Articles
In order for it to be easier to browse the articles which we have published through our newsletter we have separated out the most interesting ones.
They cover many different topics but as we are a network focussing on theatre practice most of the articles are reflecting on different types of practice in which the dramaturg is engaged.We are always interested to hear your thoughts on existing articles and if you have something you would like to submit to our newsletter please contact us on
Posted by Hanna at 05:03 PM in Articles | Comments (0) |
NEW WRITING: HOW DO WE DEVELOP NEW PLAYS?
Panel discussion hosted by the Dramaturgs’ Network in association with Literary Mangers and Dramaturgs of the Americas
at the Albery Theatre, London on the 15th October 2004
Present: Hanna Slättne (literary manager, Tinderbox Theatre, Northern-Ireland), Sara Clifford (playwright), Toby Clarke (student, CSSD), Katalin Trencsényi (freelance dramaturg), Elyssa Livergrant (lecturer in dramaturgy, CSSD) Ken Bentley (freelance director), Matthew Crampton (Old Vic New Voices), Christine Paris (Writers Guild), Susannah White (student), Lucy Linger (director), Richard Shannon (director of new writing, Polka Theatre), Abigail Gonda (freelance script worker), Liz Engleman (president of LMDA, USA), Brian Quirt (Director of Nightswimming, Canada), John Keefe (lecturer in dramaturgy and performance, Queens University ISC, Kingston University), Lyndsay Allison (freelance dramaturg), Ashmeed Sohoye (New Writing Manager, Theatre Royal Stratford East), Frances Stirk, (Literary Manager, Hampstead Theatre), Stephen Castell.
Panel:
Liz Engleman, Abigail Gonda, Brian Quirt, Ashmeed Sohoye
Chair: Hanna Slättne
Posted by Hanna at 09:01 PM in Articles | Comments (1) |
A DIRECTOR’S DIAGNOSIS
A Director’s Diagnosis
Thoughts on the discussion at the Albery with the LMDA
By Ken Bentley
I’m a big fan of American writing. It’s my opinion that, currently, the Americans are writing more good new plays than we are in the UK. There, I’ve said it.
I don’t have a patriotic axe to grind. It’s just that the Americans are telling great stories and they’re telling them well. They’ve learnt to create vivid works of fiction and mythology based on their own contemporary culture and society. But why, right now, are they capable of doing this more consistently than we are? What is it about the development process in the USA that fosters so much good new work? What do writers have in the US that they don’t have in the UK? These are questions I’m always searching for answers to and, when the Dramaturgs’ Network announced a panel discussion on new writing in association with the LMDA, I was there with bells on.
Posted by Hanna at 08:54 PM in Articles | Comments (1) |
A DRAMATURG’S DEDUCTION
A DRAMATURG’S DEDUCTION
Thoughts on the discussion at the Albery with the LMDA
By John Keefe
As so often in a ‘seminar-discussion’ situation there are many points and ideas that are raised but not picked up in the subsequent exchanges; the outstanding ‘baton’ that was not grasped was the issue of ‘audience’ and yet this was circled around many times. Thus not only should the question be ‘why is this being written?’ but also ‘for whom’? These are the kind of hard questions that theatre seems so often to avoid.
Posted by Hanna at 08:52 PM in Articles | Comments (0) |
A PLAYWRIGHTS’S PERSPECTIVE
A PLAYWRIGHT’S PERSPECTIVE
Thoughts on the discussion at the Albery with the LMDA
By Sara Clifford
I was asked to attend the discussion on new writing at the Albery Theatre by Hanna Slättne from the Dramaturgs’ Network, now working as Literary Manager for Tinderbox Theatre Company in Belfast, and Chair for the event. It was only about halfway through the morning, that I realised that, although I have written around twelve produced plays, I have rarely worked with a dramaturg – usually I work with the director, and have been lucky to have directors who also have these dramaturgical skills. On the couple of occasions that I have had dramaturgical input, I have been fascinated both by the role of the dramaturg within the company – Advocate? Critic? Friend? (sad, we writers, we don’t get out much, get our friends where we can…) – and also the dramaturgical input itself, which is independent of production and, presumably, aimed at facilitating the writer to write the best play s/he can. Whether the play will then be produced is, of course, another matter, with many a Jolly Good Play being consigned to a bottom drawer, as the theatres, with their over-commissioning policies, may only choose one (or even none) of their commissions to actually produce – and you try selling a play that the Soho has turned down. Talk about soiled goods!
