Re-Direction: A Theoretical and Practical Guide

333 Pages·2002·3.815 MB·English

by  Rebecca Schneider, Gabrielle Cody

RE: DIRECTION
Re: direction is an extraordinary resource for practitioners and students of directing. It provides a collection of groundbreaking
interviews, primary sources and essays on twentieth-century directing theories and practices around the world.
Helpfully organized into four key areas of the subject, the book explores theories of directing, the boundaries of the director’s role, the
limits of categorization, and the history of the theatre and performance art.
Exceptionally useful and thought-provoking introductory essays by editors Schneider and Cody guide the reader through the wealth of
material included here. Re: direction is the kind of book anyone interested in theatre history should own, and which will prove an
indispensable toolkit for a lifetime of study.
Rebecca Schneider is a member of the graduate faculty of Cornell University’s Department of theatre, Film, and Dance where she
teaches Performance Studies, Visual Culture and Theatre History. She is the author of numerous works in theatre, performance art, and
performance theory.
Gabrielle Cody is Associate Professor of Drama and Chair in the Department of Drama and Film at Vassar College, where she has
taught since 1992. She received her M.F.A. in Directing from the University of Minnesota, and her Doctorate in Dramaturgy and Dramatic
Criticism from Yale University.
WORLDS OF PERFORMANCE
What is a ‘performance’? Where does it take place? Who are the participants? Not so long ago these were settled questions, but today
such orthodox answers are unsatisfactory, misleading, and limiting. ‘Performance’ as a theoretical category and as a practice has
expanded explosively. It now comprises a panoply of genres ranging from play, to popular entertainments, to theatre, dance, and music,
to secular and religious rituals, to ‘performance in everyday life’, to intercultural experiments, and more.
For nearly forty years, The Drama Review (TDR), the journal of performance studies, has been at the cutting edge of exploring these
questions. The Worlds of Performance Series is designed to mine the extraordinary riches and diversity of TDR’s decades of excellence,
bringing back into print important essays, interviews, artists’ notes, and photographs. New materials and introductions bring the volumes
up to date. Each World of Performance book is a complete anthology, arranged around a specific theme or topic. Each World of
Performance book is an indispensable resource for the scholar, a textbook for the student, and an exciting eye-opener for the general
reader.
Richard Schechner
Editor TDR
Series Editor

OTHER TITLES IN THE SERIES

Acting (Re)Considered edited by Phillip B. Zarrilli
Happenings and Other Acts edited by Mariellen R. Sandford
A Sourcebook of Feminist Theatre and Performance: On and Beyond the Stage edited by Carol Martin
The Grotowski Sourcebook edited by Richard Schechner and Lisa Wolford
A Sourcebook of African-American Performance: Plays, People, Movements edited by
Annemarie Bean
Brecht Sourcebook edited by Carol Martin and Henry Bial
RE: DIRECTION
A THEORETICAL AND PRACTICAL GUIDE
Edited by Rebecca Schneider and Gabrielle Cody
First published 2002 by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
by Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group
© 2002 editorial matter, Rebecca Schneider and Gabrielle Cody
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or
other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system,
without permission in writing from the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Re: direction : a theoretical and practical guide / [edited by] Rebecca Schneider and Gabrielle Cody.
p. cm. – (Worlds of performance)
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 0–415–21390–8 (alk. paper) – ISBN 0–415–21391–6 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Theater – Production and direction. I. Schneider, Rebecca. II. Cody, Gabrielle 1956- III. Series.
PN2053 .D537 2001
792′.0233 – dc21 2001019654
ISBN 0–415–21390–8 (hbk)
ISBN 0–415–23191–6 (pbk)
CONTENTS
List of illustrations
Acknowledgments
General introduction
Rebecca Schneider and Gabrielle Cody

