourishment for a mind that finds inspiration in the most unexpected places. 

I'm not saying avoid mass media entirely. But I am saying a diet consisting of nothing but mass marketed culture will do much to mold you (slowly over the years) into an easy uncritical consumer of whatever it is the machine would prefer you consume. And, let's face it, when you accept such a bland and safe role for yourself the Algorithms and the corporations who control them will reward you immediately and handsomely. And your rewards will be widely shared via social media so as to encourage others to follow in your footsteps. Because of course, corporations are  not in the business of ensuring the survival and thriving of an idiosyncratic unpredictable and less efficient culture. No, no, no. Unpredictability and inefficiency are fast becoming dirty words in the lexicon of our brave new world. 

SHAKE UP YOUR WAY OF SEEING

vs.

BUY WHATEVER IT IS THEY'RE SELLING

REPOST: Attention Playwrights: That Monologue Does Not Belong to You

This post originally appeared in September 2021. Reposting now in conjunction with:

2022 Hear Me Out Monologue Fest - Nov. 25 & Dec. 5

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Advanced Monologue Workshop. Dec. 12, 17, 21 and 28

 

So, if you read this blog much you know that since the dawn of this pandemic I've been on a kind of OCD Mission Impossible to encourage playwrights and screenwriters--really anyone who writes scripts, who tells stories this way--to give monologue a closer look because, well... as the pandemic shutdown demonstrated so well, when the expensive and time-consuming elements associated with productions disappear and the community at large finds itself communicating via Zoom, the unique work of the playwright becomes more essential than ever. 

No lights. No sets. No costumes. No stage. Yet still feels like theatre. How come?

If people are waiting for something akin to theatre (as we once knew it) to find them and move them through the Zoom box, then who is more equipped to provide this than the playwright?

After all it's the playwright who engineers our catharsis. If I am pummeled to my core at the final curtain that's because the playwright wanted it. It's the playwright who understands, perhaps more keenly and more viscerally than any of us, the bond between life as we live it and life as we wish it to be. Our refusal to acknowledge that there might be a difference between these two things has been selling theatre tickets since man discovered fire and gathered everyone around to talk about it.

 

The Festival of Playwrights Making Lemonade from Lemons

The 3rd Annual Hear Me Out Monologue Competition Finalist Winners will be presented over two nights this year: Nov 25 and Dec. 5.

Writing Requires Listening... to everyone including yourself.

Although people looking for a writing teacher often find their way to me, the truth is I don't know that writing itself is something that can be taught. The skill of good (or great) writing starts with listening. Listening to the deepest part of you where the truth of your intentions lives. Sometimes there's a lot of noise coming between a writer and the successful execution of the idea. 

Common Sources of Distracting Noise Coming Between You and Your Vision

Imagine you need to write a synopsis of your latest screenplay. What might be some of the most unhelpful sources of noise, noise that distracts you from effectively coming up with great language to describe your new screenplay? Here are some examples of noisy voices that live inside your head and keep you up at night.

There's nothing original about your ideas.

Nobody is going to want to see this.

You better not get too specific or you'll scare off half your audience.

Your work on this latest script has taken a lot out of you and people need to understand that.

If I was really talented I wouldn't have to waste time writing marketing copy. There would be an army of professionals rushing in to do it for me.

My original impulse for starting this project dominates my view and keeps me from seeing just how far I veered off of my original idea.

I'm not honestly sure what this movie is going to be about in the end.

Someone in my writers group told me I must not forget to emphasize X, Y, or Z.

My Approach to Teaching Writers Starts With You

I have no interest in teaching you how to write like me. Nor do I imagine you want to write like anyone other than yourself. So, the primary focus when I work with a writer is always digging our way down until we uncover your deepest goal for whatever project you've brought to the RT Private Studio.

It all comes down to listening. I listen carefully to what's on your pages as well as what's not on those pages. And eventually a picture of an artist (you) comes into view. My job is to help you see what I see at the core of everything you write.

Now through Thanksgiving Day, Enroll in Advanced Monologue

Dec 12, 17, 21 and 28.

