Beginning the rewriting process...a little tip

When you've recovered from completing the very first complete draft of your script and are about to take a look at what you've got, it's useful to think of yourself as potter at the wheel.  Your first draft is your raw clay, and your job now is to work and rework that clay in your hands as it spins on the wheel.

You may have to work through it over and over until it has the exact texture, thickness, and shape you want.  Like a potter, you only produce a finished piece of quality in this way, one pass-through after another.  And slowly your script responds to your steady, gentle coaxing.  There's real craft involve here, of course.  But success also depends on attitude, on patience as you take it one step at a time, on getting in there and working through it again and again.

In the end, you have to trust that eventually a piece will emerge that you can take off the wheel, glaze, and fire in the kiln.

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I'm the Program Director of the low-residency MFA in Writing for Stage and Screen being offered by the New Hampshire Institute of Art.  Our last residency ran from June 22 to July 1 and we're currently still considering applications for starting the program this coming January at our residency scheduled for January 5-14, 2018.  If you're interested in finding out more about our program, email me at buzzmclaughlin@gmail.com and we can start a dialogue.

I'm also a playwright and screenwriter, producing partner in my production company Either/Or Films (The Sensation of Sight and Only Daughter) a professional script consultant, and the author of The Playwright's Process.  You can follow me on Twitter @eitherorfilms or @mfastagescreen.  I’m also on Facebook at buzzmclaughlinscriptconsulting.   

On releasing your script for the first time...

I can't stress enough how important the first sharing of your work is.  You're about to cross a line in the life of the project that you can't ever cross back over.  Outside input will now enter your creative process for the first time.  And it's going to have an impact, positive or negative or both.  It's going to reshape how you think about your script and all the work you've done up until this point.

Pulitzer Prize-winner Lanford Wilson once described to me his take on the initial private creation of a work:

It's such a mysterious and delicate process...as all of this is filtered through some sort of machine that we call "the Muse" and down onto the paper.  And you don't know where half of that comes from.  And you don't know what's going to stop it or what's going to impede that flow.

And this delicate relationship you have with your project changes for good as soon as you begin sharing your script with others.

Because of this, the initial feedback you seek should be from carefully selected sources and needs to be tightly controlled.  Many of the writers I've worked with rely on one or two trusted people who have become invaluable as early readers of their work.  And in many cases, it took a long time to find them.

Once located, however, these folks are a wonderful asset and an important part of the on-going writing process--or, perhaps more accurately, of the birthing process.  These friends become like midwives at the birth of a child, helping to guide each script into the world.  And they often continue in this role as the child "grows."  You, the writer, have to go through the labor, give birth, and care for each child's development, but these trusted people often continue to play a crucial role.

So when you're ready for that initial release of a new script, look for people (one or two tops) who have four basic qualities:  a perceptive mind, a generous spirit, a good working knowledge of the medium you're working in, and no fear to honestly tell you what they really think.

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I'm the Program Director of the low-residency MFA in Writing for Stage and Screen being offered by the New Hampshire Institute of Art.  Our last residency ran from January 6-15, and our next gathering runs this month from June 22 - July 1.  We're current considering applications for starting the program next January at our residency scheduled for January 5-14, 2018.  If you're interested, email me at buzzmclaughlin@gmail.com and we can start a dialogue.

I'm also a playwright and screenwriter, producing partner in my production company Either/Or Films (The Sensation of Sight and Only Daughter) a professional script consultant, and the author of The Playwright's Process.  You can follow me on Twitter @eitherorfilms or @mfastagescreen.  I’m also on Facebook at buzzmclaughlinscriptconsulting.

Which draft is this...?

There's an interesting shift that takes place when you think you're finally ready to share your script for the first time.

This may be your third, fourth, or fifth (or more) private draft that you've been slaving over for months, but now that you've determined that you're ready to take the plunge and release it for the first time, suddenly all those drafts become your "first draft."

In other words, all the rewriting work you've done up to this point has been just getting the script presentable for its initial exposure to the outside world.  No one should ever know how many earlier drafts you have slogged through to get it to this point--that's information only you should be privy to.

A corollary to this is to always identify the draft you first release to the world by date and not by number (as in "first draft," "second draft," and so on).  You'll always be working on a the latest draft of the script, regardless of which "number" it is, and dating each draft identifies it for you and any others who may need to know what version they're working with.  But it doesn't broadcast how many drafts you've been through--info that's really nobody else's business.  I'm always amazed when I see title pages with the draft number prominently displayed.  That's your secret to keep.

