A Note from the Playwright

If I could be anything but a writer—and I can’t, I’ve tried—I would be a braver person. One who just doesn’t give two shits about what other people say or think or feel; I don’t think that would make me callous or uncaring or stuck-up (to utilize a wonderfully high-schoolish word). I think it would simply make me hold my head up a little higher, look people in the eye for a bit longer, make my smile a little broader (and any picture of me will attest that smiling is not my strong suit). I hope this play makes a case for being yourself and standing up for what you believe in. For being brave. For making choices that are hard and adult and not easy. For going out and being a part of the world instead of a mere observer. I’ve written about a lot of men who are really little boys at heart, but Greg, the protagonist in this play, just might be one of the few adults I’ve ever tackled. The play talks a bit about our country’s (and, by extension, the world’s) obsession with physical beauty, but it’s really the first coming-of-age story I’ve written. A boy grows up and becomes a man. I suppose every writer has one of those stories to tell, and this one is mine. It also concerns a very blue-collar side of the work population, like the friends and family I grew up with. I know what a dead-end job is like. I know exactly what it’s like to be eating your lunch at 3:00 a.m. and feeling like life as you know it is now officially over. I have a profound respect for work and workers and communities who live from paycheck to paycheck. The worst day I’ve had writing is better than the best day I ever had working in a factory, and the people who do it, year after year, because that’s life, and food and rent and child support must be paid, have all my respect. Writing is easy. Life is hard. It’s more than hard—it’s a bitch (as many bumper stickers are happy to point out for us). I suppose that’s why I like the person who spends more time working than on Facebook, the person who gets out there and lives his life rather than blogging about it or staring in the mirror wondering about anything so damn inconsequential as looks or hair or yesterday. The future is now. It’s time to grow up and be strong.

From the preface to reasons to be pretty by Neil LaBute, to be published in June by Faber & Faber, Inc., an affiliate of Farrar, Straus and Giroux, LLC. Copyright (c) 2008 by Neil LaBute. All rights reserved.