Letter to a young playwright

If my house was on fire and I only had time to rescue 1 thing from it, what would it be?

At some point I really wanted to be a playwright. On some level, at least. At least I knew I had it in me, and it was something to be brought out, and after I brought it out I'd see if I wanted to continue. (Unfortunately not.) It's so different these days, I don't watch TV, I don't watch movies, I don't even read fiction.

I got my chance to stage a play when they had a call for plays. Not really a competition but 3 entries would be chosen, and it wasn't that stringent considering that only 8 entries showed up. But that was a chance I had to grab. The judge, who is a fairly prominent playwright in Singapore and who I will not name for good reasons, not only selected my entry but he wrote me a letter. I suppose he was as old as I am now, so maybe he was still at the end of his idealistic phase, or he feels this responsibility to encourage people who can write to write.

Somebody reminded me recently about a teacher who called me a "maths guy", and it was not a compliment because she was complaining about how nobody liked her subject, literature*1. I felt vindicated - you can write great essays for your lit paper but I wouldn't say you understand what it's all about unless you come up with an original work of your own. But it wasn't only about that. I will still remember the joy of creating something of my own, and when it is done, thinking to myself, "limpeh has earned the right to carve 'playwright' on my tombstone".

So to answer my first question, it's the letter that this judge / playwright wrote me that I will save from the fire. Now at the top of the letter he wrote "this is only for you and no one else". And indeed this is the first time I showing it around - it's been 15 years and I'm sure he won't mind and anyway I'm not naming him. The less relevant parts are cut out. The ego trips are cut out. And anyway he's got good advice so who am I to keep it all to myself?

"What do you expect for yourself, as a person and as a playwright? Why do you write? Is it like Peter*2 , for quick publicity? Or is it long term, a need to write and rewrite, a need to improve and be hurt along the way? *3

"The staging of this play is not the end of the play; neither is it the end of your "life" as a playwright. Yes, a production is important but it is a test in the school of life - these productions are tests, but there are no exams, no promotions - the promotion or development depends on you - how much do you want to learn? How much do you want to risk? How much do you want to struggle and fight? I seem to be asking more questions than giving answers, but some fundamental things you really ought to sort out.

(Here he writes some general comments about my play. I start to remember why I like this letter so much because I still get that great great ego trip every time I read it. Unfortunately I'm cutting out the ego trip.)

"Go with your instincts. Yes, the play worked on 1st reading. Yes, also there are many ways of rewriting - everybody's got to put their 2 cents' worth and really who knows which way(s) will work best? ...

"Yes entertainment is important - I totally agree with you. Your style at the moment seems to be a technique (which I like to use too) ie let's all laugh together, let's all have fun - then suddenly I (playwright) make you (audience) feel sick. Great, it works, so go with that.

"It is scary when you say you don't know much about kampong life - I think you really have to know - this play works best if it's believable. It has to be believable - the chracters have to be real and like - their dilemmas must be shown clearly, conflicts heightened. ...

(some discussion of characters which will not make sense to those who do not have the scripts in front of them)

"Death is very sad. Death of a child / teenager is painful - it's a sin. Don't waste too much time after the death - it has already left a very bitter taste in the audience. Finish the play and let the audience leave... that's what I believe.

"The advantage of having a playwright physically present at rehearsals and working with actors is that you can change to suit the actors' language abilities. If they can't handle Singlish - forget it. Thel ast thing you would want is pukey Miss La La exaggerated sickening Singlish just for laughs. You have more integrity than that. Anyway situational humour works better than all the "I donch know"s in the world. *4 ...

"The structure is pretty straightforward. I don't think you should be ashamed or apologetic for that - nor should you put down other types of plays. All plays are good if they are written with honesty and integrity. ...

"When rewriting for the final time - look at all the scenes very very carefully - is there any scene you think does not develop the play? Are there scenes which are too mono- functional? Perhaps some scenes can be combined to say the same things in less time?

"Working with actors / directors etc is not easy as I'm sure you know by now. This is especially so if everyone is more or less "new". There really is no solution or formula to this. As a playwright, you must be as open to suggestions as possible and very often this is painful because you dan't separate the honest "let's improve this production together" suggestion from the "I want a bigger role" or "I'm insecure playing this role" suggestions.

"Stand your ground if you really feel strongly about something. The way I see it - if you can explain why you wrote something and what you expect to achieve, the other party should give in. But if you can't explain and the other party offers sound suggestions and explanations, then maybe you should change.

"I strongly don't believe in actors amending my script - which is why I make it a point to attend rehearsals. If they or anyone has a problem, tell you and you change. One person must have a vision, a thread of what this play is about, and that person is you. The director will interpret that vision / spine in his way.

