some history:
Ancient Greek: The "choregus" (head of the chorus) often directed / coordinated song and movement. Playwrights probably staged the plays, and probably cast them, little known to understand if they "unified" the production.
Roman: a wealthy citizen organized the show.
Medieval: the "master of secrets" – a special effects expert (and there were many special effects in the medieval theatre). "Keeper of the register" - the "register" was a master copy of the script – a "guild" (group of craftsmen) could hold on to the register and pass it on from generation to generation.
Owner... All were primarily managerial skill, rather than artistic…
With the rise of professional acting companies (during and after Shakespeare’s time – came the "actor / manager"
by 1900s the term "director" was in wide-spread use and the primacy of director became clear – directors placed themselves at the center of production… After World War II, the term "auteur director" developed (Meyerhold, in Russia). Latest -- New eclectics – Jerzy Grotowski (1933-1999), Peter Brook, Richard Schechner.
Designer: his task to organize the space to make it workable for the actors.
Cameron & Gillespie: "idea blatant in none, but subtle in all."
[ 200x Aesthetics & Aristotle ]
Artistic Functions
Script selection : Professional directors either approve of scripts or are "matched"—by the producer(s). But most try to do the things they like best. Non-professionals – do what they like, usually – doing what they dislike might ruin the production, this is why they are not professionals.
Idea and spectacle (200x Hard Core Aesthetics) are the most common elements to excite directors.
Must learn to know what you do best, and improve on others.
The "master metaphor" – or "directorial concept" – (64) -- a concept or directorial image – To sort out the random ideas into a pattern of sorts – draw connections, give theatrical life to those that seem possible.
* Concept implies rational and thoughtful. Because art is too emotional.
* Image implies picturemaking.
Must be a combination of both. Wilson, in The Theatre Experience, 6th edition, 138, suggests using the following as ideas/ jumping-off points:
Period
Central / controlling image / metaphor
Concept / purpose:
Alan Schneider called it the "directional conception." Zelda Fichandler of the Arena Stage refers to the Russian term, "zamissel," or pervading thought.
Harold Clurman (1901-1980) – critic and director – look for the "spine" of the play – the "throughline" -- the "main action" -- a general action that "motivates the play" – the fundamental drama or conflict. (64))
Stanislavsky referred to the superobjective.
Analysis of the script—to help director "understand" the play – to make director’s consciousness capable of staging the play.
a. Depends on your point of view about directing:
(from Cameron and Gillespie):
The worshipful vs. heretical approach to the script:
On a continuum
-- Worshipful approach: Director’s job is NOT to create theatre, but to cause the script / play to create exciting theatre.
Can become boring and empty (letting the text do the work), or it can thrill us with the brilliance of getting the text’s strong points across.
-- Heretical approach: Director’s job is to interpret the text in order to make a theatrical entity of the entire production for the audience.
--to make good theatre exciting.
--director’s responsibility is to the MEANING of the performance, of which the script is only a part.
Historical precedent: classic plays becoming opera,
"Bowdlerizing" a play -- refers to deleting or changing parts of a scrpt, removing sociallly "unacceptable" or sexually "offensive" parts of the script (from Thomas Bowdler, who published the "Family Shakespeare," with sexual innuendo and reference left out, and turning sad endings into happy ones).
Can lead to offensive or meaningless productions, or innovative and truly exciting ones.
Analysis and interpretation of the script would also include.
The pattern of the play – its major elements -- structure.
How do the characters function in the play?
What are the demands on the actor?
What are the technical demands / requirements? -- sound, lights, costume, sets?
The context of the play (often this is a factor)
Biography of the playwright’s life
Playwright’s canon of work (other stuff)
Period play written
Period play takes place
Critical response to play and earlier productions
Old plays are often updated, new plays often need a different combination of techniques.
Tone and impact of the play
The play’s intended effects – director’s ideas can be placed on them.
Relative importance of elements
Which elements are the most important?
Pick elements that the script gives theatrical life to.
Spectacle and sound can be most clearly manipulated – can add to play.
Character, idea, story usually integral to the play itself.
Director interprets and helps actors achieve characterization clearly.
If a play of poetic language, must pay attention to.
If play of character directed as play of plot, has long stretches where nothing seems to be happening, boring (Three Sisters).
Where in the play are the highs and lows of each?
How to give theatrical excitement to each?
Brief History of Design
Greek - scenic devices used - masks and costumes - the "machina"- for the "deus ex machina" - but little is known of designers.
Medieval theatre - scenic elements and costume important - often a "master of secrets" (usually machinists, guildsmen) - some intricate effects - such as the Hellmouth - but little concept of artistic unity
Renaissance - theatre buildings constructed for the first time since the Roman Empire - single-point perspective in Italy -- designer becomes essential
Sabastiano Serlio (16th century) - 3-dimensional scenery
Joseph Furttenbach (17th century) - quick scene changes, painted drops, and flats
Elizabethan - Inigo Jones (274) brought Italianate staging ideas to England - by the 17th century (1600's), design was a high art and designers considered as artists.
