Robert Cohen - Theatre, Brief Version-McGraw-Hill Education (2016)

64 Chapter 4 The Playwright
No drama could have a more serious topic than The Scottsboro Boys, which (see the chapter titled “Global Theatre
Today”) treats the true story of nine black teenage boys jailed for a crime they never committed (in fact no crime was
committed at all) during the period of racial segregation in the American South. But David Thompson’s script for the
production, as directed and choreographed by Susan Stroman, transforms the story into a black minstrel show being
performed for white audiences, making the irony of the horrific real-life events an agonizing clash of social evil and
musical entertainment at the same time. Colman Domingo and Forrest McClendon play the “minstrel” performers, with
the jailed prisoners behind them. © Paul Kolnik
all proven to be enduringly popular theatrical modes.
Credibility is the audience-imposed demand that requires
a play’s actions to appear to flow logically from its characters,
its situation, and the theatrical context the playwright
provides. In a credible play, what happens in act 2 appears
to be a reasonable outgrowth of what happened in act 1.
Credibility requires that the characters in a play appear
to act out of their own individual interests, instincts, and
intentions rather than serve as pawns for the development
of theatrical plot or effect, or as empty disseminators of
propaganda. Credibility requires that characters maintain
consistency within themselves: their thoughts, feelings,
hopes, fears, and plans must appear to flow from human
needs rather than purely theatrical ones. Credibility also
requires that human characters appear to act and think
like human beings (even in humanly impossible situations)
and not purely as thematic automatons. Credibility,
in essence, is a contract between author and audience,
whereby the audience agrees to view the characters as
“people” as long as the author agrees not to shatter that
belief in order to accomplish other purposes. Even in
the most absurd situations—perhaps especially in those
situations—characters should reflect to us something
familiar. Oftentimes, it is the tension between the familiarity
of their qualities and the strangeness of the scenario
that makes a play truly compelling.
Intrigue is the quality of a play that makes us curious
(sometimes fervently so) to see “what happens next.” Sheer
plot intrigue—which is sometimes called “suspense”
because it leaves us suspended (that is, “hanging”)—is