Dramaturgy and Curation
To make a theatre festival which attracts audiences who do not normally see theatre, it is imperative that the theatre shown must be artistically accessible. By “artistically accessible”, I mean that it must be appealing to audiences who do not normally see theatre.
This brings me to the topic of dramaturging accessibility for new theatre audiences, namely whether that dramaturgy should be very thorough to attain a certain quality and image, or whether it should be looser for more liberal creation. In his article “Dramaturgy for radical theatre”, Sky Gilbert argues for “hands-off development” (Gilbert 3), wherein selected directors and other, similar artists are left to develop their projects over time, as opposed to being given critical feedback by an official dramaturg, who Gilbert believes would limit or impede the artistic range of the work.
On the contrary, Paula Danckert describes a very hands-on approach when outlining a dramaturg’s duties: “commissioning playwrights; working with writers from an early inception of a play through to production; running play development programmes; workshopping scripts with actors, designers and composers; researching different editions of texts; editing scripts; [...] planning the seasons with the Artistic Director” (Danckert).
The question for accessible theatre is which approach is best. It is my belief that hands on curation is vital when attracting audiences with little experience watching theatre. Because these audiences are not used to interpreting theatre, they will not be critically prepared to receive a play in the same way as an experienced theatregoer. In a sense, any play an inexperienced audience member sees is an ambassador to the art form: if the play is not well received, then the audience member may dismiss theatre as an art form altogether; on the other hand, if the play is well received, then the audience member may choose to become a regular theatregoer and will thus develop theatrical literacy. Therefore, any theatre festival which aims to attract a wide audience which includes new audience members must make curation and hands on dramaturgy a priority. Of course, this also means that a festival must make a specific mandate about what they consider to be “good” and “bad”. This may invite restrictive dramaturgy which locks out experimental theatre altogether, and a festival which implements such a mandate must be careful to be aware of and prevent this sort of methodology. “Good” does not necessarily mean traditional, and there are environments within which an inexperienced audience member may enjoy experimental work the likes of which they have not seen before.
Works Cited
Paula Danckert (Company Dramaturg and Associate Artist). “The Role of the Dramaturg at the National Arts Centre”. Web.
Sky Gilbert. “Dramaturgy for radical theatre”. Canadian Theatre Review, (87), 1996. 25-27.
