Q&A with playwright Mark Crawford
What inspired you to write this play? Were the characters, or any
aspects of the story, drawn from personal experience?
I had this crazy idea to write a sex comedy, but I knew I wanted it to
go deeper than most door-slamming farces. At the same time as I was thinking
about that, I was reading a lot of articles about bee colony collapse. I
thought to myself: “What if that’s part of this sex play?” And knowing that a
large percentage of theatre audiences are women over 60, I was inspired by
you—the people who attend the theatre—to put a gal of a certain age at the
centre of the action. While the story is not drawn from personal experience, I
did grow up on a farm, so there are likely parts of people I know (and parts of
myself) in all of these characters.
Were there any other particular plays, or other works, that you had in
mind as you wrote The Birds &
the Bees?
I don’t think I had specific plays or works in mind as I wrote, but I
did look at a handful of classic comedies before I sat down to write this play.
I was especially interested in plays that are set in multiple rooms of the same
house; it’s always useful to see how other writers have handled certain
theatrical challenges! I did plenty of research; I read countless articles on
beekeeping, turkey farming, neonics, and crop yields. I watched YouTube videos
on the artificial insemination of turkeys that I can’t unsee. The coolest part
of my research was hanging out in the bee lab at York University with a guy
working on his Master’s. So many bees!
What was the writing process like for this play?
If I go back to the
first page of my The Birds & the Bees notebook, I can see it took a
few attempts to get the basics down: the characters, the setting, the shape of
the big narrative arc. Once I had a decent footing on those things, I wrote a
first draft, gave it to some folks to read, got their feedback, went back to
the play, did a bunch of rewriting, and then, ya know, rinse and repeat…several
times! We had a few script development workshops, which were extremely helpful
in showing me what was working and what needed to change. I was also in the
rehearsal room full-time for the premiere and made a lot of changes to the text
right up until opening night. Since then, the play has been produced many times
and has been published, so I’ve had the chance to go back and tweak things even
further, which has been great.
Like Bed & Breakfast, this play feels very specific and closely connected to a certain type of place and culture, and yet, at the same time, it’s also quite expansive, even universal, in its larger themes. How do you strike this balance? Is it something that you consciously consider as you write?
As a playwright, I’m a strong believer in the idea that the best way to explore bigger, universal themes is by grounding a play in a specific time and place. Writing the first draft, I usually have an inkling of what I want the play to be about—thematically speaking—but I’m more focussed on character, action, story, all that stuff. For me, rewriting the next several drafts is when I can clarify the Big Ideas, hone in on those themes in the writing, and hopefully make the specific circumstances of the characters resonate beyond the stage. In terms of striking the right balance, that’s a great thing to do with the director of a play’s premiere. It’s exciting to work with a trusted colleague on that balancing act, where one or two lines can tip the scales by communicating the themes too strongly or not strongly enough.
Do you anticipate any significant changes for the Arts Club’s production of this show? How involved do you expect to be in this production?
As I mentioned, the play has been produced several times, so apart from tweaking a few regionalisms, I don’t expect the text will change for the Arts Club. But I’ve had some great chats with Lauren Taylor, the director of this production. We’ve talked a lot about the play as a whole, but also about specific things like the layout of the set. I won’t be around for rehearsals of this production, but I can’t wait to come see it! Lauren has put together an all-star cast, so I look forward to seeing them strut their stuff.
What project or projects are you working on now?
I’ve been working away on a new play. As with all writing, some days the words flow, and some days I want to bash my head against my desk! As an actor, I’m about to go into rehearsal for a play in Ontario, then we do a production of Bed & Breakfast at the Blyth Festival in September, and then hop on a plane and come back to B.C. for the Arts Club tour of Bed & Breakfast in the fall. I’m really looking forward to being back in B.C.!