Love's Labors Lost: 7 tips for future collaborators

November 13, 2012

7 tips for future collaborators

If you're reading this, it's most likely because: a) you read this blog regularly, and/or b) we're teaming up to create something together--a video, a blog post, a play, whatever.

At this point, I probably already have a good feeling about you. Trust me, that's a big step. You've already proven that you're not an asshole, a flake, or full of shit. Treat yourself if you got this far.

Now that we've cleared the deal-breakers, let's talk more about the sort of working relationship I want to have with you. With that in mind, let me give you a few tips on how to work well with me.

1. Good fences make good neighbors.

I'm very particular about boundaries--my own and someone else's. I hate feeling forced or coerced into doing something I don't want to do, and I certainly don't want to make other people feel forced or coerced into something. That's one reason why I'm not too good at sales. I take, "No, thank you" at face value. It's not a challenge to my skills of persuasion. It's a clue to back off.

2. Getting what you want is as simple as asking, but once you make demands, forget it.

"Could you do me a favor?" is the best way to ask me to do something. If it's something that doesn't make me deeply uncomfortable or spreads me too thin, I'll more than likely do it. If it really helps you, I'll even go way out of my way. But as soon as you start barking orders at me, I'll suddenly have a lot that I need to do before I can get to whatever it is you're asking me to do.

3. Spare me your feelings.

This probably sounds cold and harsh, but I've found that it's necessary for my peace of mind. Whatever we're working on is hard enough without having to navigate moods and emotions along with it. That doesn't mean that I'm going to make like the Gregory House and ignore or stomp on your feelings every chance I get. It does mean that the words "I feel" are not going to be a primary factor in how I make decisions when it comes to the work I do.

4. Don't borrow trouble.

Chances are we have enough to do that worrying about things we have no control over is a waste of time and energy. Feel free to work yourself into a frenzy, bite your nails, and pull your hair out way out of sight and out of hearing from me.

5. Focus on essentials.

I tend to mentally prioritize every decision I make into 3 categories: need to do, want to do, and would be nice to get around to doing. Aside from the way my mind naturally works, being broke has solidified the difference between need, want, and nice to have. Differentiating between these and putting the bulk of our time and energy into essentials works better than just doing whatever comes up just because it's there to be done.

6. Be easy to reach.

If I call, pick up your phone, even if to tell me, "I'm sorry. I can't talk right now. Call me back at [time]." If I e-mail you, let me know you got it even if to say, "I'll get back to you on [date and time]." I don't expect anyone to be available 24/7, and I'd hate it if people expected that of me. That said, at least give me an idea of when I can consistently reach you if we need to communicate.

7. Don't do me no favors.

I don't believe in committing to projects or relationships out of obligation. If you're going to work with me, do it because there's something in it for you that makes it worth the time and energy you'll put into it. Chances are it won't be the money or the fame. Whatever it is, make sure it's for you. Don't do it for me. Because the moment you say, "I'm doing this for nothing/so little/not enough!" I'm through with you. People who are dishonest or unclear about their motives are people I can't deal with. I want no working relationship that is revealed to be based false pretenses--or worse, a lie.

Of course, this is not the end-all, be-all of working with me. But it's a lot like what someone said about voting for Obama versus voting for Romney. Obama's not perfect, but you can have a conversation with him. The same principle applies here. Doing these things won't guarantee a perfectly smooth working relationship, but it will be something I can work with.

And that's all I'm really asking for.

1 comment:

neo-prodigy11/13/2012 7:15 AM
Sounds more than reasonable to me.
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Words, Words, Words

. . . a lot of it [fostering rather than smothering students' playwriting] has to do with finding a way to construct a dialogue about ongoing work that empowers the writer. A lot of it has to do with making sure there's a diversity of voices around you. A lot of it has to do with thinking of the writing program as a brain trust for writers, not as some infantilization in which the dramaturg gets the power. And basically trying to find a place where everyone's aesthetic in the room grows larger rather than smaller. There are many ways to do that. It's really not a hard thing to do.
--Paula Vogel, interview with Ann Linden in The Playwright's Muse

Here is what seems to me an elementary truth that must precede any other: namely, that the theater, an independent and autonomous art, must, in order to revive or simply to live, realize what differentiates it from text, pure speech, literature, and all other fixed and written means.
--Antonin Artaud, letter, 9/15/1931

I can take any empty space and call it a bare stage. A man walks across this empty space whilst someone else is watching him, and this is all I need for an act of theatre to be engaged.
--Peter Brook, The Empty Space

My work is characterized by one thing above all --- invention. In theatre we imagine the world, we do not record it, we are not documentary makers. I hold all social realism and journalistic theatre in contempt. It is a sordid habit. And the social realists have the impertinence to pretend they are 'telling the truth…'
--Howard Barker, interview

Women and writers of color are still seen as threats because, in essence, when a woman or writer of color is defining a play world, there's another definition of what our society is, and that's very threatening.
--Paula Vogel, interview with Ann Linden in The Playwright's Muse

Through this experience [working on " . . . and last week it was a mountain"] I learned the importance of the life and the dynamics under the words, and began to see the power of working from the silent space within - the emotions, the images, the experience and the feelings - rather than relying on the words.
--Sande Shurin, Transformational Acting: A Step Beyond

How does it happen that . . . the Occidental theater does not see theater under any other aspect than as a theater of dialogue?
--Antonin Artaud, Theater and Its Double

All conventions are imaginable, but they depend on the absence of rigid forms.
--Peter Brook, The Open Door

I never 'say' anything in my work. I invent a world. Let others decide what is being 'said'. Nor do I claim to tell the truth or enlighten people. We are suffocated by writers who want to enlighten us with their truths. For me, the theatre is beautiful because it is a secret, and secrets seduce us, we all want to share secrets. That is also its politics, if it has any politics at all. And modern democracies hate secrets, they want everything transparent. Obviously the critics collaborate in this desire to expose everything to the light of day, they are the police force, after all.
--Howard Barker, interview

I think that form is content . . . I've always been more interested . . . in the formal devices and the structure rather than in the subject matter . . . I really am a follower of Viktor Shklovsky, who said that in some ways the subject matter doesn't even matter. It's whether or not we see the subject matter anew that matters.
--Paula Vogel, interview with Ann Linden in The Playwright's Muse

I am well aware that the language of gestures and postures, dance and music, is less capable of analyzing a character, revealing a man's thoughts, or elucidating states of consciousness clearly and precisely, than is verbal language, but who ever said the theater was created to analyze a character, to resolve conflicts of love and duty, to wrestle with all the problems of a typical and psychological nature that monopolize our contemporary stage?
--Antonin Artaud, Theater and Its Double

The mediocre artist prefers not to take risks, which is why he is conventional.
--Peter Brook, The Open Door

"Transcendence became my life theme. I wanted to be lifted beyond everyday circumstances and everyday reality."
--Sande Shurin, Transformational Acting: A Step Beyond

I actually think of writing for the stage as not writing . . . It's about structuring, about gaps between the language that are really filled in by the collaborators and the process. It's all about indirection rather than a direct statement . . . It's like a three-dimensional chess game in a way. If I say this, will the director go in this direction? If I say this, will the actor respond? And one of the delights of the process is actually not having your intention fulfilled, but finding out at times that other people's interpretation or intention is actually more interesting than you originally thought of.
--Paula Vogel, interview with Ann Linden in The Playwright's Muse

The person who has an idea of what this language is will be able to understand us. We write only for him. --Antonin Artaud, letter, 9/28/1932