[…] It is a familiar observation that few theatrical terms are more fluidly evocative or problematic than “dramaturgy.” The range of possible definitions of the term is practically as broad as the number of its practitioners […] Yet most understandings of the concept include two basic characteristics of sound practice:

1) an effort to establish and maintain a degree of critical objectivity;

2) a deep commitment to the creator(s) involved, the project, and the art and craft of theatre.

Further, while highly elastic in terms of specific strategies, a central role of dramaturgy is to question habit, to complicate unreflective expediency, and to dig beneath the surface of unearned presumption.

Bruce Barton, Navigating Turbulence: the Dramaturg in Physical Theatre (2005)
[Emphasis and paragraph breaks are mine. Download the original here.]

The fact of the matter is, nobody agrees on what we are doing. Dramaturgy is a young field and there is no consensus, as yet, as to how a dramaturg does or should work. Aside from this, different lineages of dramaturgy have emerged within theatre and dance, further confusing everybody.

What follows is my attempt to clarify expectations regarding how I work. I write this with full respect to my many colleagues whose approaches, assumptions and methods differ from my own.

My philosophy as a dramaturg

When describing my practice as a dramaturg to friends and family outside of the artistic field, I use a collection of metaphors:

• An artistic midwife — the performance being made is not my baby, yet I help it come into the world and support the mother in giving birth.

• A psychotherapist, where the client is the piece itself.

• A very specialised kind of consultant.

The second of these metaphors — that of the therapist — has special significance for me since I am, in fact, a psychotherapy trainee (aiming to qualify as a Gestalt Therapist). Additionally, I am also a certified systemic coach. As a trainee therapist and practising coach, my orientation is firmly based on humanistic thinking with a systemic undertone.

Humanistic therapy is based on a belief in the self-actualising tendency—the process of the organism becoming itself. Independent of contingencies, the organism will always orient towards some kind of integration and congruence. I believe this can be applied directly to dramaturgical work, assuming this self-actualising is occurring not only in the artists at work but in the piece itself.

Humanistic practice is also strongly characterised by a phenomenological and client-centred flavour.

For this reason, I sometimes refer to myself as an “Artist-Centred Dramaturg” as a reference to Carl Rogers’ “Person-Centred Therapy.”

Essentially, I see it as vital to support a process that I have been invited into but which is not my own. (It’s not my baby.)

I use some concrete practices/tools/methodologies/theories that are more directly focused on making performance. I hold them lightly, but when they’re useful, they’re bloody useful:

The Six Viewpoints are based on the pedagogy of the late great Mary Overlie. The Viewpoints are known in performance training and compositional work, but they are also an extremely useful tool for analysing performance effectively and pragmatically.

Laban Movement Analysis and Body-Mind Centering are invaluable in helping me describe human movement in a nuanced and complex way.

The Discipline of Authentic Movement is an excellent training in witnessing performance work unfold.

Gestalt psychology (related to but not the same as Gestalt Therapy) is a way to understand the manner in which a perceptual whole (a Gestalt) is experienced as a whole and whether a Gestalt is closed or left open. It is also helpful in clarifying the relationships between the figure (dominant objects of perception) and the ground (everything else) at any given moment.

Finally, my background in oral storytelling and mythology. I don’t make a big song and dance about it in the dance world, but besides being a singer in a rock band, my first performative language was traditional, oral storytelling. This is relevant not so much in the aristolean sense of dramaturgy — crafting coherent story arcs — but in terms of understanding the archetypal dimension that appears in artistic work and the essential relationship between a performer and their audience that oral-tradition storytelling embodies in such a clear and straightforward way.

There are some special tasks which I see as implicit in my work as a dramaturg. These are derived, mainly but not entirely, from the condition that when making a performance, you cannot be in the work and view it from the outside as well — unlike an author who can read their own books or a musician who can hear themself practice:

• To help get the rehearsal into the trace.

• To free the artists to direct their energy, as fully as necessary, into the artistic endeavor itself.

• To help the artist understand which questions and concerns are important internally to their artistic process and which are (to be) shared with the audience.

• To help the artists be aware of when they are changing plans or direction. If they have a specific intent of what they want the piece to be (about), they may ask me to help them keep “on task” with that intent. I will not necessarily fulfil this request, but if a new direction emerges in the work, I will invite them to reflect on what extent to follow the emergent direction or to return to the earlier intent.

• To have one foot inside and another foot outside the artistic process.

• To help articulate something that is experienced tacitly.

• To clarify the structure of my experience as a model audience member.

• To help speculate how the piece will change when moved from the rehearsal space to the performance space.

• To clarify which artistic choices are on the table and what roads they might lead down (without telling the artist which I believe is preferable).

• To clarify the subject of the verb — when you are doing that, what are you actually doing?

Occasionally, I will be asked to contribute to the artistic process in a way that I wouldn’t consider dramaturgy senso stricto. This is often something more like directing.

I will, if begged and pleaded with, give my opinion as to what I would do if I were in the position of the making-artist. I do this with a lot of disclaimers. However, at the end of the day, I have had a career as a performer and choreographer, so I have my opinions about, and preferences regarding, performance.

Final Thoughts

Discovering this path of work has been one of my greatest joys in nearly two decades of active artistic work. It brings together my love of working with artists on a deeply personal and interpersonal level with my love of the art and craft of performance. It has also brought me into artistic processes I would never have thought about being involved with. If you had told me some years ago that, for example, a chunk of my work would be in contemporary circus, I would have been open but dubious.

I get to be surprised by the aesthetics and choices of others and to work with performers so excellent that I wouldn’t have been brave enough to perform alongside or choreograph for them myself.

In short, it is the best job in the world.