Interview with Nagle Jackson, Part III

The Playwriting Process

db:

Now we're switching over to playwriting talk ... some of your work habits. Do you write strictly from the keyboard, with a typewriter, pen and paper, a little bit of both?

Hand write. And then I transfer to ... I used to use a typewriter ... now I use a word processor or computer. But always handwriting. Always have. I don't know why that is. I've tried to start with the keyboard, but it's too formal. I like to be able to look at it and scratch it and then go back and see where the scratch was. So handwriting is just the easiest for me.

I do a little bit of both. And if I get stuck, then I definitely go to pen and paper because it seems to come a little bit easier.

Now I'm talking about the very first raw draft. Then it goes into the machine.

Do you, as you're going along or once you get to a draft point, then start doing any kind of informal staged readings or start hearing the words?

Directing

NJ:

No. I have a great advantage. I've been a director for 30 years. And before then, before and during some of that, I was an actor. So, I can visualize what it's going to look like, and I've never yet had a surprise. I mean, I've never yet had something that didn't look the way I thought it was going to look. But that's a distinct personal advantage that would be just the same as a composer who happens to play the violin. He's going to know his violin line is correct when he writes it.

One thing I haven't done much, though, is directing my own plays. I'm at a point to where I want to have someone else see that what I've put on paper is going to work, where I can stay apart from that. But I notice that, at least here, you direct your own.

Just recently. I didn't direct Quick-Change Room. And I didn't direct They Shoot Horses. I did do Taking Leave, and I'm doing this one. And I did do Elevation. But it took me a while. This is always an ongoing debate. I mean, that one has with oneself. Because obviously, if you're so close to it, there are going to be things that you think are just dandy, that somebody else is going to say, "Nagle, nobody but you will understand what the hell is going on here."

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