Public Theatre Research Articles

The Process of Becoming a Professional Actor

The article concerns the process of becoming a professional actor; the author investigates the motivations of young people who decide to study acting. She is particularly interested in the impact of their significant others at various stages of the career path. The text is also an attempt to look at the stereotypes related to education in public theater schools. The empirical basis of the work involves free interviews conducted by the author with actors from Polish public drama theaters (in the period of 2015–2017) as well as journalistic interviews with theater artists published in books and popular monthly magazines in the period of 2011–2016.

Wang Chong and the Theatre of Immediacy: Technology, Performance, and Intimacy in Crisis

In early January 2020, when Chinese theatre director Wang Chong (b. 1982) arrived in New York to remount his production of Nick Payne's Constellations for the Public Theater's Under the Radar Festival, he couldn't have predicted that this would be the last time for months that he would watch his actors from the middle of a full house. By the time his work-in-progress solo show, Made in China 2.0, opened at the Asia TOPA Festival in Melbourne, Australia, at the end of that February, it was clear that there would be no live theatre in Wang's hometown of Beijing for some time. All of China was on lockdown as the disease now tragically familiar as COVID-19 swept the country. Then, as Wang returned to Beijing in early March, businesses around the globe were shuttering, theatres were going dark, and theatre artists were confronting an unprecedented challenge to their personal safety, livelihoods, and ability to make meaningful art. In short order, some well-resourced theatre institutions began to stream performance recordings and reconfigure their seasons for online platforms. Only a month after returning home, Wang Chong joined this mass online movement with his production of Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot, streamed live on 5–6 April 2020 as Dengdai Geduo.

Decolonising pedagogies in prison performance programmes: making Shakespeare secondary

ABSTRACT Shakespeare’s elite cultural status bolsters the sense of achievement and empowerment experienced by participants in prison performance programmes; and yet, such engagements paradoxically risk further marginalising participants by reinforcing a colonial mentality in which Shakespeare represents an offering from a morally superior white culture. Taking the Detroit Public Theatre’s Shakespeare in Prison (SIP) programme for women as my central case study, I apply a decolonising lens in order to identify pedagogies and practices that help SIP to prioritise participant knowledge and agency, prioritise an ethics of care over high production standards, and prioritise relationality over the individualist rhetoric of rehabilitation.

Connecting Faith through Theatre: Barazan’yee as a Semi-Ritual Performance in Thai Muslim Communities

Abstract This research paper examines the creative process used to connect young Muslims with their experience, their faith, and their community through a community-based performance. It also stresses the different levels of connections that resulted from the performance itself. The author sought to reconnect Barazan’yee, an important Arabic poetic chant, to people in the Bangkok Islamic community using tools from community theatre. The performance design process allowed them to tell their own story in relation to Bar’zanyee poetry in ways that are meaningful to them and their community, thus connecting their lives to the life of Prophet Muhammad. The first performance was in a public theatre resulted in a shift in structure and participation choices for audience in the second performance at a public theatre. Although both performances were conducted in a semi-ritualized environment of the Muslim community, the latter better engaged both the performers and audience.

근대 초기 영국 희곡의 국외 연구동향: 여성과 극장을 중심으로

This paper surveys recent studies in early modern English drama with a focus on women’s active involvement in the seventeenth-century dramatic production and theater culture. Questioning the powerful cultural paradigm of “the English all-male stage,” critics of the late 1990s called for a need to revise the literary and theater history that had largely excluded women. While feminist critics have brought to our attention how early modern women’s literary activities were neglected in the literary criticism, their revisionist projects of discovering women writers comparable to Shakespeare or Jonson fail to account for the women’s more extensive contribution to early modern drama and theater culture. In the recent scholarship, the notions of women’s dramatic production and theatricality have been considerably expanded to include non-commercial dramatic genres and women’s diverse roles and their work in and out of the theater. Pointing out how women thrived in some dramatic genres such as translation, closet drama, and household drama, critics have emphasized the interconnectedness between women’s “private” drama and a variety of theatrical traditions and dramatic forms in commercial, public theater. Early modern women’s theatricality has also been broadly expanded to reexamine the significance of women’s court and street performances, French and Italian actresses in London streets, and women’s off-stage or on-page contributions to early modern dramatic literature and performance. Such interdisciplinary efforts have uncovered a diverse range of female theatrical activities beyond the single-sex playhouse stages, which has changed our understanding of early modern drama including the plays of Shakespeare and other canonical authors.

