What Have You Written?

One original one-act play produced in New Orleans back in the 80's. While it won a local contest, and in hindsight was pretty dreadful. More often, I've adapted extant works for stage production - big on Reader's Theatre I am - for example, John Preston's Franny, the Queen of Provincetown.

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A comedy play called "Oregon Trail" based off of the popular computer game. It was produced in NYC last month at the stella adler studios. Also a lot of sketch comedy.

I have one musical that I am writing that has been picked up by a producer and will be workshopped in 2007 (hah...that may seem far to you, but to me that is very soon) titled either Metropolitan or Urban Jungle (I haven't decided yet....i don't really like either). I am also working on a smaller peice called Of Gold that I hope to produce after my first one. I am really happy with how both of them are turning out, and I am learning and evolving so much as a songwriter because of them. Of Gold is a particularily unique and personal peice that I hope will eventually get rocgnized (hah...even though i have only written two songs so far, I have it fairly well planned out in my head).

Akiva

I am attempting to write "The Haunted Toilet Opera Musical," which is based on a bunch of strange dreams my friends and I have had. The furthest this will probably ever get is a production in my backyard for a bunch of local eight year olds. And that would be a miracle.

I've gotten poems published in books, I've won a few writing contests. I've attempted a play once, but it didn't work.

Ooh, and fan fiction.

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Absolutely nothing

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I once wrote a skit called "Hansel and Gretel" that we performed in front of a bunch of little kids for a cultural diversity day. I remember a lot of the lines.

HANSEL (jumping onstage)
I'm Gretel - I mean, Hansel!

GRETEL (jumping onstage)
And I'm Gretel!

BOTH
And this is the Hansel and Gretel Happy Hour!

(Both do a little jig while humming an upbeat "Two Ladies" from Cabaret.)

On the day of performance, it was changed to us yodeling in harmony.

Updated On: 12/21/04 at 07:22 PM

I do a lot of fiction work (not fan fiction) but it's never very good. I'm better with memoirs. Overall, I'm a pretty good writer.

I wrote a play at age six or seven that had two girls, a fairy godomther, and a dog. Thats all I can remember. I've helped with a few small skits and hope to write a sceen or two, as a pardy of life at my camp over the summer.

Other than that, I've atempted to write a musical, and I hate the three lines I have so far, I still need a decent premise. Other than that, I've written a fan fiction or two, but I disliked them immensly. I have a bunch of original stories, most unfinished, I have a tendancy to loose intrest.

I've won a few poetry concerts.

I've written music for a half dozen children's plays, and done arrangements for a dozen or so musical revues.

In answer to the question - and in case anyone is interested (lol) - I have written (or co-written) the Book & Lyrics for 5 musicals - and have a number of songs available to download online:

THE DYING GAME
http://www.thedyinggame.com/

NOVA - the Musical with a Virtual Twist
http://www.freewebs.com/novathemusical/

ALONE
http://tmkroll.tripod.com/alone.html

LOVERS
http://tmkroll.tripod.com/lovers.html

VOCALIZE!
http://tmkroll.tripod.com/vocalize.html

And I have written or co-written the lyrics for a number of pop, rock, folk, country songs:

http://www.jordan-music.biz/nova%20recordings.htm
http://www.soundclick.com/bands/0/benmessenger.htm

Bob

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Updated On: 12/21/04 at 08:30 PM

Link,

I love the music for Rent, so I'm sure I'd love your musical. I must say, dabbling in different forms of music is definately fun. I work on the Sondheim scale, meaning I don't sacrafice story or plot for a song, and I don't focus on spectacle or ginormous orchestrations to make a song good and meaningful. My songs don't have a distinctive melody, yet each song creates an emotional circle, meaning while it doesn't have a real melody, the whole song is a melody. And so the whole show is really many emotional circles within an emotional circle!

Apologia, the opera I wrote, was difficult to say the least. I think it's a life-changing expierence to write a performance piece, expecially an opera because you discover talents you never knew existed. I like to find an inspiration from another show, for example, Apologia inspiration was Pacific Overtures, and What Goes Around...'s inspiration was Into The Woods. I don't play piano enough to write music, but I can read it perfectly (well, as perfect as a blonde can! :)), and I put notes into this awesome program, the Noteworthy Composer, and I'm able to write like that. I'm so cheap I use the demo to print and write and play my scores. SO [time for a cheap promotional plug], if you or anyone would like to listen to any song, feel free to PM me.

Glad I could talk to a fellow composer!