“So many playwriting development opportunities focus on the forest rather than the trees, leaving playwrights stranded with a solid idea but the inability to communicate it effectively. Roland sees every tree in the forest and meticulously helps playwrights communicate precisely and artfully.”
— Laura King, playwright

“No one understands the fundamental engine that drives all monologue better than Roland Tec. His vast experience as a theatre maker and as a filmmaker give him a unique ability to keep any writer honest. Study with Tec and inevitably you’ll begin to understand your own work better than you ever have.”
— Jared Katsiane, filmmaker

“I performed my monologue that night and I heard the laughter and immediately felt relaxed and focused. I emailed a link to the YouTube to a friend and he asked: ‘Where did you get that audience?’  I got it from Roland.”
— J. Lois Diamond, playwright

FULL SCHEDULE AND REGISTRATION INFO

The Six Most Likely Reasons Your Excellent Piece of Writing Did Not Take Home a Prize

Anyone who's ever been anywhere near a writing competition of any kind -- be it as a contestant, an audience member or a judge -- knows the sad fact that it's almost inevitable that really terrific work will somehow fail to capture the adoring attention of enough judges in just the right way and will be overlooked. 

I was curious  to take a closer look at this year's entries to the Hear Me Out Monologue Competition, specifically to examine the pieces that were really great pieces of writing that somehow failed to accumulate the high scores needed to advance to the finalist round. Specifically I wondered if I might be able to identify some patterns, common flaws which were working against some really terrific writing getting its proper due.

What I found may surprise you. It certainly did me. 

For any writer preparing work to submit to a seriously competitive opportunity of any kind, these 6 flaws could make the difference between taking home the gold and barely seeing the light of day. 

I suggest you copy this list and hang it somewhere in your workspace as a reminder so that every time you’re prepping a submission, you take some time to try and eliminate these obstacles.

I like to think of these as six guests you really don't want crashing your party cause they will work against your ambition for your submission by distracting the judges from the power and brilliance of what you've created. Show them the door and your chances of success will greatly improve.

We’ll count down from 6 to 1, saving the most important one for last.

#6: Typos and punctuation problems

It may not seem like in the grand scheme of things your brilliant powerfully moving work should be penalized for the odd misplaced comma or incorrect use or their, there or they’re. But here’s the thing. I know our judges are trying to look directly into the heart of each monologue, to understand its central character, to feel its pulse and not intentionally penalize you for typos. But we’re human. And if there are enough misspellings, incorrect or confusing uses of punctuation or incomprehensible sentences, the effect is this. The reader of the piece has to work harder to feel it as they read from start to finish. They may have to stop, go back a couple lines to figure out your intention. And when that happens, guess what? Their emotional investment in your piece suffers. 

#5: Layout on the page

Let’s imagine there’s a major explosion in the middle of your monologue. How you decide to place that interruption on the page is going to make a difference in how your reader spots it as the major interruption it is or whether they potentially miss it entirely.

Also, it may strike you as absolutely trivial but I was surprised to discover that submissions with hard-to-read fonts or inconsistent line spacing or line breaks tended to get lower scores. Now I know this is unconscious on the part of the judges because I am so specific about how the pieces are to be judged. Still human beings are not computers (thank god) and anything that makes it a little harder or more complicated for me as the reader to imagine and hear and see the monologue from start to finish is competing with your chance to grab a judge where they live -- to make an emotional impression. 

We may sound rather intellectual sitting in the restaurant discussing the show we all just saw together but make no mistake as it is unfolding in the theatre and we are sitting in the dark, it is an emotional experience. We're not thinking our way through your story, we're feeling our way through it. And every little interruption to provide a footnote or reveal the need for one is an interruption in my emotional journey with your characters through the story you're telling. 

#4: The Last Line

There were several gorgeous monologues this year that felt unfinished or incomplete because although the writer had a beautifully wrought idea that really kept us engaged, it felt as though they had not figured out how the ending should feel for the audience.

Any piece of theatre (or literature for that matter) can end in a number of ways. Think about your favorite pop songs. Some end with a bang. Some peter out. Some end with a hiccup. These choices make a world of difference in how an audience is going to feel about the overall piece and your choice should be carefully aimed at the emotional content of what preceded it. It’s human nature that no matter how you end your piece, we are going to use that end as a final lens through which to revisit the piece in its entirety. Choose the wrong type of end and you risk potentially getting in the way of your audience appreciating the depth and gravitas of the whole piece. Or on the other hand, sometimes an  ending too formal and sharp can risk throwing a lighthearted charm piece into unwanted (and unhelpful) comparison to other pieces with more natural heft. The last line also does something else in monologue that’s extremely important. And that is it signals to the audience something about the main character’s likely future beyond where we leave them. Last lines can hint at hope for some much needed change. Or they can confirm our worst fears about this person and the world that lies ahead of them. 