Part I Directors of classical revolt
1 Introduction to Part I
Rebecca Schneider
2 The reign of the theatrical director: Antoine and Lugné-Pöe
Bettina L. Knapp
3 Stanislavsky: uncensored and unabridged
Sharon Marie Carnicke
4 Three Sisters at the MAT
M. N. Stroyeva
5 My Russian notebook, 1934
Lee Strasberg
6 An interview with Okhlopkov
Lee Strasberg and Sidney Kingsley
7 Meyerhold’s production of The Magnanimous Cuckold
Nick Worrall
8 Reality is not enough: an interview with Alan Schneider
Richard Schechner
9 Brecht as director
Carl Weber
10 The revolutionary moment
Lee Baxandall
11 Paradise Now!: notes
The Living Theatre
12 From Art in Everyday Life
Linda Montano
13 Invisible Theatre
Augusto Boal

Part II Auteur theatre
14 Introduction to Part II
Gabrielle Cody
15 Artaud’s Les Cenci
An account by Roger Blin, Artaud’s letters, and critical reviews
16 Tadeusz Kantor’s journey
Jan Klossowicz
17 Theatre and therapy: Robert Wilson
Bill Simmer
18 Vessel: the scenography of Meredith Monk – an interview
Brooks McNamara
19 Foreman’s PAIN (T) and Vertical Mobility
Kate Davy
20 Pearls for Pigs: program notes
Richard Foreman
21 AIDS and avant-garde classicism: Reza Abdoh’s Quotations from a Ruined City
John Bell
22 Woman, man, dog, tree: two decades of intimate and monumental bodies in Pina Bausch’s Tanztheater
Gabrielle Cody
23 Haiku in the flesh: Oguri’s theatre of transmutation
Meiling Cheng

Part III Theatres of community and transculturation
24 Introduction to Part III
Gabrielle Cody
25 Collective creation
Theodore Shank
26 An interview with Grotowski
Richard Schechner, Theodore Hoffman, Jacques Chwat, Mary Tierney
27 Talking with Peter Brook
Richard Schechner, Jean-Claude Carrière, Joel Jouanneau, Georges Banu
28 Building up the muscle: an interview with Ariane Mnouchkine
Josette Féral
29 The Other history of intercultural performance
Coco Fusco
30 Nomadmedia: on Critical Art Ensemble
Rebecca Schneider

Part IV Montage, reiteration, revision
31 Introduction to Part IV
Rebecca Schneider
32 Eisenstein’s Wiseman
Daniel Gerould
33 Montage of attractions
Sergei Eisenstein
34 Charles Ludlam’s Ridiculous Theatrical Company
Ron Argelander
35 Ridiculous Theatre, scourge of human folly
Charles Ludlam
36 Family of the f.p.: notes on the Theatre of the Ridiculous
Stefan Brecht
37 Is there a text on this stage? Theatre, authorship, interpretation
Gerald Rabkin
38 Island hopping: rehearsing the Wooster Group’s Brace Up!
Euridice Arratia
39 Hamlet at world’s end: Heiner Müller’s production in East Berlin
Maik Hamburger
40 Suzan-Lori Parks and Liz Diamond: doo-a-diddly-dit-dit – an interview
Steven Drukman
41 Three Sisters at millennium’s end: Richard Schechner’s production at La Mama
Rebecca Schneider

