Last week was phenomenal. Our play, Three Texas Women,” had a wonderful three show run at the New York Theater Festival. We got to experience a late show, a prime time slot and a matinee. It was so cool to run the gamut of showtimes. and to have the three shows so close together in the same week. I am forever grateful for the platform you gave us. When I first received the acceptance letter and read all the guidelines, I didn’t think we could pull it off. As submitted, my play was 135 pages long, with two acts and an intended intermission. The script also prominently features an abundance of food and a handful of scenes in which the characters smoke cigarettes. Oh – and we had a bathtub scene!
I set about rewriting and editing my script to work within the NYTF constraints. Smoking became a broken lighter. Bathtub became a shower. Food “smelled” great but was never seen or served. Four scenes were cut completely. All superfluous or repetitive lines were dropped. The end of Act 1 still had gravitas, but we aptly transitioned from the last scene into the first of Act 2 and didn’t give the audience a chance to catch its collective breath. We got a two hour and twenty-minute play down to 87 minutes.
And you know what? My play is better for having gone through this process. The most important words were distilled. The action grew more focused. The dialogue became more crisp. We rehearsed intensely for three weeks and it absolutely showed on stage. I am incredibly proud of our achievements onstage and off.
I will forever be a fan of the New York Theater Festival and I am proud to be an alumni of the 20th season!
Hats off to you and your team. Working with Victor on the board was definitely the right call. He was wonderfully supportive, engaged and more than capable. I made a new friend.
To all the playwrights and directors who come through the doors of the NYTF, I encourage you to embrace the limitations. Make the guidelines work for you and have faith your audience will be entranced by the way your work flows and moves rapidly from one scene to the next. If you can afford it, hire actors under an Equity showcase contract, specifically designed for festivals and buyer showcases. I highly recommend this route. The talent we had on stage was truly spectacular.
Thank you, New York Theater Festival! Now with “Three Texas Women” having completed its run, I am looking forward to seeing other plays these next few weeks. See you soon!
Much Obliged,
~ Matthew C. Mills Writer/Director/Producer: THREE TEXAS WOMEN
Joe Staton, from the Production – KNOCK KNOCK