 

When is communication most meaningful or memorable? The most powerful monologues contain within them: evidence that we are not alone.

What makes for the most compelling monologues? The same thing that makes for the most compelling dialogue. Anything that points to actual human communication.

All Dialogue is Action. We Speak in Service of Intention.

I open my mouth to speak to you. I have an agenda. Something in mind I intend to communicate with you specifically. And being human, of course, your reaction to my words as they spill out of me will never be entirely predictable... never quite what I may have expected.

Before. When I rehearsed or imagined the conversation and how it might go, I may have braced myself for resistance. Or I may have imagined my logic to be so airtight that as I plan what I'd like to say I may actually imagine any resistance simply crumbling or dissolving in the face of such powerful and indisputable wisdom. The possibilities for what we might hope for or expect or seek from others' reactions to whatever we have to say are virtually infinite.

But perfect frictionless agreement? I suppose if I were addressing a mirror, I could hope to be met with that kind of predictable assent. 

The Response to Our Words is Never Predictable

The beauty of writing scripts is that, like life, they are populated with individual human beings, each with their own lived experience which continuously feeds into a set of evolving world views, ideologies, moralities, priorities and areas of reactivity. Put two of your characters in a situation in which they're both emotionally invested and there's no end to the mayhem and mischief that may ensue.

Search Engine Optimization vs. Authentic Useful Content

The other day I was chatting with a friend who is something of an expert in the field of SEO or Search Engine Optimization and all things WWW-related. And a fact of life of our brave new online world just sort of spilled out and I'm embarrassed to admit, although this fact of life or fact of internet architecture is apparently common knowledge to anyone posting content online, I had somehow never heard or read this fact. 

Blog posts should be written around a set of search terms and the search terms should be carefully selected through research into the most common search terms in the topic about which you're writing. Apparently this is the way people who do not already know you and your blog will find their way to you.

When your posts have been carefully constructed around a curated set of key words and phrases designed to attract the right people to your blog, i.e. the people most likely to find it interesting and worthwhile. 

Here's the very first post which now strikes me as a little wet behind the ears and possibly somewhat blind to the vast tundra that the internet can be to the writer who posts from the heart without even a moment spent considering how people might find their way to you.

In a way, then, this blog has been floating in the shadows, only entering the field of vision of the people somehow connected to its contributing authors. Maybe that's why what began as a group blog eventually dwindled down to pretty much me posting 90% of the time. 

Were the other E.C. Authors simply not getting enough bang for their buck? I wish one of them had told me. 

Since I founded Extra Criticum in May of 2008, I have simply been writing about whatever thing struck me as important, odd, amusing or troubling. The most thought I ever gave to search happened once I'd finished whatever post I was working on when I'd stare at that empty box and come up with about a dozen key words to enter which I assumed would assist the Google bots and any other search engine creatures to find the article based on... what I thought it was about.

Boy was I misguided!

Navigating the Season of Submissions

Late Running GIFfrom Late GIFs

Every year around this time, as we start to notice the days growing shorter signaling an end to Summer, my teaching schedule fills up with writers eager to meet the moment. What moment is that?

It's that time of year when lots of submissions are due for development opportunities, grants and competitions. 

Recently, a favorite student of mine, someone I'll call Hal had booked time with me to prepare a major submission. This involves us reviewing writing samples together as well as the dreaded Artistic Statement. (I'll be the first to admit, by the way, that I suck at writing artistic statements; and yet people seek out my help so frequently that it almost proves the old adage: Those who can't do, teach.)

Seriously though, there's no magic secret to all this. It's simply a matter of reading someone else's material with care and then reflecting back to them what it is you see. We all have the capacity to do this. It's just that most of us lack the patience and curiosity to do it well.

The other day Hal reached out to cancel their appointment with me. It was a surprise to me because I know Hal to be a supremely hard-working and detail oriented writer. 

It was Hal's reason for canceling that inspired me to write this post. Because it contains within it what I consider to be one of the biggest challenges most artists struggle with.

I WROTE A SHOW TO CAPTURE THIS MOMENT (Too bad "this moment" just happens to be one that the entire world seems desperate to escape)

https://rolandtec.medium.com/i-wrote-a-show-to-capture-this-moment-53cdd0d955fa
originally posted to Medium.

Click here to read it.

Attention Extra Criticum readers: If you do click through and read this piece on Medium, please consider taking a moment to follow me, post a comment, clap at the end or highlight text. Engagement really helps. Thanks!

