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J. J. Brown, Wordslinger

"I Sling Words As I Go Along."

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mythology

So, I’m Adapting My Screenplay….

…..into a novel, an exercise I’d been considering for awhile now.

This particular screenplay is something I wrote many years ago, more as a response to the Women as Victim trope that was prevalent in film (and TV) than with any real hope of getting it produced. It’s a very dark piece, probably the darkest bit of writing I’d ever done before or since, but it was a very satisfying story to write, not the least of which was turning the tables on the afore mentioned trope.

The fact that this particular trope has yet to be retired suggests that this screenplay (soon to be turned into a novel) is still relevant.

For the most part, not a lot will change within the narrative as I shift the story from one medium to another. At least two of the characters are going to go through major revisions, but this is due to the fact that they were not clearly defined in the screenplay. One character didn’t have a direct connection to the story arc in the script, but in the novel, I can correct that.

Because this is a thriller with elements of police procedural, there will be some major research to undertake. I’ll also be delving into Greek mythology, Shakespeare, and music to underscore some of the themes I’m planning to incorporate into the story. True crime writers will also be a source of information and inspiration.

I’m looking forward to seeing where this project goes.

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So, while revising my Ancient Greek Comedy……

…….I made creative decisions about some of the characters in terms of gender, personality and role in their mythology.  Since they’re basically archetypal, it was easy to do.

An example would be the character of Catamitus.

In Greek myth, Catamitus is male, one of Zeus’ many lovers and a cup-bearer to the gods.

Title and cast list of Hotel Mt. Olympus.

In my play, I ultimately chose to change Catamitus’ gender to female and remove the lover aspect, but the character is still a cup-bearer to the gods.  Sort of – she’s the manager of the hotel that caters to the gods and goddesses of all mythologies.

Which now leads to the name.

Catamitus is Latin, from the word catamite. [1]  Although I had changed the character from male to female, I did not alter the name.  The “-us” is for the masculine, while the “-a” is for the feminine.  In a flash, I had fixed the problem of a running joke in my play.

Many of the characters never get Catamitus’ name right, often referring to her as ‘Cal’.  It never really quite worked, even though I kept it in.

But.

If I change it to Catamita?  Oh, the possibilities!! The puns!! The gnashing of teeth!!

“Catamita done that” sounds close to “Cat might have done that”.

I can’t wait to dive back into my play and see how that works itself out.

Catamita, on the other hand, might just tender her resignation.

 

[1] The definition of catamite can be found here.

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So, while writing Secrets & Howls……

……my first self-published novel, I chose to set the time frame in 1978 (with occasional flashbacks to 1852).  I did this in part because I didn’t want cellphones or the internet in the story.  Technology that we find useful today would not have been useful in my story, which I had purposely left without a specific time-frame until an editor suggested I do so, because it wasn’t clear to her when the story took place.

Also, I was kind of lazy and didn’t want to adjust the story to suit the cellphone/internet.  Which sent me to the library for books on the seventies, since I only had a rudimentary recollection of the decade I grew up in.  The books, however meticulously researched, were deadly dull and did nothing to help me gain a clear picture.

So I did the next best thing – I turned to music.  Going to my local music store (long since gone), I scoured their classic rock section for music specific to the seventies.  There were a few disco CDs and, looking at the playlist on the back, I remembered ever single song playing on my mom’s VW hatchback.

Naturally, I bought them.

Which brings me to my Ancient Greek Comedy.

Apparently, music from the seventies fits right in with the chaotic hijinks of the gods and goddesses of ancient myths.

Who knew?

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So, I finished the first revision of my Ancient Greek Comedy….

…..and I feel pretty good about it.  There’s still some work left to be done on it, places that need polishing, and characters that need a little more development, but overall, I’m satisfied with what I’ve written.  My next step will be to send it to a local director for a clear eye and suggestions, and from there, that’s anyone’s guess.

But I’ve got some definite ideas.

Title and cast list of Hotel Mt. Olympus.

Should it go forward and find a stage, a cast and a choreographer [1], it will be the culmination of a dream – to see a work I wrote take on a new life in front of an audience.  Will I consider myself a playwright?  Only in the loosest sense of the word –  this is a fairly comprehensive list of playwrights that deserve the title.  Each of them have a body of work that will forever be in production.

I think this is my only work to be written specifically for the stage.  I won’t say that I’ll never try it again, but my specialty is writing in the narrative form.  This was a fun and, at times, a nerve-wracking challenge.  I’ve removed characters, added them back in, re-wrote dialogue and new scenes and then, when all seemed lost, a piece of music would send me back in with renewed vigor.

In the process, I realized that the story I wanted to tell (using LOTS of humor) required me to use the stories of the gods and goddesses I chose to be characters in my play.  Interestingly, their stories tied into many of today’s social issues and, while I was pleased, I wasn’t entirely surprised by this discovery.

After all, their stories have been around for centuries – they are very human concerns that transcend time and place.

[1] While this is not a musical, per se, it does have some song and dance numbers.

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So, I’m plugging along on my Ancient Greek Comedy….

……and I can feel the tangents wanting to take off and create something new.  This is exciting to me, because it means that this play has a lot to say, that there’s more depth to it than I had originally anticipated.  But because these tangents are too nebulous and without form, I’m making them wait until this revision is finished.

I know, I know, I’m being terribly mean to these tangents.  I mean, they only want to help my Ancient Greek comedy become something truly magnificent.

And I can’t argue with that, because I want the same thing.  Still, this revision has to happen first and then the tangents can come in and do as they please.  If it makes anyone feel any better about it, I write these tangents down to remember them.  That is, if there’s something solid enough to write down.

In any case, I’m delighted to see characters that I’d written out make their way back in,  One character has regained his speech after I took it away from him.  Issues that I have strong ideas and feelings about are working their way in, which is only right.  Theater, and the arts in general, are about exploring ideas (good, bad, ugly) and politics and feelings.  The arts are here to make us think, not just make us feel.  There is something at work within the confines of this play that I can’t readily identify, but it’s exciting to me.

And that’s a very good thing.

Title and cast list of Hotel Mt. Olympus.

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So, I’m revising my Ancient Greek Comedy…..

……where chaos reigns and ancient mythologies collide.  And that’s on a good day.

Most of the characters are based on the Greek gods and goddesses, but as I revise the play, I’m paying more attention to other mythologies.  I make reference to a number of them within the dialogue, but I actually want to have the other ancient mythologies represented.  To do that, I’m looking to give them a voice and space.

Since the ancient gods and goddesses are archetypal (ex. Athena is an archetype of war and wisdom), I’ve tagged a couple of the speaking roles to change over to a different mythological god/dess.  It’ll be interesting to see how that works out, especially among mythologies that aren’t as readily identifiable, like the Greeks or Romans.  Archetypes are common throughout every culture and myth.  One of the reasons the ancient mythologies and plays resonate today is because we can still see ourselves and circumstances in those archetypes thousands of years after they were first staged.

There is, naturally, a Chorus, because what ancient play – Greek, Roman, Egyptian, (fill in the blank) – doesn’t have a Chorus, the impartial conscience and voice of the play itself?  Generally, the Chorus’s role in the ancient plays (particularly the Greek ones) served to comment on the action within the context of the play.  My Chorus sings about the action, what the situation is and offers back-up to Hera and Juno when they discover that their philandering husbands are one and the same (for my purposes, Zeus is Zeus and created his Roman counter-part, Jupiter because his ego determined that he can).

And what ancient play is complete without music?  This play was inspired by the music of the Eagles and music has always played a part in grounding my stories to a time and place and feeling.  I even created mini-soundtracks for my screenplays, each song triggering a scene or a moment that demanded to be put down on paper.

But, while writing this play, I encountered a significant problem – I’m not a musician and I don’t know how to write song lyrics.  How am I to incorporate music into this play, other than to use and pay royalty fees for previously recorded music?

Fortunately, I am blessed to know several local musicians who have become very dear friends over the last few years.  During a conversation about my play, I mentioned my concern over how to incorporate music.  Unanimously, they said, “We’ll do it, all you need to do is ask, and it’s done.”

So now I have music and possible lyrics.  I promised to have my song ideas for them upon completion of this current revision.  My goal now is to find the right places for the songs to go and carry the story forward.

I have the feeling, however, that Zeus will make every effort to make it all about him.  Because that’s his nature.

Title and cast list of Hotel Mt. Olympus.

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So, I’m listening to the rain…..

…….as it descends upon the earth in a torrent. There’s a mini-lake in my backyard now, typical of what happens when there’s too much water in the ground and nowhere for the excess to go. It’s definitely one of those days where staying inside is the best idea. Since I don’t have a lot going on that requires my presence away from the house, I think I’ll stay in, snuggle with the cat, read a book and work on some writing.

I’ve got a number of projects on the fire – a novel, a novella, a stage play, among other things – and I haven’t been as attentive to them as I should have been. Now that I’ve got a little breathing room, I think it’s time to turn my focus on the written word.

I’d written a two act stage play a few years ago – a comedy involving the gods and goddesses of ancient mythologies. It’s a little heavy on the Ancient Greeks, but that’s only because I’m more familiar with those archetypes. I’m revising the entire play now, incorporating characters based on other mythologies, so as to have a better representation.

After all, a hotel that caters to the ancient gods and goddesses of myth should be all-inclusive, right?

Right.

Although he doesn’t make an appearance, Poseidon (Roman name, Neptune) is referred to at various points throughout the play. Since water is his primary domain (although he is known to be a shaker of the earth), today seems a good day to dive back into that play and see what turns up.

Title and cast list of Hotel Mt. Olympus.
Title and cast list of Hotel Mt. Olympus.

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So, I’ve been revising my Ancient Greek Comedy….

…..and I got stuck because of Zeus. Why, you ask, would the primary god in Greek mythology be such a problem that you got stuck when writing about him?

Good question.

By rights, he should be a fun character to give life to on the page. He’s larger than life (because he’s a god, naturally), bombastic, can shape-shift into any creature or element he wishes, has the power to control the world and his fellow gods and goddesses.

Zeus should have been a piece of cake to write about.

But he wasn’t.

He started out as a Burl Ives caricature, then I took him out and made him a light/sound effect so that I could reduce the number of characters I had on-stage. Then I added him back on-stage, as a physical character, but with light and sound as his voice. A director read the work and came back with several notes, including one that gave Zeus his voice back.

‘Great,’ I thought, ‘This should be easy.’

It wasn’t.

I had gone through the first twenty pages, revising dialogue and cutting out unnecessary words (and this is how I know I’m a novelist at heart – I’m very wordy). I re-structured character motive and added new directions. All was going well, it was clicking along at a nice pace and I was enjoying the characters and their interactions.

Then I came to Zeus, his first entrance and everything came to a screeching halt.

I typed in his name, hit the Enter key to start his first line and………nothing.

Zip. Nada. Silence.

I put it aside, as I always do when I encounter difficulty. I still kept notes, writing down ideas that could be incorporated into the script. I even began to design a soundtrack, to help with the creative flow. Also, there’s a Greek Chorus and the Greeks were all about music, so it made sense to let that side develop.

But I was still stuck and Zeus, uncharacteristically, was stubbornly silent.

An article I’d read recently about character development had been ruminating in my thoughts – I don’t recall the title of the article or where I’d found it, but I will edit this post to add it should I be lucky enough to find it.

In any case, the article asked a lot of good questions and what I remember is this – what is your character’s over-riding arc? What is their question that needs answering? What is their need?

I began to ask this of my play’s characters and some interesting things began to come up, things that had been below the surface.

And then recent events and Zeus’s own well-documented behavior in his own myths began to shed some light on the subject. Now I know his questions, his arc and his need.

The darkness always comes before the light.

Title and cast list of my play.
Title and cast list of my play.

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So, sometimes when I write……

……I get songs stuck in my head. I’m not kidding – I have created soundtracks to several screenplays, mostly for my own amusement. There has been at least one occasion where the song inspired the story and I wrote the bulk of it in one sitting.

I love crooners, like Tony Bennett, and groups like the Temptations or the Flamingos. I love singers like Natalie Cole and Cyndi Lauper. Their energy, their voices, their artistry, often connect with my imagination in such a way that scenes will write themselves. Sometimes the style of music will surprise me, but the mood it conveys will always suit the scene I’m in the middle of.

Right now, I’m revising my two-act comedy, cutting out unnecessary words (boy, I can tell I’m a novelist – I’m wordy!). Lines still make sense, even when cut in half, which is good. Since I’ve not written a stage play before, this is a good exercise for me.

I haven’t been listened to music for a long time, outside of my car. I’m discovering that I need to start listening again. Especially when you’re writing a play about the ancient gods and goddesses of mythology. There is a Chorus, after all, who sing about what they witness or summarize what came before. And music is the voice of civilization – just as the written word allows us to connect with the minds of Herodotus or Shakespeare or Jane Austen or Mary Shelley, so does music give voice to that past.

When a particular style or genre of music starts nudging at you, trying to get your attention, or you have a song stuck in your head, listen to that. That’s your creative instinct telling you to pay attention, that there’s something there for you to hear, that it may add more color into your work, whether it’s writing a play or painting a portrait.

So, on that note, I need to go listen to variations of Your Cheatin’ Heart. Apparently, country music has become part of my Ancient Greek Comedy’s soundtrack.

I did not see that one coming.

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