DRAM30290 Directing Site-Responsive Theatre

Academic Year 2022/2023

This module offers students an opportunity to engage practically with selected play texts with special emphasis on the challenges they pose to directors, and on how they work in site-responsive settings. Students will explore the role of the director, the encounter between performer and spectator, the aesthetics and logistics of site-responsive theatre, and will, through practical and theoretical engagement, develop a director's notebook detailing their own proposed site-responsive production.

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Curricular information is subject to change

Learning Outcomes:

This course aims to introduce students to the role of the director through the context of site-responsive theatre. 

- Students will encounter examples of site-responsive theatre, and conduct detailed practical exploration of selected plays.
- Students will develop their initial ideas for site-responsive work into a cohesive and well-developed production plan. 

- On completion of the course, students will be familiar with issues concerning site-responsive theatre, be confident in their understanding of the role of the director in theatre, and be capable of creating a production plan in the form of a Director's Notebook

Indicative Module Content:

1. What is site responsive theatre?
2. Dramatic texts & site – which comes first?
3. The Dramaturgy of Space
4. Audience Performer Encounters
5. Physicality
6. Mini Site Responsive Presentation
READING WEEK
7. Promenade
8. Designing non theatre spaces
9. The logistics of off-site work
10. Director’s Notebook Preparation
11. Course Review

Student Effort Hours: 
Student Effort Type Hours
Seminar (or Webinar)

22
Autonomous Student Learning

80
Total

102
Approaches to Teaching and Learning:
This module examines selected play texts via their possibilities for site-responsive theatre, from perspectives of both theory and practice. 
In weekly workshops and preparation tasks, students will encounter a range of approaches to staging site-responsive, immersive, environmental and outdoor theatre in the work of key contemporary directors and companies. 
Throughout, students are supported to develop individual responses to a selected range of dramatic works through creative engagement with the practical, aesthetic and logistical challenges of site-responsive staging.
Due to the nature of this practice-based module, therefore to receive the full benefit of the module, students are strongly recommended to attend all classes.
 
Requirements, Exclusions and Recommendations

Not applicable to this module.


Module Requisites and Incompatibles
Not applicable to this module.
 
Assessment Strategy  
Description Timing Open Book Exam Component Scale Must Pass Component % of Final Grade
Presentation: Mid-Term Presentation: workshop presentation of a short site-responsive performance, and submission of a written analysis and evaluation of the impact and effects of the work in performance.
Week 6 n/a Graded No

20
Portfolio: Final Portfolio: Director's Notebook focusing on a full play text (a pre-existing, published text selected by the student) imagined site-responsively. The production concept is mapped out in a p Week 12 n/a Graded No

60
Continuous Assessment: Contribution and submission at the beginning of each class of 3 written points in response to a set task in relation to the class topic(s). Throughout the Trimester n/a Graded No

20

Carry forward of passed components
Yes
 
Resit In Terminal Exam
Spring No
Please see Student Jargon Buster for more information about remediation types and timing. 
Feedback Strategy/Strategies

• Feedback individually to students, on an activity or draft prior to summative assessment
• Feedback individually to students, post-assessment
• Peer review activities

How will my Feedback be Delivered?

Students receive informal / formative feedback througout the trimester in response to work-in-progress sharings and contribution to class discussion. Formal written feedback will be provided for the mid-term presentation and the final portfolio.

Name Role
Ms Andrea Scott Lecturer / Co-Lecturer