Seminar is a play by Theresa Rebeck that premiered on Broadway in 2011. It follows four aspiring writers who pay for a supposed great writer – Leonard – to come and critique their writing weekly. Each writer is their own personality. There is the rich, uppity, nerd-type (Kate), the quieter, reserved, and talented one (Martin), the ditzy, manipulative, and sexy one (Izzy), and the extravagant, smart, and connected one (Douglas). Leonard is depicted as brash, rude, cruel, and unpardonable. The story goes on to where Martin and Leonard connect and see their similarities and work together to better themselves.

A theme that immediately jumps at you is conflict. Throughout the play, there is conflict every other conversation. High tension exists between most characters, especially between those of different sexes. Examples are Kate and Leonard throughout most of the play and Martin and Douglas (though one-sided) in scene one, two, and so on. Another theme that is prevalent is the idea that sex sells and that sex will get you everywhere you want to be. This is shown when Izzy writes a story that Leonard deems sexy, and they proceed to pursue a sexual relationship. It could also be interpreted that sexism could be a theme when sex is not available. When Kate submits a story, being defined as a “prude,” Leonard is bored before ending the first sentence, and is bored with her immediately every time following. That is, until she submits something under the guise of a transvestite Cubano gang leader. Leonard loves the story and thinks it’s the next best thing to come to literature. Kate, herself being a feminist, sees this injustice, which in turn causes more conflict. In addition to external conflict, there is also internal conflict. Kate deals with the struggle of loving Martin but not being loved in return. Martin deals with the interal conflict of Izzy and her “whorish,” inconsistent tendencies and his writings. Leonard deals with trying to figure out how to save Martin from ending up bitter and empty like he did. Even Douglas is trying to figure out why he has all of those connections but no grasp on fame.

It was difficult to read through all of the conflict. Because it was near constant, it was harder to process. The way that my mind reads fighting, yelling, and general high tension moments is it scans it quickly, taking each word in, but tossing it quickly to move onto the next word. This makes for quick reading, and I could still comprehend the scene at the end, but it would not be as clear as it would be if it would have been normal conversation. However, I went back and reread a few scenes to remedy this and found new things each time. Another thing I had a hard time with was the formatting of the text. It didn’t take long for me to realize that punctuation was optional within their text block, but occasionally the words would seem like they belonged to someone else. For example, on page 17. The entire conversation between Douglas and Izzy and getting a ride home didn’t make an ounce of sense to me no matter how many times I read it.

Overall, I enjoyed the play. It was fast-paced and a fast read. It felt fresh. It rose my blood pressure at times and made me angry. Sometimes it felt rushed – namely in any romantic scene where kissing was involved. I’m sure that feeling will go away when we see the production. It’s not wildly predictable or unpredictable, but I don’t believe that’s a bad thing. Izzy seems like a character that is common in many other media: “exotic,” sexy asian woman. Kate seems like a nice girl in the play, like she’s naïve, rich, and nice, however that is not the widely accepted concept by the other classmates (nor is it the actual concept for Kate). Douglas seemed the most annoying out of all of the writers. Leonard seemed unprecedented in his attitude, but it was obvious to me from the start that he had higher objectives. Martin was always a quieter character, so I never formed an opinion on him until the end when everything came together. I think everything pieced together well and it was a well thought out play.

Rebeck, Theresa, "Seminar," 2014.