Waiting Room Ideas

What do I want from this play?

What do I want the audience to see?

What is my metaphor?

I think I want it to feel like a documentary. When I keep asking myself what I want it to feel like, that’s what immediately pops to mind. I saw this documentary a few weeks ago called Very Young Girls about prostitution in New York city and the victimization of poor, teenage girls. I keep coming back to that…I want it to be the characters telling their stories to the audience. I want them to be telling their stories to the world, honestly. I feel that I picked these characters because they were people that wanted to talk. They’re not the ones that don’t want people to see their lives…they’re all more present than that.

At the same time, I want the audience to be reminded that these are real people with lives similar to their own. I think that the intimate aspect of the teaching theater is appealing because it lets the audience get closer to the characters. They’re more a part of the action, not  as removed from it.

Ok I think I was just lying by saying that. I think…there is a way we can create a documentary-esque feel in the big space….I think it can be done in writing, in creating character, in acknowledging the presence of the audience. I think I want the scenes to feel more candid, less rehearsed. I want the audience to feel like a camera lens. I can see a character putting her hand over her face…someone not wanting to talk. Someone not “finishing” a scene, running out. And I think that this can contribute to the “reality” and connection of the audience. If they feel as though they are there, they are the ones being talked to, I think it can be beneficial to be on a bigger stage.

I think the way I’ve been describing it to Di/Rose is that there are these “memories”. And I think …actually…that they don’t have to feel like memories. They can be real. We, the audience, can be the ones piecing them together. Perhaps the waiting room is the glue that holds the scenes together, yes, it is the thing that joins them all, but it doesn’t mean that the other scenes aren’t in real time. They are in the present, and we are the ones seeing them in a different timeline.

I don’t know if that makes sense.

What this does mean is that there are a lot of scenes that will have to disappear. Keyona and the doctor, Sarah and the party. If the scenes aren’t memories, they’re candid scenes viewed through a lens, I’m not sure if those scenes are appropriate. This also presents the problem of what the other characters are experiencing – not the main five, but the supporting characters. I feel like those other characters are not following the same pattern in the play as it is right now. They don’t have monologues…maybe they’re unnecessary? (The other characters, I mean)

I think what’s most helpful to hammer out is how aware the characters are of this lens. Are they aware that they’re being watched? In all instances? Who are they talking to?

I think they are having “confessionals” as part of the “documentary” during their monologues or soliloquies or whatever the correct term is, that the lens is also apparent during the other scenes, but not to the same extent. It’s less acknowledgeable. At least to the other characters. I think this can work.