The Way You Did Once: An Intuitive Approach to Directing Collaboration

In my thesis, I tell the story of my personal experience of creating and directing a work of theater collaboratively with an ensemble of five performers. I examine the impact of the process on my thinking and current work. I also discuss key influences on the way I built relationships within the collaboration, including Anne Bogart’s Viewpoints technique and ideas of “common language” and “safe space.” I describe the particular challenges of creating a devised work with found text and the many elements that came together to prepare the production for performance. Audience response and intellectual analysis of the script were less important to me than discovering a collective, intuitive understanding of the work. I provide a brief discussion and copy of the final script. I conclude that finding freedom in the work and sharing it with other people was-­‐ and is-­‐ at the heart of my thesis and my identity as a theater director.