For the past couple of years, I’ve been entering plays in one of regional one-act play festivals which happen in the United States. For this particular festival, my works haven’t been selected yet. But what I like about this festival is that each entry (and there were 350 of them this year) is read by judges who give some excellent feedback about the script and end by either recommending or not recommending the piece to be produced.

Last year, both judges recommended my piece “A Writer’s Satire” – giving it high marks – though it still wasn’t chosen for production. That shows you how difficult it is to get in.

This year, my piece also was not chosen, but I still received some excellent feedback from the judges, one who recommended the piece and the other who did not. Both of the comments were positive and constructive. I especially liked the comments from the judge who did not recommend the piece because I agreed with him and his criticism. The judge said that the overall framework of the piece was good, there needed to be more development on the characters. The judge was exactly right. I agree 100%.

So why didn’t I develop the characters further in this play? Simple, I wrote it as a 10-minute play, but this festival accepts plays up to 45 minutes long. I didn’t write this play for this festival, but for another 10-minute festival, but I decided to enter it here just to see what they would say.

I was right. It’s a good 10-minute play. Of that I’m quite confident, especially after one of the judges agreed with me. It would be an even better 20-30 minute play because there would be time to delve deeper into motivations and create a more heightened experience. I simply didn’t have time to re-write it.

Maybe I will re-write it for next year.

Getting feedback on one’s writing is great. It’s not always satisfying, but it is always helpful. It reinforced the idea that I’m on the right track in my play-writing. Just have to keep plugging away.