Playing for attention: Scene Two by Naomi Guss Arts Hub Australia Friday, December 16, 2005 Can Australia shake its preoccupation with 'grand master' David Williamson? [Photo: Flickr/GrahamBinns] CLICK HERE TO JUST READ SALLY'S CONTRIBUTION (or just start from the top and read the whole article!) Writers are much like musicians; throw a rock anywhere in the world, and you'll hit one. So why the dearth of new Australian plays? Arts Hub brings you Part Two of a three part series on the state of Australian playwriting. Since publishing Part One, David Ryding, Artistic Director from Mainstreet Theatre Company contacted Arts Hub about his own take on the Australian playwrighting scene. With Mainstreet, Ryding has commissioned five plays this year, with three currently in the works. He suggested that around the country, perhaps more than $200 000 was being spent on commissioned plays this year. Ryding has a very balanced view of playwrighting - he understands the need to support and develop writers, but also has to work within funding guidelines. Commissioning plays is a huge risk, especially for the larger state companies, as they have more overhead to worry about. But you also have to balance the 'safe' funding applications with the 'risky'. One of the most important things Ryding mentioned was that playwrights currently are not accessible. He said that despite the fact that Mainstreet has an open submission policy for scripts, he may have only gotten one on his desk this year. He would be much happier for a playwright to email or call the company, and make themselves known. He also said that playwrights should join organisations like the ANPC, in order to meet others. What concerned Ryding is that often plays are produced and never seen again - an award-winning play doesn't necessarily get a state company's interest. But, Ryding also felt that more and more medium and large companies are producing work hand-in-hand with fringe groups, allowing more work to be produced. Playing for attention - Scene Two There are so few opportunities for playwrights to get their work presented, with plays scrambling for attention, that sending scripts interstate is almost mandatory. I tried this as well (of course, nobody wanted to use my work), but was uncomfortable at the thought that I wouldn’t know what would happen to my script on the other end; would it be ripped off, would it be performed in the way I intended? No matter how much people remind you not to be ‘precious’ about your writing, you do. You want to know, at the very least, that it will be produced with some modicum of semblance to your ideas. This is what my friend discovered. He had sent his script to some competition in Sydney, and was selected for a reading. He travelled from Melbourne to Sydney for this first (he had never won a competition for scriptwriting before), but found that when he got there, the performance was not to his liking, and he didn’t approve of any of the actors. Kirilee Lennerts is an 18-year old playwright who has experienced the fate of interstate playwrighting. She has mainly only school production experience, as well as basic amateur music theatre experience. She’s based in WA, and is actually having a hard time find opportunities that are Western Australia based. She has entered the St Martins Youth Playwriting Competition (actually open to international entrants as well as national) and the Dogwood Playwright Initiative. Lennerts also only received feedback on one of her submissions. "They [the submissions] have been given time and attention but it can never be as much as one would like- after all, they will be reading many other plays as well". She didn’t win either of the competitions, but was inspired to keep on writing; she now has 6 plays written, one of which will be produced next year. Flek Productions, which is in fact, her university course’s graduate company, will be producing the script. "At the beginning of this year, we decided that we should create a theatre company so that we could put forward work outside uni hours that is student run in the ‘real’ world… I guess what led me/us to producing my play next year is the desire to showcase what we can do. And with any luck, we might be able to take it one step further from where the last two [Plek performances] were". She also feels that "Western Australian playwrights have limited local competitions and most [from what she’s seen] are from the East coast". In fact, when I asked her if she could pass on any info about WA competitions, she had to tell me that she knew of none. "For quite a while I've been feeling quite alone in Western Australia. The number of playwrights (established at least) in WA, I think you can count them on two hands, and I've been taught by two of them and seen quite a few performances by the others… I also am aware that I don't have the ‘life experience’ that adult writers have, and producers." Lennerts feels as though there is a lot of amateur theatre happening in Perth, most of which is repertoire acts, with plays dating from the 1970’s and backwards. "There is limited spaces willing to support new playwrights from Western Australia. A lot of stuff happening is period or from the UK or USA". Despite the lack of opportunity, Lennerts is by no way discouraged; "The theatre I make, and hopefully will make and present in the future, is quite different to the norm; but in the sense that it is my own style. I write for an audience of ‘me’s’, and I find that the people who have read my work, the youths are the ones that connect with it far more than with some of what is being produced". Playworks, a women’s playwrighting group, turned 21 this year, and will be presenting research