"Spend time talking to the director without the actors. Actors, in my experience, don't know what they want. They are also strange / paradoxical creatures. They can give the most magical or detrimental suggestions and fight tooth and nail over it.

"By talking to the director alone, both of you build trust and relationship that will unite the production rather than divide it.

"Actors, like kids, must see that the "parents" both agree. If not you'll have the kids going to Daddy Director when Mummy Playwright does not want to give in and vice versa.

"Finally, I don't know you and I hope that you are not offended by some of the things that I say. I am being very frank and I'm not talking down or being condescending (at least I don't think so). I'm not treating you like a 15 or 16 year old. I'm talking to you playwright to playwright.

"I offer my help readily because I feel strongly that people who are seriously interested in theatre should be given good opportunities to learn. I never had a glimmer of support when I was in school - no one bother, no one cared. I don't want to see that happening to other students.


"Also, I have very strong views about theatre and playwriting which I want to share. Not every playwright wants to share and worse still, some playwrights share wrongly.

"I like your self interview, I like your notes. You are honest and I respect that. You are willing to make mistakes and learning. You have strong and important concerns. Please continue writing and writing. Call me if you need more clarification or consultation.

"All the best."

*1 in return I left her out of the loop. She didn't know I had written a play until my entry was selected. I'm a bitch like that.
*2 Peter was a character in my play who was a publicity whore
*3 My motives? I knew I had it in me, so I had to do it. I had a great idea, and it encompassed a lot of what I was thinking about at that time. There could have been vanity involved, but so what?
*4 Yes, I wrote dialog in Singlish but that was how it sounded in my head. It wasn't meant to be gimmicky but it doesn't look so good on the printed page.

After I read this letter again, I remembered that this playwright had been brought in as a consultant for our production. And I was having conflicts with the production cast and crew. They didn't like my play, and kept on wanting to change it, and emphasise the more American aspects of it. In fact I must have asked him for advice on how to mediate. I was 1 year older than the cast and crew and from a different school, so the odds may have been stacked against me, but I fought.



Yes I was more driven in those days. I really wanted the play to go through, and in the way I wanted it to work. I was thinking it could be my first and last stint in drama and I wanted to do this the right way. But it wasn't as though my vision was perfect. There were a lot of things I didn't know how to do: how to research, the difference between stuff on a page and words spoken out. And I had very little or no experience with theatre.



(And also when I went to the U I was quite driven to learn as much, read as widely as I could. I don't know why I can't seem to summon up the same enthusiasm for my day job.)



I'm still marvelling that he took the time to write that letter to me. It was a little sad that I had to stop writing. I know what it's like to write your first play, where, if it works, and if it's good you will start thinking that you could make a career out of it. That play was probably the best I had written, and it must have seemed that at 16 I had it in me to go on to better things. He must have been thinking back to that time he was starting out, what would he have wished he had known then? Because I saw a lot of ruminating about "writing as a career". When he wrote that the letter is only for me, I think he didn't want me to use it as a weapon against the cast and crew I disagreed with. The general comments about being a playwright for the first time should be applicable to anybody about to start out.



Ultimately there was a lack of desire to keep on fighting the battles you have to go through for to set up drama productions. As for being an artist, it does seem a little more frivolous than making a lot of money, or learning a lot of history, or serving industry, or serving the government, or being a relief worker in a god forsaken place. I believe that every artist has his natural idiom, the medium which he feels most comfortable with. While I could write a decent play, my natural medium happens to be music. It is for these reasons I quit writing plays.



That letter is now officially designated as a family heirloom, together with all those medals my sister won in academic competitions.

The play had very rich sources. The idea of bourgeoisie life versus noble savage. Being principled versus expediency. How something good and noble like preserving your own habitat becomes warped and perverted into something darker. Citizen action versus big business interests. The power of the media to shape opinion.

I had various forms of inspiration: God wanting to cast you out of Eden but your putting up a protest. Having to grow up but clinging on to your childhood. The guy in front of the tank in Tiananmen was an inspiration. Fantastic Mr Fox, the Roald Dahl book was an inspiration. Even Chee Soon Juan, who was staging a Gandhi style hunger strike at that point was an inspiration - if it only served to show that if you were to appropriate a greater moral legacy for your own lesser, selfish cause, there is something vaguely ignoble about it.

And the story that I told was a little more universal than I realised at the point. The farmers who were asked to move into HDB flats were not that willing. The Palestinians who were uprooted from the homes in 1948. I would look at the media storm which accompanied the Elian Gonzalez affair and think, "this is somewhat similar to what I wrote". I think, irregardless of the quality of execution, I picked a good plot.



I thought at that time, "when I reach adulthood I will be in a so much better position to rewrite it, and write this better". But maybe I might not do that.