Applause for the Memoir Writer
Bringing Your Memoir to the Stage Is Easier Than You Think
If you come to Los Angeles hoping to visit Hollywood, the place where movies are made, you may run into a small problem: you won’t find it.
The Hollywood sign is there. Hollywood Boulevard is definitely there. But that enormous place called “Hollywood,” where the movies are made? No.
The film industry is nowhere and everywhere at the same time, which may explain why it is so difficult to get into it. It’s hard to knock on a door when you can’t find the building.
Theater is different. Theater has a place. It has a stage. It has people. Sometimes it’s a professional theater; sometimes it’s a community theater, a school auditorium, a church hall, a library, or somebody’s living room. The principle is wonderfully simple: some people perform, other people watch. And you can walk in. So let’s use that!
Wherever you live, some form of theater is probably happening nearby. And don’t think “real theater” means Broadway. Theater, like writing, singing, dancing, painting, and playing music, has been part of ordinary human life for thousands of years.
Before you start writing, look around. What kind of theater exists where you live? Is there a school theater? A community theater? Does a local church put on plays? What about a college, library, or community center? Do you know a director? An actor? Someone who has always wanted to act and is simply waiting for somebody to ask?
Find out everything you can about the theatrical life around you. Then go back to your memoir and ask a different question: Is there one story in it that could happen on one of those stages? Could it actually be performed, and who could perform it? Famous playwrights have usually written for theaters they knew and actors they knew. You can do the same. If you can picture the people and the place, it becomes much easier to choose the right story from your memoir.
And yes, I said one story. Not your entire life. Choose one main story. Ideally, give it one main location, perhaps one or two additional locations, and a limited period of time. You still need conflict and a convincing ending, but theater gives you something film usually gives you much less of: time to talk. Your characters can talk about their feelings. They can remember. They can argue. They can tell each other about something that happened twenty years ago. Two people can sit at a kitchen table and talk for ten minutes. And you can add drama as much as you like. This is theater, after all.
Don’t worry too much about professional play formatting at first. Start with characters, scenes, and dialogue. And don’t begin with a three-hour historical epic involving thirty-seven members of your extended family. Start smaller, aim for about 40–60 pages. That can give you a play of roughly an hour. You can devote that entire hour to one event and explore it in detail, with all the emotion it deserves.
Once you have written your play, it is time to do something wonderfully old-fashioned: physically walk into a theater. Be your own producer, after all. Show your play to people who are involved in theater. Take the initiative. Bring some people together and read it aloud. If that goes well, try putting it on. You may discover that making theater is every bit as much fun as watching it. And there is one thing a play can give you that a book usually can’t: applause. Sometimes we all need it.
If that sounds like too much social life, write a one-person play, and perform it yourself. Find a director, or someone who would like to try directing, and take your play to a library or community center. Do it once. Do it five times. Do it whenever you can find an audience.
And if even that feels too brave, don’t leave the house. Bring the theater home. Write a short play about something that happened when your children were little. Print out the parts. The next time the whole family is together for Thanksgiving, hand your now-grown children the script and let them play themselves as kids. Or give the parts to your grandchildren and let them play their parents. I am sure that children would love playing their parents as kids, especially if you make it funny.
And then the life you lived, and later wrote about, will come alive again, this time in the voices and laughter of your grandchildren.
A memoir is a book about life. And theater has always been part of our lives. Bringing the two together can be surprisingly easy and a lot of fun. There are probably a hundred other ways to do it, but I’m not going to list them for you. If you managed to write a memoir, you already have enough imagination, determination, and courage to come up with a few of your own great ideas.
© Natalia Nightingale-Grey. 2026. All rights reserved. Reposting or quoting is allowed only with proper credit and a link to the original.
