Actress to Playwright: An Interview with Tira Palmquist

“I’m always looking for those stories that really get a hook in me and say, ‘You have to write me.’”

Tira Palmquist is known for plays that merge the personal, the political and the poetic. Her most produced play, Two Degrees, premiered at the Denver Center, and subsequently produced by Tesseract Theater in St. Louis and Prime Productions at the Guthrie. Tira’s current projects include Memory of Winter, a play developed through The Road Theater’s Under Construction 3 cohort of playwrights and The Last Time We Saw Madison, a play originally commissioned by the UCIrvine MFA Acting Program. Her other plays include Ten Mile Lake (Serenbe Playhouse), Age of Bees (Theatre at Monmouth, NYU Stella Adler Studio, MadLab Theater, Tesseract), And Then They Fell (MadLab, Brimmer Street, New York Film Academy) and This Floating World. Tira has taught writing at the Orange County School of the Arts, at Wesleyan University and at the University of California-Irvine. https://www.tirapalmquist.com/

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I just wanted to preface that a lot of my questions will stem from Age of Bees because that’s the work of yours I’m most familiar with. To begin, I would love to know what made you want to start writing.

That’s a long and complicated answer, so I’ll try to be brief. Well, I would say that it started out when I was pretty young. In the olden days, before computers, I was that awkward kid who was pleased to read. Every summer, I was just working my way through our bookshelves in our house, reading work that was far too advanced for me. I had no business reading Lolita when I was 13, yet I did. In junior high and high school, I scribbled many stories, poems, et cetera. I was also involved in the theater. To be honest, I never thought that I was going to be a writer. I just enjoyed it. For me, it was an outlet. As an undergraduate, I got my degree in theater with an emphasis in acting, and I thought I would have a career as an actor. However, in my senior year, I was in the Undergraduate Writers Workshop at the University of Iowa, known as the elite workshop for undergraduates, which ran similarly to the Graduate Iowa Writers Workshop. One of my teachers, the poet Jorie Graham, asked me one day, “Well, you’re going to get an MFA, right?” I was stunned because I’d never considered it. After all, I thought I would go off and audition for grad schools in acting. Well, as it turned out, I was getting offers for grad school in acting at schools that I was not very enthusiastic about. I took a year off to work and considered what I wanted to do. My then-fiancé and I decided we would audition for the same schools together. He would be an actor, and I would be a writer. I came to the University of California to get my graduate degree in poetry. While plugging away at being a poet, I was still heavily involved in theatre. Honestly, being a poet is kind of miserable because you’re sending work out to poetry journals. I remember having this moment in a bookstore — back in the days when bookstores used to have a section of poetry journals — and I was standing in front of all of the journals, thinking, “Nobody reads journals except the poets who are reading poetry journals to see if they’ll publish their poems in poetry journals.” This thought revolutionized how I viewed poetry and negatively impacted my attitude towards it. At the same time, I had been approached about writing for performance for this eclectic, wild performance art company in total theatre, combining aspects of dance, poetry, music, and visual arts. There was a lot of experimental work within it, and while writing with that group, I found myself just inching toward narrative. One day, I realized, “Oh, I’m writing a play. That’s what I’m doing.” That’s really when my interest in playwriting came about; it was this clarifying moment when I learned that I’m a playwright. Funny enough, I have this whole life in which I’ve studied plays, acted in plays, created props for plays, and even stage-managed plays. This revelation was a natural evolution of my work as a writer, and I’ve focused almost entirely on writing plays ever since.

I love your story! This past semester, I took Dr. Barnett’s playwriting class. So far, I’ve written three 10-minute plays.

Excellent! Is your focus as an actor?

No, I’m most passionate about going to law school. That’s the plan. I am a Writing minor because I love to write, and I think writing is an important skill — especially for lawyers. I’ve always been interested in the government, how it works, and how it affects our everyday lives, which is why I’m double-majoring in political science and economics. I do a little bit of everything! I really liked my playwriting class and would retake it if I could.

Something seems to me very theatrical about the world of law — or at least courtroom law — because you have to improvise, be quick on your feet, and be able to express all of those things confidently.

Absolutely. Next, what kind of research do you do beforehand when writing plays that aren’t entirely fictional? Do you structure your plays around research?

