Download or read book The Necessity of Theater The Art of Watching and Being Watched written by Paul Woodruff and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2008-04-30 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What is unique and essential about theater? What separates it from other arts? Do we need "theater" in some fundamental way? The art of theater, as Paul Woodruff says in this elegant and unique book, is as necessary--and as powerful--as language itself. Defining theater broadly, including sporting events and social rituals, he treats traditional theater as only one possibility in an art that--at its most powerful--can change lives and (as some peoples believe) bring a divine presence to earth.The Necessity of Theater analyzes the unique power of theater by separating it into the twin arts of watching and being watched, practiced together in harmony by watchers and the watched. Whereas performers practice the art of being watched--making their actions worth watching, and paying attention to action, choice, plot, character, mimesis, and the sacredness of performance space--audiences practice the art of watching: paying close attention. A good audience is emotionally engaged as spectators; their engagement takes a form of empathy that can lead to a special kind of human wisdom. As Plato implied, theater cannot teach us transcendent truths, but it can teach us about ourselves.Characteristically thoughtful, probing, and original, Paul Woodruff makes the case for theater as a unique form of expression connected to our most human instincts. The Necessity of Theater should appeal to anyone seriously interested or involved in theater or performance more broadly.

Download or read book The Necessity of Theater written by Paul Woodruff and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2008-04-30 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What is unique and essential about theater? What separates it from other arts? Do we need "theater" in some fundamental way? The art of theater, as Paul Woodruff says in this elegant and unique book, is as necessary - and as powerful - as language itself. Defining theater broadly, including sporting events and social rituals, he treats traditional theater as only one possibility in an art that - at its most powerful - can change lives and (as some peoples believe) bring a divine presence to earth. The Necessity of Theater analyzes the unique power of theater by separating it into the twin arts of watching and being watched, practiced together in harmony by watchers and the watched. Whereas performers practice the art of being watched - making their actions worth watching, and paying attention to action, choice, plot, character, mimesis, and the sacredness of performance space - audiences practice the art of watching: paying close attention. A good audience is emotionally engaged as spectators; their engagement takes a form of empathy that can lead to a special kind of human wisdom. As Plato implied, theater cannot teach us transcendent truths, but it can teach us about ourselves. Characteristically thoughtful, probing, and original, Paul Woodruff makes the case for theater as a unique form of expression connected to our most human instincts. The Necessity of Theater should appeal to anyone seriously interested or involved in theater or performance more broadly.

Download or read book Theatre of the Unimpressed written by Jordan Tannahill and published by Coach House Books. This book was released on 2015-05-11 with total page 161 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How dull plays are killing theatre and what we can do about it. Had I become disenchanted with the form I had once fallen so madly in love with as a pubescent, pimple-faced suburban homo with braces? Maybe theatre was like an all-consuming high school infatuation that now, ten years later, I saw as the closeted balding guy with a beer gut he’d become. There were of course those rare moments of transcendencethat kept me coming back. But why did they come so few and far between? A lot of plays are dull. And one dull play, it seems, can turn us off theatre for good. Playwright and theatre director Jordan Tannahill takes in the spectrum of English-language drama – from the flashiest of Broadway spectacles to productions mounted in scrappy storefront theatres – to consider where lifeless plays come from and why they persist. Having travelled the globe talking to theatre artists, critics, passionate patrons and the theatrically disillusioned, Tannahill addresses what he considers the culture of ‘risk aversion’ paralyzing the form. Theatre of the Unimpressed is Tannahill’s wry and revelatory personal reckoning with the discipline he’s dedicated his life to, and a roadmap for a vital twenty-first-century theatre – one that apprehends the value of ‘liveness’ in our mediated age and the necessity for artistic risk and its attendant failures. In considering dramaturgy, programming and alternative models for producing, Tannahill aims to turn theatre from an obligation to a destination. ‘[Tannahill is] the poster child of a new generation of (theatre? film? dance?) artists for whom "interdisciplinary" is not a buzzword, but a way of life.’ —J. Kelly Nestruck, Globe and Mail ‘Jordan is one of the most talented and exciting playwrights in the country, and he will be a force to be reckoned with for years to come.’ —Nicolas Billon, Governor General's Award–winning playwright (Fault Lines)

