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Alternative (head)Spaces

By Brian "Dyalekt" Kushner, member of the 2013 Emerging Writers Group

Hi, my name is Dyalekt, and I'm a theater head. A junkie, an addict, a Stan. I find no joy greater than the moment where people do stuff in front of me. Scripted, improv, whatever. I've seen Shakespeare in the Park, and the parking lot. One time I saw a 15 minute musical in a van (it was awefulsome). I've seen rock bands in fantastical costumes, and rappers turn concerts into funky monologues. I've been to readings on rooftops, in kitchens, and cafeterias. B-Boy cyphers made theaters in the round, as Soul Train lines made thrusts. I've always craved the moment where a group of people get into a groove, fall into a world, share energy. That's my church. That's where I find my universal truths, and my connection to my fellow man & woman. That's why I go to the theater.

Why do you go to the theater?

I ask because I see potential theater fanatics all the time. Most of them have never seen an actual play. They go to indie rap shows where MCs frequently cut the beat to perform soliloquies (they call them a capellas, or acapulcos if you're nasty). They go to underground parties in illegal locations where daredevils dance with fire, and you can use the stationary bike to power a vodka-milkshake-making blender. They stop for every street performer, and allow cute young folks to kick that Children's International, sign my petition, I'm-not-selling-candy-for-no-basketball-team game all day. They crave stories. Movies are fine, but there's a connection missing. Those guys on the screen filmed this flick months ago. None of the actors are going to pause to let laughter subside. The rhythm of films belong to the films, and the audience can only ride that rhythm, not affect it. That's not what these people need. They need to be a part of the story. They need people doing stuff in front of them. They need to share some energy.

Why don't they go to plays? My best guess is that they don't feel they have permission to participate. Permission is as easy to grant (When I say "hey", you say "ho") as it is to deny (our tickets are $175, and our theater is located conveniently close to Times Square, the amorphous mass of sightseeing and commerce). The barriers are more than physical, they deal with a sense of belonging. It's why my students from Quisqueya Heights never go downtown, despite being from the same borough. The theater is not a safe space for them. They don't know what they should wear, or how much they should react to what's happening. The theater feels as formal as a classroom. The theater, where drunks and brigands had much to do about nothing, is apparently mired in etiquette.

Etiquette has a connotation of "manners," but roots in out of touch elitism. According to Dorothea Johnson, of the Protocol School of Washington, the word ‘etiquette’ used to mean "keep off the grass." Louis XIV’s gardener noticed that the aristocrats were walking through his gardens and put up signs, or étiquets, to ward them off. The dukes and duchesses walked right past these signs. Due to this blatant disregard, the King of Versailles decreed that no individual was to go beyond the bounds of the étiquets.

Etiquette literally means "stay off my lawn."

I had the opportunity to see Into the Woods in its closing performance at Shakespeare (err, Sondheim) in the Park. Waiting in line for tickets is its own sort of theater, where college students, hippies, businessfolk, tourists and artisans sit calmlyish in line for a million hours for a chance to see a play with some movie stars in it for free. (I heard if you came after 2:00 AM the night before, you weren't seeing Al Pacino in The Merchant of Venice). Those same movie stars who are usually separated from us by time and distance now share their rhythm with however this audience is going to react, not to mention the rest of the city. This is the place to bring my aforementioned story cravers, right? 

The cat next to me seemed to fit the description. Slightly miffed that he and his wife weren't sitting together, and uncomfortable in his seat, he was literally* not fitting in. The lady next to my date was far more comfortable. She regaled us with her harrowing tales of fellow patrons daring to ask her to stand as they brushed past. Didn't they know this was her space? She also had a friend who won a Tony. During the performance, homie to my right starts eating the potato chips that he picked up at the concession stand. I think I heard him, but only barely above the laughter and sirens and New York City. I think I heard him but I really became aware of his eating when a man in front of me turned around and screamed at him to STOP EATING! 

Things settled 'til intermission, where the eater and the screamer argued about who was ruder. The Screamer was backed by the Tony Winner Friend Haver (TWFH), who was offended too, but afraid to yell at a large man (in a theater full of laughter). The Eater appealed to a sense of appropriateness by reminding the pair that berating other audience members is usually reserved for Yankees games (take that however you want, Yankee fans). He was trumped by the TWFH dropping "If this isn't a Yankee game, you shouldn't be eating" on him. I attempted to intervene, as these people were all arguing (yes, literally) over me. I offered that theater is a circular experience, and we must be tolerant and respectful of each other for the magic to work. Theater, right? The Eater facilitated by conceding that eating may be distracting, but his preferred method of being informed about such matters is ANYTHING OTHER THAN SCREAMING. The Screamer, armed with the privilege of seeing (and paying for) hundreds of plays, defended his rights to drag everyone in his section out of the experience by proclaiming, "This isn't about theater, it's about etiquette." 

