As a playwright, we often live a very solitary life.

Writing a compelling live story that is congruent and real is not an easy task, so most playwrights spend hours upon hours creating and refining a play.

I have been lucky for I am not only a playwright but I am a director too, and I have had the opportunity to direct 20 of my own plays, in multiple productions, and well over 100 plays in my lifetime.

That is where I learned about the power of collaboration.

A play is a live event, a collaboration between playwright, actor, director and the creative team. The playwright creates the map, and then the team collaborates to bring it to life.

And that is where all the magic begins.

Here is a short clip from my play Tales of Terror, that I have directed 3 times in the last 15 years. Tales of Terror is 4 short plays with comedic takes on four classic horror stories from the 40’s and 50’s. This clip is from THE DUMMY, which is the classic story about the ventriloquist dummy that comes to life and murders people, but with a comic spin on it. This clip features two fantastic actors, Bill Morton and Danny McWilliams.

What was unique about this production was working with Bill and Danny. When we were working on this scene, I had written no comedy act - in previous productions, I had the actor who was NOT the dummy mime speaking in silence while the dummy spoke, but in rehearsal for this production I got the idea to actually do their comedy routine.

So I turned to Danny McWilliams (who is a veteran Stand Up Comedian and one of my favorite actors at Manhattan Rep) and I said to him “Danny, we need a comedy routine - What is it?”

Danny looked confused at first, and then smiled and said “Give me a sec!… Ok, I got it.” And he told me the first bit.

“Fantastic! Let’s do it!” I said.

They quickly learned the lines and we worked the bit and it was great!

Bill went on with my scripted lines, and then I said to Danny again:

“We need another bit!”

“Another?” Danny retorted.

“Yes, this is super fun.”

“Ok, I got one!” And then right there, he pulled the next bit right out of his butt. It was amazing.

We worked it and Wow, what fun!

And then I asked Danny once again to pull from this Comedy creative consciousness, and BAM! We had our third bit.

We worked it, and it rocked, and then we put it all together with the two previous bits, I added some 1940’s old time comedy piano, and it turned into one of my favorite moments in Tales of Terror.

If I was locked up in my office writing this play, this never would have happened. It was the creative team and the creative synergy, and the comedy genius of Danny McWilliams and Bill Morton that made it come to life in ways I could never have imagined.

So this is a great reason, as a playwright, to learn how to direct.

You will create better plays with the kick ass power of collaboration!