ADVICE FOR PLAYWRIGHTS: 10 Tips To Write a Play For School Theatre Programs (And Get it PUBLISHED)

This is me, Bobby Keniston.  This is my blog, Theater is a Sport.  Please read it and follow it.  Thanks.

Hello everybody, and welcome to Theater is a Sport.  My name is Bobby Keniston, and today I'm going to talk about writing a play for the school theatre market, and give you some tips about what might help it to get published. 

I have done a great deal of posts about the craft of playwriting.  In fact, you can see the very first lesson by clicking HERE.

This post is a bit different.  This one is all about tips to get a play published for the school market.  Playwrights like to earn money just like everybody else, and, while I can't know for certain that if you follow these rules you're guaranteed to be published, these are pretty basic guidelines for the market to help you along your way.

I'm not claiming to have all the answers, but I do have 24 plays published right now, most of them for the school market, with four different publishing houses.  I have learned by trial and error in the three-and-a-half years since my first acceptance for publication, and have also been fortunate enough to strike up online friendships with a great deal of playwrights for the school market, who have generously offered me advice and encouragement. 

So let's get started, shall we?

TIP #1:  Statistically speaking, more females than males audition for school plays and musicals (this is true for community theater productions as well).  Try to write at least a few more female characters than male characters, or, better still, it never hurts to have a number of gender flexible roles (roles that can be played by either male or females)

TIP #2:  Flexible cast size is also a good thing.  If you study the market and look at old classics by the wondrously prolific Tim Kelly, you'll notice how most of his full-length plays have cast sizes of 25 or more.  The more the merrier, right?  You will also notice that many of the roles can easily be doubled, or maybe even combined.  In this way, a play can accommodate a very large cast, or a much smaller one.  Hence, hopefully, more school groups will be able to produce your play. 

TIP #3:  This is not a hard and steadfast rule, but it is something I have found to be true for my work:  Lighter fare gets produced more often by schools.  This is not to suggest you should write nothing but comedies... far from it.  I'm just saying for myself, and for many of my playwriting pals in the market, the comedies sell more than the dramas.  Many of my friends have confided to me that the serious plays they worked so hard on and are really proud of get FAR less productions in a year than their lighter, fun ones.  That's the business.  Please don't mistake this as me advising you not to write dramas.  Dramas do get published and occasionally produced.  I'm just talking from a generalized, business-minded standpoint.  Two plays I'm very proud of, FRANKIE AND THE GINGERBREAD BOY, and AEROPLANE OVER THE SEA, do not do nearly as well as my plays I DON'T MIND THAT YOU'RE UGLY or CITIZEN'S ARREST.
(NOTE:  The one aspect of school theatre where this doesn't seem to be the norm is for the forensics market.  Serious monologues and serious 10-minute duets seem to do very well as a general consensus, sales-wise)

TIP #4:  Speaking of writing shorts, whether it be monologues or duets, remember, ten minutes is the maximum.  They are mostly selling for forensics' competitions, and they are strictly timed.  And also remember, the CONFLICT and CHARACTERS are what sells these pieces. 

TIP #5:  SIMPLE SETTINGS.  School drama teachers (and I should know, I am one), by and large, do not have a large budget to work with and do not receive a great deal of help to put a show together.  Because of this, a play with a simple unit set (which means one set for the show, without scene changes), or with representational set pieces (that can be moved on quickly and easily, like stools or chairs or boxes) are very attractive to drama teachers.  I don't blame them.

TIP #6:  Share the wealth when it comes to lines.  Make your supporting characters interesting.  Make sure that even the smallest part has some interesting feature or quirk that will make him or her fun and desirable to play.  School theatre is often about getting as many kids involved as possible, and we want to make sure that they are all having a positive experience, whether they have 100 lines or jut two.

TIP #7:  NO BAD LANGUAGE or EXPLICIT CONTROVERSEY.  Yes, it is good as an artist to sometimes push the envelope, and, yes, it is important to write plays that address issues that teenagers will face in their lives.  HOWEVER... if you write a play about teenage suicide (for example), it would probably be best not to have a kid with a gun to his head, a quick blackout and loud bang, and then bring up the lights with the kid laying in a pool of his own blood.  I apologize for the graphic image, and, while that image is certainly striking, and perhaps honest, most schools would not produce it.  Don't get me wrong--- some might, but most wouldn't.  And when it comes to language, it needs to be as clean as possible.  I have been asked by an editor to remove the words "hell" and "damn" from a high school-themed play.  Yes, I know many teenagers swear and curse, and we want to be honest--- I even wrote a blog about how young adult fiction can get away with so much more than young adult plays that you can read HERE.  But take my word for it--- you will most likely lose a whole bunch of productions, and maybe not even get it published, if you write a play with a ton of swearing for the school market.  The same thing goes with sexuality.  What you have to remember is that you are a creative writer, and that working within some of these certain guidelines can actually spark creativity and dimension, not destroy it. 