Ah. 

Get off my lawn. 

Sure, prices are too high, and intermissions are antiquated, and theaters don't exist in many communities, but that's not the only thing that keeps the heads out. Those of us already in the circle have the opportunity to reach out to them, and push them away. Turns out the Eater was a Shakespeare fan, but only knew Into the Woods from his mother's double vinyl soundtrack. He's at many live events and works with performers of all disciplines. I hope to see him in line next year. I'll bring yogurt, or marshmallows. Something soft. 

*Don't judge me. I like that "literally" is a new slang word for "kinda almost literally, but it's really kinda hyperbole." It's the new "totally." 

Brian "Dyalekt" Kushner is the Education Director of the proposed New Brooklyn Theater (newbrooklyntheater.com), and his band Deathrow Tull (DeathrowTull.com) has a new music video http://tinyurl.com/8p8hed4 

This post is part of a weekly series from the Emerging Writers Group community of playwrights. The EWG is two-year playwriting fellowship at The Public Theater seeking to target playwrights at the earliest stages of their careers. In so doing, The Public hopes to create an artistic home for a diverse and exceptionally talented group of up-and-coming playwrights.

A Playwright's Pilgrimage to Lutherland

By Chris Cragin, member of the 2008 Emerging Writers Group 

I spent the past year making daily trips of the imagination to the world of Medieval Germany, the setting of the play I'm writing about Martin Luther. But as I started to make sense of the history and politics of Luther's universe, my imaginary voyages felt increasingly insufficient. I decided I had to go there with my body. So I bought a plane ticket and I set out to see what traces of Medieval Germany I could still find. 

My best friend and I arrived in Berlin with plans to spend the day visiting the city sites before beginning our Martin Luther pilgrimage the next morning. Rather than take a cab from the airport to our hipster hotel in East Berlin, we decided to bus it to a central location and walk the rest of the way. The streets of Germany taunt unsuspecting visitors with dizzying twists and turns and shapeshifting names that change almost every block. We arrived at our hotel so exhausted and confused that it took us at least thirty minutes to figure out that we had to insert our key card into an electricity box to turn on the lights in our room. Thirty minutes later it took us another ten minutes to figure out that we had to do it every thirty minutes to keep them on. Our hotel was the only thing we found in Berlin. 

The next day we woke up early and set out with our German rail pass to find Wittenberg. Note, there is no "e" on the end of that word. The Wittenberge we went to, however, did have an "e" on the end of it. Wittenberge with an "e" is almost all the way to Poland. We returned to Berlin and boarded a train to the right Wittenberg. 

Wittenberg is the Luther Mecca. This is where he wrote the 95 Thesis against the corruption in the Holy Roman Church. This is where he preached, lectured, lived with his wife Katie and their children, and hosted star-studded "table talks" about the formation of the new church. Outside Luther and Katie's home there stands a statue of Katie that so perfectly captures the beauty, strength, and quiet stubbornness I'd imagined had defined her. I felt that at any moment that statue might come to life and busy itself with the gardening and the beer brewing. She might welcome me in, offer me a seat at the Lutherhaus table. I might stay for days, or weeks, as their visiting scholars often did. I would ask Katie why she did it, why she singled out such a problematic man to marry. And she would laugh as if the answer were obvious and offer me a beer and then go about her business of muscling forward a thought revolution. 

The next day we missed our train to Erfurt. Actually, we were on the right platform looking down it and discussing whether the train at the other end was ours or not. It was. It left without us. We caught the next train. 

Erfurt is the Germany of fairy tales, with cobblestone streets so narrow that we could barely walk down them side by side. A tiny puppet theater charms passersby. I imagined that the magic elves of Luther's Prussian childhood stories must machine it. Luther spent his college years in Erfurt studying law until he was caught in a life-threatening thunderstorm immediately after which he knocked on the doors of the Black Monastery and told the stranger who answered that he wanted to became a monk. We stayed in a bed and breakfast situated right next door to the Black Monastery. I wondered if the fragile creek that ran by it was there for Luther to enjoy as a young friar. 

