Creative Play Direction

Robert Cohen and John Harrop begin their creative directing instruction Creative Play Direction by presenting a brief history of the advent of directors. In their first chapter “The Directorial Function,” the authors make a clear emphasis on one definite role of directors; they should have a diverse knowledge of everything in a theatre, ranging from the script to various production elements. Separated into ten chapters, the book explores script interpretation, theatrical compositions, director-actor interaction and styling of a play. Skimming through the chapters, it is apparent that the writers want directors to know everything since the book covers the design elements of production such as the ground plan, lighting, and sound, which people …show more content…
In the chapter covering blocking, Cohen and Harrop introduce several ways of blocking with different intentions. They stress on ways of blocking with an overriding focus on presenting intrinsic interpretation of a script. The chapter also includes a number of different images to demonstrate which blocking facilitates which visual effect correspondingly, thus very helpful for visualization. Another chapter “Working with Actors” explains different acting systems including Stanislavski’s system, Meyerhold’s biomechanics, Copeau’s poetic physicality, Artaud’s theatre of cruelty, and Brecht’s epic theatre. In this section, Cohen and Harrop take an extra step by offering a general guideline of how directors should react and interact with actors corresponding to each system. It is important to acknowledge that the authors neither show their preference of the acting system nor evaluate which system is better. This nonjudgmental approach works nicely for this book in that it does not give biased perspectives on each system; it is up to the reader to make decision on which system he or she