Stephanie Greer and Alan Humphreys by Eileen Long
“it’s hard to read a play that doesn’t look like a play”
“the minute you walk into a play and say ‘I know what you should be and if you don’t do that you’re not a play’ then you’re missing the play that’s doing something progressive.” David Lane
I recently read a discussion which calls for a new way of dramaturgical working, written by David Lane, who was working with Hannah Silva on her play The Disappearance of Sadie Jones. The article is fascinating, as it discusses what a theatre/dramaturg/scriptreader/literary manager could do when faced by a play that they don’t recognise. (What I mean by that, is a work which does not follow a traditional, generally three-act structure.) The resulting discussion gives the director/literary manager a way into working with the text and the writer, and the writer a way to vocalise what they might have had trouble describing.
“We are often uncomfortable with theatre containing hugely multiple meanings, expressing the act of expression itself.” Hannah Silva.
Hannah and David have kindly allowed me to reproduce an edited version of their discussion on this blog, and I really can’t recommend it highly enough for writers, and for anyone who works with writers. Read it here.
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