The next stop on our pilgrimage was Eisenach where we found Luther's boyhood home. Low ceilings, dwarfed doors. People were shorter back then, right? Around the corner from Luther's home rests the house of Bach. There I discovered that Luther was Bach's hero; Bach had adapted many of Luther's hymns into symphony form. I also discovered that the instruments Bach composed with looked nothing like the instruments we have today. So the Bach I listen to on my ipad actually doesn't sound the way it sounded when Bach played it? I thought of Luther's writings. Luther wasn't using the same writing instruments that we use today either. His words, also, must have sounded different when he spoke them than when I hear them now. 

From Eisenach we hiked up to Wartburg Castle. The fortress stood atop a magnificent hill, with smaller ones rippling out from it in every direction. After Luther delivered his famous "Here I Stand" speech in which he refused to recant his 95 Thesis, Luther was kidnapped and whisked away to this impenetrable structure. Everyone thought he was dead. Instead, he was working on what would become his greatest achievement: his translation of the New Testament into the German of the common people. I wandered through the time-warp of a museum until I found his study. Before me sat his desk, his window. I imagined him hunched over, working furiously in ergonomically pathetic posture. It was here that Luther first met the devil in person, he tells us. The demons he met in this room followed him for the rest of his life. 

Strangely, my tour book said nothing about the town of Worms where Luther was tried before the Emperor. I was nervous about going so far out of our way in search of Luther's trial location if it wasn't worth seeing, but I decided to risk it. When we arrived at Worms there wasn't much in the way of tourist information. My traveling companion pointed to the only large structure on our map. "That's gotta be it," she assured me. The massive Medieval palace was now an intimidating Catholic church filled with thousand-year-old stone caskets and ghostly sculptures. There was no trace of Luther anywhere. Then it occurred to me--this church is Catholic; they probably hate him. There was one unimpressive gift shop outside the Cathedral. I timidly asked the attendant if this was the place of Luther's famous trial. She smiled and nodded. I shivered. The thought of standing trial in that Harry Potter-esque structure terrified me. 

I'm back at my desk in 21st Century America, now, writing in the same ergonomically preposterous positions Luther must have written in. The masochistic body posture is trivial, I suppose, but it's something tangible we have in common, and since my trip to Germany these tangible connections have become increasingly important. Other tangible commonalities now include: Luther and I both enjoy German beer; when I sing "A Mighty Fortress is our God" I now think of Wartburg Castle as he must have when he wrote it. Even with these helpful links, Medieval Germany still feels distant, (and I am thankful for that on many levels). But it felt good to get my imagination and my body together in the same place. I've been in Luther and Katie's home; they welcomed me. And now, in some strange way I feel like I have Luther and Katie's permission to tell their story. 

 Chris Cragin's new musical SON OF A GUN, co-written with Don Chaffer, will be showcased at Theater Row this November by Firebone Theatre. SON OF A GUN was part of the 2011 O'Neill Music Theater Conference. 

This post is part of a weekly series from the Emerging Writers Group community of playwrights. The EWG is two-year playwriting fellowship at The Public Theater seeking to target playwrights at the earliest stages of their careers. In so doing, The Public hopes to create an artistic home for a diverse and exceptionally talented group of up-and-coming playwrights.

Happy Anniversary EWG Blog!

By Sevan Kaloustian Greene, member of the 2011 Emerging Writers Group 

This is all too cliche and pat to say, but I can't believe it's been a year since the EWG blog sprouted in cyberspace. When I first brought up the idea of starting the blog I wasn't sure what the response was going to be, but the The Public gave me their blessing and bit of space on their site to try it out. It's been slow to take roots, but in the past 12 months we've seen an amazing slew of topics and responses that I hope have been informative and challenging for readers. We've covered everything from race to rejection letters and profanity to hair styles, and still managed to make it all relevant to the industry as it exists today. 

I hope you've enjoyed getting to meet some of the EWG bloggers, past and present, and getting to know them as people and as playwrights. I think we represent such a diverse tapestry of opinions and perspectives - a diversity sorely lacking in the theatre. While we've recently seen voices speaking up for equality and recognition (for example, the AAPAC), I think we have a long way to go in diversifying the storytelling on the American stage that moves beyond tokenism and commercial pandering. Lest I get on my sopabox in a celebratory post, I just want to express how much I hope that the melange of cultures in the EWG does one day, sooner rather than later, becomes a part of the American theatre in a recognizable way. We owe it to ourselves and to our art form to meet the standards being set in other places such as the UK. I believe that now is the time to start seeing and hearing those different voices even though we may be bombarded by whitewashed TV and film (oops - got on the soapbox). 

