Writing Blog Number 2

20240416 Writing A Play

Writing A Play

I’ve seen a few scripts on WdC, so I thought I’d go back through my university notes and write down how to actually write a play. Not the technical aspects – that differs from country to country, theatre to theatre. Look online and see what the dominant style being used at the moment is and go for that. Every five years I need to change the way I present a play, everything from font to where the names of the characters go to what is capitalised. It’s a pain, but that’s the nature of the beast.

First, theatre is a very different medium to video or the page. It is visual, but the human is the camera, and it is essentially static. If you only watch film, do NOT try to write a play. They are totally different. So, if you want to write a play, go and see a few plays! Not just Shakespeare, not just the classics, but your local community theatre, school performances.

I’ve had one play performed and another coming up this year (I hope), both done by schools.

If you can, get involved backstage so you can see how scenes change, how props are made, make-up, the minutiae that does not matter in film, especially in these days of CGI. In a play, your character is not going to turn into a werewolf in front of the audience, and unless you use a mask, not going to be able to transform offstage in two minutes either. The make-up people will kill you if you demand that.

The theatre is a medium of “less is more.”

A great example of this is that many calls for plays from community theatres only want 4 to 6 characters in total. My plays have many more, but that suits a school environment.

Settings as well. One or two settings is what most want. Then again, look at a play like Death Of A Salesman (Arthur Miller) – it takes place in one house, two rooms. The whole play.

Do not set design in your play. You may have things that need to be places or specific colours, but if you design the whole set, you are taking away from the director, and imposing a budget that might not be possible. Give only the important details and no others in the design of sets and scenes.

Next is time. Your characters are not going to be able to age, scenery is not going to able to age. The exception is, of course, if the first half is one year, and then the intermission allows for aging to occur if that is what you need for your action.

Characters, time and place are very minimal. The action is linear and occurs over a short period. Things that have happened beforehand are not shown in flashback, but are learnt through exposition of dialogue (without it being info dumped).

Most plays also start in the middle – in media res – so the action is on stage from the word go. Think about hamlet – the king is already dead, the queen is already remarried and Hamlet is already being an emo jerk.

Next we have characterisation. And in plays motivation is the key component here. Characters have a desire or want that is so strong they will do anything to achieve it. In a play I would suggest really doing a full character study before writing it. You must know where the character lives and why. What does he or she do for a living? Is the character educated? Age, religious beliefs, political leanings, and social behaviour are all parts of a person. These items may not be revealed in the final work, but a strong character study enables you to create a round and dimensional character. To reiterate, not everything you create will appear in the final product. And this must be done for every character. Something a lot of playwrights do is impose their own thoughts and ideals on characters that have not been set that way. Avoid this at all costs; the audience will know.

Finally, avoid idealising characters. The ideal person does not exist. Hamlet had a problem making decisions. Othello trusted the wrong man and had bad judgment. Don’t be afraid of giving your characters a flaw, or even two. After all, nobody is perfect.

Next, dialogue. The characters speak sort of like real people, but not quite. They are telling the audience things, but they shouldn’t be things other characters would already know. Get people to read your play out loud so you can test if the dialogue works.

More than anything else, play writing is about expressing humanity on the stage. Most successful plays say something about the human condition. Even the musicals. Sure, there are some exceptions (Cats springs to mind), but most say something about people. Even if back-dropped by world-shattering events, the play itself is focused on the people involved. One point in time.

So, that’s probably not what you were hoping for, but writing a play is, to me, the most difficult of things to write. I am not even close to successful. A couple of people on WdC have read one of my plays. But I am going to make money as a short story writer or novelist.

Still, some stories just cry out for a theatrical setting.