Got this from the Burbank Public Library yesterday, along with about a million other plays. This is supposed to be a great family script, so excited to read it. 

Lessons learned will be on next page.

Written by Quiara Alegria Hudes

Very hard hitting American family comedy-drama. Kind of bleak, but obviously this is an amazing play.

We learned a lot from it (and plenty that we can apply to DON'T LOOK DOWN). More on that on the next page.

​Written by Tracy Letts

Written about both of these plays already on here, but went back to re-read last week and took down some notes.

Love both of these and they both have a lot to teach, so we should read this post all the time. 

This was a great play, full of manipulation, secret resentment, and unspoken feelings. One thing that I liked a lot about it was the concept of interiority vs. exteriority as first explained by Douglas in reference to landscaping. There's this idea that all the characters have a face they present that does not bely their interior lives. Leonard, for instance, has been mortally wounded by the false accusation that he plagiarized from a student, and therefore puts on a contrarian and arrogant face but keeps all of his writing to himself now. Kate, certain that Leonard only dislikes her writing because of her perceived entitlement and vapidity, pretends to be writing as a Cuban transsexual to get Leonard to see past the exteriority. Martin, certain that he'll be unable to maintain his sarcastic and judgmental exterior if he reveals his writing, keeps hundreds of pages hidden away from view.

MARJORIE PRIME is a play that exists in a world where robotic replicas of loved ones are sold as a tool for people to deal with things like death and dementia in people who are close to them.

 Written by Jordan Harrison

We have been reading plays to gain a deeper understanding of character driven work. Here are a couple big lessons we’ve learned (or re-learned) recently...