Costumes - still little regard for artistic unity, though could be lavish -- often actors supplied own costume.
1750-1900 - costume becomes more specific, along with scenery and lighting.
David Garrick hired Phillippe de Loutherbourg - a scenic designer -- to unify with representations of real places.
The Romantic era brought much more specificity, and led the way for realism, though Romantic theatre was not at all realistic.
With the use of Gaslight in 1830 in Philadelphia and by mid 19th though Romantic theatre was not at all realistic.
In the 20th century, with electric light, from painting to architecture, from two- to three- dimensional cubes, from realism to symbolism and "selective realism," arena stages in the 1950's (though they appeared much earlier in the medieval period), thrust stages in the 60's, stage design has become more diverse - but still attempts to unify a production.
Factors of Design
Physical Aspects of Scene Design:
1. Line
2. Mass
3. Composition
4. Texture
5. Color
Designers at Work
Scene Designer - must consider:
number of settings (one "unit set" (332) which is designed to remain the same throughout the production [with minor changes in background, set props, etc.], but which can represent various locales; or different sets to be changed during the production)
shape and size of the house - sightlines
how scenery will be shifted
Rigged to "fly" from the fly loft (80), elevators,turntables, tracks and wheels
Materials of set designers:
Traditional "flats" (107)- 1 x 3 " wood frame covered with muslin (a rough cotton fabric) and then painted - can look like walls or other solid structures, yet very lightweight.
Platforms and parallels (collapsible platforms) are also common (note: see images when you click on "flats" above...)
Wood, plastic, and metal, etc. are becoming more widespread.
Cyclorama - (79) U-shaped back of stage, for sky or background.
special effects
scrims (107-108) (-- our production of The Night of the Iguana used a number of scrims )
"flying" set pieces from the "fly-loft" (80)
"wagons," "treadmills" (106)
historical accuracy, if necessary
budget and schedule
The Process of Set Design:
Renderings - loose free-hand drawings of early impressions.
Ground-plan - a bird's eye view.
Three-dimensional models.
Thumb-nail sketches.
Elevations (scale drawings).
Instructions for building:
Technical director oversees construction.
The scene designer also often does the Properties (Props) that are not part of the regular scenery, handled by actors (canes, furniture [handled], letters, etc.)
Props are usually:
designed and built or
bought or rented
Costume Designer's Objectives:
1. Help establish tone and style of the production
2. Indicate the historical period of a play and the local in which it is set
3. Indicate the nature of individual characters or groups in a play: their stations in life, their occupations, their personalities
4. Show relationships among characters: separate major characters from minor ones, contrast one group with another
5. Meet the needs of individual performers: make it possible for an actor or actress to move freely in a costume; allow a perforemer to dance or engage in a sword fight, for instance; when necessary, allow performers to change quickly from one costume to another.
6. Be consistent with the production as a whole, especially with the other visual elements
costumes are often rented or bought ("pulling costumes"), built from scratch, rebuilt, or borrowed.
-clothes must be "right" for the character.
-comfortable to actor (within reason) and usable.
-aesthetically pleasing - can make a big difference to actor's character.
Designer must analyze:
Given circumstances - sex, age, health, social class, focal importance
Shape - silhouette (outline) pleasing.
Movement of costume.
Texture and draping.
Enhancement or suppression of body lines (different periods have different styles: pushed up busoms of the French Empire, flattened busoms of the 1920's, codpieces in medieval and Elizabethan, togas in Rome).
Individual actors - long necks, skinny arms, etc.
Costume shop foreperson executes the designs.
Costume designer's resources:
1. Line, shape, and silhouette
2. Color
3. fabric
4. Accessories
Makeup (117), hairstyles, and masks -- all related to costumes.
* I collect images before I cast. The way you see your main characters affects the casting. I look for a style in "faces" -- it gives me a sense how to direct the cast, how to make it into an emsemble...
The Lighting Designer
[ Lighting not an important factor in design till 1830's with limelight, but even then needed sharper control. Electricity was the key ]
to imitate natural effects
to enhance: change shape, mood and tone
Now high-tech, computerized
Objectives of Stage Lighting:
1. Provide visibility -- let the performers and other elements be seen
2. Help establish time and place
3. Help create mood and tone
4. Reinforce the style of the production
5. Provide focus onstage and create visual compositions
6. Establish rhythm of visual movement
Lighting instruments - the term used to refer to the units that deliver the light (including the housing and the light bulb, or lamp).
