A Beginner's Guide to Devising Theatre

Winner of the 2021 Music & Drama Education Award for Outstanding Drama Education Resource Much of the theatre we make starts with a script and a story given to us by someone else. But what happens when we're required to start from scratch? How do we begin to make theatre using our own ideas, our own perspective, our own stories? A Beginner's Guide to Devising Theatre, written by the artistic directors of the award-winning young people's performance company Junction 25 and is aimed at those new to devising or wanting to further develop their skills. It explores creative ways to create original theatre from a contemporary stimulus. It offers a structure within which to approach the creative process, including ideas on finding a starting point, generating material, composition and design; it offers practical ideas for use in rehearsal; and it presents grounding in terminology that will support a confident and informed approach to production. The book features contributions from some of the young performers who have been a part of Junction 25's work to date, as well as key artists and companies that work professionally in devised theatre, including case studies from Quarantine, the Team, Mammalian Diving Reflex, Nic Green and Ontroerend Goed. The work of Junction 25 is used to illustrate the concepts and ideas set out in the book. Ideal for any student faced with the challenge of creating work from scratch, A Beginner's Guide to Devising Theatre offers constructive guidance, which supports the requirements of students taking Drama and Theatre Studies courses. The book includes a foreword by theatre critic Lyn Gardner.

Jess Thorpe is co-director of theatre company Glass Performance with Tashi Gore.

List of Illustrations
Acknowledgements
Foreword by Lyn Gardner
Part One: An Introduction to devising theatre with young people
An Introduction to Junction 25
Who is this book for?
Why devise theatre?
Beginning to collaborate
Part Two: Devising theatre in seven stages
An overview
Stage 1: Building the group dynamic
Stage 2: Selecting an inquiry question
Stage 3: Finding the frame
Stage 4: Making original material for performance
· Writing text
· Movement and choreography
· Performance images
· Action
· Music
Stage 5: Structure and composition
Stage 6: Reflection
Stage 7: Production: Sharing your work with an audience
Part Three: Five interviews and one running order
Interviews with companies that devise theatre; an introduction
Interview about the process of devising All the Sex I've Ever Had by Mammalian Diving Reflex with Artistic Director Darren O'Donnell
Interview about the process of devising Wallflower by Quarantine with Artistic Director Richard Gregory
Interview about the process of devising Mission Drift by the TEAM
with Artistic Director Rachel Chavkin
Interview about the process of devising £¥EUR$ (LIES) by Ontroerend Goed with Artistic Director Alexander Devriendt
Interview about the process of devising Trilogy by Nic Green with Artist Nic Green
An example of a running order - ANOESIS by Junction 25
Index
List of Contributors