The Third Act

And Thorton Wilder is my hero. I just saw an amazingly refreshing, and wonderful performance of the play I've read a million times, Our Town. I've seen it twice before, each time with very convincing Emilys and Georges, but the rest of the cast was, you know, twelve, so things weren't as believable. This was great. Perfect, almost. Nothing crazy, just amazing acting, direction, and script. That play is one of the first pieces of innovative theatre I remember reading. I remember my first drama class, where I discovered reading new plays. Our Town and You Can't Take It With You were two of the first real plays I'd ever read, and I was hooked. Now I'm trying to write them myself. After years upon years of acting in them, helping out with them, building sets for them, reading them, writing about them, I thought I would like to write one of my own. Well, I've tried it a bunch of times in the past, and never got past more than twenty horrible pages of trite, teenage-angsty pieces. I had a few little scenes and monologues that weren't disposable, but no luck on length. I remember in high school when were were assigned to direct a 10-15 minute play I decided to write my own. It turned out, well for a sitcom-esque piece with one horrible (and unkind) actress in a vital role. It was fun though, and I started a trend of people trying to do something besides a Durang scene. Lately I've been thinking that I could direct shows, too, but nothing here is satisfying my cravings. I need, really need, to start some sort of group that can help create a show. I don't think that one person is enought to carry the creative anvil around.