Directing Postmodern Theater: Shaping Signification in Performance (THEATER: THEORY/TEXT/PERFORMANCE) - Hardcover

Whitmore, Jon

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0472095579 ISBN 13: 9780472095575

Publisher: University of Michigan Press, 1994

Synopsis

Directing Postmodern Theater brings together critical theory and contemporary theater practice to provide valuable tools for directing in today’s expansive performance world.Postmodern theater places new and novel demands on stage directors. It is more experimental, and the boundaries of what constitutes a performance have shifted. Dialogue is no longer always the primary mode of communication, and music, sound, movement, and other visual elements are being explored as ways to make meaning onstage.Directing Postmodern Theater identifies the key communications systems at work in the theater: linguistic, visual, aural, olfactoral, and physical. Further, it pinpoints and examines twenty semiotic sign-systems that can be manipulated by directors to bring about meaningful communication. It is also the first book to bridge the gap between theoretical discussions of semiotics and the actual practice of producing theater. For those theories to have an impact, argues Whitmore, they must be linked to the process of transforming a playscript or concept into a living performance. This book fills the gap in practical yet provocative ways, grounding theoretical discussions in examples from specific postmodern productions.

About this title

About the Author

Jon Whitmore is President, Texas Tech University.

Edition details

• Publisher: University of Michigan Press
• Publication date: 1994
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0472095579
• ISBN 13: 9780472095575
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 242