Five things we learned writing “Mankind’s Last Hope”

Well, it was a pretty great experience watching the live version of Mankind’s Last Hope come together under the expert direction of Bob Lundy-Paine. Long journey too. I thought, before things fade too much, I’d take a few minutes to jot down some of the things we learned along the way. But first, for anyone not familiar with the tale, here’s a sketch of the trek:
Flashback
Jeff and I started writing the script something like four years ago and came up with two episodes. We did a table read with friends, which was a blast, and then we put those scripts aside. Some six months later we saw a contest to write a new sitcom. We jumped at it, wrote a pilot, did another reading, sent the pilot in, didn’t win, took another break.
Then about two years ago, I met director Bob at a Blacksmith Cellars wine tasting. He and his wife Laura were two of the co-founders for a theater company called Virago. We ended up talking about Virago and an idea Jeff and I had, that it’d be great to stage a sitcom live. Fun chat. Then we drank more wine.

Six months later, Bob comes up to me at a school function (we have kids in the same school) and says, “Hey, you had that sitcom script right? We should do that thing. And film it too.” This was in May or June. Over the summer, I took the pilot and the best of those two early episodes and took a crack at making them (1) fit together and (2) work a little better for the stage (longer scenes, fewer sets). In the fall we did a reading with a number of Bob’s actor friends. It was a great night, and I learned a lot from hearing strangers jump into the script. So, more tweaking.
Bob had said from the beginning that we needed three episodes, with a complete story arc to make it full evening. I spent the next few months on that closer. We did a smaller reading, identified a bunch of things to keep working on, and the core of folks who were going to make this thing happen began tackling logistics.
Finally, in September, the scripts were ready to hand over, with the last tweaks made to episode three that morning based on great feedback I’d gotten from Bob earlier in the week. And of course, for most of the folks involved, the work really began then. They made a number of great adjustments and additions to the script, including some fantastic actions that really brought the characters and scenes to life. Bob had to figure out to pull together a show that was still much more complicated than I had ever realized. Five sets, twelve characters, 120 pages of script, and a choreographed song. Casting, costumes, lighting, sound, cameras. And then there it was — six shows.
So what did we learned? Well, we re-learned the old adage that people laugh more in a cold room than a hot one. So we opened those windows and we dropped cold water down from the ceiling right after the first act (think Flashdance, only with, like, ninety people starring as Jennifer Beals) and then we sent out a family of lightly cooled penguins to hug our audience members during intermission.
What else?…
1. Mebbe it’s OK to work on the same script for four years after all
There’s a truism in scriptwriting that you shouldn’t spend too much time polishing the same stone — write your script, get it read, make your tweaks, move on to the next script. And there’s a lot of wisdom to that. In five years time, you end up with a great big box of scripts and a lot of experience.
I started feeling guilty about working on the same script two years after we started, but then that unexpected twist — meeting Bob, staging the show — seemed to make it all OK. The real objective when Jeff and I started was to learn by doing. It turns out you can keep learning new things while working on the same project. (Of course, now we’re ready for something new….)
2. Better to start without a plan than to sit around waiting for a plan to show up
We wrote the script just to write the script. The idea of staging came along midway through. The chance meeting with Virago wasn’t even a glimmer back then. And the idea of filming it came from Bob. If we hadn’t written a few scripts first, Bob and I wouldn’t have had a show to talk about. No show-chat. No show. Speaking of which….
3. Blab about what you’re doing
Another side lesson here — we got excited enough about the script that we started talking about it to people. I’m generally a talkative fellow, but this project really taught me that you have to let people know what you’re working on. You never know when the next person you’re chatting with might have some great idea that matches well, and then off to the races ya go…..
4. Scripts want to be read out loud by strangers
This seems obvious, but boy, every time we had new people read MLH, it lead to major improvements. There’s just nothing better for roadtesting a script than having strangers become your characters.
5. Bet on other people
Jeff and I started writing together not knowing where it would go. Not knowing if we’d be able to write together even. Neither of us had written a script before. Bob was interested in directing without seeing any of our pages. We trusted Bob before we’d seen any of his productions. And of course, most of the cast signed on based on a premise and a handful of dialog they’d read during auditions. We even found a fantastic sound guy who none of us had met before over the Internets. Up with other people. Up with taking a chance.
OK, that’s enough for this Saturday morning. I’ll try to revisit this in a little bit, mebbe pull together a part II. Big thanks again to everyone who came out, and of course to the army of enormously talented folks who made the show possible. Fun ride, fun ride.
-Cecil