The Playgoer: Boldface Name Scribes

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Friday, June 03, 2011

Boldface Name Scribes

Forget about actors--are celebrity playwrights now taking your jobs?

With prominent Off Broadway nonprofit slots next season going to Zach Braff and, now, Jesse Eisenberg, one has to wonder.

Proof will be in the pudding, I guess...

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

don't forget Zoe Kazan!

Anonymous said...

I worked on Zoe's Humana play when it was little more than a scribble. Believe me, it didn't change much. The earnest effort of someone who'd never written a full-length play before. Mystifying.

Ken said...

I read the announcement of the Jesse Eisenberg and Zach Braff plays and thought, "Really? Those slots in the season could only be filled by plays that COINCIDENTALLY were written by well-known actors?" Who knows, maybe the plays are great. But maybe they're not. Maybe they're awful. In that case, it's a total waste, because I could have given these companies an awful play. I've got plenty of them, and my awful plays have just as much right to be staged as anyone else's.

Sabina E. said...

oh jesus christ.

Ian Thal said...

To be fair to Braff, he did write the script to Garden State and the film was fairly well regarded, so there's at least some chance that he might be able to write for the stage as well.

Anonymous said...

To be honest, Garden State was another sappy dreadful hollywood attempt at creating some sort of "real" image of romance. Regarded means nothing.

Ian Thal said...

Fair enough. I haven't seen it. I'm just noting that Braff has actually written things that have been produced in the past (unlike Eisenberg.)