Back Story: A ten-minute play ten years in the making

A writer learns that theater is a collaborative effort

Ten years ago, when I got it in my head that I wanted to drop everything and move to Yellow Springs, I rented a cheap apartment in Xenia where I lived alone for a couple months while I surveyed the landscape and did a lot of writing. The bedroom window where my computer desk sat looked out onto the horse barns at the Greene County Fair Grounds. It was late spring and there was often somebody just outside my window, usually training horses. Their voices would drift up to where I was working, but I was rarely able to make out what they were saying. One day, two fellows were sitting out in lawn chairs talking. I couldn’t understand them, but I imagined a conversation that I worked into a short story about two older men parking cars at the Greene County Fair.

Fast forward about seven or eight years. Holly Hudson organizes a 10-minute play festival at the Antioch Theater and I am impressed with the quality and creativity of many of the plays. I catch the bug and search my archives for a dialogue-heavy story that I can convert into a play. It doesn’t take me long to remember the story I called “Nothing Better to Do.” I adapt it, and change the name to “Parking Spaces,” thinking it will make a good entry for the following year’s festival. Only there is none. So it sits on my hard drive for a couple years with no place to go. It is all but forgotten until I get the promo materials for this year’s Soft Serve Playhouse 10-Minute Play Festival at the Corner Cone. I dig it out, dust it off a bit and send it in. When I receive the notification that it has been accepted, I call my friend Walter Rhodes, to whom I had given a copy of the script a couple years before, and leave a message on his answering machine. I am laughing so hard that about the only part that is decipherable is “What am I going to do now? I’m going to have to produce the damn thing!”

I have had very little experience in the theater. I can’t remember being in a play in either grade school or high school. How did I escape that? I was once drafted to be an extra in “Julius Caesar” in college and, in a scene reminiscent of the movie “The Party” with Peter Sellers, almost ruined the entire production when I singlehandedly turned tragedy into comedy. But that’s another story. As an adult, I played in the pit orchestra for “The Music Man.”

Finally, a few years ago, I was drafted by Walter to play a small part in “You Can’t Take It With You,” in a production he was directing at Clark State. This was important for two reasons: I actually learned a lot about theater while doing it; and, after 11 performances plus dress rehearsals, Walter owed me big time. So, I cashed in my chit, asking him to direct “Parking Spaces” and play a walk on role. He accepted the role and we settled on his serving as my consultant in the direction department.

I still needed two older male actors with experience or else I might have to play a part. Memorizing lines is not my forte and I had sworn off acting after the final performance of “You Can’t Take It With You.” Fortunately, local actors Ron Siemer and Jerry Buck were available. Buck and I had worked together in the play at Clark State and I had seen Siemer in at least one of Kay Reimer’s plays. After our first reading on the back deck of my house, I knew I had made a good choice; my actors understood the play and were serious about doing it justice.

Rehearsals moved out to Elaine Brown’s farm where Walter lives. We rehearsed the play three or four times per session about three times a week for almost four weeks. We weren’t going to fail for lack of preparation. Besides, we were enjoying ourselves too much to stop. All of our rehearsing was done outdoors and it didn’t rain once. On most of those days, temperatures soared into the nineties. But we laughed an awful lot. The word back at our respective households was that it seemed like we were having too much fun.

This was a different kind of writing experience for me. Usually, writing is a solitary endeavor. Writers are often self-centered, jealous and single-minded. I am no different. But I knew that producing a new play would have to be a collaborative effort. I was prepared to set my ego aside as the players spoke their lines and I learned where the weaknesses were in my script. I was ready to make the necessary changes and remained open to suggestions. But there were also times where I had to insist that a line be delivered exactly as I had written it in order to stick to the message of the play. The actors understood this, as well.

There were times when a line was spoken in a different way than in the script, because it was more comfortable for the actor to do so. The way it was written it had elbows, as Elmore Leonard would say. I was willing to make the change. Occasionally, lines had to be added to explain a situation, or make a point. After some of the rehearsals, I would take the script home and do some rewriting. From time to time the actors would seek my guidance: “How do you want me to play this?” they would ask. Sometimes, I would have a definite answer; sometimes we would reach a consensus. Often, I would look to Walter for guidance. When we were done, we had a play. My name is on it, but it was truly a collaborative effort.

As a writer of fiction, I often wondered about playwrights. Aren’t they at the mercy of their actors? Well, sure they are. But if they are willing to park their egos at the theater door, there is also a lot they can learn from them. “Parking Spaces” had a measure of success at the 10-Minute Play Festival this weekend. We couldn’t have done it without each other. It was “our” play in the truest sense. My thanks to Ron Siemer, Jerry Buck and Walter Rhodes. There is talk of us starting an “old coots” repertory company and doing more plays like this. I hope so. I look forward to working with them again.