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Theatre and Performance in the Neoliberal University: Responses to an Academy in Crisis (Routledge Research in Arts Education)
by Kim SolgaExploring how educators and institutions might embrace the STEAM turn to ensure that theatre and performance can be instrumental to the neoliberal university, without being instrumentalized by it, this volume showcases alternative models for teaching and learning in theatre and performance in a neoliberal age. Originally a special issue of Research in Drama Education, this volume foregrounds the above ideas in six principal articles, and provides a range of potential models for change in twelve case study discussions. Detailing a variety of ‘best practices’ in theatre and performance education, contributors demonstrate how postsecondary educators around the world have recentred drama and performance by collaborating with STEM-side faculty, using theatre principles to frame and support interdisciplinary learning, and working toward important applications beyond the classroom. Arguing that the neoliberal university needs theatre and performance more than ever, this valuable collection emphasizes the critical contribution which these subjects continue to make to the development of students, staff, and institutions. This book will be of particular interest to students, researchers, and librarians in the fields of Theatre Studies, Performance Studies, Applied Theatre, Drama in Education, and Holistic Education.
Theatre and Performing Arts Collections
by Lee AshHere is an exciting book that provides detailed descriptions of dozens of the most important and unique collections of “theatricana” in the United States and Canada. In Theatre and Performing Arts Collections, distinguished theatre specialists, librarians, and curators describe the unique possessions of the best and largest collections in theatre and performing arts. Each chapter provides detailed descriptions of the collections, as well as important notes about their history--information that is not available in any other source!
Theatre and Postcolonial Desires (Routledge Advances in Theatre & Performance Studies #No.1)
by Awam AmkpaThis book explores the themes of colonial encounters and postcolonial contests over identity, power and culture through the prism of theatre. The struggles it describes unfolded in two cultural settings separated by geography, but bound by history in a common web of colonial relations spun by the imperatives of European modernity. In post-imperial England, as in its former colony Nigeria, the colonial experience not only hybridized the process of national self-definition, but also provided dramatists with the language, imagery and frame of reference to narrate the dynamics of internal wars over culture and national destiny happening within their own societies. The author examines the works of prominent twentieth-century Nigerian and English dramatists such as Wole Soyinka, Femi Osofisan, Davd Edgar and Caryl Churchill to argue that dramaturgies of resistance in the contexts of both Nigerian as well as its imperial inventor England, shared a common allegiance to what he describes as postcolonial desires. That is, the aspiration to overcome the legacies of colonialism by imagining alternative universes anchored in democratic cultural pluralism. The plays and their histories serve as filters through which Ampka illustrates the operation of what he calls 'overlapping modernities' and reconfigures the notions of power and representation, citizenship and subjectivity, colonial and anticolonial nationalisms and postcoloniality. The dramatic works studied in this book embodied a version of postcolonial aspirations that the author conceptualises as transcending temporal locations to encompass varied moments of consciousness for progressive change, whether they happened during the hey day of English imperialism in early twentieth-century Nigeria, or in response to the exclusionary politics of the Conservative Party in Thatcherite England. Theatre and Postcolonial Desires will be essential reading for students and researchers in the areas of drama, postcolonial and cultural studies.
Theatre and Residual Culture: J.M. Synge and Pre-Christian Ireland
by Christopher CollinsThis book considers the cultural residue from pre-Christian Ireland in Synge’s plays and performances. By dramatising a residual culture in front of a predominantly modern and political Irish Catholic middle class audience, the book argues that Synge attempted to offer an alternative understanding of what it meant to be “modern” at the beginning of the twentieth century. The book draws extensively on Synge’s archive to demonstrate how pre-Christian residual culture informed not just how he wrote and staged pre-Christian beliefs, but also how he thought about an older, almost forgotten culture that Catholic Ireland desperately wanted to forget. Each of Synge’s plays is considered in an individual chapter, and they identify how Synge’s dramaturgy was informed by pre-Christian beliefs of animism, pantheism, folklore, superstition and magical ritual.
