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Mental Digestion

Posted by DCA Theater on August 10, 2010 in July-December 2010 Season, INCUBATOR Series: Thirteen Pocket

by Jeff Phillips, playwright for Bosto script as part of XIII Pocket Incubator

From left to right: Heath Cordts, Chip Davis and Mark Minton during a reading of Bosto

An inspired stab at a foreseen taste, tossing ingredients at hand together until the smells and the bronzing of the edibles signify its readiness, and it is delightful to the tongue…then the feast sets in and puts you to sleep, makes you feel heavy, and there’s a slight acidity in the belly in the dark of night that awakes you and keeps you stirring.

Sometimes a piece of writing comes out like an impromptu experiment in cooking.  It comes together quickly, and sits with you in compelling fashion after a first read.  But the deeper you digest, like the aforementioned meal, it keeps you stirring.

We’ve completed our first week of the DCA incubator, and have taken a look at Bosto line by line.  My copy of the script is littered with notes in the margin and so are several pages of a separate notebook.  Part of what happens when you put a handful of sharp people in a room and dig into a brand new play is that a plethora of questions are posed on top of fresh observations.  I certainly have my homework cut out for me to process each note and sift through the script to incorporate and reshape.  Luckily I have a full stretch of time this weekend to do such. I have always enjoyed puzzles, and the task in a sense of balancing out new ideas on character, time, setting, and theme is one wild and intense puzzle.  Within the setting of Bosto is a deep network of the ventilation ducts, offstage.  Such a thing can make for a high stakes scenario, yet at this point the themes and desires of each character are not yet anchored into such an imaginary presence, that could really drive the action forward. Bosto is on the verge of becoming an economic horror story.

It’s an interesting process diving into the workshopping of play.  There is no formula.  The key is come in humbled, understand that your new work is far from perfect.  It reminds me of something an acting teacher once said to me, “take advantage of the fact that now is the time where you can fuck up.”  Not to say that there is a time in creating art where risks must no longer be taken, but it’s very important that they are taken in the early stages of a work of art.