Posted by Hanna at 08:50 PM in Articles | Comments (0) |
The dramaturg in British theatre
Thoughts on the dramaturg in British theatre
prepared for the symposium on the 18th of March
by Ben Payne
First of all, an apology. I should have been with you in person today. Clare Pamment from the Dramaturgy Network has asked me to say a few things about the network and, I think, about how the dramaturg can be a force for change. I hope these thoughts are of interest to you and helpful to how you think about the network. The first thing I want to say about the network is that it is much needed and long overdue. So three cheers for you for setting it up. Long may it prosper.
You may have discovered that if you tell Europeans that you are a dramaturg they usually know what you are talking about. Edifyingly, they sometimes even have the good grace to look impressed. Tell someone from this country that this is what you are and you are more likely to be greeted with puzzled looks, mild derision or the question “fine, but what’s your real job?“ Of course, it beats immediately being dragged outside and strung up from the nearest lamp-post but as, any patriot with a shaky grasp of British history will tell you, we don’t do things like that in this country anyway ...“
Posted by Hanna at 06:48 PM in Articles | Comments (0) |
The Dramaturgs’ Network Inaugural Symposium
REPORT FROM THE NETWORK’S INAUGURAL SYMPOSIUM ON THE 18th OF MARCH AT THE ALBERY THEATRE
by David Lane
Welcome to the first Dramaturgs Network newsletter. As many of you know, our first symposium was held recently at the Albery Theatre in London, attended by a wide range of professional representatives from theatres and creative organisations from London and beyond. The symposium was intended to be not only a forum for a debate concerning the dramaturg’s role in the theatre making process but also a chance for the Network to receive constructive feedback from our future collaborators and members. It was a rare opportunity to gather dramaturgs, academics, directors, writers and literary managers together to share their opinions on dramaturgy in an intellectually stimulating environment.
Posted by Hanna at 06:17 PM in Articles | Comments (0) |
Looking and listening with knowledge
“Looking and Listening with Knowledge”
by John Keefe
This is a revised version of a paper originally published in “state of Mime”, Summer 1995, European Mime Federation.
I envisage this paper as part of a dialogue: with Marianne van Kerkhoven’s original piece (see after word), and with those who are now about to read it as an exchange of responses and observations.
Posted by Hanna at 06:14 PM in Articles | Comments (0) |
Exploring the text
EXPLORING THE TEXT
by David Lane and Mavis Howard
Two months ago the Network was invited by Context Theatre to contribute to the development of new work dealing with issues of asylum, exile and displacement. Context Theatre are a company in development that seek to promote the social relevance of theatre as the essence of their work, investigating new ways to mediate and contextualise theatre through all elements of its structure and holding a dramaturgical perspective at the centre of their practice.
Posted by Hanna at 06:12 PM in Articles | Comments (0) |
TABSLABS
Theatre and Beyond’s TABSLABS
by David Lane
Dramaturg
Theatre and Beyond are one of the South East’s leading new writing theatre companies. In September last year they launched their second series of TABLABS, designed to seek out the best new writers in a region where opportunities for development and production of new writing are often limited. With bases in Maidstone, Hastings, Walton-on-Thames and finally in Brighton, the TAB team took on a total of sixteen new writers in an effort to develop innovative and exciting work. Project dramaturg David Lane offers this reflection on the dramaturgical processes at work.
