The Art and Craft of Playwriting

by Jeffery Hatcher

  Enter HORATIO and MARCELLUS.

  FRANCISCO: I think I hear them. Stand, ho! Who is there?

  HORATIO: Friends to this ground.

  MARCELLUS: And liegemen to the Dane.

  FRANCISCO: Give you good night.

  MARCELLUS: O, farewell, honest soldier.

  Who hath relieved you?

  FRANCISCO: Bernardo hath my place.

  Give you good night.

  Exit FRANCISCO.

  MARCELLUS: Holla, Bernardo!

  BERNARDO: Say—

  What, is Horatio there?

  HORATIO: A piece of him.

  BERNARDO: Welcome, Horatio. Welcome, good Marcellus.

  HORATIO: What, has this thing appeared again to-night?

  BERNARDO: I have seen nothing.

  MARCELLUS: Horatio say s 'tis but our fantasy,

  And will not let belief take hold of him

  Touching this dreaded sight twice seen of us.

  Therefore I have entreated him along

  With us to watch the minutes of this night,

  That, if again this apparition come,

  He may approve our eyes and speak to it.

  HORATIO: Tush, tush, 'twill not appear.

  BERNARDO: Sit down awhile,

  And let us once again assail your ears,

  That are so fortified against our story,

  What we two nights have seen.

  HORATIO: Well, sit we down,

  And let us hear Bernardo speak of this.

  BERNARDO: Last night of all,

  When yond same star that's westward from the pole

  Had made his course t'illume that part of heaven

  Where now it burns, Marcellus and myself,

  The bell then beating one—

  Enter GHOST.

  MARCELLUS: Peace, break thee off. Look where it comes again.

  BERNARDO: In the same figure like the king that's dead.

  MARCELLUS: Thou art a scholar; speak to it, Horatio.

  BERNARDO: Looks 'a not like the king? Mark it, Horatio.

  HORATIO: Most like. It harrows me with fear and wonder.

  BERNARDO: It would be spoke to.

  MARCELLUS: Speak to it, Horatio.

  HORATIO: What art thou that usurp'st this time of night

  Together with that fair and warlike form

  In which the majesty of buried Denmark

  Did sometimes march? By heaven I charge thee, speak.

  MARCELLUS: It is offended.

  BERNARDO: See, it stalks away.

  HORATIO: Stay. Speak, speak. I charge thee, speak.

  Exit GHOST.

  What is the similarity here? In both plays, we start with a mysterious opening depicted in dialogue of short, staccato sentences. The impression of urgency is communicated to the audience. Something is wrong. A balance has been or is just about to be disturbed. A balance in the kingdom, and a balance in a home.

  In Hamlet, it is the balance between the known world and the “undiscovered country” of the dead. In Six Degrees it is the balance between privileged complacence and the dangers of intrusion. In each play, a world is established. And then there is a change. Something is wrong: a ghost is roaming the battlements of Elsinore castle; the Kittredges have just survived the shock of an intruder.

  In the first moments of both plays, the playwright has provided a highly theatrical means of communicating the jumping-off point of his story. In Hamlet, we witness this through peripheral, supporting characters (none of the major players has made his first appearance). In Six Degrees, the couple at the center of the play begin their own story. And we're off. In these cases, the scenes pave the way for both the revelation of the inciting incident and the point of attack. Six Degrees is a perfect example. In this opening moment, we see the results of the evening the Kittredges spent with Paul, the young con man who pretended to be the son of Sidney Poitier (the inciting incident). Following this scene, the Kittredges will decide to find out who Paul really is and embark on their own investigation (point of attack). Guare has found a theatrical and dramatic way to start his plot at the fulcrum of his inciting incident and his point of attack.

  But when using the “we're off” approach, the playwright must be mindful of the audience's level of observation and attention. It can be argued that the opening of a play provides ultimate attention for an audience, ultimate focus. But it can also be argued that at this early stage of the proceedings, the audience may not have yet found its bearings, may not yet have readied itself to focus its full attention on the performance. Perhaps an audience member has just sat down moments before the curtain has gone up. Perhaps he's thinking about a fight at home. Perhaps she's thinking about a problem at the office.