And, come to think of it, it's probably best if even you don't keep an actual count.

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I'm the Program Director of the low-residency MFA in Writing for Stage and Screen being offered by the New Hampshire Institute of Art.  Our last residency ran from January 6-15, and (if you hurry) we can still consider applications for starting the program with our June 2017 residency running from June 22-July 1.  If you're interested, email me at buzzmclaughlin@gmail.com.

I'm also a playwright and screenwriter, producing partner in my production company Either/Or Films (The Sensation of Sight and Only Daughter) a professional script consultant, and the author of The Playwright's Process.  You can follow me on Twitter @eitherorfilms or @mfastagescreen.  I’m also on Facebook at buzzmclaughlinscriptconsulting.

The writer's scanning machine...

Once you think you've made all the necessary revisions and your script seems to be really working from start to finish, I suggest you take this rewriting phase one step further before releasing it to the world for the first time.

Put your opus away for a few days.  Then, when you set eyes on it again, try to reprogram your mind to become an ultra-sensitive scanning machine that you're going to feed each page into.  Turn yourself into a hypercritical, word-sensitive, fine-tuning device that can pick up even the slightest static of doubt or nag of uncertainty.  With this machine, nothing gets through that isn't absolutely right.  When anything stops you, a word choice, the smallest whisper questioning something, have the beeper in your mind go off and stop and fix it.  Don't move on until you can scan back over the same material and sail right through.

The point here is to make your script as good as you can before you solicit responses from others for the first time.  That's the only way you're going to make genuine progress with it from here on out.  If you're not happy with what you're asking others to respond to, why waste their time?

Another way of putting this is that in the art of scriptwriting there's no room for sloppiness or laziness.  Anything less than your absolute best effort just doesn't cut it.  And in the end you never get away with it.  True professionalism means more than extraordinary talent.  It means patience and hard work and being honest with yourself as to how good your writing really is.

John Patrick Shanley (winner of an Oscar, Pulitzer, and Tony with his work) once related to me a struggle he was having with a script:  I kept writing, over and over, ten pages for six weeks, seven days a week.  I kept writing the same ten pages over and over again, and I just kept saying, "This isn't true enough, this isn't true enough."  And I kept on trying to write it more truly.  It was one of the most grueling things I've ever done.  A horribly painful thing to do.  

Every writer who has consistent success in the profession takes this as a matter of course.  Becoming your own scanning machine (or whatever you want to call it), therefore, is simply one of the essential requirements.

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I'm the Program Director of the low-residency MFA in Writing for Stage and Screen being offered by the New Hampshire Institute of Art.  Our last residency ran from January 6-15, and (if you hurry) we can still consider applications for starting the program with our June 2017 residency running from June 22-July 1.  If you're interested, email me at buzzmclaughlin@gmail.com.

I'm also a playwright and screenwriter, producing partner in my production company Either/Or Films (The Sensation of Sight and Only Daughter) a professional script consultant, and the author of The Playwright's Process.  You can follow me on Twitter @eitherorfilms or @mfastagescreen.  I’m also on Facebook at buzzmclaughlinscriptconsulting.

The window into your story...

I can't stress enough how critical it is to land on the perfect title for your script.  A title needs to be examined and questioned during the rewriting process just as much if not more than any scene, plot adjustment, or bit of dialogue.  It's your window into your story and it has to be wide open and deliciously exciting and alluring.  It has to grab you and pull you in.

Because of this, it's imperative that your rewriting phase include a good hard look at the working title you've been living with.  Several questions need to be asked:

--Is your title still working as well as it did when you first came up with it?

--Has the writing of your first draft and your subsequent reworking of it opened up any new possibilities?

--Are there any specific references or turns of phrase in your dialogue that now pop out at you?

--Does anything now hold a double or triple meaning, working on several levels at once?

--Have you locked into a working title and gotten so used to it that you pass right over a brilliant title lying there in, or between, the lines?

--Are you honestly challenging yourself to find something better?

Don't ever be leery or afraid to try a new title on for size and live with it for a while.  You can always go back to your earlier one.  And if you think you may have found something, go so far as to make up a new title page.  Then wait and see if it grows on you.

Keep searching and testing until you're absolutely convinced you've found the perfect title.  Keep challenging yourself to find something better.  It may happen early or far into the writing process, but you'll know when you've hit gold--you'll feel it.  So don't settle for something you've simply grown used to.   Because a good title always throws that initial window open wide and seduces you to enter into the adventure inside.

