SHOW BUSINESS IS BASED ON RELATIONSHIPS

A friend in Hollywood once explained to me that “Your success in show business won’t be based on your talents, but will be based on relationships” and that’s a bummer to me because the one thing I suck at is relationships, but that’s a whole other area to blog about…. I’ve been very blessed in this writing career to be able surround myself with people that are not threatened by doing good work!  I’ve been around both types of people, the ones that are threatened are ruthless and will do all they can to make you look bad and work at ruining reps, if they feel threatened by you and your work.  It’s a horrible and heart breaking experience.  The flipside, surrounding with people that ARE NEVER THREATENED is not only a blessing, but it’s a rarity and takes a lot of looking at monsters to find good people.  



The story behind my one act play, TROLLING, started in 1997 in New York City when a friend was so frustrated with the way his work was being received as a playwright that he walked out of class and was literally on his way to the Dean’s Office to quit school and never darken it’s doorways again!  I was on my way to my P.D. Unit session (The Actors Studio calls their developmental labs, Playwright Directors Units) when coming the opposite way on 7th Avenue was my friend and cohort playwright, A.J. Ciccotelli, who had just been severely critiqued by out classmates, a teacher and a guest established playwright that was brought into the session.  Critiques of plays at The Studio could range from enlightening to destructive.  The Studio since Lee Strasberg took the helm is famous for it, but there just some days where the notes are way off and come across as personal attacks on the writer.  Doesn’t always mean that was the intention by the reviewer, but when you’re dealing with someone’s passion, sometimes… it’s just the way it comes across.  Note sessions are highly charged… my friend had just had one of those sessions and well…. It was a meeting that was our destiny.

     
   

“I’ll cut class.  Let’s go get a drink!” is what I answered when I was told what happened and for the rest of the afternoon and into the night, my friend A.J. and I hit every bar we could and at the same time compared experiences, positives and negatives and came to the conclusion that “Not everybody is gonna like my work, but I know my work is good and we’re gonna do great things!”  In the long and short of it, A.J. didn’t quit school or writing and I made a great friend, but we both put our Grad School experiences into proper perspectives cause as much as I love my grad school and friends from grad school…. School, any school… isn’t the real world.  So, in 2000 we graduated… and stayed friends and cohorts, constantly calling each other and comparing our theater experiences!

           
         

FAST FORWARD – 2014 and I’m in Los Angeles trying to be a writer when I decide to put a show up in the Hollywood Fringe Festival.  I gather 6 great actors that I’m friends with and they perform my collection of monologues, THE LAST REMNANTS OF COPS, ROBBERS & HOLLYWOOD COWBOYS.  The show goes over well and gets some great reviews, but the woman that runs the theater we were in, she takes a liking to my writing and by the end of the summer hooks me up with a developmental theater company.  They make me a member and weekly, I bring work in and they read it, critique it and I go home to re-write off their notes.  This is the life of a playwright.  I’m still living in the P.D. Unit like I did back in grad school.  The wonderful thing about this production company is all the members are extremely supportive and they all want to see good work come out of the company!  I don’t see the character assassination game here like I did in my past… and… my phone rings….

It’s A. J. Ciccotelli…. He now in 2015 is an award winning High School Drama teacher, who is also working on his second M.F.A., but this one is in directing and at the same time he is the Artistic Director of a theatre company in New Jersey.  A.J. tells me about his companies Theater Festival and he’d like a piece of mine to be in it.  “Can you write a 20 min one act comedy based on your 9-1-1 Operator experiences?”  (That’s how I pay the bills in between shows!!!)  

“YES, of course I can!”

In L.A., I write out my 20 minute show and I bring it into my Monday night theater company and I try it out… and we get good notes and I re-write it again… and send it off to A.J.  He loves it, his members love it and we’re on!  2 weeks of shows in Asbury Park, New Jersey and 4 nights of shows in New York City, Off Broadway!!!!

       

It was a great run!  Audiences liked the piece a lot!!! TROLLING is now being developed for the L.A. Theatre company and has expanded to a 50 page comedy that might get a full production in the upcoming season.



So, it’s true… “Show Business is all about relationships” and… I hope I make a lot more blessed ones as this because for my show TROLLING none of this would be happening if, my friend and I hadn’t run into each other on the street and had a drink together over 15 years ago!