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Article: Stating the melody.(interview with 'Side Man' playwright Warren Leight)(Interview)
- Article from:
- American Theatre
- Article date:
- December 1, 1998
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1998 Theatre Communications Group. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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An interview with the playwright by Stephanie Coen
Side Man is a play about musicians, and its structure reflects a very musical sensibility - the play loops about in time like jazz riffs.
There's a sense of a jazz riff that I wanted all the way through. I didn't want to be hemmed in by chronology, and I didn't want the arc of the story to be a diorama. It's an emotionally driven structure, and I wanted to let it unfold the way a nice set does in a club. In a good jazz solo, you begin by stating the melody, and then you start to do riffs and go farther and farther out, or one guy in a combo will play a figure that will cause another guy to jump back to a ...