Why my next play had to be a solo show performed on Zoom.

In March of 2020 mankind was thrust into a new paradigm. With virtually every aspect of life squeezed, stretched and stuffed into shapes that many found virtually unrecognizable, the essence of what it means to be human was called into question. And change was all but inevitable.

Change can be painful, frightening, frustrating and uncomfortable. And so for the better part of two years everyone has to some degree found him or herself wrestling with uncertainty and a gnawing question regarding all our life choices pre-CoVid_19.

I feel that my exploration of this challenging and dangerous moment in human history absolutely calls out for a presentation within the confines of the Zoom black box theatre.

Opening 2 min. of the February 7th reading to an invited audience.

This has left us at once hungry for human connection (as the oxygen of life) and wary of it. We have found ourselves surprised by our own behavior. How many friends have expressed the same confusion regarding an acute loneliness and yearning for human connection coupled with an inexplicable paralysis when it comes to returning phone calls, emails and text messages. How odd it has been to observe oneself letting 2, 3, or more days sail by while phone messages or emails went unreturned even as we wished for nothing more than the back and forth of a chat with a friend. 

Zoom is the perfect architecture for this moment.

Don't Throw Our Baby Out with the Bathwater (or: Why We Still Need Zoom)

As we enter Year 3 of the early 21st century pandemic, it's understandable why we might all long for nothing more than a life outside... outside the walls of Zoom.

The last couple years were dominated by stories of loss -- loss of income, loss of job security, loss of essential routines, loss of friendships, confidence and, of course, the worst loss of all: loss of life.

But scattered here and there, tucked behind and alongside the wreckage lie some unexpected gifts.

2022 Hear Me Out Monologue Competition Call for Entries.

Announcing this year's Festival Theme & Competition Prompt:

WHEN WE NAME IT

In a world in which  social norms, political systems, economic laws and the natural environment are all facing existential challenges, the language we use to describe the world around us takes on new urgency. In order to change a thing, we first need to name it.  In order to care for something or someone it matters that we name it. If we want to understand something that confuses or frightens us, first we must name it. 

Since human beings created language, the labels we assign to things, people, places, activities, relationships, complex issues, etc. etc. have influenced our view of them. There are things we carry with us throughout life that feel so important, so powerful, that sometimes we dare not name them for fear that naming them might invite them to consume us. And yet, oftentimes the act of finally naming something we’ve been living with results in a newfound freedom. And, yes, we also name people, pets, places, projects and creations. 

And sadly, these days, our choices regarding how we identify certain things can even threaten to tear apart our most treasured relationships. 

Your 2022 Hear Me Out entry must in some way refer to some naming and its impact on the characters you’re revealing. As always we hope you will find your own way into our festival theme and we do not require the use of any specific words, language or stylistic choices.  

We only ask that your character grapples with our festival theme in some way.

And remember: your monologue must introduce us to a character who is talking to another person (or group of people). Short stories and essays will be disqualified.

Click here to get started.  Early Bird Deadline June 15, 2022 at Noon.

How'd They Do It? 2021 Hear Me Out Winning Writers Share Their Secrets: Kate Cortesi

Over the next few weeks several of last year's Finalist Winners will share their process of getting from the festival prompt to a monologue they felt excited to submit to Hear Me Out Monologue Competition.

Today, we hear from:

Kate Cortesi, author of I Love Parties (winner of the Golden Ear for long form monologues and the Most Memorable Character Award)

Here's what Kate had to say about the 2021 Festival Theme: Borders.

The Hear Me Out invitation to think dramatically and expansively about "borders" was one of my favorite things: a call to write. I used the prompt the way I use most rules: as something to subvert.

What comes to mind easily when we hear the word 'border'? You bet that's the very thing I'm going to avoid. There are borders we cross, border-crossing as an identity or a formative experience. I found my mind wandering to those borders that call to us, that we don't cross.

I submitted a piece about an elderly woman who is assumed to be harmless, and even vulnerable, who then turns out to be the potentially dangerous transgressor. Her decision not to transgress - to preserve a border - ends up being the definitive action of my short monologue play. The ultimate action is one of restraint, that forgoes gratification in the name of love.

To the writers who submit to the upcoming Hear Me Out competition, may the prompt inspire and unleash you. And if it doesn't, throw it away and see what comes of it.

Watch Cortesi's winning monologue as performed by Marnie Andrews at the 2021 Hear Me Out Labor Day Festival & Awards Ceremony.