At 9AM this Sunday, I will show up at the Back on Broadway cafe in Santa Monica, along with four other writers, and each of us will write a play in four hours.  Seems like a crazy idea? Yes, it is and it’s been happening monthly for over five years.

The plays we write will be performed Sunday night, twice, at 7:30 and 9:00 at the Ruskin Group Theatre (http://www.RuskinGroupTheatre.com), which has been running the “LA Cafe Plays” since its inception.

That’s right, 10.5 hours from writing to performing in front of a live audience.  All the plays take place in a cafe or something cafe-esque to keep production simple.

The first show is ALWAYS sold-out because people love a tightrope act.

I love a deadline.

At the cafe, five manila envelops containing the two headshots (no resumes) of our casts are tossed on the floor and we each grab one.  It’s not very competitive.  There’s no diving or battles, but that’s most likely due to a lack of coffee.

The clock is ticking.

Inside are our two actors and we’re also given a theme.  This month it’s “birth right.”

The plays are under ten pages, that’s the glass half-full view. I’ve written five Cafe Plays since August, the first was based on “Vampire Mob,” but titled “Craig’s Other List.”  The cast of that play included the very talented Shannon Malone & @JimRoof (who plays Rob Anderson in “Vampire Mob” and who was also in my award-winning short “The Swear Police” - http://www.SwearPolice.com).

It was like the screenwriting exercise where you’re told to work out your character in a short play, for no other reason than to see them come to life. I learned a lot about my main character and found motivations I didn’t have prior to that four hour writing workout.   And there’s dialogue from the play in episode one.

I based that first Cafe Play on a scene I never wanted to shoot, the scene where Don meets with someone about becoming a vampire.  It was more interesting to me to start the story in the web series after he has made the transition, described by Don in episode one as “a good fit.”

This is also where I met Chris Mulkey (Marty Five in “Vampire Mob”), who often writes Cafe Plays and is currently acting in “Jesse Boy” on stage at the Ruskin.  I first saw Chris in “Twin Peaks” (he played Hank - http://www.imdb.com/video/cbs/vi2244282137/) but never thought I’d be working with him, especially with him acting in something I was writing and directing (and producing, and editing, and financing).

When his manager said he might have to reschedule because of HBO’s “Boardwalk Empire,” I was totally cool with it. HBO vs. indie web series, I know who wins!  Luckily, we didn’t have to reschedule. I’d like to thank everyone at “Boardwalk Empire” for that!

David Lynch was a huge influence on me even when I was doing photography, video installations and performance art, long before I ever thought I’d be shooting and directing my own stuff.  “Blue Velvet” and “Twin Peaks” are two of my favorite David Lynch projects.

Shooting with Chris in a castle in the Hollywood hills, a castle with a 25-foot stone tunnel, I couldn’t help seeing him in a suit in that tunnel and not think, “this looks so cool, like a David Lynch movie.”

After the plays are printed out, a convoy of writers and producers drives to the Ruskin Theatre to meet with the directors, assistant directors and actors.  I usually sit in for a table read or two, answer questions and then I leave it to them.

I like to see what I wrote play out in front of a live audience, with the caveats of time and budget constraints.  Kinda like a web series, but with you in the room with the people watching as opposed to them sitting in front of their computers watching at home, where you can’t hear laughter.

That old Nike ad, “Just Do It,” works for creative endeavors as well as athletic pursuits. With a four-hour deadline, you have no choice but to just do it.

If you’re sitting on the fence about diving into a web series, just start, you will be amazed how you far you can push that boulder up that hill, once you start. A four hour deadline with an audience waiting, who’s in?