Artistic Statement
Artistic Statement
I’m sitting in a local Portland café, at an open writing session with my playwriting critique group, and the writing prompt has catapulted me to the realization that I’ve been writing the same play over and over. How could this be? Haven’t I grown as a person? Changed at all over the years? My cheeks grow red hot and I tell myself “say nothing” like it’s a secret. As if I haven’t already thrust these plays out into the world. I double check myself, quickly looking over my computer files. I sit quietly, recalling plots, calculating character internal and external through lines. Crap. It’s true.
My last 6 full-lengths plays, all with varying characters, settings, premises, ALL execute the theme of escape. Escape. Someone is running away from home, leaving a relationship, liberating themselves from dire circumstance. They’re running toward freedom, self-actualization, love. My plays are about getting unstuck. The characters are flies on sticky tape. The messy part where truth is often funnier that fiction. People usually talk about how relatable, comical, dark, and tragic my plays are, but no one has ever connected the dots to notice that they all tell the story of people running. Lonely people. Disconnected people. People bursting with desire for a better life. A new thought- I write about people in the sticky middle between escape and self-liberation.
I share my realization with my writing group. One writer chimes in, “It’s been famously said that we all have just one story.” Time stops while everyone pauses to take this idea in, no doubt thinking about their own catalogue of stories. I feel the flush in my cheeks start to fade, settling into this new truth. Now that it took me years to learn this about myself, what do I do with this information? If my plays all hold the theme of escape, what would happen if my characters’ stop running and simply arrived? What if the story starts in the moment of arrival? I challenge myself to write my next play about “the arrival,” but can I? Or will their arrival make them want to escape again? (A new story already forming…)
When I start a new play, I like to challenge myself. I see a challenge as an opportunity. Last year, it was, write a youth play (The Mystery of Pittock Mansion). Or write a play that plays with the structure of time, (Group; or Marlene is Dead.) Or magical realism (The Eclipse.) Or a two-hander (Remote.) Or a “coming of age” story (Junior Year Abroad.) While each story is uniquely its own, the thing they all have in common is me. And I write stories about escape.
Learning more about the craft of playwriting, or who I am as a writer, means I continue to grow as an artist. It’s good to reflect on our writing from time to time, because unlike other jobs, no one is giving us a “performance review”. It’s up to me to rope the feedback from play to play and see the trajectory of my writing career. I hope to always be learning and evolving my stories, even if the theme of escape remains. I’ll take it.
Sofia Molimbi
I’m sitting in a local Portland café, at an open writing session with my playwriting critique group, and the writing prompt has catapulted me to the realization that I’ve been writing the same play over and over. How could this be? Haven’t I grown as a person? Changed at all over the years? My cheeks grow red hot and I tell myself “say nothing” like it’s a secret. As if I haven’t already thrust these plays out into the world. I double check myself, quickly looking over my computer files. I sit quietly, recalling plots, calculating character internal and external through lines. Crap. It’s true.
My last 6 full-lengths plays, all with varying characters, settings, premises, ALL execute the theme of escape. Escape. Someone is running away from home, leaving a relationship, liberating themselves from dire circumstance. They’re running toward freedom, self-actualization, love. My plays are about getting unstuck. The characters are flies on sticky tape. The messy part where truth is often funnier that fiction. People usually talk about how relatable, comical, dark, and tragic my plays are, but no one has ever connected the dots to notice that they all tell the story of people running. Lonely people. Disconnected people. People bursting with desire for a better life. A new thought- I write about people in the sticky middle between escape and self-liberation.
I share my realization with my writing group. One writer chimes in, “It’s been famously said that we all have just one story.” Time stops while everyone pauses to take this idea in, no doubt thinking about their own catalogue of stories. I feel the flush in my cheeks start to fade, settling into this new truth. Now that it took me years to learn this about myself, what do I do with this information? If my plays all hold the theme of escape, what would happen if my characters’ stop running and simply arrived? What if the story starts in the moment of arrival? I challenge myself to write my next play about “the arrival,” but can I? Or will their arrival make them want to escape again? (A new story already forming…)
When I start a new play, I like to challenge myself. I see a challenge as an opportunity. Last year, it was, write a youth play (The Mystery of Pittock Mansion). Or write a play that plays with the structure of time, (Group; or Marlene is Dead.) Or magical realism (The Eclipse.) Or a two-hander (Remote.) Or a “coming of age” story (Junior Year Abroad.) While each story is uniquely its own, the thing they all have in common is me. And I write stories about escape.
Learning more about the craft of playwriting, or who I am as a writer, means I continue to grow as an artist. It’s good to reflect on our writing from time to time, because unlike other jobs, no one is giving us a “performance review”. It’s up to me to rope the feedback from play to play and see the trajectory of my writing career. I hope to always be learning and evolving my stories, even if the theme of escape remains. I’ll take it.