Index
Illustrations
7.1 Kasimir Malevich’s The Knife Grinder, 1912
Computer-generated examples of Meyerhold’s exploration of the materials of mass production. ‘To take a basic “literary”
7.2
word like TEXT and rob it of its semantic attachment, to deform it and restructure it architecturally.’
7.3 Rendering of L. F. Popova’s set for The Magnanimous Cuckold
7.4 State Theatre set, Moscow 1922. Popova’s ‘mechanized’ set for The Magnanimous Cuckold
13.1 Augusto Boal conducting a workshop at NYU
16.1 The 1980 production of Wielopole, Wielopole
16.2 The 1988 production of I Shall Never Return
17.1 Robert Wilson performing with Christopher Knowles, at Shiraz in Iran during the Eighth Festival of the Arts in 1974
17.2 Raymond Andrews in Deafman Glance
17.3 Christopher Knowles in The $ Value of Man (1975)
20.1 Rehearsing Pearls for Pigs
22.1 Dance ‘Cattle call’ in Bausch’s Kontakthof
The Brooklyn Academy of Music Opera House stage is transformed into a pool of ankle-deep water for Arien by Pina
22.2
Bausch
23.1 The 1988 premiere of Oguri’s thestreamofconsciousness
23.2 The 1988 premiere of Oguri’s thestreamofconsciousness
25.1 Ann Halprin explaining the score for one of her pieces at the Dancers’ Workshop of San Francisco
25.2 Mabou Mines’ Red Horse Animation
25.3 The AgitProp group performing outdoors in London
28.1 Nirupama Nityanaudau and Simon Abkarian as Iphigenia and Agamemnon in the 1992 production of Les Atrides
29.1 Fusco and Gómez-Peña, Two Undiscovered Amerindians Visit . . ., 1992–4
29.2 Fusco and Gómez-Peña, Two Undiscovered Amerindians Visit . . ., 1992–4
41.1 Act I of Three Sisters, directed by Richard Schechner
41.2 Act II of Three Sisters, directed by Richard Schechner
41.3 Act III of Three Sisters, directed by Richard Schechner
41.4 Act IV of Three Sisters, directed by Richard Schechner
Acknowledgments
Thanks are due to Talia Rodgers of Routledge for encouraging this project in every respect. We are also grateful to The Drama Review’s
editor, also editor of the Worlds of Performance Series, Richard Schechner, for allowing us to take his journal and ‘do as we think best’
in our approach, choices, and organization of material. When he took issue with our perspective he always allowed himself to be
convinced. We are also thoroughly indebted to editorial assistants Monika Gay, Magdalena Romanska, and Harvey Young of Cornell
University for invaluable help with research, leg-work, and general editing, and also to Alexa Torgensen of Vassar for hours of scanning
and spell-checking.
The following were first published in The Tulane Drama Review and are reprinted with permission of TDR (NB the prefix ‘T’ is a style
used by TDR, denoting each issue not by volume and number but by individual issue): ‘The Three Sisters at the MAT’ by M. N.
Stroyeva, Tulane Drama Review 9, 1 (T25) 1964: 42–56 and ‘Reality is not enough: an interview with Alan Schneider’ by Richard
Schechner, Tulane Drama Review 9, 3 (T27) 1965: 118–54.
The following were first published in TDR: The Drama Review and are reprinted with permission of The Drama Review: ‘My Russian
notebook, 1934’ by Lee Strasberg was published as ‘Lee Strasberg’s Russian notebook (1934),’ TDR 17, 1 (T57) 1973: 106–12; ‘An
interview with Okhlopkov’ by Lee Strasberg and Sidney Kingsley, TDR 17, 1 (T57) 1973: 121–3; ‘Meyerhold’s production of The
Magnanimous Cuckold’ by Nick Worrall was published as ‘Meyerhold’s production of The Magnificent Cuckhold,’ TDR 17, 1 (T57)
