Meet the R&D: Tommy Smith

Tommy Smith, an artist in this year's R&D group, blogs about his decision to delay development of his NFL project and shares his short play based on his investigation.

Sometimes plays don’t work out.

I had been developing a piece called NFL with Woodshed Collective's Teddy Bergman via The Civilians R&D Group. It was going to be a document-based play about football players who go haywire and murder their loved ones. After working on the draft for a couple months, I found out that Ridley Scott is planning a movie about the same subject. Then Berkeley Rep announced their season with a play about the same subject. Instead of pulling a Dante's Peak, Teddy and I decided to shelve developing the project until it seems relevant to dust it off.

NFL would have been presented during the R&D Reading Series, May 21-30. In lieu of this, please read this short play, The Death of Justin Strzelczyk, based on a section of NFL, about the demise of Steelers' player Justin Strzelczyk.

Thanks for sharing, Tommy. For other posts about our R&D Group artists, please click HERE!