What is a play? What does a play “look like”? Why write one? In this six-week workshop, students will explore answers to these questions through writing and collaboration.

We interviewed instructor Adara Meyers:

Who is this workshop for? Why write a play?

This workshop is for anyone who is fascinated by the merging of text, movement, and sensation. How do they work together to create fleeting-yet-unforgettable moments, collective experience, and the potential for infinite personal reverberations? Plays allow us to express the enormity and minutia of our lives, memories, dreams; they create an invisible bond of shared experience between the artists, audiences, and spaces. 

Writing a play can be a bold act of political transgression or critique. It can be a celebration, a ritual. And it can spark the desire to share divergent voices and perspectives. These are just a few reasons to write a play. In my view, the most impactful plays raise more questions than answers from a place of generosity and curiosity.

How can experimenting with Playwriting inform other forms, genres, and aspects of the creative process? 

Playwriting is so much more than the act of putting pen to paper, or fingers to keyboard. It can be seen as creating a living sculpture (performance), which then prompts us to think about what we consider proper form (and why). Can writing be a form of choreography? Can poetry be created through wood instead of traditionally “written” text? Can a dance be a “plain” walk across the street? When you begin paying close attention to people and their conscious and subconscious mannerisms—how they talk, how they move their bodies, which spaces they encounter or avoid on a day-to-day basis, what objects they come in contact with—the ways in which you can explore form and process are unlimited.

Is it okay if students don’t have any prior experience with play writing (or going)? 

Absolutely! There are no prerequisites for experiment with dialogue, mystery, atmosphere, and imagination. These are some of the main qualities of an intriguing play, and luckily, we can access them in all sorts of places in our daily lives. A renowned playwright I have long admired once told me, “Whenever I take a yoga class and they ask if anyone is new to yoga, I always want to throw up my hand. Of course, I’ve only been doing it for 15 years. Playwriting I’ve been doing longer. But I’m still a beginner. Although the longer I live, the more I become a beginner with tricks!” 

INSTRUCTOR: Adara Meyers
DATE: Thursdays, Sept. 29-Nov. 3 (6 weeks)
TIME: 6:30-9:00pm
WHERE: 186 Carpenter Street, Providence RI
$160-$275 sliding scale
Register here.