Posted by Hanna at 05:35 PM in Articles | Comments (0) |
Dramaturgies, the Writer, the Audience; A panel session at Writers Expo
Dramaturgies, the Writer, the Audience
A panel session at Writers Expo, November 2002
by john Keefe
I want to come at the many issues and ideas already in the air from a structural perspective; a structural model for, initially, theatre which sets the ground for the dramaturg’s role.
Posted by Hanna at 05:33 PM in Articles | Comments (0) |
Reporting from the In-Yer-Face conference
In-Yer-Face conference, a dramaturg’s view
by Hanna Slättne
In September 2002 the University of the West of England hosted a conference on British drama in the 1990’s, named after Aleks Siertz’s book ‘In-Yer –Face Theatre’ (2001). I only attended the second day of the conference[1] in Bristol, but after studying Abigail Gonda’s response to both days in Writernet’s newsletter, I have found my observations to be very similar.
The conference delegate kept returning to problems with the category of ‘In-yer-face’ theatre, a term coined in the 90’s to describe a wave of new writing dealing with contemporary society. Writing in what Siertz sees as a post-ideological society this theatre is experiential and emotive, adopting a confrontational and violent style to explore the zeitgeist. Problems arise from Siertz’s study as it focuses on only a few of these playwrights and new writing development in the 1990’s, to the exclusion and marginalisation of other writing.
Posted by Hanna at 05:29 PM in Articles | Comments (0) |
Interview with Duska Radosavljevic
Interview with Duska Radosavljevic
Dramturg at Northern Stage
by Marina Burton
MB: What inspired you to become a dramaturg?
DR: Even though I had strong interests in performance and directing to begin with, I gradually discovered during my first degree
in Theatre Studies and Communication Arts that my particular skill lay in the analysis of verbal and non-verbal texts.
I was far more interested in the process rather than the product and by the time I had to choose my final year project,
it ended up being in playwriting and the dramaturgy of theatre translation. In effect I gradually went back
to the source of the creative process in theatre – the blueprint for performance. This was reversed once again when
on completion of my first degree, by coincidence of circumstances I became a theatre reviewer – which is anyway a constituent
part of the dramaturg’s practice in the rest of Europe.
Posted by Hanna at 04:28 PM in Articles | Comments (0) |
Work in Progress Dramaturgy Festival at Newcastle Playhouse
Work in Progress Dramaturgy Festival at Newcastle Playhouse.
by Hanna Slättne
Freelance Dramaturg
- Inspiring and daunting.
Two years ago Newcastle Playhouse employed a resident dramaturg: Duska Radosavljevic. Partly in response to questions of what a dramaturg does Duska and Claire Malcolm of New Writing North staged a pioneering festival exploring dramaturgy as a craft in the autumn of 2003 at the Playhouse. It was a brave and ambitious project realised through a joint effort between Northern Stage, Newcastle University and New Writing North setting out to explore work processes in developing new writing involving a dramaturg. The four-week project consisted of three weeklong workshops developing 3 plays by authors associated with Newcastle Playhouse and New Writing North. Present in the room were actors, a director, the writer(s) and a dramaturg. In the fourth week the work was presented either in the form of a reading or a discussion on the process to an audience. The festival also included dramaturg-led workshops for writers on verbatim theatre and on exploring non - dramatic writing for the stage.
Posted by Hanna at 04:19 PM in Articles | Comments (0) |
The practice of a dramaturg in Germany
THE PRACTICE OF A DRAMATURG IN GERMANY
by Elyssa Livergant
On 14 May 2004 the Dramaturg’s Network hosted Anneli Klostermeier, a dramaturg from Germany. This occasion was part of the ongoing professional development activities held by the network. Anneli reflected on her practice as a dramaturg working in regional theatre in Germany and shared her ideas about the role of the dramaturg. Her lecture was followed by Q & A and discussion.
Posted by Hanna at 04:14 PM in Articles | Comments (0) |
