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The Director and the Playwright
October 16, 2016
I read articles on Howlround and American Theatre that looked at the relationship between the playwright and the director. The Howlround article was a director discussing her work with playwrights developing new scripts and her pain that has arisen when taken off a project that she was really invested in by an artistic director. She talked about how she has taken long journeys with new scripts, only to be dropped for a more experienced or renown director with no history with the project when the script is picked up by a producing body. She compared the feeling to being an actor who rehearsed the role only to be replaced when the show opens. She felt that her work on the show, as she helped developed it alongside the playwright, was erased or miscredited as the show was handed off to another director who got their name on it in the end.
The American Theatre article talked about a production of Hands on a Hardbody where the director completely disregarded the work of the playwright, rearranging and reassigning the parts of the musical at will. The article took the playwrights angle, who was understandably shocked and angered that their work was so cruelly torn apart.Â
The theme I saw in both of these articles is that the playwright and director both needed to feel valued and respected by the other when they work togther in these situations and that the stories in these articles were worse scenarios than the usual, but they still happen.Â