kind-of-SPAMALOT - Stage queries?

From what I understand about stagewriting, it's different from books. First, before a company will publish the script and make it available to the public, you must get the show on stage, sell tickets, and garner some good reviews. This will show the publisher your production has some merit and might be worth publishing.

From what I understand, and this is far outside my realm of expertise, plays work more through grassroots efforts. You take your play to your local theatre and see if you can garner some interest.

If they think it has merit they'll get the local theatre students involved and put it on for the school. If it has good responses, you can then take it to a more professional venue. If your local theatre thinks it sucks, chances are it does and you'll need to refine your craft. If ticket sales are dismal you'll need to refine your craft.

I would strongly suggest before putting in all this grassroots effort to get some readers to help you get your craft to the top possible form you can get it.

The thing about stage that's different from screen is there is no set final product. In screen you film it, and you can make endless copies of it and distribute it all over the world. In order for a play to be seen all over the world, it has to be acted by several different troupes all over the world. When a play is acted on stage that's it. The final product ceases to exist after the final curtain. It's over. And in order for it to be seen again, it has to be acted again.

Mamma Mia as I understand it, was put together by an already successful producer. I would suggest searching for examples of first time plays and see how it's done.

Again, not my field, so take anything I say as guesswork of how I've seen it done. There have been a few plays in my area that started with a local writer, taking it to the local theatre in this case the college, and it growing from there. You could always see if broadway is accepting submissions if you think it's ready to go straight to the top, though even Mamma Mia had 17 pre-screenings before it was accepted there. It started in The Prince Edward theatre in England or something like that. I could have the name mistaken.

Hopefully the more regular crowd will chime in soon who have a much better idea of the industry than I do. I couldn't personally write a stage play to save my life. The theatre class I took about all this was a few years ago, so venues might have also opened up since then.

Unless you have been hired/commissioned to write a play or your name is Neil Simon, you will have trouble getting people to read, let alone produce, your play.

We do six or seven productions a year. We also do a lot of new works, most by local playwrights, and a few from friends. Last night we had an opening of a new play that had a New York City production. Many of our new works have come up through the Fringe Festival route, a few have won national writing awards, but most come from people we know in the business - last nights show for example.

I get inundated with new scripts. I read them if I have a few minutes. If your play hasn't been done SOMEWHERE with good reviews, the chances of us doing it are close to zero - unless you are local or we know you. We can't afford a loser. It's not just the money - we will spend close to six months on a project from the decision to produce it to closing night - that is a lot of time from a lot of people - not a decision taken lightly. No one wants to spend a lot of time on a loser. If I pick plays that aren't successful, I will lose my volunteers as well as my audience.

Even being selective, I read a hundred plays a year hoping to find five or six to produce. I read another hundred or more that I don't even finish reading. They might be okay but I have be very selective. If it has language that will offend my audience, I don't care how good it is, I won't do it. If it has a lot of young characters in it, I probably won't do it - I can't cast it. Earlier this year we did a relatively new play that called for a 21 year old actor. I contacted the playwright and told her I wanted to cast it older. I finally cast a woman in her early fifties in the role. The playwright attended closing night and loved the production.

I hate to admit it but if your play doesn't grab me in the first fifteen minutes, I probably won't finish it.

We don't do readings or workshops on new works unless the playwrights are local.

I understand it is a Catch-22: You need to have your play produced to get the royalty houses interested but 99.99% of the theaters look to the royalty houses for plays to produce.

Remember too, that you only get one bite at the apple: If you get me to read a bad script, don't expect to read another version of your script or your next masterpiece. I don't have the time (or desire) to help you make a piece of junk into something better. I think this happens far more often than you think. I have sent e-mail's back to some playwrights telling them we won't be doing their play. Some want a detailed analysis of what is wrong with it and some actually want me to "re-write it any way I want making any changes I think are necessary."

Start with your local theater and if you can't get them to do it, get the message. If you want to spend your own money on it, go the Fringe Festival route and get great reviews.

Doug

P.S. At last nights performance, the actors met a therapist who wanted them to perform at an upcoming conference. One contact leads to another and soon you have a buzz about your play and more and more theaters will present it.

Doug has summed up the theater situation very well.

I am trying to think of some options for you.

Writer's Market is a large book published annually. It has a long listing of various publishers and theaters. It tells what each theater is looking for and what each does not want. It also tells you about requirements like whether the play must have had a production in order to be considered. If a theater or publisher has a website, the address is given, along with email addresses of contact persons. The book also provides useful information like whether you can submit the script electronically (PDF, etc.).

It is a fun book to read even if you never actually use it. In the U.S. it costs about $30.

You can also get an online subscription, which might be the best thing for you. (You list your location as Madrid. Is that Madrid, Spain?)

You would really benefit from reading the whole section on stage plays in Writer's Market.

From what I can determine, from looking at my current copy of the book, the online subscription rates are:

$6 monthly
$40 yearly
$55 for two years

These seem reasonable to me, in view of all the information that the book provides. I would expect the online site to provide all the same information, and I know that it is updated throughout the year.

Good luck, and post again to let us know if you have any success!

Roland

There are several musical theater royalty houses that might take on your musical.

Music Theatre International and Tams Witmark come to mind. You might contact them.

Options

Yes, there are some options, as Doug pointed out.

My reference to The Writer's Market made me read through some of the listings for plays, over the last couple of days. Some of the theaters/publishers state specifically that they will consider musicals.