  In the plays cited above, the playwrights employ a shrewd technique to energize the performance, begin the story, turn on the plot and introduce characters. But the playwrights also do something else. They return to the moment later on—just in case. In the opening of Hamlet, we encounter the ghost and are introduced to the mystery of its appearance. Why is it on the battlements? What is its purpose? A dramatic question has been posed, but Shakespeare will pose it again in Act One, Scene Two, and again in Act One, Scene Three, and again and again in Act One, Scene Five. No audience member could possibly miss it. In Six Degrees, Guare moves from his dazzling opening to a flashback as the Kittredges tell the story of what happened to them the night before. In twenty-five minutes of playing time, the action will come full circle. The Kittredges will discover the intruder with his “friend,” and the opening dialogue will begin again, as if in a “loop.” If the audience didn't quite catch the dialogue the first time in the opening, Guare has made sure to bring it back again. That's craft.

  The “we're off!” method buys theatrical excitement, but it also requires dramatic insurance. The key point to remember is that the “we're off!” method is designed to provide the background for the major action of the play, the inciting incident, and to lead toward the character's major conflict and pursuit, the point of attack.

  Slow Immersion

  The alternative to the “we're off!” approach of starting a play on the high-speed lane is the “slow immersion” approach, a way of acclimating the audience to the plot. Imagine a person calmly and deliberately lowering himself into cold water inch by inch, step by step, until his body is fully inured to the new environment. Slow immersion.

  This method is employed more often in representational theater and finds its greatest examples in plays written between the end of the nineteenth century and today. This method underlines the audience's need to believe in the world being represented to them. Slow immersion into a play or a scene requires time. But the best examples of this method are never slow moving. Look at Henrik Ibsen's Hedda Gabler.

  Act One

  A large, nicely furnished drawing room. In the rear wall is a wide doorway with curtains drawn back. The doorway leads to another smaller room which in turn communicates with other rooms in the house. A large framed mirror on the upstage wall dominates this smaller room.

  In the stage right wall is a doorway leading to the entrance hall.

  In the stage left wall is a large window. In the down left corner of the wall is a small door to the outside.

  In the down right corner is a white tile, wood-burning stove. The chimney extends out of sight.

  Also in the room, a high-backed chair, a cushioned footstool, an oval table, a two-seater sofa, several side chairs.

  Up left is a baby grand piano, on which numerous bouquets of roses have been arranged.

  It is early morning. Sunlight through the window.

  MISS JULIANA TESMAN, about sixty-five, wearing a simple gray suit, wearing a hat and carrying a parasol, enters from the hall.

  She is followed by BERTHE, the Tesmans' maid. BERTHE carries yet another bouquet of roses.

  MISS TESMAN: (Hushed) I can't believe it. They're still in bed.

  BERTHE: (Also hushed) I told you, Miss. With the boat ge
tting in so late last night and then the young lady couldn't rest until I'd unpacked every one of the trunks.

  MISS TESMAN: Yes, yes. Well, let them sleep in. But goodness knows they'll want some fresh morning air when they finally do emerge.

  SHE throws windows wide open.

  BERTHE: There's just nowhere left for these poor flowers. Maybe I could just put them here, Miss.

  MISS TESMAN: So here you are, Berthe, with a new master now—and a new mistress. God knows it nearly finished me to let you go.

  BERTHE: (Near tears) Think of me. Miss! What do you think it's like for me after all the blessed years I've been with you and Miss Rina?

  MISS TESMAN: We must rise above, Berthe. We must rise above. There's nothing else we can do. George must have you here with him in this house. He simply must. You've looked after him since he was a tiny boy.

  BERTHE: Oh, I know, Miss. But I can't help thinking about Miss Rina, lying there, helpless, poor thing. And the new girl! She doesn't know the first thing about looking after someone so sick.