UBLIC THEATRE’S SOCIAL ROLE AND ITS AUDIENCE

Today, public theatre is directed toward adapting to its contemporary socio-economic context. In doing this, it is trying to preserve its artistic values and at the same time fulfill and diversify its social functions and missions. When we talk about public theatre’s social function, i.e. the public value it produces, some of the main issues concern its contribution to the most pressing social matters. In general, these issues concern public theatre’s role in strengthening social cohesion, cultural emancipation and social inclusion, its role in the process of opening dialogues, revising formal history and re-examining traditional forms of thinking. Fulfilment of these functions is strongly linked with the character of public theatre’s audiences. In more practical terms, the scope of public theatre’s social influence is dependent on how homogenous its audiences are. If one considers artistic organizations’ need for sustainability as a key factor in their need for constantly widening their audience, and particularly the inclusion of “others” (those not belonging to the dominant cultural group), in the context of contemporary society’s need for social and cultural inclusion, then the task of today’s public theatres becomes rather difficult. Simply said, there are too many needs to be met at the same time. The main questions this paper is asking is: to what extent do Belgrade’s public theatres understand the importance of diversifying its audiences, and how do they perceive their social role? Starting from the fact that human capital is the primary resource and success factor of any theatre organization, we explore in what manner management and employees in these theatres address these issues, i.e. how they redefine theatre’s social role and attract audiences that do not fit the dominant theatre audience model.

“Hard-won joy”: Equity through collaboration

ABSTRACT Schools, community organizations, and major cultural entities can address educational inequities by engaging parents and children in arts processes, projects, and performances. Three cases featuring work in the arts show promise in contributing to the positive academic and social development of learners across the socio-economic spectrum. Â Learning science principles stand behind the practice of shifting roles, a practice that research shows to be highly effective means of boosting learning. Two cases describe direct school-home activities in which students take on the role of creative historians and produce new types of materials for peers, family, and community members. A third case, based on principles from design research, describes Public Works, a program started in 2013 by the Public Theater in New York City. The authors summarize using four metaphors related to the learning sciences that address equity issues by constructing a robust dialectic between social responsibility and imagination.

ΚΑΙ ΚΑΤΑΨΕΥΔΟΥ ΚΑΛΩΣ: Wagering on Divinity in Euripides' Bacchae

In the late work of Euripides, a strong contrast is established between belief in divinity characterized by sincere, affective commitment, and belief that is founded on reasoned calculation. This paper studies this contrast, focussing on Bacchae, Euripides’ last surviving work. Two recent approaches to the agency of human subjects and their disposition to evaluate are introduced and compared as models. Charles Taylor’s contemporary philosophy of ethics, of will and orders of value is briefly outlined and applied to the situation dramatized by the poet. Subsequently, Stuart Guthrie’s cognitive science model of the wager on the presence of divine agents as instrumentally advantageous, is also shown to pertain to an attitude discernible in the tragedy of Pentheus and Dionysus at Thebes. In a work of public theatre, one concerning the complex figure of Dionysus, this endorsement of the quality of sincerity as a condition for validity is significant in the course of Greek religiosity. The widely attested shift to increasing individualism in the Athenian fifth century finds striking expression in the definitive emphasis laid on personal feeling and emotional sincerity in dealings with divinity.

