I write plays because writing dialogue is the only respectable way of contradicting yourself. I put a position, rebut it, refute the rebuttal, and rebut the refutation.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
I write my plays to create an excuse for full-tilt acting and performing.
You write a play mostly out of yourself. There's a need to get a certain thing down.
As a writer, you get to play, you get alter time, you get to come up with the smart lines and the clever comebacks you wish you'd thought of.
At the heart of the failure of most plays is the inability to carry on a thoughtful conversation about your work with yourself.
Although you should never mention your premise in the dialogue of your play, the audience must know what the message is. And whatever it is, you must prove it.
Perhaps I abandoned criticism because I am full of contradictions, and when you write an essay, you are not supposed to contradict yourself. But in the theater, by inventing various characters, you can. My characters are contradictory not only in their language but in their behavior as well.
For me, a play is a form of writing which isn't complete until it is interpreted by actors. But it's still a form of writing. And so most of my time is spent thinking about how to write a sentence.
I come from a tradition where the writer writes a play for the actors, rather than for himself, and the dialogue is made to work onstage, so it needs actors to help shape it. So you never get a play right straightaway.
I've never written a play before, and I'll never write one again. You can quote me.
I don't consciously start writing a play that involves issues. After it's done, I sit back like everyone else and think about what it means.