Teeth Traditions!

"Don't say the old lady screamed. Bring her on and let her scream."

- Mark Twain

The tooth fairy is a character in modern Western culture said to give children a small amount of money (or sometimes a gift) in exchange for a deciduous tooth when it comes out of a child's mouth. Not if you live in Botswana! In Botswana, children throw their teeth onto the roof. In Afghanistan they drop their teeth down mouse holes, and in Egypt they fling their teeth at the sun! Travel around the world and discover the surprising things children do when they lose a tooth.

The Idea

“Everyone thinks they can write a play; you just write down what happened to you. But the art of it is drawing from all the moments of your life.”

- Neil Simon

The idea for To Catch a Tooth came during a class at Loyola Marymount University. I was taking an introductary Playwrighting class. We all had to write a one act. I had written a few things at this point about kids Blackmailing Santa and getting lost in video game worlds. So, I guess it was only natural that I thought of another mythical/make-believe character for kids to mess around with.

A friend of mine, Pieter Miller, and I were talking about fairy tales and holiday figures. He said something along the lines of, "you know what always creeped me out was the Tooth Fairy!"

Dylan: "Why?"

Pieter: "Well, think about it. What kind of a fairy goes around the world buying bloody teeth off of kids?"

And that was the beginning. Right away you start thinking, okay... what would a kid do with that. And then I started thinking about how the Tooth Fairy must always carry a lot of cash because she has to give kids a buck for each tooth... and then the idea was born.

That was in the Spring of 2000... six years, and several re-writes later here we are...