Shortlisted for the STR Theatre Book Prize 2023 With an exclusive focus on text-based theatre-making, Inside the Rehearsal Room is both an instructional and conceptual examination of the rehearsal process. Drawing on professional practice and underpinned by theory, this book moves through each stage of rehearsals, considering the inter-connectivity between the actor, director, designers and the backstage team, and how the cumulative effect of the weeks in rehearsal influences the final production. The text also includes: - Auto-ethnographic and fully ethno-graphic case study approaches to different rehearsal rooms - Interviews with directors, actors, designers and actor trainers - A consideration of the ethics of the rehearsal room and material selected for production - Practical exercises on how to creatively read a text from an acting and directing perspective Informed by over 20 years of directing experience in the UK and Europe, Robert Marsden's book offers a practical guide that ultimately demystifies the rehearsal process and challenges how the rehearsal room should be run in the twenty-first century.

"A clear and accessible how-to-approach to the rehearsal process. Author Gary Sloan brings more than thirty years' worth of acting experience to bear on the question of how to rehearse both as an individual actor and as part of the team of professionals that underpins any successful production. Interviews with acclaimed actors, directors, playwrights, and designers share a wealth of knowledge on dynamic collaboration. The book is divided into three main stages: a flexible rehearsal program, how to work as part of a company, and the creation of a personal rehearsal process. This helps readers to refine their craft in as straightforward and accessible a manner as possible... Breaks down the rehearsal process from the actor's perspective and equips its reader with the tools to become a generous and resourceful performer both inside and outside the studio." -- Back cover.

The sensational first novel from the Booker Prize-winning author of The Luminaries. Set in the aftermath of a sex scandal at an all-girls’ high school, Eleanor Catton’s internationally acclaimed award-winning debut is a provocative and darkly funny novel about the elusiveness of truth, the slipperiness of identity, and the emotional compromises we make to belong. When news spreads of a high school teacher’s relationship with one of his students, the teenage girls at Abbey Grange are jolted into a new awareness of their own potency and power. Although no one knows the whole truth, the girls have their own ideas about what happened. As they obsessively examine the details of the affair with the curiosity and jealousy native to any adolescent girl, they confide in their saxophone teacher, an enigmatic woman who is only too happy to play both confidante and stage manager to her students. But when the local drama school decides to turn the scandal into a play, the boundaries between fact and fantasy soon break down as dramas both real and imagined begin to unfold. Sharply observed, brilliantly crafted, and infused with a deliciously subversive wit, The Rehearsal is at once a vibrant portrait of teenage longing and adult regret, and a shrewd exposé of how we are all performers in life, from one of the most bold and exciting voices in contemporary fiction.

A remarkable story about love, loss and the power of the imagination, from an award-winning, celebrated writer for children. On a frozen Christmas Eve, Mouse Mallory and his family set off across a snow-white valley to visit his grandparents. They never arrive. As the wheels skid off the icy road, Mouse is thrown from the car. When he wakes, he finds himself in a magical landscape, with only a talkative sheep and a very bossy horse for company. And they tell him: this is your story now. So begins Mouse's extraordinary quest through a world of wonder. A world of monsters, minstrels, dangerous knights and mysterious wizards; a world of terrifying danger but also more excitement than Mouse has ever known. All to find a castle, somewhere, beyond. But why is Mouse looking for a castle? As thoughts of his family back at the car begin to surface, Mouse realises this might be the most important journey he will ever make ... This is a novel about love and death. It's about the power of stories to change the way we view the world - and it's about the power of a child to change their own world. Emotionally arresting but ultimately uplifting, this is a remarkable novel for our times.

‘Fizzes with intellectual curiosity. Kane writes engagingly and with a humility difficult to find among idea-entrepreneurs’ James Harkin, Independent We all think we know what play is. Play is what we do as children, what we do outside of work, what we do for no other reason than for pleasure. But this is only half of the truth. The Play Ethic explores the real meaning of play and shows how a more playful society would revolutionize and liberate our daily lives. Using wide and varied sources – from the Enlightenment to Eminem, Socrates to Chaos theory, Kierkegaard to Karaoke – The Play Ethic shows how play is fundamental to both society and to the individual, and how the work ethic that has dominated the last three centuries is ill-equipped to deal with the modern world. With verve, wit and intelligence, Pat Kane takes us on a tour of the playful world arguing that without it business, the arts, politics, education, even our family and spiritual lives are fundamentally impoverished. The Play Ethic seeks to change the way you look at your daily life, how you interact with others, how you view the world. It is a guidebook to new, exciting – and unsettling – times. Shocking, controversial, yet magnificently argued, The Play Ethic is a book no one who works, or has ever worked, can afford to be without. ‘Kane's Manifesto for a Different Way of Living is a brave attempt to inject a little playfulness . . . into the dull grind of the working stiff’ Iain Finlayson, The Times

A detailed guide to the collaborative method developed by the acclaimed creators of The Laramie Project and Gross Indecency--destined to become a classic. A Vintage Original. By Moisés Kaufman and Barbara Pitts McAdams with Leigh Fondakowski, Andy Paris, Greg Pierotti, Kelli Simpkins, Jimmy Maize, and Scott Barrow. For more than two decades, the members of Tectonic Theater Project have been rigorously experimenting with the process of theatrical creation. Here they set forth a detailed manual of their devising method and a thorough chronicle of how they wrote some of their best-known works. This book is for all theater artists—actors, writers, designers, and directors—who wish to create work that embraces the unbridled potential of the stage.

A rare insider's account of the true story behind the development of the famous Stanislavski method. Vasili Toporkov was one of the rare outsiders ever to be invited to join the Moscow Art Theatre. Although already an experienced and accomplished artist, he was forced to retrain as an actor under Stanislavski's rigorous guidance. Stanislavski in Rehearsal is Toporkov's vivid account of this learning process, offering an eloquent and jargon-free insight into Stanislavski's legendary 'system' and his method of rehearsal that became known as the Method of Physical Action. Spanning ten years - from 1928 to 1938 - Toporkov charts the last crucial years of Stanislavski's work as a director and offers the only reliable biographical sketch that we have. Through Toporkov's account, Stanislavski is revealed as a multi-faceted personality - funny, furious, kind, ruthless, encouraging, exacting - waging a war against clichés and quick answers, inspiring his actors and driving them to despair in his pursuit of artistic perfection.

Playwrights in Rehearsal is an inside look at the writer's role in the creative process of bringing his or her words to life on stage. Susan Letzler Cole, granted rare access to some of the major playwrights of our time, recounts her participation in rehearsal with Arthur Miller, Sam Shepard, Tony Kushner and Suzan-Lori Parks, and others.

John Abbott, author of The Improvisation Book, explains how theatre directors at every level can use improvisation in the rehearsal room. Foreword by Mark Rylance. 'Improvisation can be used as part of the creative process of rehearsing a play. It can be a fabulous tool for exploration and discovery. It can strengthen the actor's commitment to their character. And it can create an environment of confidence and spontaneity.' Packed with useful exercises and improvisation scenarios, and examples from a wide variety of plays, Improvisation in Rehearsal reveals how improvisation enriches and enlivens the creation of characters, back-stories, relationships, shared histories and emotional lives. The book also demonstrates how improvisation can be used as a powerful tool in the foundation of a strong company, and when searching for the hidden depths and dynamics in a scene. Building on his own experience as an actor, director and teacher, Abbott writes with clarity and an infectious enthusiasm which will motivate directors to try the techniques for themselves. As Mark Rylance says in his Foreword, this book 'will inspire and delight its readers'.