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I'm the Program Director of the low-residency MFA in Writing for Stage and Screen being offered by the New Hampshire Institute of Art.  Our last residency ran from January 6-15, and we are still considering applications for starting the program with our June 2017 residency running from June 22-July 1.  If you're interested, email me at buzzmclaughlin@gmail.com.

I'm also a playwright and screenwriter, producing partner in my production company Either/Or Films (The Sensation of Sight and Only Daughter) a professional script consultant, and the author of The Playwright's Process.  You can follow me on Twitter @eitherorfilms or @mfastagescreen.  I’m also on Facebook at buzzmclaughlinscriptconsulting.

Your rewriting mantra...

Less is more.  Another cliche, another basic truth.  Especially in script writing.  My suggestion is to make a continuous loop tape of this three-word sentence and have it running in your head whenever you work on rewrites.

Early drafts, especially first drafts, are notorious for over explaining and forcing information.  On your first pass-through, you are exploring and discovering as you go, at least to some degree.  A certain amount of overwriting is normal and inevitable.

Now, however, with the finished draft in your hands, you know where your story ends up and the initial route it took to get there.  This allows you to apply the "less is more" principle with a good measure of confidence as you work your way through subsequent drafts.

Probably the best explanation I've ever heard of a writer's rewriting process is what Academy Award winning screenwriter and playwright Horton Foote once told me:  I am merciless about it, and I say to myself "is this scene too long, or have we lost the wants here?  Are they talking too much?...Is there too much exposition?  How can I do this more simply?  I believe in elimination.  I always ask myself, "What can I do without?"

Your job now is to get everything out of the script that the audience can discover for themselves.  So in your rewriting strive to put as much between the lines as you have in the lines.  That's when less really becomes more.

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I'm the Program Director of the low-residency MFA in Writing for Stage and Screen being offered by the New Hampshire Institute of Art.  Our last residency ran from January 6-15, and we are still considering applications for starting the program with our June 2017 residency running from June 22-July 1.  If you're interested, email me at buzzmclaughlin@gmail.com.

I'm also a playwright and screenwriter, producing partner in my production company Either/Or Films (The Sensation of Sight and Only Daughter) a professional script consultant, and the author of The Playwright's Process.  You can follow me on Twitter @eitherorfilms or @mfastagescreen.  I’m also on Facebook at buzzmclaughlinscriptconsulting.

The ability to discard...

One of the things that's always impressed me when talking about the rewriting process with successful writers is that they all seem to have one trait in common:  They're ruthless when it comes to cutting material that isn't exactly right.

Most have said in one way or another that it's when they finally were able to discipline themselves and develop the ability to cut material in their working draft that their writing started to take off. They've found it liberating and exciting.  And have embraced the absolute necessity of not allowing their scripts under any circumstances to be saddled with material that isn't working fully.

The little writer's cliche "If in doubt, cut it out" comes into play here.  You may not fully understand your doubt about a line or exchange, but if you feel at all uneasy about it, trust that probably there's something wrong with it.  And usually the problem turns out to be that the material in question isn't really needed and in fact slows down the forward movement of the script.  It's essential that you train yourself to become sensitive to this built-in sensor and not to ignore its warning buzzer when it sounds, quiet as it may be at times.

This ability to discard has been a major factor in the success of all great writers.  It's one of those elements of the craft that they've mastered, and its application has played a key role in lifting their work into a league of its own.

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I'm the Program Director of the low-residency MFA in Writing for Stage and Screen being offered by the New Hampshire Institute of Art.  Our last residency ran from January 6-15, and we are still considering applications for starting the program with our June 2017 residency running from June 22-July 1.

I'm also a playwright and screenwriter, producing partner in my production company Either/Or Films (The Sensation of Sight and Only Daughter) a professional script consultant, and the author of The Playwright's Process.  You can follow me on Twitter @eitherorfilms or @mfastagescreen.  I’m also on Facebook at buzzmclaughlinscriptconsulting.

The tyranny of the written revisited...

I know I posted a piece on this subject last fall, but I think it's worth repeating when it comes to the rewriting process...

Without question, the most formidable hurdle for most writers (including myself) is freeing themselves from words already written.

You can repeat the phrase "words are cheap" a thousand times, but when it comes down to tossing out a scene, a page, or even a single line of dialogue, a protective wall will often rise up and a threatening voice will say:  "Don't you dare touch this!" or "This is clearly an essential part of the script!" or "This was written with great pain and suffering and it stays!"

