I was talking with another theatre professional that I know who said of my upcoming project, Art, “Yeah, I’m not a fan of that play – too much talking, not enough action.”
It got me thinking. I don’t think that’s true of this play, but more importantly, I think it’s an interesting reminder of what makes plays work.
Plays are about what people do, not what they say.
If you take a play, any play, you can kill it by staging it with no stakes, no struggle, no characters fighting for what they want or need or believe. Plays are about the big moments in people’s lives, they’re the out-of-the-ordinary events that force people to make big choices! They’re not, when done well, just “people talking.”
A famous playwright said this far better than I can:
That’s what happens in plays, yes? The shit hits the fan.
-Edward Albee
Tony Caselli 
Amen, Brother!
Drama doesn’t have to be huge swordfights or murder mysteries. The most human of problems can be thoroughly dramatic and engaging if staged properly, and with quality actors who commit to it!
-Soap-Box Joe Z
Get up on that Soap Box, Joe! Speak The Truth!!
*laughing*
POWER TO THE PEOPLE!
it’s a fine line to walk…too much action and you can lose the details of the dialogue, too little action and you have people sleeping in aisles…and then if the action doesn’t really fit what’s going on, then you have people wondering, “now why is that guy doing that?”, instead of paying attention to what you want them too…it’s enough to drive a director batty! but those are the most fun challenges, at least i think they are…
i was directing a show a few years ago and i had an actor ask me how i wanted her to play a scene, funny or serious…i said i didn’t want her to ‘play’ the scene at all but react as her character would…she pushed a little more saying that if i wanted people to laugh then she should play it funny…i reminded her that funny just is, serious just is…if you try to make something what you want it to be instead of being honest with the text, you get an unreal performance…the seriousness of funniness of a scene is there regardless of how you play it…but you’ll get the honest audience response if you play the scene as your character would respond to that particular situation in real life…
she kinda looked at me as though i had just lost my mind…but i’ve always been of the opinion that as soon as you force something into a play, or try to make into something it isn’t, you lose what the playwright wanted to say…
i guess what all this is trying to say, is that in a good play, everything is there, just discover it…
Yep – the playwright’s intentions should always be at the root of every decision you make as a director.