Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, October 8, 1995 TAG: 9510100015
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 13 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: KEVIN KITTREDGE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
A genie who could spell.
"I never learned to spell," confessed the author of numerous plays, including the locally popular "Grace and Glorie" - which was performed in Mill Mountain Theatre's Theatre B last year. "I always had a mental block for spelling."
In the second grade, Ziegler said, he found learning to spell so painful he threw away his spelling book.
Twice.
"I think it left scars," he said of the experience.
ZIegler's computer, with its "Spellcheck" function, changed all that.
Blissfully, he began to splash words upon the screen, spelling them any which way - confident the computer would eventually make it right.
The old wounds healed at last.
"I said, `There you go, Sister Eleanor Terese. I didn't need to know all that stuff,' " Ziegler said.
Actually, it wasn't just the spelling.
In fact, when Ziegler met his Kaypro, all her shortcomings - her weight, her one-sided floppy disk, her pitiful 64 thousand K of RAM - were as nothing. They hit it off anyway.
"It was instantaneous," Ziegler said of the bond between them.
Not only could Ziegler spell with the help of his computer, he could rewrite to his heart's content - without having to retype a whole page every time he made a change.
"Plays almost always are creatures of rewrite," Ziegler said, noting that even after the play is written to his satisfaction, actors and directors will want things changed. "It doesn't ever stop until after you get it published."
Before the computer, it was all an endless headache. But now, Ziegler said, "revising is a joy. It's no problem at all."
Ziegler, who teaches playwriting and scenic design at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, is the author of more than a dozen plays. "Glory Bound," a musical about small town racism, premiered at Lime Kiln Theatre in Lexington this summer.
Jere Lee Hodgin, director of Mill Mountain Theatre, has called Ziegler's ear for dialogue and language "uncanny."
Ziegler's "Grace and Glorie" may be staged off-Broadway in New York this fall, if it can find a theater. The 1989 "Home Games" also appeared off-Broadway, while other Ziegler plays have been performed in New York, Houston, New Jersey and Virginia.
It is an impressive record. And if not for the computer, Ziegler said, it might have been different.
Because in the beginning, the constant retyping - coupled with the fear of misspelling - threatened to make his writing career a short one.
Without computers, ``I don't know that I would even be doing this," the playwright said.
In addition to the easy rewrites and the spellcheck function, there is something else about computers that appeals to Ziegler. Something a little hard to explain.
In short, he thinks all those little pulsing lights on the computer screen do something to his brain.
"You need to have some sort of trigger," he explained. "All writers have certain rituals they go though when they sit down to write. My theory is they're crossing the bridge from their left brain to their right brain" - that is, from the logical to the creative side. "For me, the computer does that."
It doesn't, he has found, do it for free.
"I think I've had to pay a price for it," Ziegler said of the benefits of using a computer. "It seems to have hurt my vision."
Ziegler also has back problems that he blames on the computer. He uses posture chairs, on which he kneels to work - as though in obeisance to the cyber gods. And he has a rowing machine and weights he uses in an attempt to combat through exercise the effects of too many uninterrupted hours at the keyboard.
"Time becomes meaningless," at the computer, Ziegler admits. "I can sit for three hours and not know it's been three hours - until I try to move.
"I know that it's killing my body," he grinned. "It has nothing to do with my mind."
There are other disadvantages to using a computer - namely, power failures, software glitches and other high-tech catastrophes that Shakespeare never had to worry about, which can swallow up a play in half a heartbeat.
Ziegler, who has seen work disappear a time or two, said he used to fret about such things. But no more.
"At first it used to totally freak me out," he said of disappearing work. "Now if I lose it I figure if it was really that great I'll remember it."
Besides, Ziegler frequently makes paper printouts of his works-in-progress - especially before going to rehearsals.
"There's just something about a script in the theater that's sacred," the playwright said.
by CNB