Deadline: 30 September

http://www.thebigidea.co.nz/work/jobs-opportunities/theatre/playwriting/91522-call-for-writers

A chance to write some dialogue with more snap crackle and pop than Geoff Dyer's rice crispies.

Hey Sarah

Hopefully you're reading this and can edit and post too. I have just had a cup of coffee and caffeine works on me much the same as the upswing in brain activity from amphetamines so I apologize in advance for the stream of consciousness below! I haven't got a plot line or characters in mind for our story, other than the general idea I've outlined in the first post - in a sense I'm thinking of it as the story of Wellington, like Wellington is the central character. So would be good to perhaps brainstorm about who our characters are, and what happens to them, and try and build it that way.

My random thought of the day is - I think we should set some of the story in Wellington's green spaces, like Mount Victoria, wild gaps of nature, hemmed in at the edges by homes for humans.

(what a good band name - homes for humans. or better, the name of a campaign for helping society accept that the homeless are not sub-human, and so should be treated with all the respect and kindness they would like to receive if homeless.)

Anyway back to the story - I'm thinking of magical bits of the story happening in the green spaces, I'm thinking Midsummer Nights dream, when the worlds of nature and the supernatural collide with the human, material world. So in the green spaces start as being separate to the city, places where the characters drift off into some sort of dream-like reverie. Like, perhaps one of the characters would go to the swing on Mt Victoria to talk to a friend who has passed away, a time when we get to hear something more of what's really going on in their head. Perhaps the friend who passed away is the connection between all of the characters, either knowingly or unknowingly...

I also think we should have a Miranda-like device where the scene develops as the lead character wishes it would, then the scene is replayed, unfolding in a very different way, and not at all what the lead character wants to see.

And perhaps these could happen later on in the piece, so that the supernatural things that happen only in the green spaces start to happen in the city.

Told you - caffeine inspires a whole heap of chattering mind with me. Be good to catch up and figure out some plot and character, and we can take turns in drafting dialogue. What say you, Sarah Muschamp?

Hey Sarah! Welcome to The Beginning of the Story.

So it's fundamentally a sliding doors concept that we're scripting. The story happens in Wellington - it's both the story of Wellington and a universal idea of connection - (the Wellington-ness is the fact that it's a village; and not the town to choose to sleep around in because everyone knows everyone else and it's nearly impossible to have sex with a stranger because in Wellington, a stranger really is a friend you've yet to meet. And figure out how many different friends-of-friends you have in common.)

So it's definitely Wellington's story, and couldn't be set anywhere else, and has to look and feel like Wellington, but it's a story made universal by the fact that this connectedness is something that is everywhere, in every city, yet nothing you can usually see - all the connections you have with people are often covered, and only sometimes discovered, and often discovered in a place the size of Wellington.

So a cast of about 9 people I think is what we need. And a set up a bit like He's just not that into you, but the stories of each individual should weave together. The characters should come perilously close to each other and not make the connections on occasion, and at other times they should all connect, with a 'are they going to actually meet and is it all going to come together' tension culminating in a thrashy bang ending where worlds collide.

What do you reckon? Also I think there's should be some magical element to it, because Wellington moves around (am positive that Blair and Allen street swap places periodically to keep the citizens on their toes) and the hills and winding roads mean you can only get to places by indirection.

That may be a red herring though and am willing to chuck out that idea.

And yay! looking forward to writing it with you! good fun!