TIP #7:  While many plays for adults, particularly in the professional theater, do not appreciate in-depth stage directions, you have to remember that school theatre is often directed by people who see the value in the program, but might not have the most experience when it comes to directing.  There's an old adage about how many English teachers have been forced into the role of drama director over the years.  This is true for many different kinds of teachers.  Not every school has a separate theatre program with someone who majored in theatre in college.  So, stage directions can be very helpful to create a vivid picture for these folks.  The same is true for setting designs and costume and prop plots.

TIP #8:  The one play that I haven't managed to get published is called RAINBOW AND THE GOOFBALL.  It's a fairy tale I created.  Every editor who has read it has responded to me about how much they like the piece... some have even raved.  But each one has said there is no room for it in their catalogue.  If this play were called CINDERELLA AND THE GOOFBALL, it might have had a much more sporting chance.  If you're going to write a fairy tale, do something fresh and new with a name people already know.

TIP #9:  People often ask me if a play needs to be produced before it can be published for the school market.  Here's the honest answer:  only 2 of the 24 plays I have had published had a production before being published.  I know this goes against conventional wisdom, but it is the truth.  In fact, RAINBOW AND THE GOOFBALL was one play that had a production before being published, a successful one in fact, with great pictures and reviews, and that did not help it get published.  Now, obviously, a production doesn't hurt.  The reason some places strongly recommend it is because a great deal of rewriting can take place during the course of a production, making the script "tested for success".  So I don't know what to tell you.  What I will say, is that I ALWAYS read my plays out loud, often with a group of students, to hear how it sounds, and will make changes from that.  Hearing a play out loud does help one revise it.

TIP #10:  This tip will seem a bit like a cop out, but, it's true just the same:  KNOW WHEN TO BREAK THE RULES.  My advice is to get at least a few publications under your belt before you do, but, no one, not even editors, know for certain what can go through the roof and be a smash hit.  You just don't know.  You can do your best to follow trends (which isn't a bad idea), see what's big in the world of kids and teenagers, tap into all these different avenues, but, hey, in truth, it's all just a guess.  The number one job is still to please yourself first and to write something you can be proud of having your name on.  Plays are in print for quite a good stretch of time after being published.  Remember that. 

I hope you have found these tips useful.  To learn more about my plays, you can click HERE, and check out all the links (note, a few of my plays are forthcoming, so they are not yet available to check out). 

Remember, writing plays for the school market is tough, so it's good to get some advice here and there.  Also remember--- theater is not just a craft, or an art form, or a way to make some money--- it is also a sport.

How Do Playwrights For the Amateur Markets Make Money or Bobby Keniston Takes Stock of His Relatively Young Playwriting Career

Note:  This is not me.  Not yet.

Greetings everyone, and welcome to Theater is a Sport.  My name is Bobby Keniston, and I am a playwright, director, actor and theater teacher.  Basically, I am a drama geek.  That is why I have this blog.  I write down my thoughts about theater on a given day and then wonder if anyone wants to read them.  I have been pleasantly surprised to find that the answer is yes, some people do. 

Today I am going to talk about a subject that I think will interest people more than many subjects I may talk about.  I tend to talk a good deal about the "craft" and have not talked too much about the actual "business" of theater.  So, today, I decided I would talk a bit about money.

Money.  Money.  Money.

Many people could joke that the title of this post very well could have been "Do Playwrights Make Money?" as opposed to "How Do Playwrights Make Money?"   In fact, when you have people at the top of the field like Tony Kushner running his mouth about how he can't make a living as a playwright (wonder if he would want to switch royalty checks with me), I guess it is a fair question.  Of course, Mr. Kushner does not write for the amateur market as I do. 

The late Tim Kelly, a very prolific playwright for the school and community theater markets, published over 350 plays in his life, and, when his career really took off, would have about 6,000 performances of his plays every year, all over the world.  His pieces were translated into dozens of languages.  He adopted the old quote and paraphrased it for the amateur theater market:  "You can make a living, but you can't make a killing". 

The reason so much of this is on my mind is that I have been taking stock or my playwriting career today.  A little more than three years ago, my very first play was accepted for publication.  No books out yet, no contract signed, just accepted for publication.  In the three years since (which have seemed to fly by), here  is where I am at:

--- 22 publications (including a contribution to an anthology of monologues, and co-author of a book of improvisation starters),
--- 80 productions of my plays
--- 140 performances of my plays
--- Productions of my plays in 36 states, as well as in Canada and Australia,
and
--- and unpublished play of mine represented the state of Maine at a New England Regional Festival for community theaters, where I won an award for Best Emerging Playwright

This looks pretty good listed out, I must confess, and I am proud, I truly am, and grateful for my successes. 

