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Thursday, 26 November 2009 |
Canadian actor, director, and playwright Sterling Lynch celebrates the first anniversary of his blog today, November 26, 2009. Congratulations!
Sterling and I started working together several months ago when our paths crossed on Twitter (@MareBiddle and @SterlingLynch). Though we each bring a unique perspective and process to the composition of a play, Sterling and I appreciate a similar aesthetic in the form.
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Tuesday, 17 November 2009 |
Taking risks. Moving outside the four edges of the page. Taking a gamble that the world is in fact round. That I won’t sail off the edge of the screen even though it certainly feels like that to me. Canadian graphic novelist, Von Allan, just released his first book entitled the road to god knows…. Over the last few weeks, we have talked via email about taking risks. He told me, “Risk taking for me isn’t the work itself. Risk is deciding to even try to do any of the work at all.” Von’s thoughts so clearly capture the fits and starts of staying seated at my desk every day. Writing is easy. It’s starting to write that sends me into a spiral. I imagine that today—today I will not be able to do it. Today I will not be able to string the words together. Today I will fail.
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Friday, 11 September 2009 |
I’ve been working on a collection of short plays, Baby You Can Drive My Car, for the better part of a year. One 10-min play in the collection, Pumpkin Pie, was included in the 2008 Theatre Artists Studio’s Holiday Festival. Several other pieces have been workshopped at Space55 in Phoenix. People are excited about the collection and want to continue developing the work for production next fall. It’s too bad this piece isn’t even close to what I intended to write.
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Sunday, 16 August 2009 |
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I’m generally not one for quippy little phrases like, “on the same page”, “out of pocket” or “thinking outside the box”. I don’t like bumper-sticker-speak. Three letter acronyms (TLA’s) drive me batshit. And don’t even get me started on Intel-speak. If someone you love is employed by Intel you know what I’m talking about here. We should form a support group – an ISG. |
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Friday, 24 July 2009 |
I finally met up with Tyson Crosbie last week. He was generous with his time and in his inscription in my copy of Phoenix 21. We talked for about an hour, and I fully intended to follow up on my post a few weeks ago by asking him to answer the question: which comes first - point of view or negative space? That’s what I intended, but I’m about to hijack my own article.
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Monday, 20 July 2009 |
Does process or product drive the work? Kyle (@Jordre) and I had this conversation not long ago. We talked about the give and take between our will and the life of the work – when does the work lead, and when does the artist? We have such great crazy conversations when we’re both exhausted and in need of a break. “Do you work toward product or are you entirely process driven?” I asked him. “Do you know what you want a painting to look like before you start, or after you’ve started, and moreover, how do you know when you’re done?”
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Sunday, 12 July 2009 |
Tyson Crosbie is a Phoenix-based fine arts photographer. His second collection, Phoenix 21, is an essay of photographs that to me tell a very distinct story: a story of separation, fury, and acceptance. I don’t know if this is what Tyson intended, but his work feels like poetry to me – infused with the artist’s intent as well as the point of view of the observer.
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Wednesday, 24 June 2009 |
My friend, Kyle Jordre, is a Phoenix-based abstract expressionist. His work is beautiful and infused with the imagination of the beholder—to whatever they see. He approaches painting in ways that have forever altered my perspective of the world and of what art brings to my writing life.
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Thursday, 11 June 2009 |
Five of us meet every week to read scripts and give each other feedback on our material. Sometimes I don’t construct the arc properly. Sometimes I muddy up the throughline. Sometimes I get too tricky with a device, or two. Tell me what’s not working. But don’t mess with my people.
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Friday, 05 June 2009 |
Tonight is the reading of my play The Guy From 1992 at the Dramatists Guild of America’s New Works Festival at the Scottsdale Center for the Performing Arts. This is my second year in the festival, and it’s shaping up to be a wonderful evening. I have the coolest director ever for this gig. I'm so happy with where she's gone with this whacked little diddy. My actors are hilarious and so sweet and invested. What a gift to see my words lifted with care and projected with reckless abandon.
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