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Hi OP, I definitely don't have as much experience or skill as Neil Gaiman, but I'm finishing of a Bachelors and entering a Masters in Creative Writing with a focus on Theatre! I've been playwriting since I was about 15 and have won some awards and produced my own plays in the past.

Like Mr.Gaiman said, for now you should learn this way.

I had similar guidelines regarding cast size when I first started out. At first, it's so you learn that nothing on stage should really be a throwaway line. One Acts are short, and absolutely every bit of information is conveyed to the audience via dialogue and movement - you don't want them looking too many places. And you don't want to fill your scene with lines that just establish character without furthering the scene. Or worse, just lines because you can't have someone stand there silent for a whole scene (unless it's a character trait for a purpose).

I still get guidelines like this now, even, in university settings, but for us it's now more of a cost issue. When you actually start producing professionally, you want to pay your actors what they deserve - big casts cost more and may make your play infeasible for a smaller production company. It's just an industry truth that many production companies will pass on your play with a large cast and the ones with loads of money will need the play to be EXCEPTIONAL to pick up.

On the significance thing:

One of my teachers always used to say "the only ones who can break rules of literature well are the ones who know them so well they know exactly how to do so deliberately, for effect."

So for right now, yes. Every character should be significant. This doesn't mean they all need to represent something deep and metaphorical - they should be doing something for the play, so that if you took them out the play wouldn't work.

Later, you can start to experiment with characters that pop in and off and maybe are doubled by one actor, but generally the "they should be doing something" rule holds up.

Age and gender can definitely be a little more fluid, BUT I absolutely could see this rule for a beginner playwright. You need your characters to be solid, not vague. If you're balancing making their lines more in a limbo then you aren't thinking about "how would a 20 year old woman differ in speech than a 50 year old man?" (Or insert any gender.) With all these characteristics (age, gender, race, disabled/abled) comes different life experiences you need to think about, and those experiences can be INCREDIBLY important to character.

Now I absolutely do have some characters who are open age, race, and gender wise. But, I do so very deliberately, they are rarely the protagonists, and far more if I want representation in my plays I write it explicitly. I'm a queer Indigenous playwright, so representation is something I think about a lot.

Every play does have a meaning, but again, it doesn't need to be deep and metaphorical. If you write a story the meaning will come.

I've written silly comedy plays that end up engaging in class criticism, or I have a seemingly pointless fantasy play that's just an experiment in challenging the expectation that every Indigenous body on stage has to account for themselves through an arc revolving healing from colonialism.

So for now, learn the rules, then have fun breaking them later!

Hello Neil, I’m doing a playwrighting course right now and the teacher says all of these rules such as the fact that no play is producible with more than 5 characters. He also says that every play must have a meaning and that every single character must have very specific things about them and age and gender should rarely be optional. I feel like a play can do whatever you want it to.

I know you mainly do novels and film, which are both very different, but as a writer, do you think that plays should have this many rules?

I would suggest learning to do it his way, because you will learn things, but be prepared to throw it all out when you've finished. I'm sure it's easiest as a beginner playwright to have no more than 5 characters, for example, and it also means you'll not forget about any characters and you'll keep it small, but it's obviously not any kind of a rule in the real world.

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@staff@wip i am begging you to put the desktop version back to what it was before, I literally just opened desktop and almost screamed. there was nothing wrong with it before, whhyyyy would you change something that didn't need fixing when so many things on this site DO need help

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Tiktok reminded me of something I've wanted to talk about for a while. This going to be a real "don't like don't read" because I will never change my mind about this.

I don't like True Crime, and I think there are questions you should ask yourself when consuming True Crime content to be more aware of the ethics of it.

1. Are the victims still alive?

2. Are the victims' families still alive?

3. If yes, did they give consent for this trauma to be talked about on that specific podcast/show/video?

4. Was the crime one where the victim was harmed in a physical or psychological way?

5. Is this media sensationalizing it at all? Do they treat someone's pain and trauma as a source of entertainment?

This looks like sound effects, usually some kind of music to make it seem scary, like a horror film. Very exaggerated voices from the hosts. Sometimes a certain amount of reverence towards the severity or the horror of the crime (or even the perpetrators themselves). Speculation about the crime. (That is a HUGE one, these questions also apply to so-called investigative journalists who lack all the ethics of journalism.)

If the answer is yes, in my opinion, that true crime podcast is not ethical.

And I am biased, I'll disclose that right away. My community has a hatred towards sensationalized True Crime. We live on Highway 16, aka The Highway of Tears. I've seen families personally who are approached by these 'journalists' and then hurt by them, where their pain is used as entertainment instead of awareness. Being in an online space that shares my views on this, I know other families, MANY families, have similar experiences and are against the boom in TC content.

Hitchhiking is illegal where I live, we all know why. So they do discuss tragedies with us from a young age, (and if you don't know, this is a part of MMIWG2S) but only ever as tragedy. Not as entertainment.

So yeah, that's my thoughts. I'm sure it can be better worded and I'm aware not ALL TC is quite so bad, but it's just something to think about.

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Hi anon. I won’t publish the ask for privacy, but I wanted to say thank you for your apology. I accept it, on the condition that you also reflect not just on what you mentioned in the apology but the act of sending hate at all.

I’m hoping you weren’t one of the ones sending suicide bait (I’m pretty sure i know who that was, and it’s unrelated to this) but even if you weren’t: sending hateful anons is objectively fucked up in any situation, regardless of what is happening or what you think is happening. The fucked-up-ness doesn’t go away even if you think you’re in the right.

Around the time ~all that~ happened I was simultaneously dealing with someone else who was harassing me, a lot. From a completely different side of Tumblr. They still occasionally pop in my inbox. So you can imagine how overwhelming it felt to receive more hate on top of that. I am not exaggerating when I say that period of time very nearly killed me.

So just don’t ever send hate no matter what the situation is. If someone has wronged you, block them.

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Here’s a full painting of yeehaw!geralt :D

[ID: A messy western painting of Geralt (the Witcher) as a cowboy. He’s holding a lasso and riding a horse through shallow water as a drowner reaches up from below. ]

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today in indigenous lit we’re talking about how captain marvel is colonizer propaganda 👍🏼 stay tuned friends 

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Another corrupted angel! This one DEFINITELY looks not okay. 

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considering how many times a villain has kidnapped mj and publicly announced 'spiderman I have the woman you love' you'd think.....someone would look into her personal life a little?

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#(he can’t argue though)

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One of Jaskier's pinfeathers broke and Geralt had to pull it out. He was not prepared for the blood.

@witcher-bows-and-arrows

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I made a spoof poster of romeo and juliet for my geraskier playlist SKSKKS

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Bruno 🤝 Belle: the whole town sang a song about how weird I am, which sucks, but it’s also kind of a banger and the coordination is honestly impressive.

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Yeah I enjoyed this movie a normal amount *opens ao3*

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Wow!

My comfort fic Phosphorescence was nominated for Best Pick-Me-Up Fic in this year’s @irondad-creator-awards! Thank you so much! I still look upon that one fondly, and I’m overjoyed to hear that it brings happiness to others too.

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✨ Happy Witcher Season 2 yall! ✨

What a fun installment the last season was and im looking forward to more!

Also yes this was a good excuse to paint Roach as the goodest bestest prettiest good horsey.

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#something lgbt is happening here

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Jaskier being tortured for information on Geralt and his Child Surprise 

The Witcher 2x05