Creativity Quotation #10

"Every human being needs an outlet for his inborn creative talent. If you feel you would like to write, then write. Perhaps you are afraid that lack of a higher education might retard you from real accomplishment? Forget it. Many great writers, Shakespeare, Ibsen, George Bernard Shaw, to mention a few, never saw the inside of a college.

Even if you will never be a genius, your enjoyment of life can still be great."

- Lagos Egri, The Art of Dramatic Writing

Posted on June 23, 2015 and filed under Career, Creative, Writing.

Visit of Remembrance: Angel Island and its Comic Interpretation

Episode 1 of Henry Kiyama's The Four Immigrants Manga, translated by Frederik L. Schodt.

Episode 1 of Henry Kiyama's The Four Immigrants Manga, translated by Frederik L. Schodt.

The Four Immigrants Manga opens with an episode in which two of the four main characters, Charlie and Frank, are detained on Angel Island at the Immigration Station. Charlie even reads a Chinese poem carved on the wall of their room. As a result of this episode, I put Angel Island on my list of places I wanted to visit for research purposes. I wanted to see the Chinese poems with my own eyes; I wanted to stand in the room depicted in the comics.

I made it to the island last fall, but unfortunately did not have any cash with me when I reached the Immigration Station. It felt like a punchline to one of Kiyama's strips. But last week, I once again took the Tiburon ferry to Angel Island with a wallet full of cash - I was not missing my chance again - and a pen & notebook ready to write down any tidbits of information that might be interesting or applicable to the musical.

I ended up taking no notes. As I made my way through the different rooms open for viewing, my eagerness for "research" gave way to a more overwhelming sense of reverence. I don't want to make it sound magical or even unique - I often get this pull towards reverence when I walk into historical sites. I think I just quietly realized that this portion of my research was going to be more about considering the stark reality of what had occurred, rather than collecting data.

From 1910-1940, hundreds of thousands of Chinese immigrants were held like prisoners for extended periods of time in order to enforce The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. Other Asians and immigrants were detained as well, but most of the discrimination was targeted specifically toward the Chinese. Interestingly, Henry Kiyama probably never spent time detained on Angel Island because the year of his arrival was around 1904 - six years prior to the Station's opening.

It's very simple to read these facts and have a fleeting reaction - even if it is an honest and heartfelt one. I knew these facts prior to visiting the Station, and easily "knew how wrong it was" without thinking too much about it thereafter. But to actually stand there and stare at one of the poems hand-carved into the walls, to feel the lack of privacy in the cramped quarters, to see the beautiful San Francisco Bay through windows barred by a chain link fence - it is difficult to have a mere fleeting reaction when phantoms of the terrible truth are made available to your own senses.

One of the remaining Chinese poems on the walls of the Immigration Station.

One of the remaining Chinese poems on the walls of the Immigration Station.

This experience makes me ask an unanswerable question: Why did Kiyama choose to capture this difficult history in the form of a comic strip? Immigration Station isn't the only tough historical topic covered in the book. Kiyama takes things like the horrific events of The Great Quake and Fires of 1906 or targeted violence against Japanese immigrants, and he wraps them up into quippy, sometimes-whimsical-sometimes-flippant 12-panel strips that conclude with a punchline. One could reason that Kiyama was distant enough from these events that he ignorantly depicted them with insensitivity to their gravity.

But this also feels too simple an explanation, partially because Kiyama also depicts himself going through terrible times which are dismissed with a joke. In one episode, the character of Henry (who is based on Kiyama) loses all of his money when a bank fails. Henry is in tears, but his friend Charlie casually glosses over the tragedy with a final joke riddled with wordplay. I can't say whether this financial loss actually happened to Henry, but the fact that he shows himself undergoing misfortune that is treated with levity indicates to me that there is a more complex intention behind Kiyama's choice to combine real life events with comic strip fantasy than merely ignorant humor.

What exactly all this means I haven't quite sussed out, but I'm interested in using the remaining work on my musical to explore these problems. My use of American vaudeville as the primary stylization for the show brings with it similar questions of levity vs. gravity, and that became even more clear to me as I stood in the rooms of Immigration Station. My upbeat opening number during which the boys are held on Angel Island felt simultaneously wrong (for not-at-all accurately reflecting the history) and right (for mimicking Kiyama's own approach to the matters). It's a tense and awkward place to be in - a sort of historically transgressive limbo - but something tells me that herein lies the soul of my show.

If you've never visited Immigration Station, let alone Angel Island, I highly recommend it because even if the history-stuff gets too heavy for you, you can always take a beautiful hike around the Island and catch the best views of San Francisco and the Bay. (Just remember how odd it is that such beauty exists with such a complicated backstory.)

Posted on April 7, 2015 .

Takeaways from Day 3 of the ASCAP/Dreamworks Musical Theatre Workshop

Tonight's panelists were Michael Weiner and Alan Zachary, the writing team responsible for Broadway's First Date among many other impressive projects.

  • Solve the problem of your story's superstructure before you tackle its musicalization.
  • Don't take the path of least resistance when it comes to your song moments. There are moments that write themselves, but there will be times that require etching and digging to find the songs that have yet to be.
  • "All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others." - George Orwell, Animal Farm. Some characters have to be more important than others in order to give a solid through-line for the story to fall back on. Answer the question - "Whose story is this? Who am I rooting for?"
  • Don't leave vague empty gaps in your writing when it comes to action/staging. Even if the director changes it eventually, give her something to start with (I thought of Mrs. Lovitt's opening solo in Sweeney Todd and how it's very clear musically that she's busy pounding dough with very specific musical figures).
  • Don't rely solely on your lyrics to get the point across. Your music itself provides emotion, subtext and other storytelling elements. Don't ignore the effect your music is having on a scene's mood or premise.

Takeaways from Day 2 of the ASCAP/Dreamworks Musical Theatre Workshop

Today's panelists included Kevin Bannerman who has worked on story development for Disney Animation (Pocahontas, The Hunchback of Notre Dame), 20th Century Fox (Anastasia), and now Amazon Studios; and Winnie Holzman, book writer for Wicked and writer of TV series such as My So Called Life and Huge. This evening's presentation was not a plot-driven musical, but rather, as Stephen Schwartz called it, a "thematic revue." A show consisting of songs & scenes connected by a theme, but that didn't follow a standard narrative arc (think Cats or A Chorus Line).

  • Who is your show aimed at? Answering this may help you keep the thematic threads of your work focused and clear.
  • Leaving the audience wanting more isn't always a good thing. Make sure you answer the right questions for your audience so they get a grasp on what the premise of the work is. (For example, clarify the language of the show, real vs. heightened moments, context for songs).
  • Schwartz: "I'll accept any level of reality you present, if I understand what it is."
  • It doesn't matter how good the individual songs are if you don't provide an organizing principle that propels your audience forward. In a story-based show, this job is relatively easier - the central conflict should provide the forward momentum. However, when you no longer have a story to depend on, you need to give us a reason to stay interested.
  • I wish I could recall this verbatim, but Schwartz went through examples of shows that aren't structured around a typical narrative, and he explained what ties Cats together. It went something like: "They keep bringing out this old, sad cat and then shooing her off-stage. And you keep wondering, what's with that old, sad cat? And then she gets to sing her heart out at the end and go to heaven in a tire." True words.
  • Also, provide that organizing principle early enough in the show so that the audience isn't left confused or tempted to check out.
  • Holzman (paraphrased): "Be OK with living with these questions for now. You don't have to have everything answered." Schwartz: "Yet."