42 & 43: Picking up the Scraps: Writing Plays about our Grief
About the episode:
About today’s guest, Ian Ornstein: Ian grew up in California and moved to Chicago in 2015. He writes (plays, short stories, essays, monologues) and performs (improv in various forms) around town. Right now he's thinking about trying to move through life with less judgement and being open to the various varieties that life presents him. To join Ian’s quarterly email list (where he shares his creative projects and more) go here: https://mailchi.mp/f07a754c2dc2/ianornsteinquarterlysignup
Today, Ian and I discuss:
The inspiration behind Ian’s play “The Virgin Death”
The impossibility of fully honoring someone’s life
How we do NOT believe everything happens for a reason (instead, something horrible happens and then we pick up the scraps, hoping to make something beautiful from it)
My struggles with writing a memoir
And so much more!
(Episode 42 - Part 1) Listen on Apple Podcasts | Listen on Spotify
(Episode 43 - Part 2) Listen on Apple Podcasts | Listen on Spotify
Quotes:
"How do you do a eulogy that’s actually honoring the person? ... Ultimately comes to this discovery that it's like, you know, what I'd be thing that I can do is just tell stories about him."
"There's a part of me that's like, am I even allowed to use tragedy? Does it belong to me? Like, can I write songs about Evan, is that wrong? I don't know."
"I realized I had to independently be like, Am I okay with this... I was really would be putting burden on them... It would raise some like uncomfortable, inappropriate things for them that are like in the play."
"At the end of the day, you just can be considerate, and if you break someone's heart, but you were being considerate, like that's potentially on them at that point. You can't necessarily be responsible for everyone's feelings."
"There's a balance between having to really think about other people and having to like, not worry about other people... If you go over to one side, you want to fall on the other side where you're like, 'Hey, I trust people are going to react to that.'"