Download or read book The Art of Resonance written by Anne Bogart and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2021-08-26 with total page 185 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What is artistic resonance and how can it be linked to one's life and one's art? This latest book of essays from legendary theatre director Anne Bogart, considers the creation of resonance in the artistic endeavour, with a focus on the performing arts. The word 'resonance' comes from the Latin meaning to 're-sound' or 'sound together'. From music to physics, resonance is a common thread that evokes a response and, in general, is understood as a quality that makes something personally meaningful and valuable. For Bogart, curiosity is a key personal quality to be nurtured throughout life and that very same curiosity, as an artist, thinker and human being. Creating pathways between performance theory, art history, neuroscience, music, architecture and the visual arts, and consistently forging new thought-paths, the writing draws upon Anne Bogart's own life and artistic journeys to illuminate potent philosophical ideas. Woven with personal anecdotes, stories and reflections, this is a book that will be of interest to any theatre artist and anyone who reflects on the power of the arts, of theatre-making and what it means to be engaged in the artistic process.

Download or read book Theatre World 2009 2010 written by Ben Hodges and published by Applause Theatre & Cinema. This book was released on 2011-04-01 with total page 601 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An overview of the 2009-2010 theatre season includes photos, a complete cast listing, producers, directors, authors, composers, opening and closing dates, song titles and plot synopses for more than 1,000 Broadway, off-Broadway, off-off-Broadway and regional shows, as well as the past year's obituaries, a listing of all award nominees and winners and an index.

Download or read book The Play that Changed My Life written by Benjamin A. Hodges and published by Hal Leonard Corporation. This book was released on 2009 with total page 204 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: (Applause Books). What was the play that changed your life? What was the play that inspired you; that showed you something entirely new; that was so thrilling or surprising, breathtaking or poignant, that you were never the same? Nineteen of today's most gifted playwrights respond in this most revealing and personal book, published by Applause Books and presented by the American Theatre Wing, founder of The Tony Awards. From Edward Albee's 1935 visit to New York's Hippodrome Theatre to see Jimmy Durante (and an elephant) in Rodgers and Hart's Jumbo, to Diana Son's twelfth-grade field trip in 1983 to see Diane Venora play Hamlet at The Public Theater, from David Henry Hwang's seminal San Francisco encounter with Equus to a young Beth Henley's epiphany after seeing her mother in a "Green Bean Man costume," The Play That Changed My Life offers readers a unique peek into the theatrical influences of some of the nation's most important dramatists. The book is filled with tributes, memories, anecdotes and other insights that connect past to present and make this volume an instant "must have" for anyone who adores the theatre. Also in the book are pieces by David Auburn, Jon Robin Baitz, Nilo Cruz, Christopher Durang, Charles Fuller, A. R. Gurney, Tina Howe, David Ives, Donald Margulies, Lynn Nottage, Suzan-Lori Parks, Sarah Ruhl, John Patrick Shanley, Regina Taylor, and Doug Wright, as well as an introduction by Paula Vogel. All together, the playwrights featured here have won more than 40 Tony Awards, Pulitzer Prizes, Obies, and MacArthur genius grants.

Download or read book The Theatre of the Real written by Gina Masucci MacKenzie and published by . This book was released on 2008 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Theatre of the Real: Yeats, Beckett, and Sondheim traces the thread of jouissance (the simultaneous experience of radical pleasure and pain) through three major theatre figures of the twentieth century. Gina Masucci MacKenzie's work engages theatrical text and performance in dialogue with the Lacanian Real, so as to re-envision modern theatre as the cultural site where author, actor, and audience come into direct contact with personal and collective traumas. By showing how a transgressively free subject may be formed through theatrical experience, MacKenzie concludes that modern theatre can liberate the individual from the socially constructed self. The Theatre of the Real revises views of modern theatre by demonstrating how it can lead to a collaborative effort required for innovative theatrical work. By foregrounding Yeats's "dancer" plays, the author shows how these intimate pieces contribute to the historical development of musical as well as modern theatre. Beckett's universal dramas then pave the way for Sondheim's postmodern cacophonies of idea and spirit as they introduce comic abjection into modernism's tragic mode. This exciting work from a new author will leave readers with fresh insight to theatrical performance and its necessity in our lives.

