Talking With Writers is a series of short conversations with PlayGround writers.
> Talking With Writers
> News
> Best of PlayGround
Talking with Writers: Brady Lea
May 6, 2009
On Monday, May 11th, 2009, the 13th annual Best of PlayGround festival presented a staged reading of Brady Lea's full-length commissioned work, MUSHROOM BOY at the Thick House. Fellow PlayGrounder Sam talked Brady into a last-minute, no-preparation IM conversation on FaceBook the week before her reading. Below is an excerpt:
SAM: I see from your Facebook status that you like the rain.
BRADY: I liked this rain. It felt kinda east coasty. I'm from eastern PA. The warm humid weather and rain was cool.
SAM: So what's Mushroom Boy about?
BRADY: Mushroom Boy is about a pre-middle aged woman with a not-entirely-healthy obsession with a hunky young mushroom vendor at her local farmers market.
SAM: So this is autobiographical?
BRADY: I did actually have this crazily flirty mushroom vendor for a while. It was just kind of a cheap thrill. I would always turn around to see who was behind me that he was trying to make eye contact with.
SAM: Which farmer's market was this at? I'm sure our readers will want to know.
BRADY: Well, he no longer works there! But I would see him at both the alemany farmers market (which i walk to almost every weekend) and the civic center farmers market. Same vendors. He's been gone a few years, but hilariously, people who are familiar with the short play ALWAYS tell me they are sure they know who i am talking about.
SAM: So this script was originally written as a 10-minute play for playground a few years back, right?
BRADY: Yes, it was in the best-of festival in 2005. The topic was "diversion". i remember that the following month, the topic was "Strange Attractor" and I was all, "d'oh, I wrote that play last month!"
SAM: So what was your experience turning it into a full-length? Did you find it challenging?
BRADY: When I first wrote it, a lot of people asked if they would see more of it, and I always said no, that I thought it was complete. But that was a few years ago, and I found myself writing another short play last year that seemed to be sort of the next step. And that led to me musing about what happens when fantasy becomes reality... so, it wasn't too hard to take it in a new direction. Or if not a totally new direction, to go all the way down the road the other play was leading to.
SAM: So, will people laugh, cry, be puzzled? What do you hope the audience response will be?
BRADY: I hope they will laugh, but I also hope they will cringe a little.
SAM: I love that you want your audience to cringe. Now i'm definitely going.
BRADY: And, uhhh, not cringe because they are sitting in the audience with me while watching this awful play. But I don't know--I like to explore the intense neurosis and obsession that can occur in relatively lower-stakes situations. I mean, there's not a ton of death and dismemberment--except of vegetables. But we can still get worked up about the little things.
SAM: What can Brady Lea be found doing when she is not writing plays?
BRADY: I can be found teaching clowning, physical theatre and improvisation to teenagers at School of the Arts. or... cooking. I do go to a lot of farmers markets and cook a lot. Tonight I roasted a chicken with herbs from my tiny garden.
SAM: Yum. Any other projects coming up that you're looking forward to?
BRADY: Well, I hope I can be looking forward to a full production of Mushroom Boy! But otherwise, for the next few weeks, I'll be focusing on helping my students get some new original physical theatre and clown pieces on their feet.
SAM: Are they coming to see the reading?
BRADY: I hope a few of them will.
SAM: Can't you just make it, like, a course requirement? Like, if they don't go, they'll fail?
BRADY: I'm not their playwriting teacher, but some of them are very good writers--and we do talk a lot about comedic structure. One of them [Reese Adams-Romagnoli] just got his play picked to be presented as part of the Young Playwrights Project at the Best of PlayGround festival... But I love Reese. He is a juggler. sometimes you meet someone and you go, "my people!"
SAM: Yes.
BRADY: He is definitely one of My People. So I am glad he's gonna have a play done. He kind of showed up as a better juggler than I am, yet, I intend to take credit for having taught him everything he knows.
SAM: Try to keep his arrogance in check, though; nothing worse than an arrogant juggling playwright.
BRADY: Well you always have something to hit him with.
SAM: Good point. Can I include suggestions of teacher-student abuse in this interview, or would that be unwise?
BRADY: Hmmm. I don't know! I don't think I've hit him yet! But I did drop one of his classmates on my head.
SAM: Maybe it'll be a draw for the reading. "Let's go see the play by that teacher who beats her students."
BRADY: Haha. I don't beat them! I only throw things at them! See, that makes it ok.
SAM: Important distinction. Yay, it's printable! Okay, so in closing: why are you involved with PlayGround? what impact has it had on you and your writing?
BRADY: The greatest thing about it for me is the level of people I get to work with. The actors and directors are so many miles above what a new playwright might find if trying to put together a show on their own. So, you get to meet those people, have them know a little bit about you. people you have been seeing on stages around the Bay Area for years are suddenly reading your play. That's cool. And having playwrights who are a step or two ahead of me in their career to
follow is helpful too.
SAM: Cool - thanks for talking.
BRADY: Hokay! I gotta do a little more rewriting.
BRADY LEA is a playwright, performer and theatre arts educator. She is a three-time PlayGround Emerging Playwright Award winner and the recipient of the 2006 June Anne Baker Prize. She is a graduate of Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Clown College and performed for several years with the vaudeville trio The Kloons. Brady is currently a visiting artist in physical theatre and improvisation at San Francisco School of the Arts. She lives in Bernal Heights with her husband David.
MUSHROOM BOY
Synopsis: Katherine is pre-middle-aged and mildly depressed, but determined to shake her funk by cooking organic produce from local farmer’s markets three times a week. Or is it her unnatural obsession with a steamy young mushroom vendor? She keeps buying produce she never cooks as she develops a fantasy life with this young man. Meanwhile, her uneaten produce is berating her, and her best friend is a turkey sandwich (with avocado and bacon). What happens when fantasy becomes reality? And what if your parsnip really does hate you?