think fast

The following are thoughts related to the 24-hour play making process we undertook last week.

One might argue that making a play in 24 hours is a bad idea from the start and doomed to failure.

It would be easy to take this line given the widely held belief that the best theatre in the world is made slowly over long development periods. Not to mention the fact that speed is antithesis to what should be fundamental in making work - thoughtfulness. Without time to reflect and re-examine one's impulses it is inevitable that those ideas will be under-developed. No?

All of this ignores the context, of course. The project was an experiment meant to alter dramatically our typical modes of creating.

The joy of making work this way is that you don't have time to think. Thinking can get in the way, allowing time for second-guessing and erecting blocks in the creative pathways.

Thinking fast, under pressure of deadline, forces open new highways. It requires a certain amount of creative prioritizing. And it compels us to take creative risks rather than rely on familiar methods.

A normal creative path, from impulse to finished project could be symbolized by a winding rural road. Unpredictable, unreliable, and full of the unexpected. The 24 hour process could be said to build a super-highway of sorts. This new road is not perfectly smooth but it offers a clear line to the finish. One could argue, of course, that the highway analogy also includes drawbacks. We miss some beautiful scenery and we ignore exits which might lead to other, more fruitful, places.

This leads us to creative prioritization. With an end so clearly in sight, we're forced to eschew certain tangents which, in another context, could be extremely useful. This clarity of priority leads to a singularity of purpose in the work which can be very potent. Without those tangents the work might accused of lacking nuance but it will certainly gain from a high level of focus.

Getting us out of our comfort zone and forcing us to stay away from these tangents encourages us to take risks. (This is only possible in the context of an experiment where it is acceptable to fail.) Risk is the place where the best work happens. The Rite of Spring, A Doll's House, Saved, Einstein On The Beach, the work of Jackson Pollock - all of these took risks, challenged the status quo, and in the end, had an enormous effect in and beyond their respective mediums.

If you had 5 minutes to talk to the whole world, what is the best thing you could do with that time?

If you had one chance to show the world what you could do, would you do something familiar or take a risk?

If we're emotionally honest these are very hard questions to answer. It's easy to say we would be bold and fearless and take a risk. But would we know how? What if taking creative risks was a practice like yoga? Something we did every day and got better at over time.

I think it was Hitchcock who talked about exercising the story muscle... Everyday he took a newspaper story and converted it into a narrative.

Practice, practice, practice.