I moved from New York City to the backhills of Kentucky.  No, I didn’t have family there.  I wasn’t raised there and in fact, when I was growing up, there was a general attitude in my hometown that people from Kentucky were dirty and stupid.  Frankly, they’re anything but.  Appalachia is filled with simple, honest, sincere, unique folks and many of the central towns and cities artistic and sophisticated.  Louisville has reinvented its industrial persona to hip and contemporary, particularly in the downtown area.  Frankly, I moved to Kentucky because it’s one of the most beautiful places on earth and land was affordable. The mountains, streams and knoblands exert energy like the streets of New York, but in a natural, gentle way.  But the truth is, where I chose to live back then, there were little arts at all.  So, I did what artists do, I created art in my community.  In this case, filling a particularly chilling void of arts for kids.

I believe the arts are integral to human development.  So I founded a theatre training program for kids.  And if you think working with kids is different from working with adults, you’re right.  Only you’re wrong, too.  The right part is they’re kids.  The wrong part is that the same techniques we develop as professional theatre artists, whether actors, writers, directors or designers, are the same you develop with kids.  That is if you want to get something good out of them on stage.   Like adults, some kids present a natural strength in the arts, some don’t, but like everyone, old or young, kids can progress from one level to another wherever their starting point.  Directors working with kids generally fail to get what they want from their youthful actors because they fail to realize they can.  It’s about respect and creating a playfully disciplined environment where quality of work is stressed and the occasional rolling of the eyes at you, or rolling across the floor for that matter, is ignored.  A good director knows a roll across the floor works for kids as well as adults.  So the next time you’re working with kids, start each rehearsal with warm-ups and play some theatre games and exercises.  The adults in the cast will love it.

I jumped out of bed this morning excited about writing my first Backstage Blog and proceeded to shut my finger in the bedroom door. It reminded me immediately of the Technical Director at the University where I got my MFA in Theatre. He would have said that was real comedy. Of course, why the Technical Director was leading a Graduate Seminar on Comedy I’ll never know. I guess the Security Guard was booked that semester. Anyway, as I sit at my computer typing with an increasingly blue index finger I hear the words, not really, from the elves in a children’s play I read recently… “Do you know how to write a blog, Bippin?” “No, I thought you did.” What about you, Jack?” “Why would I know how to write a blog?” “Do you know how to write a blog, Fizzel?” “No, I was supposed to bring the vodka.” At any rate, Swatchcloth, the leader put it ever so clearly, “If a duck can write a blog it can’t be that difficult for an elf.”

Moving away from elves to writers, even though I’m sure they have much more in common than the average elf cares to admit, I’d like to say a word about good writing, the kind that gets my attention and makes me want to read past the first page. Heartland Plays looks for writers living outside New York and LA, but isn’t that where all the talent is? Personally I think everybody should live in New York at one time or another. Sorry, not everyone can live in LA. You only get to live in LA if you’re both beautiful and talented. Or at least beautiful. I loved living in New York and feel invigoratedly comfortably at home there. (You notice, invigoratedly is not a word. That’s one of the best parts of writing, you can make up your own words.) But living in New York was only one of the many life experiences I intended to achieve or explore or have fall on my head in my lifetime and that quest led me to all parts of the world and up and down my own backyard of this amazing United States. And it just seems to me that a lot of other writers took that same kind of path and wound up living in woods and small towns, along rivers and in working class cities and quaint historic villages with all kinds of stories bouncing around in their heads but out of range and out of touch with agents and producers and editors that actually have the power (and yes it is power) to get that work out of their hands and into the hands of readers and actors and directors and in front of audiences where it rightfully belongs.

I believe life experiences are the heart of good writing. Don’t get me wrong. It doesn’t mean you have to write about every nook in the universe you’ve uncovered, every lover you’ve enjoyed or grew to despise, or every salesman and politician you’ve encountered along the highway. Leave those to travel writers, lovers and bloggers. Take instead your insights, your impressions, your passions and your depressions and allow them to inspire and texture your work. Wherever you live, wherever you are, you have a framework on which to build great stories from a perspective entirely unique to your life and the sum total of your experiences. You can submit a well-crafted play, but if it lacks life, I’ll know it.