Fundamentals of Play Direction

Director's Function 

Defining the duties, responsibilities, and required knowledge of a play di- rector would give the uninitiated some indication of the director's function, but would still be limited since-unlike the playwright, designers, and ac- tors-the director's contribution remains intangible and not easily perceived. The complete ignorance of most people about the function of directors is not perhaps surprising. Even in music, the presence of the director's counterpart- the conductor of an orchestra-is seen and felt, but not so the director: Once the play is in performance it is there for what one sees, hears, and feels. The thought, creative efforts, and technical controls that have gone into the behind-the-scene workings rightly should be nonintrusive.

Of course, we must recognize that the new vision a director may bring to a work, or the use of a play as a vehicle for his own creative input, definitely establishes the director's presence, however ineffable. This elusive quality of the director's contribution has had its dire consequences whenever a play's direction falls into the hands of those untrained and inexperienced in its many demands no matter how closely they may have been associated with other theatrical productions. On the other hand, a director may have the necessary requisites and training and still prove ineffective. This is the mystery and often the tragedy of any art.



Five Elements of Play Direction 


Composition

Composition is the structure, form, or design of the group. It is not, how- ever, the meaning of the picture. Composition is capable of expressing the feeling, quality, and mood of the subject through color, line, mass, and form. It does not tell the story. It is the technique; it is not the conception.

Composition is the rational arrangement of people in a stage group through the use of emphasis, stability, sequence, and balance, to achieve an instinc- tively satisfying clarity and beauty. Since composition cannot be avoided in the placement of set pieces, fur-niture, objects, and people on the stage space, both director and designer should create effective compositions that serve the demands of the situation, rather than haphazard arrangements that prove distractive, contradictory, or intrusive.

Picturization 

After the technique of procuring articulate and pleasing arrangements has been mastered and a mood value obtained with our compositions, we are ready to inject meaning into the stage picture. Already in doing the demon- strations and exercises under composition, we have found it difficult to pre- vent meaning, or a storytelling quality, from entering the work. Now we are ready to concentrate on this factor which is called picturization-the second fundamental element of directing.

Picturization is the visual interpretation of each moment in the play. It is the placing of characters in a locale that suggests their mental and emotional attitudes toward one another so that the dramatic nature of the situation will be conveyed to an audience without the use of dialogue or movement. It is the outer action that, in turn, makes the audience understand, at times con- trary to the dialogue, the inner meaning or subtext existing within and be- tween characters. This visual interpretation of the play should be developed as fully as the auditory.

Movement 

Movement, the third fundamental element of directing, is the stage picture in action. It comprises the moments of picturization in their ever-changing aspects. Although movement exists in the passages from picture to picture, it must have of itself a definite picturizing value. In discussing the situation of Solomon and the two mothers (chapter 7), we have incorporated the smallest amount of movement during the changes from one picture to another. By degrees this increases until we arrive at a great deal of movement, movement that becomes an important factor in staging and must be considered an active contributive quality of a play in performance. Just as we learn the principles of composition and picturization from painting, so we learn the contributions of movement to the stage play from the principles of movement in the dance. Like composition, movement has both a technical value and a mood value. Movement, such as exits and entrances or the hiding of an object, is supplied by the author for the necessary action in the progression of the story. There are other movements, however, supplied by the director for character eval- uation, emphasis, variety, and mood expression.

Rhythm 

With rhythm, our fourth fundamental element of directing, we come to an area of play directing that is difficult to capture in writing, even though rhythmic experience, sensitivity, and expression can be recognized and under- stood by most. To appreciate rhythm and its practical application, we must first analyze its characteristics and the role association plays in its subsequent resulting emotions. These become aids in determining the rhythm of a play and the functions it can perform.

The exercises under rhythmic pattern and tempo are meant primarily to further this appreciation and sensitivity to rhythmic experience rather than to give us an instant technique that can be applied mechanically to the subtle dynamics of directing.

Pantomimic Dramatization

The importance of pantomimic dramatization to the performance of a play is evidenced by the psychological fact that most people are visually minded and therefore are more deeply impressed by what they see than by what they hear. This fifth element of directing is most valuable in giving a play distinction, richness, and vitality by using the fundamentals as a means of dramatizing each scene without the use of dialogue.

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