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The work of the
director is central to the production of a play. The director has the
challenging task of bringing together the many complex pieces of a
production—the script, actors, set, costuming, lighting and sound and music—into
a unified whole. To accomplish this task, a director needs to:
The director’s
work is most often based on a detailed study and analysis of the script to be
produced. Many careful readings of the script help the director develop an
individual vision of the playwright’s intentions, which will form the core of
his or her interpretation. This sense of “what the play is really about” will
shape a director’s thinking about every other aspect of the production.
Directors also study the characters in the script, gathering as much information
as they can about their physical and psychological traits. This is vital
preparation for casting, when the actors who are best able to bring the
characters to life in performance need to be chosen.
Collaboration
The director’s initial meetings with the set,
costume,
lighting and sound designers typify the
creative collaboration vital to theatre. Any notes the director has made on the
technical needs in the script are shared with the designers. The free flow of
ideas that takes place here will further refine the director’s vision of the
production as a whole.
Details in the script about the specific locale(s) in which the action takes
place need to be attended to early in the production process, because they will
determine both the basic requirements of the set and the possible movement of
the actors on stage. Acting areas, entrances and exits, and furniture and props
called for in the script or desired by the director will need to be a part of
the set design.
The floor plan can then be sketched out. The floor plan is a basic outline
drawing of the stage setting as it would look from above. It is an essential
rehearsal planning tool because it allows a director to work out the blocking of
the play. Blocking (or staging) is the precise moment-by-moment movement and
grouping of actors on stage.
The director’s creative collaboration continues during his or her work with the
actors in rehearsals. The actors will bring their own interpretations to the
project and perhaps inspire the director to rethink his or her interpretation.
They will work closely together to breathe life into the lines and develop a
deeper understanding of the characters’ motivations and relationships, fleshing
out the subtext of the play. Later the focus of the director’s work in
rehearsals will broaden to the overall look and feel of the whole production as
transitions between scenes are smoothed out, effective pacing is achieved and
all the design and technical aspects of the production are integrated.
Once the show opens, the director's work is essentially complete. Now it's the
stage manager's job to make sure that every
aspect of the production runs just as the director intended time after time,
until the production closes.
[Members of AACT can read more
on this subject in our
Knowledge Base collection of articles.] |