Hamilton: An American Musical by Lin Manuel-Miranda

Reviewed by: Hamilton: An American Musical by Lin Manuel-Miranda Patricia Herrera HAMILTON: AN AMERICAN MUSICAL. Book, music, and lyrics by Lin Manuel-Miranda. Directed by Thomas Kail. Richard Rodgers Theatre, New York City. Disney Plus, streaming, July 4, 2020. Since its off-Broadway debut at the New York Public Theater in early 2015, Lin-Manuel Miranda’s musical Hamilton has become a theatrical phenomenon of historic proportions, achieving staggering levels of critical and commercial success. I have had the great fortune of seeing Hamilton onstage a couple of times and have enjoyed this artistic masterpiece, but as I have written before, that pleasure comes with some caution and trepidation. By detaching from the narrative of slavery and disavowing Black bodies and their experiences, Hamilton brings the white body back to life, glossing over the racial terror saturating American history. While Disney’s early release of Hamilton is certainly beneficial in terms of accessibility, these shortcomings are far more pronounced. In the wake of 2020’s racial injustice protests and the coronavirus lockdowns, when gasps of grief and rage grew even louder, the show’s closing image of Eliza’s gasp took on a whole new meaning. Wrestling between pleasure and urgency, the craft of theatre remains as a source of “revolution and revelation” (as the Schuyler sisters desire). Under the direction of Thomas Kail, who also directed the stage version, the film is a firsthand look at the actual stage production at the Richard Rodgers Theatre. Rather than emulating the form and style of cinema, the film is an immersive live-captured version of a Broadway musical. Televiewers come close to experiencing what it feels like to be on the stage as a performer or in the theatre as an audience member from the comfort of their homes. While the film indeed offers a great approximation of theatre, the cinematic form, as is true for most live-recordings, can’t replace the liveness nor capture the give-and-take between actors and audience. What remains is a valuable historical document preserving the original cast on film and underscoring the collaboration of the creative team. Shot in three days in June of 2016, when the cast was performing the show to sold-out audiences on a nearly daily basis, Kail captures both the scope and intimacy of Hamilton. He employed nine cameras, some placed in the audience, others overhead, and another set in the rear of the stage. The wide shots allow for a fuller theatrical experience. The spare, evocative set design of David Korins and stunning choreography of Andy Blankenbuehler stand out as central elements of the musical. The large two-story wooden scaffold with coils of nautical ropes and pulleys hanging in front of the brick wall underscores America being built from its foundation and how Hamilton and other immigrants came by ship. The film accentuates even more the physicality of the ensemble. Actors move above the stage, descend onto the platform, and stand on a turn-table-floor, offering the musical more expressive complexity to the subtext. Alex Lacamoire’s score, blending the rhythms of hip-hop, rock, and Golden Age Broadway, heightens the audio experience. The film beautifully captures theatre-making at its best, particularly in the final duel scene. The scratchy-rewinding-of-time along with the countdown punctuates Hamilton’s death. Ariana DeBose theatrically heightens this moment when she grabs the invisible bullet that will kill the title character in mid-air and the ensemble freezes in a series of tableaux. As the turntable-floor rotates ever so slightly, the ensemble reenacts flashes of Hamilton’s life in slow-motion. The camera shifts from wide shots to close-ups capturing those moments sometimes not visible to the naked eye. Sitting in the far-off theatre seat, I missed the intensity of the spittle flying from King George III (Jonathan Groff). Now seeing his uptight posture up close against his spittle filled that moment with so much more humor. The wide shots and close up also helps capture the emotional intensity of the conclusion. Towards the end, Eliza speaking [End Page 83] Click for larger view View full resolution Lin-Manuel Miranda is Alexander Hamilton...

Under the Red White and Blue: Patriotism, Disenchantment and the Stubborn Myth of The Great Gatsby

Under the Red White and Blue: Patriotism, Disenchantment and the Stubborn Myth of <i>The Great Gatsby</i>

