Steve Garfinkel has managed to stay below the radar among the Houston playwriting set, but with a glowing review in the Houston Press, he has come to the forefront. Steve’s original musical, P’s and Q’s: the ABC’s of Manners, with music/lyrics by the duo Trout Fishing in America, premiered at Main Street Theater this summer. As Steve says, the musical came about because “Becky and Viv (Rebecca Greene Udden, Executive Artistic Director at Main Street, and Vivienne M. St. John, Producing Director of their Theatre for Youth) had been talking for years about doing a play or musical on manners, and finally they said ‘Let’s do it.’ They also had the idea to make it family-oriented, that is, suitable for ages seven and up. And Becky was a big fan of Trout Fishing, so she suggested them for the music.” Steve was a logical choice for the assignment to write the book: Main Street had commissioned him to write a number of plays over the past 25 years.
How did the first commission come about? “I was acting and directing at Main Street, and I kept talking to everyone about this idea of mine to turn a children’s book about an alligator, The Great Escape or the Sewer Story, into a musical for children. I think Becky just got tired of hearing about it, so she paired me up with Marianne Pendino (as composer) to investigate the possibility.” Main Street produced it in 1985 under the title It’s a Jungle Out There. In the years since, Steve has continued to act and direct at Main Street, and Becky has asked him to adapt five other books, of her choosing, into plays for children and young adults. In addition, he was asked to adapt six classic tales into children’s plays for Express Theatre, Nashville Children’s Theater, the Children’s Museum of Houston & the Ensemble Theatre.
“Adapting children’s books is rather wonderful to do,” Steve remarked. “They seem daunting at first because they only have about 22 sentences in them, but I write as much from the illustrations as the text. On the other hand, doing an original work like P’s and Q’s was hard – agony really for the first six to eight months. I hated the first draft! I threw it out, and then ploughed in again with a completely different concept. It was better, but still it felt like pulling teeth at first. Finally the play got to a point where it had a life of its own, and from there on in, it was actually fun.”
Steve had some previous experience, though, with writing an original musical, but as he remembered, “With that one, it was a total collaboration. I was a member of a theatre commune in Austin called The Combine. We all wrote, we all acted, and our 1969 rock musical Stomp!, played in several cities before Joe Papp found it and asked us to perform at The Public Theatre. After 141 performances in New York City, Stomp! went on a six-month European tour. The script wasn’t even written down until after it closed. ”
And when he is asked “What’s next? Now that you’ve written an original play on your own?” With a gleam in his eye, Steve murmurs “All of a sudden I have all sorts of ideas for straight plays, and an idea for one that could be musicalized. Hopefully we’ll be crossing the Rubicon soon on one of them.”
Houston
Steve Garfinkel has managed to stay below the radar among the Houston playwriting set, but with a glowing review in the Houston Press, he has come to the forefront. Steve’s original musical, P’s and Q’s: the ABC’s of Manners, with music/lyrics by the duo Trout Fishing in America, premiered at Main Street Theater this summer. As Steve says, the musical came about because “Becky and Viv (Rebecca Greene Udden, Executive Artistic Director at Main Street, and Vivienne M. St. John, Producing Director of their Theatre for Youth) had been talking for years about doing a play or musical on manners, and finally they said ‘Let’s do it.’ They also had the idea to make it family-oriented, that is, suitable for ages seven and up. And Becky was a big fan of Trout Fishing, so she suggested them for the music.” Steve was a logical choice for the assignment to write the book: Main Street had commissioned him to write a number of plays over the past 25 years.
How did the first commission come about? “I was acting and directing at Main Street, and I kept talking to everyone about this idea of mine to turn a children’s book about an alligator, The Great Escape or the Sewer Story, into a musical for children. I think Becky just got tired of hearing about it, so she paired me up with Marianne Pendino (as composer) to investigate the possibility.” Main Street produced it in 1985 under the title It’s a Jungle Out There. In the years since, Steve has continued to act and direct at Main Street, and Becky has asked him to adapt five other books, of her choosing, into plays for children and young adults. In addition, he was asked to adapt six classic tales into children’s plays for Express Theatre, Nashville Children’s Theater, the Children’s Museum of Houston & the Ensemble Theatre.
“Adapting children’s books is rather wonderful to do,” Steve remarked. “They seem daunting at first because they only have about 22 sentences in them, but I write as much from the illustrations as the text. On the other hand, doing an original work like P’s and Q’s was hard – agony really for the first six to eight months. I hated the first draft! I threw it out, and then ploughed in again with a completely different concept. It was better, but still it felt like pulling teeth at first. Finally the play got to a point where it had a life of its own, and from there on in, it was actually fun.”
Steve had some previous experience, though, with writing an original musical, but as he remembered, “With that one, it was a total collaboration. I was a member of a theatre commune in Austin called The Combine. We all wrote, we all acted, and our 1969 rock musical Stomp!, played in several cities before Joe Papp found it and asked us to perform at The Public Theatre. After 141 performances in New York City, Stomp! went on a six-month European tour. The script wasn’t even written down until after it closed. ”
And when he is asked “What’s next? Now that you’ve written an original play on your own?” With a gleam in his eye, Steve murmurs “All of a sudden I have all sorts of ideas for straight plays, and an idea for one that could be musicalized. Hopefully we’ll be crossing the Rubicon soon on one of them.”
dhowie@dramatistsguild.com