Theatre and Testimony in Shakespeare'S England
by Holger Schott SymeHolger Syme presents a radically new explanation for the theatre's importance in Shakespeare's time. He portrays early modern England as a culture of mediation, dominated by transactions in which one person stood in for another, giving voice to absent speakers or bringing past events to life. No art form related more immediately to this culture than the theatre. Arguing against the influential view that the period underwent a crisis of representation, Syme draws upon extensive archival research in the fields of law, demonology, historiography and science to trace a pervasive conviction that testimony and report, delivered by properly authorised figures, provided access to truth. Through detailed close readings of plays by Ben Jonson and William Shakespeare – in particular Volpone, Richard II and The Winter's Tale – and analyses of criminal trial procedures, the book constructs a revisionist account of the nature of representation on the early modern stage.
The Theatre and the State in Singapore: Orthodoxy and Resistance (Routledge Contemporary Southeast Asia Series)
by Terence ChongThis book provides a comprehensive examination of the contemporary English-language theatre field in Singapore. It describes Singapore theatre as a politically dynamic field that is often a site for struggle and resistance against state orthodoxy, and how the cultural policies of the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) have shaped Singapore theatre. The book traces such cultural policies and their impact from the early 1960s, and shows how the PAP used theatre – and arts and culture more widely – as a key part of its nation building programme. Terence Chong argues that this diverse theatre community not only comes into regular conflict with the state, but often collaborates with it - depending on the rewards at stake, not to mention the assortment of intra-communal conflicts as different practitioners and groups vie for the same resources. It goes on to explore how new forms of theatre, especially English-language avant garde theatre, represented resistance to such government cultural control; how the government often exerts its power ‘behind-the-scenes’ to preserve its moral legitimacy; and conversely how middle class theatre practitioners’ resistance to state power is strongly influenced by class and cultural capital. Based on extensive original research including interviews with theatre directors and other theatre professionals, the book provides a wealth of information on theatre in Singapore overall, and not just on theatre-state relations.
Theatre and the State in Twentieth-Century Ireland: Cultivating the People
by Lionel PilkingtonThis major new study presents a political and cultural history of some of Ireland's key national theatre projects from the 1890s to the 1990s. Impressively wide-ranging in coverage, Theatre and the State in Twentieth-Century Ireland: Cultivating the People includes discussions on: *the politics of the Irish literary movement at the Abbey Theatre before and after political independence; *the role of a state-sponsored theatre for the post-1922 unionist government in Northern Ireland; *the convulsive effects of the Northern Ireland conflict on Irish theatre. Lionel Pilkington draws on a combination of archival research and critical readings of individual plays, covering works by J. M. Synge, Sean O'Casey, Lennox Robinson, T. C. Murray, George Shiels, Brian Friel, and Frank McGuinness. In its insistence on the details of history, this is a book important to anyone interested in Irish culture and politics in the twentieth century.
Theatre and the Virtual: Genesis, Touch, Gesture (Routledge Advances in Theatre & Performance Studies)
by Zornitsa DimitrovaTheatre and the Virtual lays out a set of conceptual instruments for the articulation and engendering of the forces of theatrical potentiality. Creating a passage toward a reconstitution of the given, a theatre of the virtual opens bodies in motion to a region of an ongoing genesis of forces. The outcome: regimes of constraint are abandoned through a radical practice of ecological attunement. Violence is eschewed through an onto-ecology of touch. Closed systems are repotentialised to become co-constitutive of their environments. A logic of spectrality settles in—not so much entities as atmospheres, not so much a being as a style of being, not so much a body as multitudinous milieus of response. This is the task of a theatre of the virtual—to safeguard the possibility of the extra-epistemological and uphold one’s right to offer accounts of oneself from outside of being, all the while creating a fractured record of the wondrous mutations of a moving, gesturing body. This book will be of great interest to students and scholars in theatre, philosophy, new materialisms, environmental humanities, gesture, and the ontology of response.
