Richard O'Reilly

Scenecraft: The Art of Hearing Voices

Any prose benefits from sharpening the tools most often associated with playwriting: monologue, dialogue, and silence. Whether the example is the compelling presence of the monologue in the radio work of NPR's Ira Glass and David Sedaris, the sharp stylized dialogue in the films of Mike Leigh, the comic outrageousness and vulgarity of Sarah Silverman, the naturalistic street smart sweep of David Simon's The Wire, or the wry poignant humor in the stories of Lorrie Moore, modern prose leans heavily on theatrical lessons of how people speak to each other and to themselves. The class will include looking at these examples as a bridge to generative writing. Using gossip, dreams, photographs, listening to voices reading aloud, writing in the room, and working collaboratively, interdisciplinary experiments will be undertaken to create different modes of dialogue and monologue. Working with actors and performing, the class will make writing that steps off the page and into the mouths of real and imagined people. This workshop welcomes makers from performance, sound, design, or any other forms.

Working from a premise that dialogue is the pulse of a play and story its skin, we will generate new work for the stage. From first scenes to a completed rough draft, students will write a one-act or full-length play over the course of the semester. We will begin with a series of generative exercises, using dialogue and experiment to focus in on elements of character and story in the beginning of a play. We will then choose one of your new scenes to continue forward, moving into the center or crisis section of the play. In the final weeks of class, we will bring the new piece to a conclusion. Over the course of a semester, we will work on editing, rewriting, and reimagining the play into a full rough draft form. Previous playwriting experience is not required. Assigned texts will vary according to students' needs and interests, but will typically include readings of contemporary and modern plays. Some of the artists we may study in this course include playwrights Caryl Churchill, Suzan-Lori Parks, August Wilson, Wallace Shawn, Samuel Beckett and Edward Albee; as well as SAIC writing program alumni Kristiana Colón, Idris Goodwin and Jenny Magnus. The class will end with a staged reading of a section of each student¿s play.

This exploratory seminar provides an opportunity to experiment with blending literary and artistic forms as a way to create something new. Be prepared to take risks and favor questions on our expedition. Some hybrid forms include: prose poetry, flash non/fiction, lyric essay, text and image, video poem/essay, epistolary, and more. To assist us, we study hybridity from practitioners Carole Maso, Terrance Hayes, Sarah Shun-Lien Bynum, Torrey Peters, Kristen Radke, Kazim Ali, among others. Through generative exercises, group-led reading responses, a collaborative presentation on a hybrid form, and sharing new work in feedback sessions, the course culminates with a final project studio day. This class is open to writers and artists across all disciplines.

Taken every semester, the Graduate Projects courses allow students to focus in private sessions on the development of their work. Students register for 6 hours of Graduate Project credit in each semester of study.

Taken every semester, the Graduate Projects courses allow students to focus in private sessions on the development of their work. Students register for 6 hours of Graduate Project credit in each semester of study.