Sofia Molimbi
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Sofia Molimbi
Artistic Statement
Artistic Statement
I’m sitting in a local Portland café, at an open writing session with my playwriting critique group, and the writing prompt has catapulted me to the realization that I’ve been writing the same play over and over. How could this be? Haven’t I grown as a person? Changed at all over the years? My cheeks grow red hot and I tell myself “say nothing” like it’s a secret. As if I haven’t already thrust these plays out into the world. I double check myself, quickly looking over my computer files. I sit quietly, recalling plots, calculating character internal and external through lines. Crap. It’s true.
My last 6 full-lengths plays, all with varying characters, settings, premises, ALL execute the theme of escape. Escape. Someone is running away from home, leaving a relationship, liberating themselves from dire circumstance. They’re running toward freedom, self-actualization, love. My plays are about getting unstuck. The characters are flies on sticky tape. The messy part where truth is often funnier that fiction. People usually talk about how relatable, comical, dark, and tragic my plays are, but no one has ever connected the dots to notice that they all tell the story of people running. Lonely people. Disconnected people. People bursting with desire for a better life. A new thought- I write about people in the sticky middle between escape and self-liberation.
I share my realization with my writing group. One writer chimes in, “It’s been famously said that we all have just one story.” Time stops while everyone pauses to take this idea in, no doubt thinking about their own catalogue of stories. I feel the flush in my cheeks start to fade, settling into this new truth. Now that it took me years to learn this about myself, what do I do with this information? If my plays all hold the theme of escape, what would happen if my characters’ stop running and simply arrived? What if the story starts in the moment of arrival? I challenge myself to write my next play about “the arrival,” but can I? Or will their arrival make them want to escape again? (A new story already forming…)
When I start a new play, I like to challenge myself. I see a challenge as an opportunity. Last year, it was, write a youth play (The Mystery of Pittock Mansion). Or write a play that plays with the structure of time, (Group; or Marlene is Dead.) Or magical realism (The Eclipse.) Or a two-hander (Remote.) Or a “coming of age” story (Junior Year Abroad.) While each story is uniquely its own, the thing they all have in common is me. And I write stories about escape.
Learning more about the craft of playwriting, or who I am as a writer, means I continue to grow as an artist. It’s good to reflect on our writing from time to time, because unlike other jobs, no one is giving us a “performance review”. It’s up to me to rope the feedback from play to play and see the trajectory of my writing career. I hope to always be learning and evolving my stories, even if the theme of escape remains. I’ll take it.
Sofia Molimbi
I’m sitting in a local Portland café, at an open writing session with my playwriting critique group, and the writing prompt has catapulted me to the realization that I’ve been writing the same play over and over. How could this be? Haven’t I grown as a person? Changed at all over the years? My cheeks grow red hot and I tell myself “say nothing” like it’s a secret. As if I haven’t already thrust these plays out into the world. I double check myself, quickly looking over my computer files. I sit quietly, recalling plots, calculating character internal and external through lines. Crap. It’s true.
My last 6 full-lengths plays, all with varying characters, settings, premises, ALL execute the theme of escape. Escape. Someone is running away from home, leaving a relationship, liberating themselves from dire circumstance. They’re running toward freedom, self-actualization, love. My plays are about getting unstuck. The characters are flies on sticky tape. The messy part where truth is often funnier that fiction. People usually talk about how relatable, comical, dark, and tragic my plays are, but no one has ever connected the dots to notice that they all tell the story of people running. Lonely people. Disconnected people. People bursting with desire for a better life. A new thought- I write about people in the sticky middle between escape and self-liberation.
I share my realization with my writing group. One writer chimes in, “It’s been famously said that we all have just one story.” Time stops while everyone pauses to take this idea in, no doubt thinking about their own catalogue of stories. I feel the flush in my cheeks start to fade, settling into this new truth. Now that it took me years to learn this about myself, what do I do with this information? If my plays all hold the theme of escape, what would happen if my characters’ stop running and simply arrived? What if the story starts in the moment of arrival? I challenge myself to write my next play about “the arrival,” but can I? Or will their arrival make them want to escape again? (A new story already forming…)
When I start a new play, I like to challenge myself. I see a challenge as an opportunity. Last year, it was, write a youth play (The Mystery of Pittock Mansion). Or write a play that plays with the structure of time, (Group; or Marlene is Dead.) Or magical realism (The Eclipse.) Or a two-hander (Remote.) Or a “coming of age” story (Junior Year Abroad.) While each story is uniquely its own, the thing they all have in common is me. And I write stories about escape.
Learning more about the craft of playwriting, or who I am as a writer, means I continue to grow as an artist. It’s good to reflect on our writing from time to time, because unlike other jobs, no one is giving us a “performance review”. It’s up to me to rope the feedback from play to play and see the trajectory of my writing career. I hope to always be learning and evolving my stories, even if the theme of escape remains. I’ll take it.
Sofia Molimbi