Theatre and the World: Performance and the Politics of Culture
by Rustom BharuchaIn this passionate and controversial work, director and critic Rustom Bharucha presents the first major critique of intercultural theatre from a 'Third World' perspective. Bharucha questions the assumptions underlying the theatrical visions of some of the twentieth century's most prominent theatre practitioners and theorists, including Antonin Artaud, Jerzsy Grotowski, and Peter Brook. He contends that Indian theatre has been grossly mythologised and taken out of context by Western directors and critics. And he presents a detailed dramaturgical analysis of what he describes as an intracultural theatre project, providing an alternative vision of the possibilities of true cultural pluralism. Theatre and the World bravely challenges much of today's 'multicultural' theatre movement. It will be vital reading for anyone interested in the creation or discussion of a truly non-Eurocentric world theatre.
Theatre and War
by Jeanne ColleranHow has the media since the First Gulf War altered political analysis and how has this alteration has in turn affected socially-critical art? Colleran examines more than forty plays, many written in direct response to the 1991 war in Iraq as well as to the 9/11 attacks and the retaliatory actions in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Theatre/Archaeology: An Imperfect Archaeology
by Michael Shanks Mike PearsonTheatre/Archaeology is a provocative challenge to disciplinary practice and intellectual boundaries. It brings together radical proposals in both archaeological and performance theory to generate a startlingly original and intriguing methodological framework.
Theatre Artisans and Their Craft: The Allied Arts Fields (Backstage)
by Rafael JaenTheatre Artisans and Their Craft: The Allied Arts Fields profiles fourteen remarkable artists and technicians who elevate theatre production to new dimensions, explore new materials and technologies, and introduce new safety standards and solutions. Readers will learn how the featured artists delved into entrepreneurial ventures and created their own work for themselves; researching, studying, and experimenting, seeking answers when none were available. The book explores how to make an impact in the entertainment industry from behind the scenes, and how students can model themselves after these successful professionals to jump-start their career in theatre production. Aimed at theatre and film practitioners in the allied arts fields, Theatre Artisans and Their Craft offers a collection of success stories that are both inspiring and informative.
The Theatre Arts Audition Book for Men
by Annika BluhmFirst Published in 2003. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.
The Theatre Arts Audition Book for Women
by Annika BluhmFirst Published in 2003. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.
Theatre Arts on Acting
by Laurence SenelickDuring its fifty year run, Theatre Arts Magazine was a bustling forum for the foremost names in the performing arts, including Stanislavski, Laurence Olivier, Lee Strasberg, John Gielgud and Shelley Winters. Renowned theatre historian Laurence Senelick has plundered its stunning archives to assemble a stellar collection of articles on every aspect of acting and theatrical life.
Theatre as a Weapon: Workers' Theatre in the Soviet Union, Germany and Britain, 1917–1934 (Routledge Library Editions: Soviet Society)
by Richard Stourac Kathleen McCreeryBased on theatrical research of unusual depth and enterprise, Theatre as a Weapon (1986) shows how the workers’ theatre of the 1920s and 1930s transformed the social function of theatre. Drawing largely on unpublished sources, it provides lively case studies of workers’ theatre in the USSR, Germany and the United Kingdom. They range from the Russian mass spectacles in front of the Winter Palace, through the thousands of factory and courtyard performances in Germany, to the May Day activities of the Workers’ Theatre Movement all over Britain. The authors worked for many years in political theatre in Britain, Austria and Germany, and they draw on their wide experience to focus on both major theoretical controversies and their practical ramifications. They show how workers’ theatre became an instrument, a weapon, for political change, helping to raise the consciousness of thousands of workers and encouraging them to take action. They describe how worker-actors, musicians, writers and directors formed small, flexible troupes which contributed locally to the day-to-day struggles of their class, while at the same time participating in national and international political campaigns. Developments in dramatic structure are analysed, from the simple review form to the more complex scene-and-song montage. Placing the work of Meyerhold, Eisenstein, Piscator, Brecht and Eisler in this context, the authors demonstrate how the montage principle became the significant factor in the political theatre of this period. The book is illustrated with rare photographs which reflect the atmosphere of those mass movements. Unique in its coverage, Theatre as a Weapon is above all an analysis of how the mirror of realistic theatre was transformed into a dynamic weapon for social change. It fills an important gap in the history of working-class culture.