I hope you've enjoyed this rather mild, and wet, summer. I can't wait for the fall cycle of blogs to kick off next week as we head into our second year. I hope you'll continue to come back every week to see what we have to say and to pass it on to friends and colleagues. Changes have to start somewhere, no matter how small and insignificant they may seem now. 

My immense thanks and gratitude to all the EWG bloggers who have contributed and to the folks at The Public who entertained my silly little notion to start a blog and have supported it all the way. 

Sevan K. Greene is a member of the 2011 Emerging Writers Group. He's got some readings and things coming up which you should check out on his website (www.sevangreene.com) which he'll update as soon as he's done putting the finishing touches on his play about Lucifer. Yes...THAT Lucifer. Intrigued now, aren't you? An Apostolic Middle East-born Americanized playwright writing about a traditionally Christian force of evil in a romantic and heroic way. Oooo...prepare ye. 

This post is part of a weekly series from the Emerging Writers Group community of playwrights. The EWG is two-year playwriting fellowship at The Public Theater seeking to target playwrights at the earliest stages of their careers. In so doing, The Public hopes to create an artistic home for a diverse and exceptionally talented group of up-and-coming playwrights.

The Lazarus Play

By Pia Wilson, member of the 2008 Emerging Writers Group 

I let it go too soon. 

My play. I let it go too soon and moved on. I had a public reading of the play and handed it off to my agent and went on to write the next play and the next one. 

I knew there was trouble with the play; in my gut, I knew. It was in decent shape though, and I can be impulsive. I wanted to get it out there. I’d heard the play out loud in a wonderful reading with great actors, and although the ending was far too happy for my taste (yes, I said happy), I figured I could work on that trouble spot if I got a production for the play. 

You see I say “if” because in America, we’re not as big on producing plays as we are in “developing” them with readings, barebones productions and the like. I’d already had a solid reading, and the play had gotten a chance to breathe, if not live, so .... 

But then I was sitting at my kitchen table on a Sunday morning, ready to write, and I opened the play by mistake. I opened the play, glanced at it and then closed it. I went on to write something else. Then, months later, I became obsessed. 

I am still obsessed with this play that was, by all accounts, done. I am consumed by this little, Lazarus play, which has been quite patient with me. I can now see the play in a different light than I had before. I was too close before. With time and emotional distance, I started rewriting the play, knowing what needed to be changed. 

An entire character is gone from the play. I indulged my instinct to go darker with the tone, and that lead to other insights, changing key relationships in the play. Previously, I had been resisting the coupling of two characters I thought were morally wrong to be together. I let them go for it, with happy results (happy for me, not the characters). The happy ending has been painted with much darker colors, and although the characters say similar things, the meaning of the dialog has changed. 

I’ve come to think that half of rewriting is uncovering instincts and thoughts the writer has buried or has yet to find hiding in the subconscious. Of course, there is craft involved in tightening dialogue, pushing some themes to the foreground while relegating others to the background, and making sure the structure is sound. But there’s something to be said about exploring the ocean just beneath our smart, awake brains. I think we could stand to let the lizard brain slither about a little more, hissing into our ears. 

The funny thing about the theater, though, is that once the industry has read something and passed on it, the play doesn’t get a second chance. This is understandable, considering how busy literary departments are and how many plays they read. Yet, knowing all this, I went back to fix the play. I’m still working on getting it right: not because I’m hoping some theater will pick it up, but because I want to do right by my characters. I love them, even if they are really, truly bonkers (or terrible or funny), and I can’t get along without them. I owe them for filling my life with their absorbing chatter. I owe them and so I’ll give them another chance to breathe. 

Pia Wilson is a member of the 2008 Emerging Writers Group and is also obsessed with coffee, whiskey, traveling and finding the secret to life in big, old, dusty books in obscure bookstores (not necessarily in that order). This post is part of a weekly series from the Emerging Writers Group community of playwrights. 

The EWG is two-year playwriting fellowship at The Public Theater seeking to target playwrights at the earliest stages of their careers. In so doing, The Public hopes to create an artistic home for a diverse and exceptionally talented group of up-and-coming playwrights.

things that other people aren’t willing to do

By Akin Salawu, member of the 2008 Emerging Writers Group 

I’m endlessly chastising myself for not writing as much as I could. When I’m lucky, I manage to maintain a regular writing schedule. Of course life, work, dating, the gym, and lately the Olympics are powerful distractions from writing. 