What's important to remember as you start going back into a first draft script is to not allow your mix of words to harden too quickly.  And struggle to not fall in love with anything in that initial draft. Keep telling yourself this is very much a work in progress and don't be afraid to try things that your first pass through your story is giving you clues about.  You can always go back to where you were if a new insight doesn't pan out.  Just don't let anything set too early.  Stay limber with your pages and don't hold on too tight.

I have a long-time client that I admire precisely because of his ability to stay loose and flexible.  He never hesitates to throw out scenes and rewrite and rearrange material to make his script stronger. And his work definitely improves with each subsequent pass through, to the tune of several scripts receiving professional productions throughout the country and abroad and getting several published by Samuel French.

The implied warning here is to not become your own worst enemy and insist on keeping material that weakens your evolving play or screenplay.  The tyranny of the written can easily dim the potential brilliance of any script-in-the-making.

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I'm the Program Director of the low-residency MFA in Writing for Stage and Screen being offered by the New Hampshire Institute of Art.  Our last residency ran from January 6-15, and we are still considering applications for starting the program with our June 2017 residency running from June 22-July 1.

I'm also a playwright and screenwriter, producing partner in my production company Either/Or Films (The Sensation of Sight and Only Daughter) a professional script consultant, and the author of The Playwright's Process.  You can follow me on Twitter @eitherorfilms or @mfastagescreen.  I’m also on Facebook at buzzmclaughlinscriptconsulting.

The rewriting process: Getting some distance

I like the analogy that a finished first draft is like a freshly baked pie.  When you first take it out of the oven, you have to put it on the rack to cool.  If you dig into it right away, it falls apart, the insides come oozing out as you attempt to put a piece on your plate.  And if you try tasting it, your mouth gets burned.

In my experience, gaining a bit of distance from a very first draft is essential.  The degree of objectivity gained with even a few days of "cooling off" helps enormously as you go back to appraise what you've come up with.  During this time find some way to engage yourself in another all-consuming project, perhaps even start working on another new script idea.  Or as Marsha Norman explained to me, "You should just find wonderful things to read between the time you put the play away and the next time you pick it up.  You should fill your mind up with other language, other characters' concerns."  However you do this, the idea is to get some distance, get the project out of your head as much as you possibly can.

During this breather period, it's also critical that the script remains a private experience.  Your script is still incubating.  It's a very delicate phase and this is not yet the time to start sharing your initial draft with anyone.  Getting input from others now could forever destroy that special, intimate relationship you've been nurturing with your work and that you still have a use for.

The point here is that your ability to judge a first draft's merits can only be trusted if you keep it to yourself and allow yourself to gain some objectivity.  And the only way you can achieve that is to put it on your own private rack for awhile and walk out of the kitchen.  I've never encountered an exception to this.

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I'm the Program Director of the low-residency MFA in Writing for Stage and Screen being offered by the New Hampshire Institute of Art.  Our last residency just ended, running from January 6-15, and we are currently accepting applications for starting the program with our June 2017 residency running from June 23-July 2.  I'm also a playwright and screenwriter, producing partner in my production company Either/Or Films (The Sensation of Sight and Only Daughter) a professional script consultant, and the author of The Playwright's Process.

You can follow me on Twitter @eitherorfilms or @mfastagescreen.  I’m also on Facebook at buzzmclaughlinscriptconsulting.

What to do when your first draft sucks...

For starters, first take a deep breath.  Then give yourself a pat on the back for having pushed through the wilderness to the finish line for the first time regardless of how bad you think it is.  Pushing through the entire story in draft form is obviously a major step.  Finally, put that first draft away and forget all about it for at least two or three days or a week or longer and let it cool.  Getting some distance is critical.  Remember, what you at first think is terrible is usually much better once you come back to it--if you've put it out of your mind for a while.  

In that cooling off period, remind yourself that successful and well known scripts you have read and studied are projects that have gone through several if not many many drafts.  Scripts that have been tested with actors and that have incorporated lots of good feedback in subsequent drafts by people who understand what makes a script work and lift off the page.  That these plays and screenplays have gone through the ringer so to speak in order to eventually come out as polished finished works.

So many of the writers I work with need to be reminded that the name of the game is process.  That once you come back to your initial draft your job is to take it one step at a time regarding rewrites. You first need to determine where you sense the biggest road blocks--the scenes that stop the forward movement of your story.  Then determine which of these is the biggest problem and fix it by trying a different approach.  Just that one problem.  Then examine the ripple effect that one fix has on the rest of your script and make necessary adjustments along the way so your fix fits in and makes sense throughout your tale as it unfolds.  Then tackle the next biggest issue, and so on and on...

