Taking up playwriting was a total surprise to me. When it happened I was a Contributing Editor with New Jersey Monthly magazine. I came across a story that I was fascinated by, but could not figure out how to write as an article. I started a list for myself of all the curious details of this story (the competitive friendship of Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton), and soon began seeing their relationship as scenes in a play. I have always been an enthusiastic audience member, and was attending a lot of theater at the time. I had never considered writing for the stage, but I really was fascinated by the conflict between these two individuals and wanted to find out why, so I continued to pursue the form that the story took. As is so often with creative writing, the subject dictated the form.

That first play, The Brightest Light, has in a couple ways been very typical of my subsequent dramatic work. The theme of community can be found to some degree in most of my full-length plays. And, I still do not start with an idea that I want to address, but instead I get intrigued by a story or a person or a conflict between individuals that fascinates me. I pursue that, and by the time I have written the play and figured out what happened between these characters, what the play is really about (the theme, the premise, the idea) has usually revealed itself to me.