But let me make this clear:  I do not make a living from being a playwright. 

Okay, this may seem weird, but this blog is about education, so I'm going to share some stats with you, just so you know a bit about the money side of things as I have experienced them.  I will limit this to my published plays.  If nothing else, maybe this will make some people think twice before skipping out on paying royalties for producing plays.  I am going to limit this to my royalty earnings from the company with whom I have the most publications.  Again, this is neither bragging nor complaining--- I share these figures strictly for educational purposes.

ROYALTY EARNINGS MY FIRST YEAR AS A PLAYWRIGHT :  $365.78
EARNINGS LAST YEAR:  $742.99
EARNINGS SO FAR THIS YEAR (I will be getting more before the royalty period closes):  $928.17

Again, this is not a representation of all monies earned through playwriting, just my published plays with Brooklyn.  As you can see, there has been steady growth, but not exactly living wages, right? 

Here's how it works:  a school or community theater group wants to put on my play.  They pay for the rights to perform it.  A one-act play with this publisher costs $35 per performance.  For my early one-acts with Brooklyn, I receive $17.50 of that $35, for more recent ones, $21.  For more recent plays, I also receive 10% book royalty, or roughly $0.55 for the scripts sold.  

For a ten-minute play, the productions cost $15 to license, of which I receive $7.50.  Since, when ten-minute plays are performed for forensics competitions the royalties are waived, the books are sold in script packs of $12.50, for which I receive $1.25 for each script pack sold. 

So, first off, you might be thinking, "wow, he doesn't make very much."  But, in truth, I'm actually doing pretty well considering the age of my career, and considering I am primarily earning income from publications for the amateur markets.  Clearly, a playwright like Neil Simon, who once had 3 shows running on Broadway at the same time, was (and is) making far more cash than myself.  But, my career is steadily growing, my name and my work is getting out there,and, yes, my publishers, all four of them, work hard to get my plays produced.  I am very lucky. 

So how do playwrights for the amateur markets make money?  Simple--- volume.  The more productions, the more performances, the more money.  So, how do you get more productions? 

This is actually a simple answer, too. 

Time, hard work, and luck.

Yes, once in a while, a writer may come along who, for whatever reason, has a really big hit with their first play for the school or amateur market, get 200 productions a year from it, and receive a good-sized royalty check.  This does happen.  It has not happened to me (yet), but it can happen. 

For the rest of us, it is a matter of writing, writing, writing.  And, of course, the writing has to be good, at least good enough for publication.  And I feel I should let you in on a little secret that is very important to this discussion:  I have 22 plays published with four different publishers, and I still get rejected.  Not every new play is accepted by the first company I send it to.  I still have to make sure I'm writing good stuff, and, even if it is good stuff, it doesn't mean it is going to be published.  Maybe it's not right for a market, maybe the catalogue has too many "similarly themed" pieces, but, for whatever reason, I am not automatically published because I have some credits.  Granted, I think my work is considered perhaps a bit more quickly than it was when I didn't have anything on my resume, but that's only fair, isn't it?

But I digress.

The reason the publications are important is because the more publications, the more plays you are presenting to the public.  This means your name appears a lot more in the catalogue.  When your name appears a bunch in the catalogue, there's a good chance people are reading the synopsis and a better chance that they are ordering a perusal copy that will hopefully lead to a production.  The more production that are out there, the more press.  If you write one-act plays for high schools, you have to hope upon hope they are taking your script to a competition, where other schools from the state will see it, like it, and look up you other work. 

I hope this doesn't sound like I'm complaining about how I'm not making the big bucks (yet).  Don't get me wrong--- I do think playwrights have a very justifiable reason to complain, at least in the amateur market--- people lying about how many performances, being the bottom rung on a theatrical latter--- but, to me, at least, I think the system is tough but fair.  You have to work hard.

You have to write. 

Write.

Then write some more. 

I don't do a ton of networking right now because of my location, but, even still, the more I write, the more my numbers are growing.  And that's how it should be.  Are they growing as fast as I would like?  Well, I think most people wish they were making more money than they are... it's an expensive world, and, yeah, I would love to have better financial independence.  But, the fact remains, whenever I receive a royalty check, I get a huge smile on my face, because it is money I have in my hand that represents working on something I love, and this work somehow inspiring complete strangers to want to work on it too.

Thanks for reading this post.  Find out more about me by clicking the links below.  Until next time, please remember--- theater is not only a craft and an artform.  Theater is a sport.

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