In high school, I wrote a play that won first prize at the 1995 Rocky Mountain Playwrighting Festival.
The play, Landslide Victory, depicted an afterlife that was, for all intents and purposes, godless, where the almighty was chosen by an election no one cared about and where a random doofus bumbles his way into garnering enough support to depose the imbecile who’s currently in office.
Trust me, that summary is much, much better than the play itself.
While I’m discussing my novels, I thought of this formative work and wanted to ponder where it sits in my mind and my life, all while looking at the two times it was produced.
#
Landslide Victory started as a short story I wrote my sophomore or junior year of high school. I had a morbid fixation on the afterlife as a kid, inspired by movies like Beetlejuice and The Heavenly Kid, so I channeled that into a simple story that follows a guy who dies, learns the afterworld is essentially chaos and somehow bungles his way into being elected god.
Unfortunately—or fortunately, depending on your perspective—I no longer have a copy of the short story. That’s a shame; I’ve managed to archive most of my other writing from over the years. Oh, well.
In the spring of my junior year, I was cast in a school play, the wonderfully surreal comedy The Life and Death of Almost Everybody by the late British playwright David Campton. The play follows a janitor who, while cleaning an empty theater, conjures his own little world that quickly spirals out of his control.
The play, understandably, had a huge influence on how I approached Landslide Victory, from its goofy tone to how it opens with a endless speech from the lead character. It’s the first full-length work I ever finished, and as such, it’s about as shitty as you’d expect.
Though after all these years, simply calling a formative work “shitty” does it a disservice. I was still running out the “brown water,” and it would take years—and a lot more writing—before that water would even begin to lighten.
#
My prep school, McCallie, required everyone to participate in some kind of activity in the afternoon. Much to their credit, they granted me permission to produce Landslide Victory at a small local theater as my springtime activity.
I’ll talk about how terribly I directed this production in a moment because I’m so deeply moved at what a great time it was. I’m skipping over a longer story, but over the course of my junior and senior years of high school, I not only got involved with theater, but I also made dozens of new friends from all over my hometown. Most of them already knew each other, but there were some gaps, and over those two to three years, we all started hanging out, partying together, and putting on shows.
I was also able to cast a childhood friend of mine, an amazingly talented guy. He and I grew up in the same neighborhood but went to different high schools. This play proved to be such a wonderful way to reconnect with him; he’s one of my very favorite people. (Trust me, if you ever hear me talking about him when he’s not around, you’d think it was Jimmy Olsen talking about Superman.)
Like any close-knit group, there was some infighting, but man—by now, all I can remember is the good stuff. I certainly had friends in high school, and we had a blast, but I was drifting apart from a few of them, and Landslide Victory gave me a really soft place to land. (We also all wound up putting on a production of Much Ado About Nothing the summer after I graduated high school; it’s a memory that’s lambent with nostalgia for me and may warrant another blog entry sometime.)
#
The biggest problem with Landslide Victory, on its face, was its length. Over the course of rehearsals, we never actually ran through the entire text. I wish I’d radically cut it down, and moreover, I wish I’d recruited a smaller company of actors; it was incredibly difficult to wrangle everyone for rehearsals, though again—meeting all these awesome people was well worth the trouble. (I was also, putting it mildly, really hard on everyone in the show, and I wish I could get a do-over.)
The other problem with the play was … well, everything. It’s just not a very creative, inventive, or internally consistent work, with the kind of wooden, declarative, hammy, and self-important dialogue you can imagine coming from a high schooler. That said, the play has its moments. The “incumbent” god, a dullard named Mort, is obsessed with crafting entire planets from food. Here he discusses his latest project with his underling, the play’s lead, known only as Gofer:
MORT. Then, keeping with the breakfast motif, we’ll follow that with a layer of cream cheese, all topped off by an absolutely dazzling surface of Hollandaise sauce I’ve whipped up.
GOFER. Surface of Hollandaise sauce?
MORT. Do you think a meringue would be more appropriate?
“Do you think a meringue would be more appropriate?” still makes me smile after all these years.
#
The production I staged with all the local theater geeks was … a lot. It had two intermissions and ran almost four hours. Four hours. My god, what was I thinking?
But there’s nothing I could’ve done to stand in the way of the talented cast I’d assembled, all of who worked their asses off. I can remember every performance, every moment. The lead actor, who I’m still friends with, cooked up so many fun gags to spruce up my leaden text. Another guy, the childhood friend, was awesome. The female lead, and the play’s nominal villain, covered her script with notes. Everyone kicked ass.
