This is a picture of Galileo I took. He looks quite glum doesn't he? He's thinking about the universe.
One of the questions you get asked a lot as a playwright is 'what's next?' Over the years I've worked out ways of avoiding this question. 'Lots of things', I say. Or 'I'm thinking about becoming a chef'.
It's not that I don't have lots of things I'm doing next, it's just that I like to keep them to myself. I also like to keep them from myself. If I think too much about a project before I can sit and write it, I tend to over think it or get bored of it.
For me, the only way I can hope to surprise the audience is to surprise myself.
The contradiction comes in the fact that I have to sell my ideas, sometimes years in advance. My technique is now to write the outline/plan or whatever I have to and then try to forget about it until the planned writing time. (I once completely forgot about one idea and had to be reminded by the producer what it was about. True story).
This week has mostly been about planning what I'm writing next year. And so I could tell you what I'm doing but then it wouldn't be a surprise, would it?
