Let’s talk about audience/ Developing audience / An exercise with an audience! Let's talk about audience Audiences come to the theatre on the off chance that they will have a good time. Give them one. Entertain them. (Tommy Murphy) We asked our playwrights to share their thoughts on the audience. Something that may not have occurred to you is the importance of the audience to the playwright – and not just because we want someone to watch our plays. Theatre is a collaborative experience and the final collaborator is the audience. A play can exist without an audience, on paper, as a script, but as Verity Laughton points out, not truly finished until it has been “through a season with an audience and worked on with their reactions in mind.”  |  | Theatre is live and part of what makes it unique is the connection that is made each night, every night. It’s the communication, the live response, the living, breathing energy that exists between the people in the audience and the people on and behind the stage. … watch the face of the audience. It will tell you more about whether they are engaged than any applause will. (Jane Harrison) A playwright should be aware of their audience. Like Jane Harrison above, Suzie Miller points out that audience feedback can have a direct response on your play, at least in the earlier stages. If you have a rehearsed read of the play, or any form of a play read – listen to the feedback. If two people say the same thing then really take notice. If three people have the same criticism, consider changing it!! (Suzie Miller) | |  |
Developing audience So how do we look after our audience? Our playwrights had firm ideas on this: I think all playwrights should be audience-focused… not indulging themselves at the expense of the people who’ve put their bums on the seats…. (Debra Oswald) | | Don’t be boring (easy to say, I know). Don’t be obscure if there is any way to express the ideas more clearly. Be generous to your audience – that is, offer up every treasure that belongs in the play you’re writing, whether it’s narrative, beautiful language, suspense and surprises, humour, emotional sweep, whatever. Give us a feast. (Debra Oswald) It’s all about mutual communication isn’t it?...Respect (the audience) as fellow humans – we are all audience for the thing once it’s alive there in the space, after all. Personally, I like to question, intrigue, engage, challenge, prod, puzzle, but never alienate or try to make someone feel dumb. We’re all sharing this wacky planet together. (Catherine Ryan) | | |
But although you should keep your audience in mind, and, as Debra and Catherine above point out, avoid talking down to them, alienating them, or (the worst crime of al), boring them, you should also remember that you are the playwright. You are writing a play because you have something you need to say. You have a story you are burning to tell. You have a character you are itching to set in motion.
Write for yourself. (Michael Gow) | | You can’t predict them. Sometimes they’re quiet and don’t laugh and you think they hate it, but they often are just reacting to it in a different way. I think one of the most important things you can do as writer is watch your work as often as you can with different audiences. You end up getting to feel the audience, in much the same way actors probably feel and ride audiences from on the stage. Sometimes it’s really excruciating watching your work with an audience, but those are important times to be there. The worst times are when you’re really learning. But make sure you learn from what works too. It’s funny, you never know what a show will really be until the first time you see it with an audience.(Lally Katz) | | |
An exercise with an audience! I love to hear actors read the play aloud. So much becomes clear when you hear it – where the play is sagging, where it’s confusing, the moments that are in your head but not on the page yet, the balance between characters, etc. (Debra Oswald) As an exercise, get a bunch of friends around and read your play out loud. (Pick the friends carefully! You want a nice blend of sensitivity, honesty and encouragement) At the end ask them to tell you - What did they like about the play?
- What were their queries about the play?
If they all think the same about certain issues take notice for your next draft. I leave the final word on getting the most out of audience feedback, however, to Tommy Murphy: When I listen to a response to a draft, I deliberately hear every statement as a question. “I didn’t buy that bit” would be written down in my notebook as “Is that moment believable?” I do not have to answer the questions on the spot. I sleep on them. I aim to be open because I want a play that is for an audience beyond just me. I avoid being defensive because I don’t want to cling onto ideas. That’s why you have to wait to show your work. If the ideas aren’t ready to be critiqued you find yourself protecting your babies. That’s not a happy position for the writer especially in such a collaborative artform.
|
“…overall the strongest common denominator in my starting a new piece will be when I have got a voice, usually that of the main character, then I can weave the rest around that.”
(Verity Laughton) |