The key is to never panic and to always realize that you peel the onion one layer at a time.  And when you make one fix it will suggest another fix and another.  Some big, some small, but all making a contribution to allowing your script to eventually get better and begin to lift off.

I will always remember what Athol Fugard, the highly successful South African playwright, told me in an interview I did with him regarding his first draft woes:

There is always a mortifying moment when, having pushed through that first draft without going back and checking anything--just working, just driving, just trying to create that arc on paper using the scraps that you've accumulated--there is always that moment when you say, "All right, that's finished, now I've got to read this."  And then you read it, and it's an awful experience....I have never experienced anything but the most appalling, sinking feeling on reading the first drat of a play.  Every time!  

The difference with this writer and all successful writers?  He knew it was all process and that he'd eventually produce another wonderful finished work.

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I'm the Program Director of the low-residency MFA in Writing for Stage and Screen being offered by the New Hampshire Institute of Art.  Our last residency ran July 21-31, 2016 and we are now considering applications for starting the program with our January 2017 residency that runs January 6-15.  I'm also a playwright and screenwriter, producing partner in my production company Either/Or Films (The Sensation of Sight and Only Daughter) a professional script consultant, and the author of The Playwright's Process.

The tyranny of the written...

Often, the biggest rewriting hurdle for writers is freeing themselves from words already written-- prying loose material that's been, for one reason or another, set in concrete in your mind but in truth is weighing your script down and keeping it from lifting off as it needs to.  And, of course, the remedy is to develop an attitude that doesn't allow your mix of words to harden in place prematurely.

The late Horton Foote, one of our revered playwrights and screenwriters, once told me the following:

You have to divorce yourself emotionally....There's a point where I just calm down and cool it and become as objective as I can.  I find those moments that are really essential, and I find those that are nonessential, and sometimes it kills me; I've cut some of the best writing that I've ever done.

The basic rule here is that if the script as a whole is to be served, you sometimes have to be willing and able to let things go.

Probably the most striking example of this is Edward Albee's experience with his Pulitzer Prize-winning play Seascape.  He told me that he discovered at the first rehearsal that what he thought was a play in three acts was really a play in two acts, so he cut out the second act entirely, going from two intermissions to one.  One day the play had three acts and the next morning it had two.  And he told this story with no regrets whatsoever.  The work as a whole was served, and that's what counted. Extreme, yes.  Necessary?  Absolutely.  He discovered the play was structurally sound without the material between the first and third act.

So be tough on yourself if you can.  More than likely you'll be serving your script by heeding the mantra "less is more."

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I'm the Program Director of the low-residency MFA in Writing for Stage and Screen being offered by the New Hampshire Institute of Art.  Our last residency ran July 21-31, 2016 and we are now considering applications for starting the program with our January 2017 residency that runs January 6-15.  I'm also a playwright and screenwriter, producing partner in my production company Either/Or Films (The Sensation of Sight and Only Daughter) a professional script consultant, and the author of The Playwright's Process.

Finding a title for your script that works...

Every writer I know needs to have a working title of his or her current project.  It's a label, a simple and often generic description of the story that's taking shape.  That's all it needs to be.  And sometimes you get lucky and find increasingly that as your script takes shape your working title resonates ever louder.  If that's the case, consider it a little gift from the muse.

In the vast majority of cases, however, there comes a time in the writing process when that working title needs to be looked at anew and an all out effort must be made to discover the title that truly resonates and that will seduce readers into opening that cover page to discover what's inside.

A good title is provocative and alluring (for you and everyone else), something that will stop people in their tracks and make them want to devour the script then and there.  It needs to capture perfectly the central idea you're dealing with and it should reverberate strongly in the reader's mind after the script has been experienced.  In other words, what you want to capture is a title that pulls the reader in and defines perfectly what the reader is left feeling and thinking after the read.

Of course, a good title does not a good script make, but a weak title can seriously threaten the future life of a good script.  It's a label for what's waiting to be read between those covers and eventually for what's running in theatres or seen on the screens of the world, and your title needs to reflect the life and passion found in it.  It's imperative that you settle for nothing less because it represents your initial gateway into that rarefied world where scripts find legs and start attracting serious attention.