The lighting designer can influence only five things in lighting: Color, direction/distribution, intensity, form, movement
1. color - changed by using gels -- colored pieces of plastic (heat resistant - the only color light that will get through is the color of the gel)
mixing of colors -- warm lights (amber, straw, gold) with cool colors (blue, blue-green, lavender) can produce depth and naturalness
2. direction / distribution - can be up to 150 lights in a production
3. intensity - brightness -- controlling the amount of current to instrument - "dimmers" control that amount
4. form -- the shape of the light
5. movement -- alterations in the other factors will give impression of movement - this would also include the movement of a "follow-spot" (powerful spotlight as that swivel and shine on different places).
fades, cross-fades, blackouts can suggest movement and form
Instruments:
a. spotlights: ellipsoidal reflectors - long distances, sharp and clear
b. fresnels (pronounced "fruh-nel'" - named after Frenchman Fresnel who designed a "step lens" - the lens had less and more even mass, so it would heat evenly, avoiding the problem of regular convex lenses heating uneavenly and thus cracking - "fill" light - diffused, to "wash" or "blend."
c. striplights, footlights: footlights used very little these days, but strip lights used to add "fill" light.
d. flood lights: no lens, no color - for a "flood" of light
Sound Design
Sound design has always been used in some way (rolling cannonballs for sound of thunder), but with modern technology, more precise sounds are possible.
Reproduction -- the use of motivated (called for by the script) and environmental (help create more illusion of reality) sounds
includes sound effects...
Reinforcement -- the use of amplification
Modern practice of "mic'ing", sound effects, background music - further technology (some discussed on 138) and expertise may increase sound capabilities, as it appears to be one of the hardest to control.
When I say do not think about text, actors, stage separately, I do not mean directing everything at once. On the contrary, you direct "lyaer by layer" -- script and actors (characters), genre and staging, themes and light and etc. You are a builder, not a magician; you have to fix one thing at the time.
We have free actors to act -- and therefore to "block" and "fix" many extra-directions (to hide and cut). Directing is limiting the unlimiting (non-organized) imagination. Concept is your tragectory (your story); NEW STORY!
From an idea to show -- what a travel! Survival is the name... How much can I get (bring and give to public) at the end (spectacle)?
In the theatre, most of a director's time is devoted to rehearsal. The French word for rehearsal is répéticion, which describes much of what goes on. What happens specifically during a rehearsal will depend on the nature of the play and the personal style of the director. Sometimes the actors are allowed plenty of time and freedom to explore and experiment with their characters. Indeed, one of the most important duties of a director is to maintain a "safe" environment during rehearsals in which actors feel free to take risks in the creation of their characters. On other occasions the director might give the actors very specific blocking and other instructions at the first rehearsal. Actors are usually given a deadline by which time they are expected to be off book--having learned their lines and blocking. Plays are usually rehearsed in small fragments at first. There is much stopping and starting, discussion, and repetition. Then, as these individual sections begin to take shape, they are combined and rehearsed as full scenes. Near the end of the rehearsal period, the scenes are combined for uninterrupted run-throughs of complete acts. At this point the director is more likely to give notes to the actors at the completion of scenes or acts rather than by interrupting them in progress. In the case of musicals, separate rehearsals are conducted by choreographers and music directors. Finally, the director begins to shape the entire piece by focusing on such overall elements as pace, tempo, and rhythm.
The last step in preparing a play is the introduction of the design elements during technical rehearsals. While there are variations in practice depending upon the play, theatre, and level of production, the following pattern is fairly typical. The first tech usually involves adding the actual scenery and props that will be used. In the case of a multi-set show, this will include coordinating the changing of scenery with the movements of the actors. The second tech adds the lighting and sound cues. The third and fourth techs involve adding costumes and make up and are called dress rehearsals. Finally, a test or preview audience is admitted in order to make final adjustments based on their reactions. At this point, the director's contractual obligations normally end. Although in the case of long-run shows the director may be required to check back periodically to ensure the integrity of the piece--that actors are not making gratuitous changes.
In television, especially episodic dramas and sitcoms, rehearsals are much shorter. For example, the television series Homicide: Life on the Streets, was filmed on location in Baltimore. Often different directors are hired for each episode. A director for Homicide was on the job for only fourteen days: seven days of pre-production planning, and seven twelve-hour days of shooting. They had no "real" rehearsals at all, only walk-throughs with the camera. This is possible for three reasons: the lead actors have already created their characters and relationships, many of the sets are the same, and the script itself is shorter than a play. To finish on schedule they must shoot six to eight pages per day as compared to from two to three pages which is common in film. In film, rehearsals are held in piecemeal fashion because the shooting takes place over several months in many different locations. In both film and television, actors need less time to learn their lines since each shot is only a short piece of the script. Actors have time between set-ups to study their next lines. http://homepage.mac.com/roberthuber/school/1delec10.html