I tend to do a fair amount of research, and the need for research varies in terms of how integral that research is for the story to unfold. For example, with Age of Bees, that whole play started because my brother, inexplicably at the time, sent me an article about colony collapse disorder. I have no idea why. He literally cut the article out of a magazine, stuffed it in an envelope, and sent it to me. And I thought to myself, “Cool, Mike. Alright.” But I was captivated, and after I finished reading the article, I knew it would be my next play. I didn’t know how or in what form, but I just knew it would be my next play. I fell down a rabbit hole about colony collapse disorder: what it is, why it’s happening, and what I need to know about it for this play. At my in-laws’ house, my father-in-law collected a metric crap-ton of books, and on one of the shelves, I found the A-Z book referenced in Age of Bees. So, I found that book and flipped through the pages, thinking, “This is really cool.” I asked him if I could have it; he said yes. By reading that book and finding out more about bees, along with other research, the story started to emerge. Having lived in southern Ohio and around a lot of apple orchards, the geography and sociology of it and all of the research I was doing about bees combined into this future vision for the play. A lot of the play was based on what I had learned about bee colonies and how they operate, but also this quote that many have falsely attributed to Albert Einstein: “If the bees go, then the flowers go, and if the flowers go, then the food goes, and if the food goes, we go.” This idea of the real truth of how we rely on industrial pollinators — bees — for our food became super interesting to me. Additionally, humans are immensely adaptable to new situations — sometimes for good and sometimes for ill — so what would that look like? One of the best things I’ve learned about being a part of the theatre world is asking myself: “How would that go down? What would that be like?” Soon after, that’s when this very isolated colony of people emerged in the play. So, I can’t say that I did research to figure out X, Y, and Z about the play, but all of the research helped me filter out what was necessary for the story.

Thank you. In Dr. Barnett’s playwriting class, developing believable conflict was one of the most challenging parts for me. You’ve done it so well in Age of Bees, so I was wondering if you could share some advice on generating conflict and believable tension in plays.

I think it will sound silly, but it comes to this straightforward formula: Character + Desire + Obstacle = Conflict. In doing that, you have to think about the characters and what they lack in conjunction with their main agenda throughout the play and that desire to achieve it. The desire has to be big enough, like a deep, burning desire, to develop that tension you want. However, the desire also varies based on the play. For example, a desire in a 10-minute play could be minor: “I want this cookie, but you’re keeping me from it,” or “I would just like you to stop talking,” right? However, for a big play, it has to be a more significant, more substantial desire: “I need to get away from my family,” “I need to fulfill myself as a person,” or “I need to solve this mystery.” Then, finally, the obstacle is a crucial component, where you ask yourself: “What is keeping this person from achieving that desire?” That play wouldn’t be very good if it were easy to get up and step over that obstacle. Or you’re either ginning up conflict or you’re stringing us along with something like “All he has to do is X, Y, and Z.” Part of it is figuring out how these pieces work together, knowing just how challenging that obstacle is, and where that obstacle sits — whether it be interior, from another person, societal, or all three. The more time you spend really figuring out the components of those three elements of the equation, the more the conflict starts to live and breathe.

Wow, thank you. That seems so simple, but it’s actually much more difficult when you’re writing your play.

Absolutely. It’s a simple equation with a lot of complexity to each component, but that’s where plays fail or are usually unsuccessful. Whether written by a student or another professional, it usually comes down to one of those elements not quite making sense. Either I don’t understand why that person wants this thing because you’ve never really fleshed that out, or that obstacle seems utterly unbelievable. Early on in my playwriting career, I used to just start writing without having figured a whole lot out. I thought, “Oh, here’s a good idea. Let’s go.” But then I would essentially write myself into corners. I would get like 25 pages in and go, “Oh, shit. I don’t honestly know where I’m going next.” I feel like I’ve gotten to the end of a branch, and I’m about to fall off, so I realized that I kind of have to let the play live and breathe in my head for a while. It’s almost like baking, where you must let the bread proof before making it. The proofing period of the play is about figuring out those components. Somebody asked me, “Oh, so you outline?” but actually, I don’t outline my plays. However, I do have to figure out where the play begins. Where does the conflict really emerge? Where is the jumping-off point for that? Where is this thing? Et cetera. In any play, there’s usually this real deep, dark-night-of-the-soul moment where it just seems like things are at their worst, and you don’t know if they will be able to go beyond that point. Then I start asking, How does that conflict resolve? When does the play end? Where is the clear end point? If I don’t have those things figured out, then I don’t have a play yet. Of course, those things can change as you’re writing, but I find that once I get those things figured out, then the first draft can happen pretty quickly. It’s not going to be necessarily a good draft, but it’s a draft, right? And at least I have the framework built for the play.