서울시민회관의 공공극장 운영 방향성에 관한 연구 - 상주단체인 서울민속가극단의 활동을 중심으로

이 연구는 1960년대 관립문화공간이자 대형 다목적홀인 시민회관의 운영실태, 문화수용 양상을 고찰하고, 단명한 상주공연단체 사례를 통해 시민회관을 재조명하는 데 목적이 있다. 시민회관은 단순한 이윤보다 서울시민의 문화생활과 지역사회의 공익에 이바지해야 하는 공공극장으로 설립되었다. 이곳은 고급예술과 대중예술, 전통예술과 현대예술이 혼재된, 혼종성을 지닌 문화공간이었다. ‘자본’의 공간이자 ‘혼종성’의 공간인 시민회관의 특성을 규명하기 위해서, 시민회관의 전속공연단체로 육성시키려 한 서울민속가극단의 공연활동을 실증적으로 검토하였다. 시민회관이 이윤을 추구한다는 비판에 직면한 서울시는 공익성을 중심으로 하는 시민회관의 운영 방향과 공공지원 기능을 요구받고 있었다. 이에 따라 서울시는 ‘서울민속가극단’ 출범과 운영을 적극 지원하였다. 서울민속가극단은 민속예술의 대중화·무대화를 모토로 공연활동을 펼쳤으며, 활동 중심 무대는 시민회관이었다. 다시 말해, 서울민속가극단은 무분별한 민간단체 대관 위주라는 시민회관 운영상의 비판을 감안하여 공공 공연장의 자체 기획기능을 활성화하기 위해 서울시 후원으로 탄생한 공연단체이다. 서울민속가극단은 악극, 여성국극 공연을 재구성한 공연을 선보였으나, 기존 공연물과의 차별화나 문화담론 형성에 새로운 방향성을 제시하지 못한 채 해체되고 말았다. 이 논문에서는 수요-공급이라는 경제논리로 운영된 시민회관 전속 예정 공연단체의 쇠퇴 과정과 공연 특성을 규명함으로써, 혼종성의 공간이자 자본의 공간인 시민회관의 성격, 프로그램 운영실태와 한계를 드러내고자 하였다.

Kariera aktorska i jej determinanty w społecznym świecie teatru zawodowego w Polsce

The article is an attempt to answer the question about factors affecting the trajectory of an acting career. The author confronts the objective dimensions of a career with a subjective concept of success, clarified by the participants of the social world of theater themselves. The empirical basis of the work are free interviews conducted by the author with actors of Polish public drama theaters (in 2015–2017) and journalistic interviews with theater artists published in books and popular monthly magazines in the last two decades of the 21st century. All sources were subjected to qualitative content analysis. It shows that in addition to talent, which is the basis of an acting career, hard work is also important. The actors pay attention to personality aspects – charismatic people with a natural ability to attract attention have a greater chance of success. The cultural capital of the stage artist and social capital (the relevant role of linking artistic careers) are not without significance for the course of the acting career. Actors also say a lot about coincidence of events, but it is worth remembering that “you have to be good to be lucky”, you have to be more motivated and determined. The author also tries to answer questions whether awards actuate the course of acting career and whether migrations are an opportunity for creative progression.

地方議会議事録分析による話題抽出についての一試論――地方議会・委員会での公の施設「劇場・音楽堂等」に関する議論を事例に

地方議会議事録分析による話題抽出についての一試論――地方議会・委員会での公の施設「劇場・音楽堂等」に関する議論を事例に

ONSTAGE, the Online Data System of Theatre in Amsterdam from the Golden Age to Today

Abstract ONSTAGE is the data repository for Amsterdam’s first and most prominent public theatre venue: the Schouwburg. In theatre history, the Amsterdam Schouwburg has a fairly unique place due to its rich body of extant account books, programs and administrative records of annual play lists, and registers of expenses and revenues. These sources, as a most sensitive finger on the theatre’s pulse, can be used as analytical tools that provide access to the theatre’s artistic business, from its foundation in 1638 until today. This data paper is an assessment of the new ONSTAGE data system, in terms of its structure, the nature of the data and enrichment, and the research potential. The paper also explores future growth in linked data systems.

No Villain

No Villain

In Memoriam: Gerald Freedman (1927–2020)

Acclaimed theater and artistic director Gerald Freedman passed away on 17 March 2020. In a career spanning almost seventy years, Freedman became one of the more accomplished and influential directors in American theater. His credits are almost too numerous to list, but highlights include directing book scenes for the original Broadway productions of West Side Story and Gypsy, and a long association with Joseph Papp's Public Theatre, where he directed the world premiere of Hair and served as artistic director. His other stints as artistic director include The Acting Company with John Houseman and Stratford, Connecticut's American Shakespeare Theatre. Additionally, Freedman had a long tenure as artistic director of the Great Lakes Theater Festival in Cleveland, Ohio, from 1985 to 1997. He also served as Dean of the School of Drama at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts.Freedman holds a significant place in the production history of Arthur Miller's work. Miller's 1972 play The Creation of the World and Other Business had much trouble during the rehearsal period over artistic differences between Miller and the production staff. The original director Harold Clurman and most of the cast, including Barbara Harris and Hal Holbrook, were replaced, and Miller rewrote much of the material. Freedman took over the direction, but the Broadway production with Zoe Caldwell, Bob Dishy, and George Grizzard was largely panned and ran for only twenty performances. Freedman had greater critical success with his direction of the 1990 Roundabout Theatre production of The Crucible, which was the first major New York revival in almost twenty years. At the Great Lakes Theatre Festival in 1994, Freedman directed Death of Salesman, featuring Hal Holbrook as Willy Loman and Elizabeth Franz as Linda. The production subsequently went on a seven-city U.S. national tour.When the Arthur Miller Society was formed in 1995, Freedman graciously accepted an invitation to join the honorary board. The theater world is forever changed because of his significant contributions.—Steve Marino

