I was out for a walk this afternoon- as is my wont- and suddenly had inspiration for an idea for a game. Originally it was going to be a parlor game, but it would take too much paper for that to be workable. But I think it would be an excellent forum game, and so I ask: who wants to play the world's first ever game of A Streetcar Named Macbeth?
A Streetcar Named Macbeth is a drama game in which everybody is writing a play and nobody knows what the play they're writing is.
One person, the game-master, writes a play script. Except, however, that it isn't a normal play script, but a play script waiting to be filled with stage directions and dialogue. It looks like this:
SCENE I
ALICE:
BOB:
CHRISTINE:
No dialogue. No stage directions. Nothing but names, slots for things those names say, and an order those slots are in. It is the closest thing to a tabula rasa you will see, divorced from setting, plot, character development (though not quite all of character- there are names, and those names have genders), theme, and all that good stuff. That's where you come in!
The number of players is the number of characters in the play, plus one. What happens is that each player is assigned a character, except for one remaining player, who is assigned to do the stage directions. When you are assigned your person, you take the script and imagine what sort of play you would like to write. A romantic comedy? Detective story? Story about the fall of a family, a man's redemption from alcoholism? Your blank slate. Except that you can only write the dialogue for your character and nobody else's- or you can only submit the dialogue for your characters. Thus, if you want a romcom where Alice and Bob get together against the evil schemes of dastardly ex-boyfriend Charlie, and were assigned to Alice, you can imagine Bob and Charlie's motives or even write some pretend dialogue- but you can only write Alice's dialogue. If you were assigned to stage directions, you can imagine the characters, but you can't write anything they say- you can only write the setting and how the characters interact with it, though of course that leaves you plenty of room to maneuver- you can imagine them hanging out at a tea party and make Alice the maid, in the most wretched dive of a bar and make Tom the bartender, in a restaurant and make Dan the waiter. In some ways the stage direction guy affects the final progress the most, since he influences how everybody is positioned and (for the most part) interacts with each other.
Then, everyone sends their part of the script in, the gamemaster combines them, and hilarity ensues, because each character is single-handedly trying to advance his or her own plot through complete nonsequiturs while interacting with a setting that has screw-all to do with any of the dialogue: Ann is a heartbroken prostitute trying to find redemption in mental patient Bob, his valiant squire Charlie, and his arch-nemesis the dastardly mad scientist Tim during a wedding reception. Andrew asks John to tail that crook Bubba, following which John embraces him and tells him angrily that Andrew's not his father anymore. The possibilities are endless.
The only other two rules:
a.) Characters can write their own minor stage directions for a piece of dialogue- namely, who they're turning to talk to and in what sort of tone they're saying it. Stage direction guy doesn't interfere with this, but writes all other stage directions.
b.) Just to remind you: if you're stage direction guy, be mindful of who has dialogue. When I write the script tonight, each character will have the chance to interact with each other if they so choose, and each will have at least some time off-stage. Don't write that Emily walks off stage left just before she has a few lines of dialogue.
So who wants to sign up? For obvious reasons, I'm going to cap the number of players at...let's say 9; that gives us 8 characters and a stage direction player. And I'll write the skeleton script after I take a shower.
Author
Topic: A Streetcar Named Macbeth: World Premier (Read 2655 times)