Student Blog: Passing the Script, A Playwright's Reflection

As I’ve mentioned in previous blogs on my BroadwayWorld page, playwriting is a passion of mine that I hold very dearly, and plan on keeping in my life into my professional career. And of course, with this comes the dreams of having my work published and produced regionally-- something that’s always been a dream of mine. These past two months, I felt a skyrocket for my career when for the first time I opened my email inbox to a formal rights request for one of my short plays.

In 2022, a play I wrote entitled Mortal Dilemma won a regional playwriting contest at Trinity Rep in Rhode Island, where it received a staged reading. Following that, I took the script to an arts show at my then college, where it was fully cast and produced. The piece had had some time to sit for the past two years, so I wasn’t expecting anyone to discover it, that is until I received an email from students at Butler Community College. They were selecting plays for a one night event called The Underground Theatre Project and came across Mortal Dilemma on a new works site, and asked me formally for the production rights. This was EXHILARATING to hear! All I’ve ever wanted was for my work to be performed regionally and here was the exact opportunity. Of course, I accepted their offer, and that was that. …sort of.

Every production of my piece that had been done thus far was one that I largely had creative influence over, and this would be the first time where that wasn’t the case. I’ve always been very particular about my work, and there was a slight stressor in the back of my brain at the idea of the piece not being done or perceived in the way I intended as the writer. However, I decided to take this as an opportunity to practice releasing some of that perfectionism around my work and trust the artists it was in the hands of. After all, they saw something in the text– enough to want to bring it to life. I owed it to the students to trust their process and creative eye. 

I got occasional updates on the piece for a while, and actually was able to gain a bit of a friendship with their theatre program through supporting each other on social media! I gave over to the excitement and curiosity of my piece being in entirely new hands, and actually found it was a bit thrilling to know that my writing was being thought through and conceptualized in a way completely different from my own. Also on social media, I was able to get to know some of the BCC students, and was especially excited when the actors invited me to sit in on one of their rehearsals virtually! I LOVED their portrayals of the characters and found that I was feeling the life and poignancy they delivered, while also pleasantly surprising me with light and sound ideas I hadn’t even thought about in my own productions.

While I wasn’t able to see the final performance in person due to distance, I opened my laptop up the second they sent me the video and watched it immediately with the widest grin on my face. The production they put up was a complete pleasant surprise, being very different from my past creative choices in a way that held my attention and interest through its entirety. It was such a proud, surreal moment for me to see my own work after being practiced and staged, and most of all I loved seeing the audience and their reactions. There was something so powerful about knowing that even across the country, my art was impacting people in completely new ways and under new eyes. I messaged the students afterwards to praise their performance and let them know how grateful I was for this experience and the opportunity to not only share my work with a new audience, but also to entrust it into such good hands. I hope that this experience is a great first of many productions I can have shared with the theatre world going forwards, and it is absolutely a start I won’t forget :)