Marveling at the determination and commitment of Olympic athletes has had me thinking I need to approach writing the way an Olympic athlete approaches training for their sport. Granted, athletes seem fundamentally different from artists, but we do share key challenges. Athletes and writers share an endless drive for improvement, an unquenchable passion for our respective disciplines, and we are constantly struggling to conquer ourselves. 

Michael Phelps trained 365 days a year for 5 years straight without missing a single day. He told Piers Morgan: “If you wanna be the best, you have to do things that other people aren’t willing to do.” 

A decade ago, I was much more disciplined about writing 4 hours every single day. Lately I’m lucky to get 2 hours a day. Since the 2012 Summer Olympics opening ceremony I told myself I would get up at 5AM every day to write for 2 hours before leaving for work and then write for 2 more hours before going to bed. It has not been going so well. 

For some reason, I find it easier to get to the gym every single day than I do to get in 4 hours of writing every day. The physiological benefits of exercise may far exceed the satisfaction of writing 4 hours a day. However, the endorphins released in the gym ought not be more powerful than the joy of writing. 

Even training for my first triathlon 2 years ago came easier than writing 4 hours a day. But if I’m honest, my time in the gym is fairly mindless and I just have to get through the motions. The caliber of training achieved by Olympians is anything but mindless as writing is rarely mindless. 

Yet forcing yourself to write when you are completely uninspired is truly grueling. Lack of inspiration suggests writing should perhaps not be approached the way an Olympic athlete trains. Phelps surely had countless mornings where jumping into the pool was the last thing he wanted to do. When we writers just aren’t feeling like writing, it’s just so easy to surrender. I sometimes tell myself, “It won’t be any good if I force it.” 

Strangely, the first days back in the gym after being away for a while are truly brutal. But you know that as long as you keep going back, it will get progressively easier and more enjoyable. And every writer knows that the more diligently and consistently you face the blank page, finding that ever elusive inspiration gets progressively easier and more enjoyable. 

And some days I fail. The writer in me occasionally fears failure. But then I remember the Michael Jordan quote up on the corkboard above my desk: 

"I've missed more than 9,000 shots in my career, I've lost almost 300 games. Twenty six times I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over in my life. And that's why I succeed!" 

Akin Salawu is a Brooklyn based reality tv editor and sporadic triathlete working on a screenplay about a groundbreaking doctor at Harvard McLean. 

This post is part of a weekly series from the Emerging Writers Group community of playwrights. The EWG is two-year playwriting fellowship at The Public Theater seeking to target playwrights at the earliest stages of their careers. In so doing, The Public hopes to create an artistic home for a diverse and exceptionally talented group of up-and-coming playwrights.

Musings on Eight Months in New York: MORE, BIGGER, BETTER

By Riti Sachdeva, member of the 2013 Emerging Writers Group 

I hesitated to move to New York. “Go on,” people tried to persuade me, “New York’s the center of theater.” Having made theater in Albuquerque for the past fifteen years, I know one doesn’t need to be in New York to make compelling theater or to cultivate discerning audiences. One does, however, need to live in New York to get paid to make theater. Thus, the truer statement, New York is the center of the economy rang clear as I headed back to the east coast. Being admitted into the Emerging Writers Group at the Public has led me to commit to being in New York for at least two years. 

As we were walking to Union Square one night after an EWG meeting, my sister EWGer asked how I was doing. I replied that July was a month of reflecting on the excess data in my brain and body about the last seven months as a theater maker in New York. Was it the thin tone in my voice or the slump of my shoulders that lead her to ask, “Yeah, kind of heartbreaking, huh?” Well… yeah… kinda. It seems like New York is my new squeeze, the honeymoon period’s been over, I’m learning to accept its offerings and rejections, wondering what I can live with and what is a deal breaker, contemplating a monogamous vs. bi-coastal relationship, and anxious about how long it might last. 

Don’t get me wrong, New York has given me so much love: friendly people, eager collaborators, wonderful sublets, lucrative projects, brave productions, and so many opportunities. What I didn’t expect to experience is the crisis of NOT ENOUGH. With all the blessings I’ve received and continue to receive in this city, I find myself in the abyss of “it’s not enough, I want more, there is more.” The feminist socialist in me thinks, “Of course you’ll think this, you’re in the gut of capitalism and the bile of the system is all about MORE, BIGGER, BETTER.” The meditating spiritual seeker in me thinks, “You’re here to work through this – it’s a core issue that has arisen, once again, to pass.” The underdog artist in me thinks, “Fuck this New York theater caste system and the contest for the theater elites’ attention.” 

