I Hate This: On the Writing

No excuses. No apologies. The facts are enough. The facts are awful. Let them be awful. It is hard not to apologize. But is that the way it happened?

Brian Cook’s production of I Hate This introduced me to the writing, and I am stealing that idea. We don’t know what “David” does. He says he was heading off to work, but he’s wearing jeans and a sweater.

Note: I was wearing jeans and a sweater. That sweater, and some long lost pair of jeans. I was in reality going to audition for an Ohio Lottery commercial, because at that time I thought I was an actor. I was asked to dressed somewhat artsy, hence, the sweater. Regardless, I did not make the audition.

“David’s” mother alludes to his being a writer, and a writer is what I always wanted to be, before I somehow got the idea that I should be an actor. I do not know why I decided to be that, unless it was an urgent need for attention, which is a bad reason to do anything.

Hartwick production design by Brian Cook

Now, as always, I am happiest when I am writing. It is what I always wanted to do, who I wanted to be. I should have studied English, but I digress. In this play, “David” is a writer, in And Then You Die, he is a cartoonist. Even when I was an actual cartoonist, I was more excited by the writing than the drawing.

Brian’s design for the Hartwick production included a great deal of paper. Paper spread across the floor, up the walls, even grew up the legs of the tables and chairs, the hospital bed.

Our design will be much simpler. But writing will happen. There will be writing.