next year on the state of female playwrights in Australia. In 1994, less than a third of works were written by women and next year’s STC season will have no female-written plays included. The artistic director of Playworks, Teresa Bell, recently pointed out that more should be invested in playwrights and plays that speak to contemporary Australia. "With expensive productions of David Hare’s political play Stuff Happens playing to full houses in Australia, talking about America and England’s involvement in the war on Iraq; I was disturbed that Australia was not mentioned once. It shows how insignificant a player we are on that world stage. Why are we not putting money into productions by our playwrights talking about these very issues?" she said. Sally McLean, a Melbourne playwright, has felt the sting of being too pinned down by criteria, with a recent script on WWII rejected for funding. She is an actress, writer, film producer, and all-round performing arts person. McLean is the creative director of Salmac Productions, an international collaborative group of independent film makers from Australia, Canada, Scotland, England and America. She has worked in England with the BBC, New York theatre directors, produced feature films, had successful seasons of plays, and is an internationally recognised published author. Her recent play, PS I love You, a multimedia theatre piece about women’s roles on the home front during World War II, was turned down for funding. "As yet, none have granted me money to stage the show professionally… What did confuse me about the funding decisions from this first round of applications was that the project received great feedback on the quality of the script and there was interest in the subject matter… but no-one was able (or willing) to tell me why it was unsuccessful at this time. This is a problem as naturally I want to improve the product, if it's a product issue – or, alternatively, improve my funding application writing skills if it is a presentation problem. One small piece of feedback that I did receive… was from an employee of one of the Trusts who commented, 'I think maybe (the work's) just too conventional'. A comment like this distresses me a little, if it's true. I agree that playwrights should push boundaries, explore new ways of communicating ideas and take risks, but I also believe that we have a responsibility to make our works accessible to the public, and inform as well as entertain…" "…Cutting one style out because it is seen as 'too conventional' diminishes what the theatre is - a multi-dimensional, completely individual experience for both audience and practitioners. And you certainly know – in an instant – if you’ve succeeded or failed as a writer, performer of director of theatre, no matter what your style of writing or performance, for audiences can be unforgiving and instant in their feedback. And that’s the risk and the joy of the medium." Perhaps the best example of the lack of risk in theatre lately is the recent retirement of David Williamson. The Age wrote an article on whether or not David Williamson is the last great Australian playwright. Yes, he's a good playwright. But what's ridiculous about this concept is that there are many playwrights out there, who will probably never achieve the sort of backing Williamson had when he was emerging. He came up through the ranks of 1970's agitprop (agitated propaganda) theatre, and in fact started out at La Mama (before it was known as La Mama). Is there another David Williamson out there? Most assuredly. But will they be seen by audiences and the performing arts community for long enough for people to remember their names? Probably not. "Since the early 1980s, his social comedies and more serious-minded works have taken almost $20 million at the Sydney Theatre Company box office. Melbourne Theatre Company figures show that his 15 plays staged there from 1992 to this year earned $9.2 million at its box office," says The Age. But let’s not forget that these companies have high budgets, regular Government funding, and the ability to offer subscription tickets. How does an emerging playwright expect to earn a company this much in bums on seats, when the large companies veer towards presenting 'old standbys' and international works that have proved themselves in places like the West End and New York. The Age continues: "It will be interesting to see who comes along to replace David as a provider of reliable social comedy. STC's general manager Rob Brookman says, 'The only other English-language playwrights who have had such an extended relationship with an audience are Alan Ayckbourn and Neil Simon. Our audiences are used to seeing the annual Williamson; it became a community rite.' … The STC and the MTC have been programming Williamson fare so long that it was inconceivable that another play wouldn't be coming hot off the press." With Williamson retiring, the companies tell The Age that they will be looking to fill the gap with other 'standbys' like Hannie Rayson plays and works by Alan Bennett. It is clear, that in terms of large, major performing arts board companies, it is simply not enough to be a local playwright; you must be a playwright (of any nationality) with decades of experience. And yet, Sally McLean's work, which is pretty mainstream, cannot get funding. Stay tuned for the final instalment of Naomi's investigative features series into the state of new Australian playwriting. Article first published on Arts Hub - www.artshub.com.au Naomi Guss is also the Editor of The Prompt Copy - a free weekly arts industry newsletter with arts news, jobs and auditions. Go to www.freewebs.com/thepromptcopy for more information < back to Press