1. Chapter 10 – Image Maker: The Director
The theatre of the future, if it is to hold us, will have to shake off the belief that it is showing us “a real room with real people.” For the theatre’s role is to present life through some kind of poetic vision, metaphor, image—the mirror held up as ’twere to nature.
—Alan Schneider

2. Chapter Summary
In collaboration with playwrights and other artists and assistants, directors interpret and shape performances as theatrical metaphors of our world.

3. Forerunners Concept of director evolved in 1860s Europe.
Prior to that time, “staging” determined by actors, theatre managers, and/or playwrights:
David Garrick (English actor-manager)
First “modern” directors:
Georg II, Duke of Saxe-Meiningen (Germany)
André Antoine (France)
Konstantin Stanislavski (Russia)
Director:
Understood all theatrical arts
Shaped production into unified whole

4. Director as Artist
Director collaborates with playwright, actors, designers, and technicians:
Creates a carefully selected vision of life—a special mirror
Theatre’s role from a director’s viewpoint:
Presents “life not in its literal exactness but rather through some kind of poetic vision, metaphor, image” (Alan Schneider)

5. Director as Artist Director is controlling artist:
Responsible for unifying production elements
Three types of director:
Dictator—treats actors and designers as “servants”
Creative coordinator—accepts creative input
Guide—provokes and stimulates cast and crew
Director’s job is to discover the potential of a play:
Search for the “spine” or “through-line”

6. Director as Artist: Peter Brook and The Mahabarata
Cycle of three plays:
The Game of Dice
The Exile in the Forest
The War
Adapted from Sanskrit poem (400 BC)
Brook makes minimal yet spectacular choices:
Dramatic use of elements (fire, earth, water)
Symbolic properties:
Wooden wheel = Krishna’s chariot
Billowing cloth = newborn children
Battles conveyed via Eastern martial arts

7. Director as Artist: Peter Brook and The Mahabarata
Brook’s intention not to make older texts appear modern or relevant
Wants to connect the stage and the world around him
A theatrical act cannot influence the political world. But theater allows us to open up to something beyond the daily horrors; it allows us to reinforce something positive inside each of us.
—Peter Brook

8. Directors at Work Director’s responsibilities:
Selecting or creating a script
Deciding on interpretation and “look”
Auditioning and casting actors for each role
Working with crew to stage production
Rehearsing the company
Coordinating design and production elements into unified performance

9. Directors at Work Auditions and casting: Matching actor to role
Design conferences:
Prior to casting, director selects design team
Confers with team to set production concept
(c) Barry Slobin /PlayMakers Repertory Company
Pauline Flanagan and Brendan O’Malley in
The Beauty Queen of Leenane, Directed by
Nagle Jackson

10. Directors at Work
Ground plan:
Defines shape and size of playing space

11. Directors at Work: Assistants
Assistant director:
Attends production meetings
Coaches actors
Rehearses special or problem scenes
Stage manager:
Compiles promptbook
Prepares rehearsal schedule
Records blocking, cues, etc.
Voice (dialects) coach:
Works with actors to ensure audibility and clarity of meaning

12. Directors at Work: Assistants
Movement coach (fight coordinator):
Works with actors for safety and expressive physical work
Musicals:
Musical director
Choreographer
Nonprofit theatre:
Production dramaturg

13. Directors at Work: Production Dramaturg
Gotthold Ephraim Lessing:
Playwright
Joined Hamburg National Theatre (1767) as house critic
Advised on play selection and production
Responsibilities of dramaturg:
Select version of text to perform
Prepare translation or adaptation
Do background research on play, playwright
Serve as critical “eye”

14. Staging: Approaches and Styles
Elia Kazan:
Wanted to be faithful to playwright’s intentions
Mike Nichols:
Sought controlling idea or event—truthful moment(s) that illuminate playwright’s meaning
Anne Bogart:
Bases approach on mystery and danger in text
(c) Martine Franck/ Magnum Photos, Inc.
Ariane Mnouchkine’s Staging of Richard II

15. Staging: Approaches and Styles
Preplanned approach:
Rehearsals used to “block” the play:
Determine entrances, exits, where and when to stand, sit, etc.
Collaborative approach:
Director and actors work together to develop movement, gestures, character relationships, stage images, and line interpretations.

16. Director as Auteur: Julie Taymor
Approach:
Blend of Eastern and Western theatre
Studied and worked in Paris, Eastern Europe, Japan, Indonesia
Incorporates masks, puppets, dance, tai chi, singing
Juan Darién:
Features puppets, masks, movement, and a musical score sung in Latin and Spanish
Production reflects cultural influences from Europe, Japan, and Indonesia

17. Director as Auteur: Martha Clarke
Dance theatre:
Trained as dancer at Juilliard School
Chief creator (auteur) of her theatre pieces
Works are expressions of her subconscious, not narrative:
“If you watched a rehearsal of mine, you would see that nine-tenths of it is in such disarray. I flounder I’m foggy a lot of the time. And the actors and dancers have to search as much as I do.”
The Garden of Earthly Delights:
Interpretation of Hieronymus Bosch painting

18. Core Concepts
Before the emergence of the director in the 19th century, leading actors, managers, and playwrights ran the theatres, dictated production elements, and took care of financial matters.
A coordinating specialist—the director—became necessary with advancing technology and changing subject matter brought about by new currents in social, aesthetic, and political thought.
Today’s audiences experience theatrical works through the director’s imagination and intellect, often to such a degree that the modern director has become almost as distinct a creative force as the playwright.