Nostalgia in Print and Performance, 1510–1613: Merry Worlds. Harriet Phillips. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019. Pp. vii+239.

<i>Nostalgia in Print and Performance, 1510–1613: Merry Worlds</i>. Harriet Phillips. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019. Pp. vii+239.

&amp;#8220;Todo el mundo es un escenario&amp;#8221;: estudio comparativo de los espacios teatrales en el Barroco español y en la escena isabelina

Este articulo ofrece una comparacion de algunas manifestaciones del teatro del Siglo de Oro y de la era isabelina desde la perspectiva del espacio. Para ello, en primer lugar me refiero a la dimension antropologica del espacio que subyace a todo acontecimiento teatral y que permite ir mas alla de los aspectos tecnicos de la representacion. Luego describo brevemente el contexto cultural que propicio el esplendor tanto del teatro barroco espanol –especificamente en la obra de Lope de Vega–, como del ingles de los siglos XVI y XVII, en particular, el de William Shakespeare. El analisis comparativo abarca elementos como la ubicacion de los teatros publicos: los corrales de comedias de la Cruz y del Principe en Madrid y del teatro del Globo en Londres, asi como el estudio de la arquitectura de estos espacios, su aforo, las dimensiones del escenario y la ubicacion de las galerias, entre otros. Investigar la materialidad de estos espacios tiene como objetivo comprender mejor los mecanismos de configuracion espacial disenados por ambos dramaturgos, quienes mediante la palabra poetica y performativa, utilizando recursos ticoscopicos, logran producir la ilusion teatral que hace visible lo invisible al crear espacios imaginarios en el escenario, en un proceso colaborativo entre los actores y el publico.

P.P. Pertsov and gazeta «Novoye vremya» (1898–1901) (New aspect of creative biography)

The article examines the early stage of cooperation between the writer and philosopher P.P. Pertsov and the conservative newspaper Novoe Vremya (1868–1917). Fragments of Pertsov's archival correspondence with the philosophical writer V.V. Rozanov, Pertsov's father and the critic of the liberal magazine «Russian wealth» A.G. Gornfeld are partially introduced into scientific circulation. The author analyzes the reasons for Pertsov's difficult attitude to the publisher and editor of Novoye Vremya, the playwright and founder of the Maly theater in St. Petersburg, A.S. Suvorin. The author substantiates the conclusion about Pertsov's fundamental differences related to the position of Novoye Vremya in the case of the French officer A. Dreyfus. An overview of Pertsov's publications in the newspaper related to the beginning of his collaboration with the newspaper is given. The author traces the evolution of the attitude of a young critic, a liberal in the recent past, to the «New time». Russian Russian theater and drama is the first time that Pertsov's correspondence with A. Suvorin is introduced into scientific circulation, filled with reflections on Russian theater and Russian dramaturgy. The letters discuss Pertsov's theatrical articles: «About the new theater» (about the production of a play by the German playwright G. Gauptmana «Lonely») and «a Satire or a drama» (about productions of new plays by A.P. Chekhov). Pertsov and Suvorin discuss performances of the Art public theater (Moscow art theater), which opened in Moscow in 1898. In a polemic with a young critic, Suvorin defended the national theater, represented by plays by Russian playwrights, primarily A.N. Ostrovsky. Pertsov advocated a new theater, focused primarily on the production of plays by modern playwrights regardless of their nationality.

Hamilton, Lin-Manuel Miranda, The Public Theater, New York City, 20 January 2015

Hamilton, Lin-Manuel Miranda, The Public Theater, New York City, 20 January 2015