Download or read book How to Start Your Own Theater Company written by Reginald Nelson and published by Chicago Review Press. This book was released on 2010 with total page 205 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With advice and instruction from an experienced actor and theater director, this pragmatic, authoritative guide imparts backstage know-how for wouldbe playhouse practitioners on everything from fundraising and finding a space to selecting plays and navigating legal issues. Chronicling three seasons at Chicago's award-winning Congo Square Theatre, this journey behind the curtain reveals the nitty-gritty details--such as managing rent, parking, and safety issues; determining tax status and calculating budgets; and finding flexible day jobs--that are often overlooked amid the zeal of artistic pursuit. Inspired by Congo Square's own unique inception, the valuable how-to also speaks directly to the many underserved audiences who want to create their own companies, including African American, Asian American, Latino, physically challenged, and GLBT communities. With lists of Equity offices, legal advisers, and important organizations, this complete resource is sure to help ambitious theater lovers establish and maintain their own successful companies.

Download or read book Arguments for a Theatre written by Howard Barker and published by Manchester University Press. This book was released on 1993 with total page 196 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Howard Barker, author of over thirty plays, has long been an implacable foe of the liberal British establishment, and champion of radical theatre world-wide. His best-known plays include The Castle, Scenes from an Execution and The Possibilities. All of his plays are emotionally highly charged, intellectually stimulating and far removed from the theatrical conventions of what he terms 'the Establishment Theatre'. These fragments, essays, thoughts and poems on the nature of theatre likewise reject the constraints of 'objective' academic theatre criticism. They explore the collision (and collusion) of intellect and artistry in the creative act. This book is more than a collection of essays: it is a cultural manifesto for Barker's own 'Theatre of Catastrophe'.

Download or read book An Introduction to Technical Theatre written by Tal Sanders and published by Pacific University. This book was released on 2018-09 with total page 120 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "An Introduction to Technical Theatre draws on the author's experience in both the theatre and the classroom over the last 30 years. Intended as a resource for both secondary and post-secondary theatre courses, this text provides a comprehensive overview of technical theatre, including terminology and general practices. Introduction to Technical Theatre's accessible format is ideal for students at all levels, including those studying technical theatre as an elective part of their education. The text's modular format is also intended to assist teachers approach the subject at their own pace and structure, a necessity for those who may regularly rearrange their syllabi around productions and space scheduling" -- From publisher website.

Download or read book Brazilian Theater 1970 2010 written by Eva Paulino Bueno and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2015-03-25 with total page 277 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How did Brazilian theater survive under the military dictatorship of 1964-1985? How did it change once the regime was over? This collection of new essays is the first to cover Brazilian theater during this period. Brazilian scholars and artists discuss the history of a theater community that not only resisted the regime but reinvented itself and continued to develop more sophisticated forms of expression even in the face of competition from television and other media. The contributors recount the struggle to stage meaningful plays at a time when some artists and intellectuals were exiled, others imprisoned, tortured or killed. With the return of democracy other important issues arose: how to ensure space for different practices and for regional theater, and how to continue producing international plays that could be meaningful for a Brazilian audience.

Download or read book Theatre Builders written by James Steele and published by Academy Press. This book was released on 1996 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An exploration of innovative theatre designs by 30 of today's most respected architects.

Download or read book There Must be Happy Endings written by Megan Sandberg-Zakian and published by . This book was released on 2020 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Literary Nonfiction. Drama. African & African American Studies. LGBTQIA Studies. Middle Eastern Studies. Performance Studies. Women's Studies. Is it possible--is it even ethical?--to make hopeful art in an unjust and chaotic world? In the tradition of artist-essayists such as James Baldwin, Anne Lamott, and Adrienne Rich, Sandberg-Zakian looks to her own socially-engaged theater-making practice alongside a diverse array of cultural influences (from slave narratives to popular musicals, Batman to This American Life), considering how we might reconcile our desire for hope and possibility, connection and transformation, with the necessity of navigating darkness, despair, hate and violence. The artistic coming-of-age journey of a contemporary theater artist in ten essays, THERE MUST BE HAPPY ENDINGS: ON A THEATER OF OPTIMISM & HONESTY is a smart, engaging and gently humorous contribution to the discussion of how we face art-making--and living--with hope and optimism, and an elegant, accessible, and satisfying companion to practical work in the world.