1973: 14–34; ‘Brecht as director’ by Carl Weber, TDR 12, 1 (T37) 1967: 101–7; ‘The revolutionary moment’ by Lee Baxandall, TDR
13, 2 (T42) 1968: 92–107; ‘Paradise Now: notes’ by the Living Theatre, TDR 13, 2 (T43) 1969: 90–107; ‘Antonin Artaud’s Les Cenci’
by Roger Blin et al., TDR 16, 2 (T54) 1972: 90–145; ‘Robert Wilson and therapy’ by Bill Simmer, TDR 20, 1 (T69) 1976: 99–110;
‘Vessel: the scenography of Meredith Monk: an interview’ by Brooks McNamara, TDR 16, 1 (T53) 1972: 87–103; ‘Foreman’s PAIN(T)
and Vertical Mobility’ by Kate Davy, TDR 18, 2 (T62) 1974: 26–37; ‘An interview with Grotowski’ by Richard Schechner, TDR 13, 1
(T41) 1968: 29–41; ‘Eisen-stein’s Wiseman’ by Daniel Gerould, TDR 18, 1 (T61) 1974: 71–6; ‘Montage of attractions’ by Sergei
Eisenstein, TDR 18, 1 (T61) 1974: 97–106; ‘Charles Ludlam’s Ridiculous Theatrical Company’ by Ron Argelander, TDR 18, 2 (T62)
1974: 81–6; ‘Ridiculous Theatre, scourge of human folly’ by Charles Ludlam, TDR 19, 4 (T68) 1975: 70. ‘Family of the f.p.: notes on
the Theatre of the Ridiculous’ by Stefan Brecht, TDR 13, 1 (T41) 1968: 117–41.
The following were published in The Drama Review: A Journal of Performance Studies and are reprinted with permission of MIT
Press: ‘Stanislavsky: uncensored and unabridged’ by Sharon Marie Carnicke, TDR 37, 1 (T137) 1993: 22–37; ‘Invisible Theatre’ by
Augusto Boal, TDR 34, 3 (T127) 1990: 24–34; ‘Tadeusz Kantor’s journey’ by Jan Klossowicz, TDR 30, 3 (T111) 1986: 98–155;
‘Pearls for Pigs: program notes’ by Richard Foreman, TDR 42, 2 (T158) 1998: 157–9; ‘AIDS and avant-garde classicism: Reza
Abdoh’s Quotations from a Ruined City’ by John Bell, TDR 39, 4 (T148) 1995: 21–47; ‘Woman, man, dog, tree: two decades of
intimate and monumental bodies in Pina Bausch’s Tanztheater’ by Gabrielle Cody, TDR 42,2 (T158) 1998: 115–31; ‘Talking with Peter
Brook’ by Richard Schechner, Jean-Claude Carrière, Joel Jouanneau, Georges Banu, TDR 30, 1 (T109) 1986: 54–71; ‘Nomadmedia: on
Critical Art Ensemble’ by Rebecca Schneider, TDR 44, 4 (T168) 2000: 120–31; ‘The Other history of intercultural performance’ by
Coco Fusco, TDR 38, 1 (T141) 1993: 143–67; ‘Island hopping: rehearsing the Wooster Group’s Brace Up!’ by Euridice Arratia, TDR
36, 4 (T136) 1992: 121–42; ‘Suzan-Lori Parks and Liz Diamond: doo-a-diddly-dit-dit, an interview’ by Steven Drukman, TDR 39, 3
(T147) 1995: 56–75.
‘The reign of the theatrical director’ by Bettina L. Knapp was originally published in The French Review 6, 6 (l988) and is reprinted
with permission of The French Review.
The selection from Art in Everyday Life by Linda Montano, Station Hill, NY: Astro Artz, 1981; ‘Collective creation’ by Theodore
Shank, TDR 16, 2 (T54) 1972: 3–31; and ‘Building up the muscle: an interview with Ariane Mnouchkine’ by Josette Feral, TDR 33, 4
(T124) 1989: 97–106, are reprinted with permission of the authors.
‘Is there a text on this stage?’ was originally published in Performing Arts Journal 26/27 (l985) and is reprinted with permission of the
journal.
‘Hamlet at world’s end: Heiner Müller’s production in East Berlin’ by Maik Hamburger is reprinted from Shakespeare and Cultural
Traditions, edited by Tetsuo Kishi, Roger Pringle, and Stanley Wells, London: Associated University Presses, 1994. It is reprinted with
permission of the Associated University Presses.
‘Review of Three Sisters’ by Rebecca Schneider was published in Theater Journal 49, 3 (1997): 365–7 and is reprinted with
permission of the journal.
Note
Notes at the ends of chapters are by the author(s) of those chapters unless otherwise indicated.