Theatre as Sign System: A Semiotics of Text and Performance
by Elaine Aston George SavonaThis invaluable student handbook is the first detailed guide to explain in detail the relationship between the drama text and the theory and practice of drama in performance. Beginning at the beginning, with accessible explanations of the meanings and methods of semiotics, Theatre as Sign System addresses key drama texts and offers new and detailed information about the theories of performance.
Theatre as Voyeurism
by George RodosthenousTheatre as Voyeurism usefully (re)defines the notion of voyeurism as an 'exchange' between performers and audience members in contemporary theatre and performance. Pleasure (erotic and/or aesthetic) is here privileged as a crucial factor in the way meaning is produced in the encounter with a theatrical work. George Rodosthenous has drawn together an intriguing selection of authors and the ten chapters make a significant contribution to the overarching critical project of assessing the value of approaching theatre through – and as – voyeurism. The authors focus on a range of case studies including specific theatre artists such as Jan Fabre, Romeo Castellucci, Ann Liv Young, Olivier Dubois and Punchdrunk. This edited volume is therefore relevant to prospective readers interested in various aspects of visual experience in the theatre today.
Theatre at the Crossroads of Culture
by Patrice PavisWestern culture has a long and fraught history of cultural appropriation, a history that has particular resonance within performance practice. Patrice Pavis asks what is at stake politically and aesthetically when cultures meet at the crossroads of theatre.? A series of major recent productions are analysed, including Peter Brook's Mahabharata, Cixous/Mnouchkine's Indiande, and Barba's Faust. These focus discussions on translation, appropriation, adaptation, cultural misunderstanding, and theatrical exploration. Never losing sight of the theatrical experience, Pavis confronts problems of colonialism, anthropology, and ethnography. This signals a radical movement away from the director and the word, towards the complex relationship between performance, performer, and spectator. Despite the problematic politics of cultural exchange in the theatre, interculturalism is not a one-sided process. Using the metaphor of the hourglass to discuss the transfer between source and target culture, Pavis asks what happens when the hourglass is turned upside down, when the `foreign' culture speaks for itself.
Theatre Audiences: Gods And Groundlings: Historical Theatrical Audiences (Theatre Symposium Ser. #20)
by Susan BennettSusan Bennett's highly successful Theatre Audiences is a unique full-length study of the audience as cultural phenomenon, which looks at both theories of spectatorship and the practice of different theatres and their audiences. Published here in a brand new updated edition, Theatre Audiences now includes: • a new preface by the author • a stunning extra chapter on intercultural theatre • a revised up-to-date bibliography. Theatre Audiences is a must-buy for teachers and students interested in spectatorship and theatre audiences, and will be valuable reading for practitioners and others involved in the theatre.
Theatre, Body and Pleasure
by Simon ShepherdBreaking new ground in the study of performance theory, this maverick and powerful project from renowned Renaissance scholar and queer theorist Simon Shepherd presents a unique take on theory and the physical reality of theatre. Examining a range of material, Theatre, Body, Pleasure addresses a significant gap in the literary and drama studies arenas and explores the interplay of bodily value, the art of bodies and the physical responses to that art. It explains first how the body makes meaning and carries value. Then it describes the relationships between time and space and body. The book’s features include: * large historical range, from medieval to postmodern * case studies offering close readings of written texts * examples of how to ‘read for the body’, exploring written text as a ‘discipline’ of the body * breadth of cultural reference, from stage plays through to dance culture * a range of theoretical approaches, including dance analysis and phenomenology Writing in accessible prose, Shepherd introduces new ways of analyzing dramatic text and has produced a book which is part theatre history, part dramatic criticism and part theatrical tour de force. Students of drama, theatre and performance studies and cultural studies will find this an absolute must read.
