Author | Lightnews

PlaywrightNow

@playwrightnow.bsky.social

160 followers 78 following 300 posts

I teach myself to write plays one post at at time. Author: Trap, Ghostlight, The Neverland Project, This is a Test, Small Actors. O. Henry's Guide to the Present Member of www.labtwenty6.com, a Los Angeles Writers Group.

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Huntsville Independent Press @hiphuntsville.bsky.social · 8d

Good morning, #5amwritersclub! Writing isn’t about controlling every word—it’s about trusting the next one. 📖

#6amwritersclub #WritingCommunity #AmWriting #AmQuerying #IndieAuthor #AuthorsOfTwitter #WIP #AmWriting #MorningWriting

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MT Hart @mthart.bsky.social · 7d

NOT A LIFT, BUT, #WritingCommunity, This is the SINGLE MOST Important post that I believe should be posted EVERY DAY by every author so teachers and readers shop here first. IMHO steal and repost!

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PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 7d

Does autopilot Web browsing ransack your concentration? (Like now?) Try an internet block. I like Freedom. Cheap, effective. It helps. (I have no affiliation.)

PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 10d

I'm starting an organization devoted to abolishing set changes. Our motto: There are better ways to kill your play's momentum.

Please join.

#playwriting

PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 10d

If you live in Los Angeles and like live theatre, go to the website in this article and you'll instantly see how useful it is.

theatrecommonsla.org

Reposted by PlaywrightNow

Cole Haddon @colehaddon.bsky.social · 11d

In 1959, an American schoolgirl wrote C.S. Lewis (THE LION, THE WITCH AND THE WARDROBE) and asked for advice on writing. This was his response:

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PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 11d

"It takes as long to rehearse Hamlet today as it did four hundred years ago."

Nic Bencerraf, as quoted in the article "Masters Degree Preferred," by Maridee Slater in @howlround.bsky.social

PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 12d

The longer it takes to write the first draft, the more you invest in it— in a bad way. Write it fast so you can scoff at it.

#writing

PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 13d

Useful term.

The Magical Negro. A supporting stock character who comes to the aid of white protagonists. Spike Lee popularized the term, while calling out The Green Mile for containing a super-duper-magical Negro character, selflessly helping white people.

PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 14d

Rewrite stuck? Find important info introduced neutrally. Electrify it by using it as a tactic, a reveal, a weapon. (Follow the ripples.)

#playwriting #writing

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ChapterBuzz Discovery Network @chapterbuzz.bsky.social · 16d

#writing tip!

Don't just give readers the entire backstory about a character or place all at once. This is an "info dump," and it's very boring.

Instead, spread it out! Sprinkle in bits and pieces of the backstory in dialogue, descriptions, and action scenes.

#writingtips #amwriting #selfpub

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PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 16d

If your antagonist is a cartoon, you drain away most of your stakes. No one will care.

#stakes #writing #scripts

PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 17d

If blocks of writing time are rare and you have one coming up, do yourself a favor and find 20 minutes a day in the days preceding.

You don't want to jump in cold. You want the play in your head, questions primed, and a list of tasks you're desperate to start with.

#writing

PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 18d

Read plays you just saw and see plays you just read.

PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 18d

Start writing. No matter what. The water does not flow until the tap is turned on.

—Louis L'Amour

PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 20d

Horror movies terrify us even though we know that nothing onscreen can reach out and grab us. If anything, it's plays that should be scary.

#halloween #horror #scary #writing

PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 21d

Jason is important to the history of horror because he's right at the border of the monsters who we pretend scare us and the people who actually do.

#scary #halloween #amwriting #writing

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PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 24d

Theatre, especially high school theatre, needs scary plays.

What frightens us in a play is different from what frightens us in a movie. In theatre, jump cares rarely work,

Scary plays are about dread.

#scary #writing

PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 24d

The best way to raise the stakes of a goal is to show all the different things your protagonist does to achieve it.

#writing #writetip #writingcommunity

PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 25d

If a shark stops swimming, it dies. Writers are sharks. If the fingers aren't moving, the ideas don't come. Try writing while lying in bed, staring at the ceiling. Maybe, you hope, inspiration will flow past my gills.

Perhaps a sea lion will swim into my mouth.

PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 25d

The quiet panic attack:

"This play is too big. I don't know what I'm doing." One strategy: a list of tiny projects. Typos, smooth a scene, change problematic names. When you don't know what to do, do SOMETHING. Even small progress relaxes you, leads to bigger progress.

#writetip #writingcommunity

PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 26d

Pixar's 22 rules of storytelling can be found all over the internet. I guarantee that you'll find at least three that are useful to you.

www.aerogrammestudio.com/2013/03/07/p...

Pixar's 22 Rules of Storytelling

Pixar's Rules of Storytelling were originally tweeted by Emma Coats, a Pixar Story Artist. Rule 1: You admire a character for trying more than for their successes.

www.aerogrammestudio.com

PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 26d

Why I use an internet blocker, in two sentences:

I see the headline "Chrissy Teigen's fall from grace" and I'm desperate to click on it.

First, I look up who Chrissy Teigen is.

#amnotwriting #writing

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PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · 29d

I love the phrase Jump the Shark, the moment a narrative so leaves its reality that it's ruined.

In the first 10 minutes, you make a contract with the audience. Jumping = breaking the contract.The contract terms are implicit:

This is a comedy.

No one will shapeshift.

The Fonz doesn't waterski.

PlaywrightNow @playwrightnow.bsky.social · Oct 5

Weaponize your exposition.

Put another way: the best character to dole out information isn't the friend who tells it over tea; it's the enemy who's lashing out, pummeling your protagonist with it.

#writing #writetips #writingcommunity #stageandscreen

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