Young Writers Society

XD Thanks Jiggity, very much. Exactly the kind of critics I'm looking for. It's my first play, and I want to know exactly what's wrong with it. Thanks for not sparing my feelings!!

Cooldude>> Yay!!!! You're the closest guesser ever on the ages!!!!! Thank you!!!

Warning... I write plays, but I've never tried to critique them in my life. I hope this does help though, even if it is shorter.

Age: I'd say Mute is young, maybe 14, but sage is about 30. Not sure with Prate. But I learned this from later in the play, not the beginning, and it seems that that would be a rather relevant point to understand the interactions between Mute and Sage. You might want to make ages more clear sooner if you can.

Beats: I don't think you use to many beats. Then again, I tend to assume that who ever is acting a play has no idea how to act, so maybe I'm not the best judge of that...

Anyways, I like your script. The idea's good and even though it doesn't seem startlingly uncommon a theme, it's not over used and I could turn out very well.

I didn't like this. I thought it was - although an interesting premise - poorly done.

Dialogue is the heart and soul of the play. And I struggled to find even one line that I believed. That's because most of the interaction seems to be about the interaction. Why are you asking so many questions? Why are you being so angry? Why, why, why -

The reason for that is very obvious - you have nothing to say. At least, your characters certainly don't. But you shouldn't be afraid of that. Silence, in a play, is a very effective, very dramatic tool that's great for tension, comedic effect, etc.

SAGE: Silver. It’s cloudy today. [s]Why? What’s wrong? [/s]

MUTE: You always ask me what’s wrong when I talk to you. That’s what’s wrong.

[s]MUTE: You always ask me what’s wrong when I talk to you. That’s what’s wrong.

SAGE: (smiles) I’m sorry. I’ll stop.

MUTE: (Good-naturedly) Quit smilin’, it makes me nervous.

SAGE: How do you know I’m smiling?

MUTE: S’not natural for you to smile. Are you mockin’ me?

SAGE: Why would I mock you?

MUTE: Nah, you’re not, I can tell. S’in your voice.

SAGE: Then why scare me?

MUTE: Why do you always ask questions?

SAGE: (smiles) Because I don’t know the answers.

MUTE: That was a pretty good answer, right there.

(Sage chuckles.)

I really love this so far. I love the interaction between Sage and Mute. Mute's fear every time he thought Sage was gone really touched me. I know I'd be the same way if I had been locked up.

As for critique, nothing big jumped out at me.

SAGE: Why are you so eager to know?

BLAINE: Why do you think?

SAGE: (beat) Ah. Thinking of escape?


This is just dumb for the sake of being dumb. Please, this isn't funny. Sage can't be that stupid and I imagine that exchange falling very flat on stage for some reason.

Hello!

Disclaimer: I do not know how to really crit a play..I write mostly movie scripts..so I will do my best. Sorry if some stuff is wrong.

The age question:
I feel like Sage is maybe mid to late thirties
Mute is about sixty
Prate is somewhere inbetween
and Blaine is twenties

The "beat" question:
Here is the thing, I don't think it is necessary to put any of those types of things in a script. You have a lot of (beat)'s and (smiles)'s and other directions in parenthesis. I think yeah it helps when you are reading to get the feelings down easier. But the thing is when an audience sees this play they aren't going to have the script to tell them the emmotions or what the people are doing. The audience has to see it for themselves. Also as the writer all you are doing is giving the characters and the story to the actors and directors and such. You should leave it up to the actors to some extent to think about how they think the character would feel or what they would do at certain times. That is just my opinion, it is your play so it is all up to you.

I really like this though, I think it is going to be a good play the only thing right now is I can't really see where it is going..I can see them all trying to escape but not till later on. For right now I feel like this is a mental story, you really have to think about what is going on.

Be careful...
All of your characters are in a cell, a very small, confined space. You have to use that space constructively and make it work for them. I think I do see an escape in the future with this new guy coming in, but wait for the right moment, don't rush. You can really do a lot with them stuck in their cells, really mess with their minds. Especially Blain, I feel like he could really lose it before they make it out of there.

I'm sorry that this will be a short crit and not very helpful.

Anyway... I really liked it. ^_^ About the age, I wasn't so sure if I really thought about it. I wouldn't guess in the twenties, but then again it could be teenagers. But then again they do seem sort of older than that. Not too old, but... older. It's kind of hard to explain it.

At first I actually thought Sage was a girl, just because of the name though. I was wondering what else Prate was doing throughout the play actually. Even though I know you meant for him to the quiet one who doesn't talk, I was just naturally curious. By the way, why does Mute have a blind fold on? Did something happen to his eyes? *starts to feel like is critiquing this like a story* Sorry, I don't usually crit scripts.

Oh! I almost forgot to add that I don't think you were puting too many (beat)s. As Kylan had said, it's your script and since you wrote it you should be able to decide how many you think is needed. There's not a specific amout of beats that your allowed to have, just don't go crazy with them.

Overall, I liked it. ^_^ Tell me when you post more!

-kittykat

Haha thank you very, very much. That helped a lot. Like, you have no idea how much that helped.

But Sage isn't stupid....he's educated...Dangit. -.- I'll see what I can do to fix that. I don't want my audience to think a character is stupid when he's actually very, very smart.

Thank you sooo much!!

Hello there!

Can you tell how old they are? Like, are their ages clear?

I'm guessing they're in their mid-thirties to forties, but I have a feeling you were intending them to be teenagers, right?

And am I using too many (beat)s?

No. Besides, it's your play and you can use as few or as many stage directions as you'd like.

[All lights, all camera, and no action]

Your first play, huh? I've tried to write plays once or twice, though they usually sputter out once I get ten-fifteen pages into them. They're considerably different than writing a story or a poem. Dialogue is a tricky thing to master and once you have the basics down, new playwrights need to learn how to use dialogue to move the plot forward and how to entertain the audience.

The dialogue here is vaguely interesting. I think your main flaw, however, is a lack of real action or profound character development. From start to finish, the only the thing that changes in the story line is that a new character is introduced. Otherwise, all you have is about ten minutes worth of witty stings spoken in cockney accents. Also, if your characters are adults, they act pretty immature, especially for criminals.

[The Name Game]

At one point here, you introduce your character's names to Blaine. This is a very storybook-esque thing to do, and what's more, it fails to contribute anything valuable to the plot. Please, cut the introductions out. They smack of amateurity.

Also, try not to name your characters after their personality traits, or the opposite of. Mute is a talker, Prate is a mute, and Sage is stupid. Don't go there.

[The Nitty-Gritty]

MUTE: S’not natural for you to smile. Are you mockin’ me?

SAGE: Why would I mock you

(beat) Yes. Still empty. (pause)

SAGE: You’re welcome [s]for setting you free.[/s]

SAGE: Why are you so eager to know?

BLAINE: Why do you think?

SAGE: (beat) Ah. Thinking of escape?

Lots o’ moss

BLAINE: (turns to Prate) How are you?