Wow! That makes perfect sense. Playwrights’ end goals are usually to have their plays produced in theatres, so how has seeing your plays performed affected you and your understanding of your writing?

First, I think that you can’t really understand how your play works until you see it on its feet, which is one reason why — especially for new work — it’s vital to have some sort of development experience in which there is a workshop production or something of that nature. As long as the play is just on the page, it’s just a template; it’s not a complete play yet. It still needs other elements like acting, lights, sound, et cetera, and I often find in rehearsal with actors that those are really clarifying moments where I realize, “Oh, right. I did not need this whole page of dialogue because it’s completely getting in the way of going from point A to point B.” Hearing my writing aloud helps me realize that unnecessary parts of dialogue suck the tension out of my play and makes it more difficult for the plot to propel forward. The point is that I will never see those things unless I’m in rehearsal. The most magical thing is seeing a production of your play live with an audience and seeing other people respond to your work. Watching them watch your play is electrifying. Hearing people audibly react to your writing is so gratifying because you realize that people not only understand your work but appreciate it. There’s something very lonely about being a writer and living with imaginary people in your head and feeling a little insane about it. However, being in a room with other people — strangers, even — responding to my work makes me reflect and think, “I wasn’t so crazy.”

Awesome. I know you’ve touched on this next question a little already, but how do you find a story to tell? Also, what inspires you to write a story?

Honestly, it often comes from the news, but it also comes from events and moments in my life. I think it’s imperative as a writer to start to realize the stories that matter to you a great deal and the stories that not only matter to you but that you have a business telling. These stories don’t have to be super personal. Obviously, I never worked at an orchard, nor was I impregnated as a teenager, but some ideas matter to you, and that you believe matters to others. I’m not trying to turn theater into a kind of polemic — theater as policy — but it matters. Look, other people are going to spend money on seeing your play. It’s okay to write fluff that isn’t necessarily meant to be a social action. It’s great to write comedies where the goal is to be ridiculous and have a great time watching it, and if that’s what moves you, you should absolutely write that. However, for me as a playwright, I’m always looking for those stories that really get a hook in me and say, “You have to write me,” whether it’s about something that I see happening in the world like colony collapse, climate change, dealing with grief, or whatever it is. It’s like an idea that won’t let you go and gets into your brain and body. You know that idea would make a good story when you keep coming back to it, so ponder it and absolutely write it.

I need to find something that makes me feel the way you just described, and it will take some time.

It absolutely does. I don’t know how old you are, Nick, but I know some things matter to you because otherwise, you wouldn’t be studying to be a lawyer. It’s those things that grow for you. Everybody finds their voice as a person — whether you’re a writer or playwright or whatever — and it’s a matter of finding that urgency of why you’re here and what on Earth you’re going to do with your time and voice.

Excellent insight! Thanks! Okay, my final question is, what advice do you have for aspiring playwrights?

Just keep writing. Well, okay, no, it’s more complicated than that. You should just keep writing; you shouldn’t give up too early. Understand that your first couple of plays may never get produced, and that’s okay. Also, read as much as you can, and I don’t just mean reading plays — although obviously you should also be reading plays — but read histories, historical fiction, newspapers, and everything you can get your hand on to feed the well. It’s like the expression, “Garbage in, garbage out.” I think it applies to the world of the arts as well. If you immerse yourself in something that’s not giving you good mental nutrition and not feeding your garden, then I don’t know that you will get your desired results. Additionally, see as much as you can. See all sorts of movies and plays. Understand how plays work from the inside out: Build props, work on costumes, and do lights. All those experiences will help you understand the technical components of putting together a play and give you a more solid foundation for creating your own stories. Also, put yourself out there and take risks. I think that it’s really important to not just send your work out but also to investigate places where you can work together with other artists — whether it’s collaborative writing or a writers’ workshop. Every time you keep applying yourself in those kinds of ways, you’re firming up your own voice as a playwright and your own skills. If you write a play and nobody seems to want to do it, take heart that it could be several things that aren’t appealing in that play for other people, or it could just be that it wasn’t the right time for that play. Wait a couple of years; maybe time will come when you least expect it.

Nicholas Perrone is a junior at MTSU pursuing degrees in Political Science and Economics with a minor in Writing. He is also the intern for the Fall 2024 In-Process Series.