A good actor always sets you straight. If you've written a false moment and thought it was probably pretty great, the actor's gonna show you when he gets to that moment. They're the great test of the validity of the material.
Sam ShepardRead
When you write a play, you work out like a musician on a piece of music. You find all the rhythms and the melody and the harmonies and take them as they come.
Interpretation
Writing a play is a creative process similar to composing music, where one discovers various elements like rhythm and harmony.
In this quote, Sam Shepard illustrates the art of playwriting by comparing it to music composition. Just as a musician discovers rhythms, melodies, and harmonies, a playwright finds the essential elements of their story as it develops, suggesting that creativity involves a natural exploration of ideas and emotions integrated into the narrative.
In practice
During a lecture on playwriting, a teacher quoted Shepard to inspire students about the creative process.
A good actor always sets you straight. If you've written a false moment and thought it was probably pretty great, the actor's gonna show you when he gets to that moment. They're the great test of the validity of the material.
I stay away from heavy-handed stuff, the good guy and the bad guy. It just doesn't interest me; all it does is create more fences between people, I think.
I hate endings. Just detest them. Beginnings are definitely the most exciting, middles are perplexing and endings are a disaster. … The temptation towards resolution, towards wrapping up the package, seems to me a terrible trap. Why not be more honest with the moment? The most authentic endings are the ones which are already revolving towards another beginning. That’s genius.
There are places where writing is acting and acting is writing. I'm not so interested in the divisions. I'm interested in the way things cross over.
Democracy's a very fragile thing. You have to take care of democracy. As soon as you stop being responsible to it and allow it to turn into scare tactics, it's no longer democracy, is it? It's something else. It may be an inch away from totalitarianism.
On stage, you're not limited at all because you're free in language: language is the source of the imagination. You can travel farther in language than you can in any film.
Let proportion be found not only in numbers and measures, but also in sounds, weights, times, and positions, and what ever force there is.
Work is what you do for others, liebchen. Art is what you do for yourself.
I thought it would be fun to take the kind of character that nobody would like, none of our readers would like, and shove him down their throats and make them like him.
His laughter tinkled among the teacups.
A film is like a battleground. It's love, hate, action, violence, death—In one word, emotions.
The urge to destroy is also a creative urge.
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