10 Minute Play Project: Geva Submission

Workshop

Please take the first 20 minute in class today to complete your workshop of various student-written plays. Then, we will begin our next project:

Writing the 10-Minute Play Project

The 10 minute play has gained quite a bit of respect over the last few decades. Starting as a theater gimmick and festival curtain risers, the 10 minute play can usually be produced with little or no budget, a theater can produce several new playwrights in an evening, and the plays are short (lacking the attention span one needs when seeing Shakespeare)--which appeals to a contemporary audience.

You will need a premise: the organizing theme or idea that defines everything in the play. A good premise will indicate an interesting inciting incident to help you start off your drama with some effective action or conflict, and will carry you through to the end of your play. The things to remember about 10-minute plays is that they are similar to short stories:

• They have a premise
• They have a dramatic situation (setting, characters in action, & a complication)
• They have a beginning, middle, and end
• They have a tight structure (most never change scene or setting)
• They are at most 10 pages long.
• There are usually fewer than five characters. Often two or three at most.
• The beginning of the play starts at a very early POINT OF ATTACK (inciting incident).
• By the end of the first page or the top of the second the argument or conflict has been presented.
• The play usually has only one conflict and one plot line.
• There is not much exposition. By the middle of the first page, exposition has been stated.
• The end of the play falls very close to the climax. Only a few lines are devoted to resolution.
• Most plays deal with the exceptionally brief, but powerful moment in a character's life.

Take ideas from your journal, reading, or handouts, or your own memory & imagination; Use the graphic organizers, if you need them, and read the handouts "The Dramatic Triangle" & "The Roots of Action" given to you this morning on plot and use the "Exercises" to help you create a play. You may work alone or with a single partner for this project.

Then write. Brainstorm, draft, write. Try to avoid unnecessary fooling around or off-task talking.

HOMEWORK: Your draft will be due next Friday. A 10-minute play should be between 5-10 pages in script format. If you are working with a partner, plan to use Google Docs or some way to share your files so you both can work on it during midterm week.