Look at a handful of some of the all time great titles:

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf ?
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
A Streetcar Named Desire
Death of a Salesman
Angels in America
They Shoot Horses, Don't They?
Crimes and Misdemeanors
To Kill a Mockingbird
It Happened One Night
Five Easy Pieces
The Rules of the Game

Obviously, I could go on and on.  But my point is clear.  Every great title pulls you in, makes you want to discover and embrace the story it represents.

My next blog will walk you through a simple and field tested title search exercise that I've found is quite successful in uncovering your own perfect title.

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I'm the Program Director of the low-residency MFA in Writing for Stage and Screen being offered by the New Hampshire Institute of Art.  Our last residency ran July 21-31, 2016 and we are now considering applications for starting the program with our January 2017 residency that runs January 6-15.  I'm also a playwright and screenwriter, producing partner in my production company Either/Or Films (The Sensation of Sight and Only Daughter) a professional script consultant, and the author of The Playwright's Process.

Sharing Your Script For The First Time: Part 2

Continuing our discussion...

Once you've located your initial readers and they've agreed to the task, expect to wait a while before hearing from them.  For most people, reading a first draft of a friend's play is a big order.  They'll take this very seriously and wait until they can clear a morning or afternoon or evening for the task--something that, for almost all of us, takes time to pull off.

Once they've read your play, set up separate, one-on-one sessions with each of them.  The last thing you want is for them to hear each other's reactions as they're attempting to tell you their own.

Sharing Your Script For The First Time, Part 1

I can’t stress enough how important the very first sharing of your work is.  You’re about to cross a line in the life of your project that you can’t ever cross back over.   Outside input will now enter your creative process for the first time.  And it’s going to have an impact, positive or negative or both.  It’s going to reshape how you think about your script.

The rewriting process: scanning your script

Here’s another simple little exercise that you might add to your arsenal:  

Before releasing your new play or screenplay to anyone for the first time and after you think you've made all necessary revisions and the script really works for you from beginning to end, I suggest you take your rewriting process one step further.

Beginning the rewriting process: Keeping your script to yourself

As you enter the initial phase of rewriting your first draft, it's important that you resist the often times compelling urge to share your work with others.  That day will come soon enough.  Now more than ever as you proceed with this first examination of the draft, you still need to protect that private relationship between you and your script.  It's your impressions at this point that are the most important.  Your reactions.  Your ideas for changes.  I realize that the urge to share, to get the opinions of respected, trusted friends can be almost overpowering at this point.  You want to know how others respond, what they think, what they understand and don't understand.

The First Draft of Your Script: Getting Some Distance

A finished first draft is like a freshly baked pie.  When you first take it out of the oven you have to put it on the rack to cool.  If you try cutting a piece hot, it falls apart, the insides oozing out as you attempt putting the piece on a plate.  If you try tasting it, your tongue gets burned.

It's mysterious how this works, but distancing yourself from a finished first draft is absolutely essential.  The degree of objectivity gained with even a few days of cooling off helps enormously as you go back to appraise what you've come up with.

More often than not, when you finish writing that final page, that negative voice will have grown from a whisper to a shout.  However loud it may be, resist concluding that what you've written is terrible.  Realize these feelings are normal.  There’s also the outside chance the opposite may happen and you're so excited about what you've written you can barely contain yourself.  Or you may be somewhere in the middle, uncertain as to its merits.

Whatever your feelings are toward that stack of pages, however, the worst thing you can do is to immediately start reworking them.  You need, instead, to put your newborn draft away and totally forget about it for awhile.  Two weeks to a month will permit you to gain some distance, but some writers need much more time.  During this break try to engage yourself in some other all-consuming project, perhaps even starting work on another play.  Or, as Marsha Norman suggests, "You should just find wonderful things to read between the time you put the play away and the next time you pick it up.  You should fill your mind up with other language, other characters' concerns."

I also highly recommend that you still don't share your work with anyone else even though the urge to do so now that you have a completed draft is often compelling.  During this cooling off time you and your play are still incubating together.  It should still be a private process.  Getting input from others now could forever destroy that special, intimate, personal relationship you've been nurturing.  So fight off the impulse to share your play quite yet.  You'll be happy you did when you come back to it.

Usually what happens when you return to your draft after such a distancing period is that it'll surprise you.  If you hated it when you put it away, now it'll most likely read  better than you thought it would.  If you loved it, now it'll probably be obvious that it needs more work.  The point here is that your ability to judge its merits can only really be trusted if you've allowed yourself to gain some objectivity and the only way you can achieve that is to put it on the rack and let it cool off for a while.  I've never encountered an exception to this.