  MISS TESMAN: Oh, we'll manage. I suppose I'll have to take most of the burden on myself. But we'll manage, dear Berthe. Don't worry yourself over my poor sister.

  BERTHE: There is something else, Miss. I'm frightened that the young lady won't find me to her liking.

  MISS TESMAN: Oh, you're being foolish, Berthe. Certainly at the beginning there may be one or two little problems, but—

  BERTHE: I have a feeling she'll be very demanding.

  MISS TESMAN: Well, of course she will! She's General Gabler's daughter. Just think what her life was like when he was still alive! Remember her out riding with her father, galloping past us in the street? In that long, black dress with a feather in her hat?

  BERTHE: Oh, yes, I remember. I couldn't have dreamt then that she'd wind up married to our little scholar.

  MISS TESMAN: No, no, neither could I. But Berthe dear, our George is no longer a little scholar. You mustn't call him that. You have to say, “Doctor.”

  BERTHE: Yes, yes. So the mistress told me last night, as soon as they walked through the door.

  What do we learn from this initial “slow immersion” into Hedda Gabler? Hedda has not even come onstage yet. Neither has her husband George Tesman, her former lover Eilert Lovborg, the sly Judge Brack, or the naive Mrs. Elvstead. Miss Tesman and Berthe are the smallest roles in the play. But Ibsen is patiently laying his groundwork. His set description tells us a lot: we're in an upper-middle class drawing room at the turn of the century. Lots of flowers suggest a woman's presence and a homecoming. All of the entrances and exits will be used to maximum effect later in the play, as will the furniture, especially that stove. We know that someone has just returned from a trip. We know that the maid used to work for Miss Tesman but now works for the young master of the house. We know that Miss Tesman's sister Rina is dying. We know that “General Gabler's daughter” is spectacular and difficult. From these opening moments we learn:

  • the central characters (Hedda—“General Gabler's daughter”—and Dr. George Tesman, her husband)

  • the foreshadowing of the central dramatic action (Will Hedda survive this setting?)

  • the tone of the play (Serious)

  • the style of the play (Naturalism)

  • and the design—setting, sound, light, costume—of the play (A realistically depicted drawing room)

  The “slow immersion” strategy is different from the “we're off!” method, but the key point to remember is that the “slow immersion” method is also designed to provide the background for the major action of the play, the inciting incident and to lead toward the character's major conflict and pursuit, the point of attack.

  Two points of departure. One destination. Quoting Aristotle, “The case is made.” And the play has started.

  EXERCISES

  1. Introduce two characters. In twenty lines of representational exposition, let your audience know that one is a construction worker, the other a psychiatrist; that the setting is a church; that the two characters are waiting for the same person to enter; that the president of the United States is visiting the city in which the scene takes place. Use code words/phrases/references to suggest professions, place, offstage characters in a natural manner.

  2. Decide when the action of your story starts. Write down the first action of the play. Consider this first action. Is this the point of attack? Or is this action the inciting incident to the point of attack. Or is it a lesser action? The way to tell is this: The most dramatically exciting action is the one that comes at the point of attack.

  3. What does your audience need to know in the first few minutes of your play? Write a presentational scene that delivers exposition at the beginning of the play. Put the key exposition in a monologue. Choose a character in your story who has a strong need to tell someone—either the audience or an unseen character—the exposition.

  4. Now write the same exposition in representational dialogue. Use code, use conflict.

  5. Now try to write the exposition without dialogue. Use stage action without words. Use the set. Use sound and music. Use slides above the stage if need be. Be as economical as possible.

  6. Write the first scene of the play in the “we're off!” method. This may lead you toward a presentational mode. Find the dramatic, theatrical moment in the early part of your story that will grab the audience's attention in the first seconds of the play. Will it entice the audience? Will it confuse them? Will it make them lean forward and want to learn more? Will you have to go back and fill in some blanks, a la Six Degrees of Separation?

