Dear Reader – Long time, no see! I apologize. Quick explanation. First, several months ago, I was contacted by my editor at Waveland Press, who indicated that he was interested in doing a 3rd edition of Introduction to Play Analysis. This was good news, since it indicated that sales were strong enough to justify it. I then pitched the idea of a complete overhaul of the book, which he endorsed enthusiastically. Last week, I submitted the completed revision, which I am very excited about.
What I’ve done is substituted the analysis of Susan Glaspell’s one-act Trifles in place of the original material on The Glass Menagerie. My thinking was that I wanted to do two things: 1) make the textbook self-contained (so we’ve included the text of Glaspell’s play as an appendix), and 2) provide a step-by-step example of what our analysis system looks like when applied to a specific play. I also did a general stylistic edit to make the text a bit sharper and more streamlined. Essentially, what I did was synthesize Introduction to Play Analysis with my other analysis book, Play Analysis in Action: Susan Glaspell’s Trifles.
So that took up a lot of mental energy. I don’t know when the 3rd edition will come out, but I’ll keep you informed.
While working on the revision, I experienced a personal shift: I just lost energy around writing about theater. I knew I wanted to get myself out of the current events discussions surrounding the seeming collapse of the nonprofit theater model. I was going back to my roots in criticism, reading Robert Brustein, Lionel Trilling, and my new critical hero Edmund Wilson, and considering making a shift to long-form think pieces about plays, theater theory, and theater history. And that may happen in the future.
Basically, I realized that (once again) I was treating this like a job instead of an enthusiasm. I realized that my writing I is more energetic and valuable when it is powered by a new idea or current obsession. I’m not a pundit churning out essays on a regular schedule.
What this means for you is that Theater Ideas may jump around a bit in the future (welcome to the inside of my head), with new “content” sometimes appearing in fast succession, followed by stretches of silence while I read, think, and reload my imagination.
So what am I energized about right now?
Broadly, I find myself returning to questions about the structure, purpose, and techniques of the rehearsal process. I’ve always held to the slogan that “sacred cows make the best burgers,” so I suspect I’ll be knocking the building down to the foundation and questioning a lot of things about how we build plays. Overall, I think the rehearsal process is, at root, about learning a new skill. In other words, it is basically a pedagogical process, and as such can benefit from recent research into how people learn. For example, the replacement of a “teacher-centered classroom” by the “learner-centered classroom” might have some useful ideas for theater practice. And I might spend some time thinking about the benefits of an ongoing theater company, and what needs to be done to avoid staleness.
I’m also very interested in what is happening in AI these days. I have always been an “early adopter” when it comes to technology, and I refuse to get sucked into the negative narrative surrounding the effects of AI on all things creative. At the very least, I want to experiment with it myself. For instance, I look at something like Cuebric and start wondering about how it might enhance storytelling.
I’m also interested in the stock market right now, which I probably won’t be writing about, but which is another instance of pattern recognition that, when all is said and done, is what I really find fascinating in play analysis, theater making, and anything else.
So that’s where my head is at for now—more updates coming as inspiration strikes!
P.S. Substack has rolled out additional tools on the site. They can now accomodate audio and video. I’m curious about your habits. Would you take this poll for me?
In addition to reading my Substack, which of the following do you do (this is for me to figure out if I’d like to expand my genres). The poll will be live for 3 days: