TAPOK Playwrighting Workshop

April 24-27, 2018

Introduction

• Your script is a recipe book. A script of a play is a set of instructions for the actors and the

director.

• Film vs Stage

o It’s alright to mix the film and stage medium, but first one must be able to identify the

delineation of the two, must be able to recognize which element of film is being adopted

for stage, and vice versa.

▪ E.G. Flashback is a cinematic device

▪ E.G. VO is a cinematic device

o Film scenes have to be short, as a rule. Because it gets boring for the audience.

o While stage scenes have to be long, as a rule. Because the audience might get confused

Choosing the Material

• PROCESS EXERCISE:

1. What do you want to write about? If the topic is not limited, what is something that you

are very passionate about? Something that you can defend and stand behind regardless?

2. Write an argument for it. A point-by-point argument. 5 minutes free writing.

3. Write a counterargument for it. Deconstruct it point-by-point.

(This exercise allows you to get to know your material. To find out what really is your point.)

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 TAPOK Playwrighting Workshop
April 24-27, 2018
Trainor: Mr. Rody Vera
Prepared by: Decelle Suarez

Character Work

o The ONLY 2 things to focus on when making a character:

▪ OBJECTIVE: What does the character want?

▪ OBSTACLE: What keeps their character from getting it?

• Objective

o Your character can only want one thing. One objective. The character must want it so bad

that s/he is willing to stake her life for it.

o Desire equates stakes. The bigger the desire of the character to get the objective, the

bigger s/he has to lose.

o Conflict sometimes arises when your objective clashes with your several identities or

categorization.

▪ E.G. a same-sex couple wants to get married

• Obstacle

o However, generally, conflict arises from the obstacles which the character has to

overcome to achieve the objectives.

o Two characters can have the same objective. What separates one character from another

is how they respond to the obstacles.

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 TAPOK Playwrighting Workshop
April 24-27, 2018
Trainor: Mr. Rody Vera
Prepared by: Decelle Suarez

• PROCESS EXERCISE:

o Pick a protagonist in which the whole story will revolve around

o Write them a character sketch

▪ Who are they? (Age, Occupation, etc)

▪ What is their objective/desire?

▪ Tell their story based on their objective

o Pick a moment or situation in the character’s life – an emotional peak. Either they are

talking with someone else, or alone. Write out a monologue detailing what they want and

what the obstacles are against their objective. What does the character decide on doing

then (what is the response)?

• Notes post-monologue:

o Put your character in trouble. Real trouble. Let your character deal with that trouble

instead of providing a safety net. That’s how the character develops.

o Find the dramatic potential of your character. Dapat naay gibuhat ang character, mao

nang naay mahitabo. As opposed to: naa ray mahitabo sa character. In that way, static ra

ang character. Wa siyay dramatic potential.

o Always think in terms of: what will the character do amidst all these odds? Instead of

what will happen to the character?

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 TAPOK Playwrighting Workshop
April 24-27, 2018
Trainor: Mr. Rody Vera
Prepared by: Decelle Suarez

SCENEWORK

• 2 ways to write any dramatic form: ACTION LINE & DIALOGUE. When you mix the two

together, you make a scene.

• The challenge is: paano mo titimplahin yung action at dialogue para ipakita ang emotional

journey ng character?

o Action lines push the story forward. BUT kung manobra gani ka ug action line, naay risk

to be shallow and confusing.

o Dialogue adds depth to the story. BUT kung manobra pud ka ug dialogue, laay. The

momentum of the story stops.

o One has to mix action and dialogue in a way so that the story is pushed forward, but at

the same time naay depth.

• Every scene has a beginning, middle, and end.

• Think of how you can collapse a bunch of scenes into only a few moments. That would make

scenes richer.

o Always consider: what is the point of the scene? If you can easily reveal the events of the

scene in a few lines at a more dramatically rich moment, then go with that.

• When world-building or operating inside a fantasy world, the audience must still have someone

human-like to relate to. They must be able to justify how and why the fantasy world works that

way. For example, the distaste of purebloods towards half-bloods in the Harry Potter series are

understandable and parallel to our own experience with racism.

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 TAPOK Playwrighting Workshop
April 24-27, 2018
Trainor: Mr. Rody Vera
Prepared by: Decelle Suarez

CONFLICT BUILDING

• If you have a lot of things you want to say from which your conflict would arise, prioritize.

o Which is the main message?

o Otherwise, you and the audience will be confused as to the origin and solution of the

conflicts. It will be hard to tie them all together in the end.

• DEUS EX MACHINA – all problems are solved by one external force. Avoid this. The hand of

the writer is too obvious. It must be the characters who should solve the problems themselves.

Otherwise, you stunt their development.

• Most basic forms of conflict:

o Two people want the same things (Man vs. Man)

o Identities/principle of two characters clash (Man vs. Self)

o A fight for status. We human beings are very aware of hierarchy. We are constantly and

subconsciously trying to one-up each other. There is conflict when the status of the two

characters are the same. There is character development when one character has status A

in the beginning, then a completely different/opposite status B by the end.

• The character must not be passive. Sometimes, the character doesn’t do things. Things just

happen to her. If the character is always the victim, then the audience can’t be emotionally

invested in her.

• It doesn’t mean that just because the character cried, drama na.

• Drama is: ano ang ginawa ng character? It’s not what happens to people. It’s what people do

about the things that happen to them.

• Avoid narration. The more sparingly you use a narrator, mas mayo. They can be overused. And

they are an easy way out (of telling the story). Let the conflict unravel.

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 TAPOK Playwrighting Workshop
April 24-27, 2018
Trainor: Mr. Rody Vera
Prepared by: Decelle Suarez

PREMISE

• "To tell you the truth, I don't write down my premise. Because even when I start to write, I don't

know what my premise is exactly. I will find that out in the process"

• REFERENCE: The Art of Dramatic Writing by Lajos Egri

▪ Premise should be clear before you start or finish

▪ Premise may not be clear at the beginning tho

▪ Basta by the end klaro na ang premise

▪ If not, then you have too many things you want to say and they're fighting over the

dominant message

• “But for me, you don't really start with a premise. Write what you want to write, then when you

read it, edit.”

• "Hindi ko sinusulat agad. Iniisip ko muna. Magswi-swimming muna ako o maglalakad. Dun ko

ipro-proseso."

• "You cannot claim to know everything. Take advice. Even after it's publish, edit it if you've found

out that something is wrong."

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 TAPOK Playwrighting Workshop
April 24-27, 2018
Trainor: Mr. Rody Vera
Prepared by: Decelle Suarez

STRUCTURE

• PERSON vs CHARACTER

▪ A person’s life is composed of many big, life-changing moments.

▪ A character exists only in one of those big, life-changing moments.

o You really cannot and should not fit an entire person’s life into the story that you

are trying to write. It will be confusing for both the audience and the character.

• POINT OF ATTACK – where you start your story. In a short play, usually a few moments before

the climax. For example, 20 minutes nalang (bago mag climax). In that 20 minutes, dapat na

narrate niya na yung backstory.

▪ “Usually, magsisimula tayo in the time of the character’s life na malapit na sa

kasukdulan”

• STORY vs STORYTELLING (structure)

▪ Stories are generic. They have been told and retold for ages. There are probably less than

50 types of stories that exist.

▪ It’s structure that makes your play interesting; how are you going to tell a story that can

easily be told in a simpler way?

• RECOMMENDATION: Betrayal by Harold Pinter

▪ Pabaliktad ang structure

▪ First scene: naghihiwalay na sila

▪ Last scene: when they fall in love with each other

▪ It was examining how a betrayal happens.

• Hindi mo kailangan magsimula sa simula

• GENRE: it’s the mixture of structure + genre that dictates the uniqueness of a play.

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 TAPOK Playwrighting Workshop
April 24-27, 2018
Trainor: Mr. Rody Vera
Prepared by: Decelle Suarez

▪ For realism, sometimes we start not knowing what’s going on. The beauty is in how you

drop the information of backstory i.e. how you build a climax. Take some time to have a

feel of the dramatic arc. “Minsan, masyado mong maaga binibigay yung information,

nawawala yung sense of surprise.”

• MOTIF – you use and image to tell your story.

▪ E.G. Indigo Child: used electricity as a motif. While electricity is often viewed to mean

power, light, etc; the story used it to portray trauma, and a dark part in the character’s

life.

• PROCESS EXERCISE:

▪ Write your storyline – a chronological telling of the events from the backstory to the

story to the future.

▪ Write you structure – how will you tell the story? how will you reveal the backstory?

o BEAT SHEET – a play is divided into beats. Emotional beats or action beats. It

helps break down which gets revealed, and how the characters react to them.

▪ WRITE THE STORY BEFORE THE STRUCTURE SO YOU ARE NOT CONFUSED.

• Notes post-exercise:

▪ Careful not to shift focus to supporting character instead of your main character. If the

supporting character is the one struggling, and the one doing things to get what they

want, they’ve basically become the main character now.

▪ Sometimes, your character’s problem is overshadowed by another character’s problem

and it makes your character petty now. The audience will no longer sympathize with him

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 TAPOK Playwrighting Workshop
April 24-27, 2018
Trainor: Mr. Rody Vera
Prepared by: Decelle Suarez

o E.G. you write a story about loyalty. The girlfriend wants to break up with her

boyfriend because he has HIV and this implies that he slept with someone else.

The audience, however, will more likely sympathize with the boyfriend instead

of your main character, because his problem is heavier than the girlfriend’s.

▪ When you kill the hope in your character, the drama goes away.

o “Yung pagpapakamatay sounds very dramatic. But yung ganung klaseng act ng

isang tao, it actually has no dramatic potential. If you start your story at a point

where the character is already attempting to kill herself, the story is done. The

character has given up. Most importantly, we didn’t see the struggle. The drama

is actually before all of that happens. What led the character to kill himself?

Write about that.”

▪ Your main character must be willful

▪ Anything that your character says will be considered as true until you show that he/she is

lying. Careful not to leave such loose ends.

▪ It’s another story when the audience knew from the get-go that the character is lying.

o DRAMATIC IRONY

o The audience knows about the lie but the characters don’t

o E.g. disguise/different identity. Any change in assumed identity can

create dramatic irony.

o Common tool for suspense in drama

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 TAPOK Playwrighting Workshop
April 24-27, 2018
Trainor: Mr. Rody Vera
Prepared by: Decelle Suarez

DIALOGUE

1. High Context vs Low Context Dialogue

a. HIGH CONTEXT: Exists when parties in communication have a great deal of shared

knowledge. Relies mostly on the implicit. Audience doesnt know wtf the two characters are

talking about. Will only understand if shown OR when u use a low context dialogue. E.G. 2

lawyers/doctors talking. You can use this to withhold information.

b. LOW CONTEXT: exists between people when there is a lack of shared knowledge,

experience, understanding-creating the need for parties to explain a great deal to each other.

Relies mostly on the explicit. E.G. Harry potter. Use in advocacy plays that is introducing a

new issue

i. Usually used for exposition

c. YOU DONT HAVE TO SAY IT UP FRONT

d. EXERCISE: How do you reveal Mother is dead. Scene: 2 sisters - without them talking about

mother's death/funeral

2. At any line at any script, always implicate a status negotiation

a. Here is where subtext comes in

b. Playing status games to get what you want

c. Low status challenging high status

d. Character playing low status to deceive high status character

3. Use of Wit and Metaphor

a. Beware of using mixed metaphors - UNLESS you're telling a joke

b. E.g. Electricity in Indigo Child

c. Beware of old jokes/witty remarks 'na kumita na'

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 TAPOK Playwrighting Workshop
April 24-27, 2018
Trainor: Mr. Rody Vera
Prepared by: Decelle Suarez

d. If you utilize an old joke, better add something to deconstruct it/add a layer

e. Balihin ang cliche to change the expectation

4. Use of Speech Acts

a. Speech Act is a word, phrase, or sentence that suggests immediate or deferred action. It requires

the other to "respond".

b. E.G. THE THREAT. Expectation: will the threat be realized or not?

c. E.G. THE PROMISE. Sets up anticipation. If she does not deliver the promise, we learn

something about the character, if she delivers the promise, we have a plot point

d. E.G. THE COMMAND. Demands an immediate response. Character is compelled to react.

Determines the relationship of the characters at the moment.

e. E.G. THE VOW. Establishes a bond of trust between characters. Tests the credibility of the

character making the vow.

f. E.G. THE STRATEGY. Planning an action keeps the play in the moment. The planned

strategy provides the ready-made plot points e.g. Heist films

g. Speech acts involve BEHAVIOR not idealisation or idle chat. Speech acts accelerate the

rhythm of the scene

h. Kapag sa tingin ninyo masyado nang nag kukwento ang character, find an object to push the

story forward

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