Theater games at Chicago's St. Nicholas Theater Company

In addition to poetry, I have a fascination with the stage and theater, at least from a writer’s perspective. At the urging of friend Terry Soto, who also was an avid playgoer, I volunteered evenings (circa 1975?) at the small St. Nicholas Theater Company in Chicago on Halsted Street, north of Diversey. The theater space occupied what was once an auto repair shop. 

William H. Macy (right) in "American Buffalo"

It was founded by the then little known Chicago-based playwright David Mamet and actor William H. Macy. Many of Mamet’s early plays were launched at this little Chicago theater, such as “The Water Engine” and “American Buffalo,” in which Macy appeared. As a volunteer, I answered the phone, helped with the mailings, sat in rehearsals and attended as many performances as I wanted.

People who worked in the theater kept asking me what I was doing there, what I wanted to get out of volunteering. Did I want to become an actress? I wasn’t sure at that stage of my life if I wanted to write plays. I did love the plays of Arthur Miller and Eugene O’Neill, which oozed with poetry as well as edge-of-your-seat drama. At that moment, I merely reveled in just being around a theater and seeing what evolved to bring a play to life. I had no personal goals beyond enjoying my experiences there.

At St. Nicholas, I met lots of actors, took voice lessons (mainly with the goal of improving the way I read my poetry aloud) and knew if I wanted to, I might likely meet someone to go out with. No one, however, particularly attracted me.

As an equity actor, William H. Macy had to take on a longer and more formal name to distinguish him from Bill Macy, who played the husband to Bea Arthur of “Maude,” a popular show on TV at the time. Today, nobody remembers Bill Macy but everyone knows William H. Macy. Back at St. Nicholas Theater, I took one look at Macy and thought, not very charitably, “That little shrimp isn’t going anywhere.” How totally and utterly wrong I was!

Romance may not always be in the air during your extracurricular activities, but you are never wasting time if you are doing something you enjoy and stimulates you.  Getting involved in the theater showed me how the element of poetry woven in seamlessly within truly expert dramatic dialogue could be applied to my own poetry.
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The previous piece appears in my nonfiction memoir, reference and creativity guide Frugal Poets' Guide to Life: How to Live a Poetic Life, Even If You Aren't a Poet. ◦

Theater games at Chicago's St. Nicholas Theater Company

Dialogue with Creative Work

I have a day job, but I don't necessarily want to dialogue with it. I may argue with it a good portion of the eight hours I punch in, but I have other avocations that make more appealing partners. One is musical theater writing. I've worked on a children's musical and besides dialoging with my actual composer/collaborator, which is the most satisfying, my journal serves as an ideal stage to work out the answers to what drives the piece in the first place.

Some of the questions I pose consist of "What does the main character want?" and "What is the musical about?" When I ask what it's about, I don't mean the plot. The plot is what happens, scene by scene. Instead, I mean what deeper meaning is the piece trying to bring out? If it's about belonging, does the character discover that he or she can belong or that it may be impossible to really belong. If it's about connection, what might a character do to continually reinforce disconnection before finding a path to connecting with other people.

If working on a play or musical, you might have a journaled dialogue with your character asking directly what he or she wants, believes, avoids or regrets. You may not only find out your answer, but also find ways to smooth any bumpy parts of the script your characters trip on or redirect their steps when they wander away from where they and your piece are ultimately headed. [Intensive Journal Workshop][Ira Progoff] ◦

Dialogue with Creative Work