Download or read book Storytelling in Opera and Musical Theater written by Nina Penner and published by Indiana University Press. This book was released on 2020-10-06 with total page 294 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Storytelling in Opera and Musical Theater is the first systematic exploration of how sung forms of drama tell stories. Through examples from opera's origins to contemporary musicals, Nina Penner examines the roles of character-narrators and how they differ from those in literary and cinematic works, how music can orient spectators to characters' points of view, how being privy to characters' inner thoughts and feelings may evoke feelings of sympathy or empathy, and how performers' choices affect not only who is telling the story but what story is being told. Unique about Penner's approach is her engagement with current work in analytic philosophy. Her study reveals not only the resources this philosophical tradition can bring to musicology but those which musicology can bring to philosophy, challenging and refining accounts of narrative, point of view, and the work-performance relationship within both disciplines. She also considers practical problems singers and directors confront on a daily basis, such as what to do about Wagner's Jewish caricatures and the racism of Orientalist operas. More generally, Penner reflects on how centuries-old works remain meaningful to contemporary audiences and have the power to attract new, more diverse audiences to opera and musical theater. By exploring how practitioners past and present have addressed these issues, Storytelling in Opera and Musical Theater offers suggestions for how opera and musical theater can continue to entertain and enrich the lives of 21st-century audiences.

Download or read book Disability and Theatre written by Stephanie Barton Farcas and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2017-07-28 with total page 286 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Disability and Theatre: A Practical Manual for Inclusion in the Arts is a step-by step manual on how to create inclusive theatre, including how and where to find actors, how to publicize productions, run rehearsals, act intricate scenes like fights and battles, work with unions, contracts, and agents, and deal with technical issues. This practical information was born from the author’s 16 years of running the first inclusive theatre company in New York City, and is applicable to any performance level: children’s theatre, community theatre, regional theatre, touring companies, Broadway, and academic theatre. This book features anecdotal case studies that emphasize problem solving, real-world application, and realistic action plans. A comprehensive Companion Website provides additional guidelines and hands-on worksheets.

Download or read book Acts written by Tzachi Zamir and published by University of Michigan Press. This book was released on 2014-06-03 with total page 278 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why do people act? Why are other people drawn to watch them? How is acting as a performing art related to role-playing outside the theater? As the first philosophical study devoted to acting, Acts: Theater, Philosophy, and the Performing Self sheds light on some of the more evasive aspects of the acting experience— such as the import of the actor's voice, the ethical unease sometimes felt while embodying particular sequences, and the meaning of inspiration. Tzachi Zamir explores acting’s relationship to everyday role-playing through a surprising range of examples of “lived acting,” including pornography, masochism, and eating disorders. By unearthing the deeper mobilizing structures that underlie dissimilar forms of staged and non-staged role-playing, Acts offers a multi-layered meditation on the percolation from acting to life. The book engages questions of theatrical inspiration, the actor’s “energy,” the difference between acting and pretending, the special role of repetition as part of live acting, the audience and its attraction to acting, and the unique significance of the actor’s voice. It examines the embodied nature of the actor’s animation of a fiction, the breakdown of the distinction between what one acts and who one is, and the transition from what one performs into who one is, creating an interdisciplinary meditation on the relationship between life and acting.

Download or read book Theater and Human Flourishing written by Harvey Young and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2023-02-07 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This collection explores the link between theatre and human flourishing. It interrogates both the social good of theatre and the personally restorative work of a range of live embodied performances. It brings together the disciplines of theatre (and performance studies) and psychology, especially positive psychology, to explore the social benefits of theatre: creating community, encouraging interconnection, serving as a mean to reveal and share both healing and trauma"--