In preparation for the premiere of Enormity, Girl, and the Earthquake in Her Lungs, we were excited to chat with playwright Chelsea Woolley! Read on to unpack some of the inspiration behind this piece and the journey that it has taken since its inception in Write From The Hip!
We’re so glad every time a WFTH piece lands on one of our stages! Can you chat about the process that Enormity took to come out of that program to make it the piece it is now? Are there any wild shifts/cuts/additions that you’re willing to share that have come up over the years?
I love taking a look back at first drafts and seeing how far a script has come. In the case of “Enormity”, that requires looking way back to 2017! The original story proposed to Write from the Hip, was a biting satire about domestic violence as told through a handful of farcical suburban women taking a camping trip. The play then swung dramatically into a non-linear, experimental piece with no named characters at all, just dashes on a page to indicate when a new voice would speak. In that version, every scene was a standalone, episodic look at one aspect of violence. (I think in those drafts there was a scene about demon pigs – which I should really consider repurposing because who doesn’t look a stage pig.) The play then swung again to become what it is today with a central story arc, and named characters, though the silly suburban women from draft one still do make an appearance, so look forward to that!
The script has some really quick dialogue that requires a really tight ensemble. Can you describe your process of creating distinct and dimensional voices for Vic and the tendrils? Did you always imagine 6 tendrils or have there been more or fewer over the years?
When the play shifted from dashes on a page dialogue to actual specific characters, I had to work backwards to excavate unique character voices and objectives out of all that unassigned writing I already had. I started with a possible 29 named characters. I had all of their names and personalities written out on a big poster board. By combining characters to create fewer but richer personalities, I got that down to 10, then 8, and finally down to what it is today which is 7 including “Vic”, the central character. The last voice to be cut was a tendril named “Itch”. Their nervous and neurotic traits were absorbed by two characters, Ago and Lull, who still exist in the story today.
The piece intersects with what has the potential to be, some heavy themes and circumstances. Why did you choose to take a more comedic approach?
Historically, theatre was so much more participatory a form than it is today. But laughter still exists as a way to take part in this communal experience. If you laugh at a character, you end up liking them more, trusting them more. If you laugh at a piece of writing, you end up liking it more, trusting it more. I hope laughter during this play builds trust that the story and its creators are taking care and giving you mini breaks from heaviness or intensity. We’re asking you to pay attention, and feel, and invest, but also through laughter, we promise that we won’t take too much before giving a little back. That you’re allowed to enjoy yourself. If you laugh, it means you’re having a good time. I always want to craft a good time.