We had three performances; the third one really cooked.
I’m still friends with several people from this cast. They’re a special bunch. One of them, a brilliant guy who played one of the lead roles, traveled with me to see the Colorado production.
#
A writing teacher of mine heard about the Rocky Mountain Playwrighting Festival and helped me assemble the submission package. McCallie dedicated an entire department to writing, with a full computer lab and two teachers dedicated to helping kids learn how to write across all disciplines. Like a chucklehead, I made fun of it at the time, even though it was manifestly well-conceived and executed. Both teachers made a difference in my life. One of them died at a very young age; I may write about him at some point.
I completely forgot about the contest until I got a call telling me I’d won it.
#
It’s funny to look back at moments like these and wonder what went wrong?
I don’t mean to bring the mood down. I don’t mean to be too hard on myself. I’ve had some small success as a writer, and I’m incredibly proud I got to be a part of this contest. The winning plays—there were three others—received some prize money and a production in Telluride, Colorado. They even flew us out there for the weekend.
I thought I was at the beginning of a great career. I wasn’t.
In thinking back on this experience, I want to highlight a difficult creative lesson I started to learn, but I also want to talk about some of the good stuff. My trip to Telluride includes some cherished memories, and I’d like to share those.
No kidding—after all these years, I don’t think I’ve ever spoken with anyone about either of these things in any kind of detail.
#
Note: Once again, I don’t want to be too hard on myself. I wasn’t at the beginning of a great career, but I’m proud of the career I’ve had.
#
The difficult creative lesson I started to learn was a simple one: You’re not as good as you think.
Correction: You’re not even remotely as good as you think, and you’ve got a long road ahead of you before you can even start to approach this level.
I know I’m rightfully inviting a lot of scorn and derision. Hey, look—some kid was coasting on unearned confidence! What a dumb asshole!
But as excited as I was to get to travel across the country to see my writing brought to life, my excitement was tempered when I saw the other plays that won.
Man, they were awesome.
I’m sure that all three plays had their quaint youthful weaknesses and shortcomings. Maybe. But when I sat down to watch them, I remember the intense feeling of Wow, I couldn’t do this mixed with Oh, no. My play is so embarrassingly bad in comparison.
#
Here’s a brief summary of the other plays, taken entirely from memory:
The Luthier. A violin craftsman slowly cracks up, all while his wife deals with the fallout. Beautifully written, and if memory serves, I think the writer might’ve also played the lead? (Regardless, he was great.) Anyway, it was lovely, and I also remember the wife’s performance with admiration. (I remember thinking the play could’ve easily been called The Luthier’s Wife.)
James Dean. The famous actor wanders into a bar or diner for an evening. As I recall, this was written by two people, who I think were a couple? The guy played the title role masterfully.
Strangely, the title of the third play escapes me, although it was my favorite of the three. It was something like Breathing or Breathless? Anyway, it was a series of monologues between a married couple, one of who was a murderer, if memory serves. The folks in Telluride staged it with this remarkable life-sized puppet, which stood in for the killer. The entire experience was beautiful and terrifying, and I can still call up images from it in my mind’s eye with total fidelity. One line of dialogue, which I’m sure I’m butchering, has lingered with me, “I love the feeling of breathing in your sighs.”
#
It occurs to me that there’s a version of this blog entry where I might change course and say, Y’know what? I’m being too hard on myself. My play could go toe-to-toe with those others!
Nope. It couldn’t. Trust me.
But didn’t I say earlier that I had some cherished memories from this experience? If my play was such dogshit, what could those memories even be?
Well, even though my play was easily the weakest of the bunch, here’s what I vividly remember:
The folks who staged my play fucking loved it.
#
I don’t say that lightly, but they did. After several travel delays, I arrived in Telluride at the last minute, right before the festival was about to kick off with two of the other plays—The Luthier and James Dean, I think—followed by my play. There was a break between the shows, and I headed outside. On my way toward the door, I heard people outside saying, “Is that him?” “What does he look like?”
Outside was the cast, who I immediately recognized. It’s a goofy bunch of characters, and they were all in makeup and costume. To a person, they greeted me warmly. Two of the characters were being played by a mother and daughter, both of who were incredibly talented. I’ll never forget how kindly the mother—whose name I wish I could remember—spoke to me. I’m paraphrasing from a distant memory, but as I recall, the mother in particular was moved by the play’s depiction of an afterlife that was relatively free from religion.
