Seeing Mamet

[livingdeb]

Today we got to hear David Mamet, the director, playwright, etc., speak. The first thing I learned is that his last name rhymes with gamut, not Camay.

He's funny, probably more funny than truthful, but he was kind of mumbly, so it's hard to say.

As with all artistic types, many of the questions were about how he does what he does and what he recommends that other people do if they want to do what he does.

He says theory is all good and fine, but you need to test things with an audience. They don't care about you or your theories, they just want to be entertained. He says watching audience reactions are how he learned to edit his work so mercilessly.

He says school seems like a good idea, but you can argue back to your professors and classmates. It's important to get out there where your future is on the line.

LiveJournal Topic - If you could create anything artistic, what would it be?

LiveJournal has a thing called "Writer's Block" on their home page where you can find a question like this each day to write about. This was yesterday's question.

One of my answers is that I would like to make life-size sculptures, from something clear, of two people cuddling. They would show all different ways to solve the extra-arm problem--that's why they would be made of something clear. No hiding the third arm problem on the back side of opaque sculptures; that would be missing the whole point.

There would be a huge set of them, at least 20, maybe 50: as many as I could think up.

Comments

The Extra-Arm Problem

[fraeuleinchen.livejournal.com]

Wow - solving this dilemma would be such a quality-of-life improvement for so many people. I wonder if there's some culture out there whose bedding or furniture maybe already solves this... it's a real-life problem for so many, cutting through all socioeconomic and racial and sexual orientation and religious groups, I think. Anyway, art with a purpose - is that still art? (Yes!)