All the banter in my head still can’t stop the rise of the noun that acts like a verb- AMBITION: a desire for personal achievement. In Albuquerque, ambition was an internal gauge of continuously pushing myself to write, act, perform, produce, create, build audience, and generate dialogue. Within the EWG, ambition is to rise to the standards of nine peers who are phenomenal writers and generously sharp, critical thinkers. In the larger context of the New York theater pecking order, ambition has come to mean acknowledgement or recognition from theater institutions with resources and networks. I’ve spent over twenty years being an independent artist, telling stories of people whose experiences are largely invisible, casting people who otherwise have rare opportunities, bringing in audiences who are sure theater is utterly irrelevant and now, having moved to New York, I crave the approval of important people who run important institutions? Really? How did I get here? 

Part of the issue is that what was once my art is now becoming my profession. Money and economics walk hand in hand with power and prestige and create a hierarchy. The insidious way in which I’ve bought into the theater caste system over the last eight months is a little scary and embarrassing. What I mean by the theater caste system is the top down pyramid of levels of shows that presume quality through economic investment: Broadway, off-Broadway, regional, off-off Broadway, and community-based theater. Admittedly, even the idea of attempting to climb this ladder of success wouldn’t have entered my consciousness if I weren’t part of the EWG. That the play I submitted to get into the group is a fourteen character piece set in 1947 South Asia, weaving the intimate, epic, and speculative, makes me sometimes hope there just might be room for my voice in the “upper rooms” of the theater hierarchy. The questions then are about my attachment to this ambition-this moving up in the hierarchy to be bestowed the resources so I can have MORE, BIGGER, BETTER. 

What will happen, what will it mean if I don’t get MORE, BIGGER, BETTER? 

And maybe more importantly, what am I willing to do to try to achieve it; give up to achieve it; to say/not say to achieve it; who am I willing to befriend/avoid to achieve it; who/what am I willing to support/ignore to achieve it? What will mark the “achievement of it” anyway? Or is it a bottomless desire? 

In conversation with the EWG compañeros, we’ve talked about not begrudging each other’s opportunities and achievements because recognition for one makes us all more visible. We trust this to be true. Spiritually, however, I know that any attachment to receiving opportunities and accolades is a set up for envy, misery, resentment, and the no-win situation of comparing myself to others, in which, I will always come up short. 

The interesting aspect about my struggle/discomfort with ambition in the context of the New York theater hierarchy is that I belittle my achievements in a way I do not judge others. These are things I’ve caught myself thinking and saying about my work: it was only an off-off Broadway production; it wasn’t an Equity so-and-so; it was just a short independent film; it wasn’t a national commercial; it wasn’t a paid blah blah. The list in my head of why it is not enough, why it should be MORE, BIGGER, BETTER goes on and on. 

I have a friend who would read this and say, “Girl, you just being a damn ingrate – that is-ungrateful.” I smile as her voice in my head reminds me that I’m taking my professional/creative salvation through the theater caste system way too seriously. Other theater makers have shared that these thoughts and feelings are part of the transition of being a working artist in New York. As I finish writing this, I look forward to the next EWG meeting when an agent is scheduled to come to talk to us more about the business. I can’t help it - I’m seduced by the vast opportunities and encouraged by the endless trajectories…and grateful for a spiritual practice that occasionally challenges me to act on principles like integrity, generosity, and compassion to help keep MORE, BIGGER, BETTER in perspective. 

Riti Sachdeva is a theater maker, dancer, and cultural worker currently writing a revenge fantasy with a boring working title so let’s just call it UNTITLED REVENGE FANTASY. Her piece SCENE/UNSEEN, which she conceived, co-choreographed, and performed in, was awarded Overall Outstanding One Act at the 2012 Planet Connections Theatre Festival. You can check out more of her work at http://www.facebook.com/midniteschild. 

This post is part of a weekly series from the Emerging Writers Group community of playwrights. The EWG is two-year playwriting fellowship at The Public Theater seeking to target playwrights at the earliest stages of their careers. In so doing, The Public hopes to create an artistic home for a diverse and exceptionally talented group of up-and-coming playwrights.