  7. Write the first scene of the play in the “slow immersion” method. You'll probably find you employ a representational mode here. What small questions can you pose to hook the audience as you move toward revealing the inciting incident and then pushing toward the point of attack?

  8. In Six Degrees of Separation John Guare shows us the inciting incident—the night Ouisa and Flan spent with Paul “Pokier”—that propels his play forward. For your play, write a scene where you depict the inciting incident onstage. If you were rewriting Hamlet you would write the scene of King Hamlet's murder by his brother Claudius.

  9. In Hamlet, Shakespeare does not show us the inciting incident that propels the play forward. It is told to Hamlet and the audience by the ghost. Now write a scene that reports on your inciting incident as an event that took place in the past, as Shakespeare does when the ghost tells Hamlet about his murder. If you were rewriting Six Degrees, you'd write a scene where Ouisa Kittredge tells someone about the night she and her husband spent with the intruder, Paul.

  10. Decide which of the above two methods is more conducive to the story you wish to tell and the plot you wish to structure.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Great Middles

  In every play, almost everything takes place in the middle. No writer has yet found a way to jump from beginning to end without crossing that pesky territory in between. A play that begins strongly with a terrific point of attack and then suddenly rushes to its climax is a play without a center. The middle takes up 50 to 75 percent of a play. For most full-length plays, that's seventy to one hundred pages. In running time, it's probably sixty to ninety minutes.

  Many plays fail because they never get off to a strong beginning. Many plays fail because they have a weak, confusing or predictable ending. But most flawed plays fail because nothing much happens in the middle. The characters run out of goals too quickly. They run out of obstacles. They run out of ideas and strategies. Opportunities don't arise.

  You might want to look at your play this way:

  As a map, with a point of departure and a point of arrival.

  As a football field, with goals and lines along the way.

  As an arc, with many arcs within arcs, as Martin Esslin suggests.

  There may be other ways to draw your play, and frankly, you don't have to draw anything. I am convinced, however, that writers need to think in terms of shape a
nd journey, and if there's a way for you to visualize that shape and journey, do it. Use whatever works for you. But you can see from my three diagrams that the middle of your play is the part that covers the largest number of miles; it has the most yardage; it contains the most arcs (and arcs within arcs).

  You want to fill the great middle of your play with two primary ingredients: forward-moving action on the part of the main character(s); and complications.

  Forward-moving action is fairly easy to grasp. It's any direct or indirect action performed by the main character(s) to achieve the major goal of the play. These actions include murders, robberies, seductions, searches, confessions, lies, kindnesses, cruelties and sacrifices. They are struggles toward the goal(s).

  Complications can be found in many actions:

  • A sudden entrance that interrupts a character's plan (the maid comes in while a murder is in progress).

  • An exit that leaves a character alone and adrift (the wife deserts her husband just before his big client comes to dinner).

  • A tempting diversion that pulls a character from her action (the jewel thief can't resist stealing a small ring en route to a much bigger heist).

  • A roadblock (a man tries to secure a business deal, but he finds his prey has signed what appears to be an ironclad contract with someone else).

  • An opportunity (the one person who knows that the “princess” is an impostor arrives at the party).

  • A challenge (a duel is fought just before one of the duelists is to be married).

  • A withheld secret (a little boy spies an illicit kiss but doesn't let on that he's seen it).

  • A pursuit (a woman is trying to tell a man that she's in love with him, but other suitors keep running after her).

  • A revelation (the woman the hero is about to marry is unmasked as his sister).

  • A reversal of fortune (a witness the defense lawyer thought would give the accused an alibi incriminates him instead).

  As you plan your middle section, think of all the potential complications that could arise. Are they strong enough? Are they believable? Could they really happen, given the rules you've established for your play? If it's a crime drama, think about criminal law and the rules of probability. If it's a children's fantasy, think about childhood beliefs and the rules of magic. Are there too few complications? Too many? Compare your work to the plays we listed earlier.