And here’s where I think after going wrong in many ways, my play managed to go right: it was very me, and even though the me of 1995 was a stupid chucklehead—I still am—I also wrote a play that was a lot of fun to be in, and that showed through in all of the people I met. They were clowning around and laughing, cracking jokes and asking if was okay for them to mention Jerry Garcia onstage. (He’d died very recently, and of course I said it was okay.)
One detail I remember fondly: I’d seen a cast list for the show by this point, and I knew that they’d cast a woman in the lead role, which I’d written for a guy. She wasn’t outside, so I never actually got to see her until the play started. She was fucking fantastic. (She and I remained friends after the event, and she’s since read a couple of my novels, I’m proud to say.)
The director of the play was this tall, kind-faced goofball who apologized for cutting so much of the text, but good god, I’m glad he did. Even though the play was a shitty formative work, it found no better form than it did on that stage in Telluride. They knocked it out in ninety minutes with no intermission.
#
At some point, I spoke with the guy who ran the festival, and no kidding, I asked him why my play won. As always, I’m paraphrasing from a distant memory, but he highlighted one scene.
I’ll spare you the gory details, but the play’s story revolves around the upcoming election for god. A random guy, Dave, becomes the favorite to win the election. The play’s lead, Gofer, is dispatched to retrieve Dave so he can put his name on the ballot.
But Dave says no.
#
I worked on this play closely with one of my high school english teachers, who took time out of his life to read my dumbo play and give me notes and feedback.
In an earlier draft of the play, there was no need for Dave to put his name on the ballot. He was simply entered into the election, and Gofer went to tell him he’d won, and then Dave declined to accept the win. My teacher suggested the change, which led to this scene:
DAVE. I’m afraid.
GOFER. Of what?
DAVE. I don’t know why, but I’m afraid of what could happen. You see, in the past, I never really did anything anyone noticed. Then, all of a sudden, because of me being myself, the entire Universe is telling me that I should become their God. That is so stupid. None of you know me. None of you know what kind of job I’d do. Listen, when I screw something up, I don’t mind hurting me, but this is different. I don’t want to screw everything up. And what if I lose? I know you have a lot of confidence in me, but there’s still no guarantee I’ll win. And then what? Where would I be then?
GOFER. But, you can’t think that way. That school of thought is the reason why Mort is still God, and why we’re all still leagues apart from each other.
DAVE. I’ve got to get out of here.
GOFER. Where are you going to go?
DAVE. I don’t know. Someplace to forget about all this.
GOFER. It’s easy to be worthless, isn’t it?
DAVE. Stop it. Dammit, I’m not worth the effort! Forget about me. Please, I’m tired of letting other people think for me. [He starts to exit.]
GOFER. Tell me this. [Dave stops.] What will we do?
DAVE. It’s not my problem. [He exits. Gofer, broken, sits in Dave’s chair. Fade slowly to black.]
Oooooooh, look at that dramatically dramatic stage direction: Gofer, broken, sits in Dave’s chair. Fade slowly to black. Lydia Deetz couldn’t do any better!
Gofer sits in Dave’s chair.
No, no … Gofer, broken, sits in Dave’s chair.
Jokes aside, I vividly remember writing this scene, and moreover, how easy it was to write it once I’d made this change. I’m stating the obvious, but: the change introduced conflict.
I also vividly remember my teacher very kindly saying, “It’s fun to hammer out these kinks, isn’t it?” (Unlike a lot of my remembrances in this blog, I remember exactly what he said. I’ll never forget it.)
The dialogue above isn’t well-written … but it played well, and moreover, it was one of the first promising signs that I might be able to build my craft as a writer if I kept working at it.
It’s not Shakespeare, but it ain’t bad.
#
I think it’s also worth mentioning how quickly I recognized the superiority of the other winning plays.
Listen, I know it’s a low bar to clear, but over the course of my creative life, I’ve been in a few situations where my work was juxtaposed with other, better works. It’s not a pleasant feeling, but I would much, much rather be intellectually and creatively honest with myself when it comes to my own work and the work of others.
As the years have gone by, I’ve also worked on my craft enough to the point where my work fares better in comparison with some others. Not always, but sometimes.
I’ve learned that I’m not a prodigy. I’m very much a journeyman.
#
I’ll leave you with this. I recently got back onto Facebook, and while looking up old friends, I ran across a post with some of the cast of my production reminiscing about the play … and how much fun they had.
I don’t want to put words into anyone’s mouths, but I was so deeply touched to stumble upon this discussion. I hope they remembered the good stuff, too.
Robert J. Peterson, Author 