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I get overly enthusiastic,” says writer and actor Margaret Martinello, with energy I'm tempted to label “boundless.” She does professional writing, communicating, and fund-raising as Director of Bioscience Development at UPEI; sits as a village councillor for Victoria-by-the-Sea (“Way more work than I anticipated,” she admits); serves on the Board of the Victoria Playhouse, where she helped initiate this year's notably forward-looking collaboration with the National Theatre School; acts in productions such as last summer's Love Letters at Victoria; and now attends rehearsals for the world premiere of her play, Option to Renew, at the Playhouse this season. In spare time, she is completing a screenplay, set on PEI, with an actor friend in mind for (and in consultation about) future production.
All this has blossomed since she took an “option to renew” her life by moving to Victoria-by-the-Sea from Los Angeles, in October 2005.
“There are so many more opportunities here than in LA!” she says, with fervour—a statement as likely to surprise friends on the Island as friends in California. “It's easier to connect with people.”
If LA is film-struck, Victoria is theatre-struck, the perfect inspiring place for a writer who saw screenwriter friends become “discouraged” about losing control of their material in the Hollywood movie machine. “There's more respect for the written word in the theatre,” she says.
Option to Renew originated as Margaret's thesis for a Master's in Professional Writing at the University of Southern California, where she was working as well as studying. But the play's no academic exercise; instead, Option to Renew is “a screwball comedy” in the old style of movies such as The Philadelphia Story or It Happened One Night. “I like the old comedies,” Margaret says, “with a man and woman who are in equal positions but still need each other.”
Martinello's play follows a woman “in early middle-age, about 42, at the top of her game in business…but her love life is a disaster. So she decides to take her business best practices and apply them to her love life.” She interviews men, to select one to be her live-in companion for three years, with an “option to renew.”
“She's controlling the situation,” says Margaret. “No more messes.” But messiness ensues. “The play is about learning to let go and realize we can't control life.”
“Of course, it's an absurd situation. A screwball comedy needs an absurd situation,” says Margaret. Add to the characters' smart verbal jousting a knife-throwing scene and a crepe-making scene, and the actors will have both their mouths and their hands full.
“This might sound esoteric,” Margaret says, “but I do believe the story's out there already, and the writer just needs to be centred enough to let it happen. As I've grown confident with my writing, I'm looser, more willing to make messes…to allow something unexpected to pop up.”
Option to Renew may eventually become a screenplay, too. “I'm skittish about screenplays,” Margaret admits. She laughs, “I can control the situation better in a theatre situation—there's that control thing again!”
Margaret values the ability her acting experience gives her “to write the sorts of lines actors like to deliver,” and she would love someday to play the female lead in Option to Renew. Acting in Love Letters last summer made her, she says, “itchy to act again. Soon.” But for the play's debut, she says, “It's best for this production for me to sit back, to let Erskine [Smith] direct, and to visit rehearsals and pass a few notes.”
Margaret's “outreach” in the community, she says, is worth it “to be able to help shape things, as you are able to do here [on PEI].”
She confesses, “I'm a little dissipated—but I'm learning to say no. I have to. I have a demanding day job, and I want creative juices for acting and writing.” The energy Margaret Martinello has found in Victoria-by-the-Sea may not be boundless, but it's as big as her gratitude to be living large in a small community.