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Type of bind: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 808.2
EAN num: 9780435086299
ISBN number: 0435086294
Label: Heinemann Drama
Manufacturer: Heinemann Drama
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 176
Printing Date: November 01, 1993
Publishing house: Heinemann Drama
Sale Popularity Level: 298266
Studio: Heinemann Drama
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Product Description:
In The Dramatist's Toolkit, playwright and Backstage columnist Jeff Sweet offers an intensive and practical guide to being a working playwright. In this informative guide, Sweet discusses such matters as:
- The building blocks of playwriting
- How characters relate to one another
- The differences and similarities between musicals and plays
- Screenwriting vs. playwriting
- and much more!
Jeff Sweet offers guidance for the beginning playwright and advice for the seasoned professional.
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Rated by buyers 
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Its brevity aside, the most striking feature of Jeffrey Sweet's The Dramatist's Toolkit is that it's not written like most playwriting texts. Instead of ponderously essaying Aristotle (though if you want a good analysis of Poetics, I'd recommend Hatcher's Art & Craft of Playwriting), Sweet cuts to the chase of negotiations and subtext. His is the only book on playwriting that I've ever seen to really get to the heart of creating scenes (and the better part of the book focuses on just this).
Because of this emphasis, this is not going to be the book you should refer to for structure; again, Hatcher is strong there, as is Gordon Farrell's Power of the Playwright's Vision (the only text I've seen to give numerous structural breakdowns). However, Sweet's advice - taken well, and with the usual pinch of salt - is very liberating to the writer who's been struggling against formulaic playwriting texts.
Sweet's book is worth its cover price based solely on its discussions of negotiations, which really are eye-openers as to how subtext really works. His section on exposition, with a discusion on high and low contexts, is likewise strong. The book is great as a reference while doing your actual writing, just to remind you of things you can really make work.
Now, Sweet's a bit brief (but powerful) in this book, but makes up for it in the sequel, Solving Your Script. The latter is a reinforcement of the ideas from The Dramatist's Toolkit, with enlightening, well annotated examples. Together, they make up a powerful combination addressing what is so rarely touched on in playwriting books: how to actually write powerful, subtle scenes. Combine them with a couple of good structural books like Hatcher or Farrell, and you've got a much better basis than most of the formulaic texts.
Rated by buyers 
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This book is a fair introduction for a newcomer. But when I say newcomer, I mean a newcomer to writing, not to playwriting. For example, what writer experienced in any genre really needs to be told not to let a couple of long-married characters converse endlessly about facts that should be second nature to both of them? Of course, as Sweet points out, knowing something and doing it are different things. But how to *do* within the context of a play is exactly what "The Dramatist's Toolkit" doesn't reveal. Sweet correctly notes that a play is a very different artistic form than a novel. But having made this observation, he doesn't go much of anywhere with with it. Most of what he says about the craft of writing a play could also be applied to novel or short story writing. This includes his point about using physical objects to illustrate themes.
Fortunately, Sweet elaborates on the doing of playwriting in his fine book "Solving Your Script," so I'd recommend skipping "The Dramatist's Toolkit" and going directly to Sweet's second book.
It speaks loudly about "Solving Your Script" that I would recommend it, because I had serious trouble with the unblinkingly self-important tone of "The Dramatist's Toolkt." In his very first chapter, for example, Sweet seems to assert that playwriting should be an actors-only club, because no one else could really understand the stage well enough to write for it. Short of revealing something about Sweet's background or loyalties, this assertion is useless. One buys a book on playwriting to receive the author's insights, not to be told to go home if one lacks those insights at the outset. Besides, Sweet's preference for actors as playwrights is just plain unsupportable. While he lists several great novelists that made lousy playwrights, he doesn't name a single great actor who made a good playwright. There have been some, but they are outnumbered by the great actors who stuck to acting, the art form they knew best. Remarkably, it is without a trace of irony that Sweet later complains that too many modern plays revolve around acting and show business. His proposed solution to this problem is laughably underwhelming: it is that actors should pick up a newspaper now and then so that they'll write better plays.
Sweet is undoubtedly a good playwright, but "The Dramatist Toolkit" provides scant evidence of his skills as a playwriting teacher. Sweet's insight about using physical objects to illustrate themes did seem powerful to me. A few more insights of this caliber might have made this into what I would consider a five star book.
Rated by buyers -
My advice is to skip this book and go directly to Jeffrey Hatcher's or Louis Catron's, if you haven't already. Sweet's book is pretty obvious: conflict, contradictory characters, small casts because no one can afford to produce your work,etc., but what is irritating is his unctious style wherein he provides his views as though they were the most perspicacious and insightful renderings of the dramatic writer's craft, when all they are are basically common sense. Also, there's much here that seems very similar to the book "Backwards & Forwards" (1982) by David Ball, who refers to the "playwright's toolbox." Additionally, the author's championing of improv as a means to develop plays is a bit over the top. Just because it worked well at Second City to develop skits, it doesn't mean it will work in creating a finely crafted play. I don't know one distinguished playwright who uses improv to develop ideas; this method, in my view, usually leads to rather banal dramatic development and worse dialogue, for example, ok, you're a couple and are having a fight over having your mother-in-law over for dinner. Not much to work on as far as I'm concerned. Maybe this author uses improv to develop his plays, but the ones I've read that he's written do not seem particularly original, although well-meaning. I'm sure the guy means well, and if he can make a living in theatre purveying this stuff, hats off to him. For whatever reason, writers do not seem particularly interested in the art and craft of playwriting. That may be the reason regional theatre is mainly a middle-class entertainment instead of a forum to challenge social ideas, and it certainly doesn't bear much relationship to the origins of the theatre: to enact a ritual that helps a society cohere. Film and TV have taken that role, it seems. Although the advice here has some merit, I'm sure a book on blacksmithing could as well. The trouble is no one is particularly interested in the subject matter anymore.
Rated by buyers -
...books on writing plays...this one, as well as "Backwards and Forwards," have changed me as a playwright. I still have a long way to go, but Mr. Sweet's book is an exceptional one in the field.
Rated by buyers -
This book is wonderful. It distills so much that I wanted to know about theatre plays. But, the title should have been longer. It should have added "... and Working Actor". In addition to laying the clear foundation for writing / creating / improvising plays, Sweet also sets the stage for the actor. Basic principles are outlined with copious examples. And, it is easy to read. That's good because I started my second reading and am noticing that "basics" are set in a complex, inter-related text that reveals even more on this second reading. There's no other book like it. I highly recommend this book to anyone working in the theatre! (And, I am usually a harsh critic of books like this.)
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