I want to know what about the play attracted you to it.  What was it about the play that was so compelling that you want to (have to) direct it?  What do you hope to convey to the audience?  How will you convey it?  Tell me in one or two words what the play is about:  Love or Blind Ambition or Suspense or Healing or Understanding others or Hate.  Even a farce has a message. 

Too often I hear platitudes and people are not able to tell me what the message of the play is.  I have been told that they like the play because it is funny.  Or that they saw the play somewhere else and it was good.  Or that the play can be easily cast with available actors.  That tells me nothing. 

A couple of years ago, I read The Vagina Monologues and did not like it at all.  A good friend of mine approached me wanting to do the show.  I asked her what she saw in the play.  She said it was about love.  Love of ourselves, love of others and the love that keeps us  going when all seems lost.  I could tell the play was important to her and she had a cohesive message that she was going to tell through the play.  I approved the play and it was wonderful - everything she promised and more.

I am sure you have seen more than one production of a play and have noticed that they are all different because they have a different director and to some extent different actors.  What will make your production worth seeing?  What themes will you stress?  I have seen four different stagings of "ART" from Broadway to the corner of a local deli.  I came away from each one with a different message and saw something very different in each production.  Based, to a large extent, on the vision of the Director.

What about your staging of your play is so important for the people of our community to see that we need to invest our time and money in it?

Doug