Theatre, Brief
by Robert Cohen Donovan Sherman Michelle Liu CarrigerTheatre, Brief emphasizes that theatre is a reflection of ourselves, because at the core of any great art is a commentary on the human experience. Theatre is not merely entertainment, but a way for people to connect with one another and express important ideas about our culture and society. Through coverage of design, acting, and directing, students are given a behind-the-scenes look at professional theatre artists performing their craft. Theatre, Brief immerses its readers in the world of professional theatre, giving them in-depth descriptions of many job functions and various aspects of a play’s production from beginning to end. Students will enjoy the “Why Study” Spotlight and sidebar features that connect the chapter topics to future careers.
Theatre (Brief Edition), 9th Edition
by Robert CohenThis lively introduction to theatre offers equal measures of appreciation of theatrical arts and descriptions of the collaborative theatrical crafts. The author's enthusiasm for and knowledge of the current theatre, highlighted by contemporary production shots from around the world, put the students in the front row.
Theatre Buildings: A Design Guide
by Association of British Theatre TechniciansThe Association of British Theatre Technicians produced its first guide to the design and planning of theatres in 1972. Revised in 1986, it became the standard reference work for anyone involved in building, refurbishing, or creating a performance space. Theatre Buildings – a design guide is its successor. Written and illustrated by a highly experienced team of international theatre designers and practitioners, it retains the practical approach of the original while extending the scope to take account of the development of new technologies, new forms of presentation, changing expectations, and the economic and social pressures which require every part of the theatre to be as productive as possible. The book takes the reader through the whole process of planning and designing a theatre. It looks in detail at each area of the building: front of house, auditorium, backstage, and administrative offices. It gives specific guidance on sightlines, acoustics, stage engineering, lighting, sound and video, auditorium and stage formats. Aspects such as catering, conference and education use are also covered. The information is supplemented by twenty-eight case studies, selected to provide examples which range in size, style and format and to cover new buildings, renovations, conversions, temporary and found space. The studies include Den Norsk, Oslo; The Guthrie Theatre, Minneapolis; The Liceu, Barcelona; Les Bouffes du Nord, Paris; The RSC’s Courtyard Theatre in Stratford on Avon; and the MTC Theatre in Melbourne. All have plans and sections drawn to 1:500 scale. The book contains around 100 high quality full colour images as well as over 60 specially drawn charts and diagrams explaining formats, relationships and technical details.
Theatre Buildings: A Design Guide
by Margaret Shewring David HamerIn 2021, its Diamond Jubilee year, the Association of British Theatre Technicians (ABTT) undertook to revise Theatre Buildings: A Design Guide (Routledge, 2010). This new edition (Routledge, 2023) has substantially re-written text with fresh images and entirely new reference projects, providing essential guidance for all those engaged in the design of theatre buildings. Edited by Margaret Shewring (Emeritus Reader, University of Warwick, former Director of the Postgraduate Diploma and MA in Theatre Consultancy), this new publication is written by a team of international experts, architects, theatre consultants, acousticians, engineers and industry professionals led by Tim Foster (Foster Wilson Size) and Robin Townley (CEO of the ABTT). It provides an invaluable resource for those looking to build, remodel or conserve theatre buildings, taking into account the significant changes which have taken place in the last twelve years in all aspects of theatre design and technical practice. It locates those changes in the wider context of the need for sustainability in the theatre industry in response to the climate emergency, inclusivity, diversity of access, placemaking and concerns for health and wellbeing. This new edition provides guidance for anyone who seeks inspiration and encouragement to create or improve a place of entertainment or who seeks to understand what might be required to accommodate an audience for the presentation of live performance and the successful use, operation and organisation of such a venue. Its generous format and the thirty-two new reference projects, more than 260 high-resolution colour images and 175 diagrams and specially commissioned plans make it accessible and informative both to the general reader and the professional specialist.