Giving equal space to the sanctity of script and the artistic freedom of directors, this book addresses the difficulties encountered by playwrights and directors as they bring a script to the stage. Inspired directors can help a writer of genius turn his play into exciting theatre, but playwrights find that giving directors leeway to interpret and modify text can result in directors' overriding authorial intentions. This book presents the best that has been written by literary theorists on the current definitions of text and attempts to depart from quick rule-of-thumb assessments of the problem.Drawing from definitive articles in literary and theatre journals, part one gives the reader basic concepts and terminology. Interviews with playwrights and directors, showing the complexity of the issue, appear in part two, and part three includes case studies of playwrights and directors who faced production crises. Legal aspects of collaboration are considered in part four. The book concludes with a positive approach and possible solution to the problem.

Giving equal space to the sanctity of script and the director's artistic freedom, this book considers the difficulties encountered by playwright and director, as they bring a script to the stage.

IllustrationsPrefaceAcknowledgmentsTheories of Authorship and InterpretationLiterary Assumptions about TextLiterature's New Criticism Applied to TheatreRemarks of Playwrights and DirectorsAlley Forum: Playwrights, Directors, and the Postmodern StageRobert Anderson, PlaywrightSidney Berger, DirectorDanny Mann, Director, and Edward Albee, PlaywrightLanford Wilson, PlaywrightRobert Wilson, Performer, Director, WriterJose Quintero, DirectorTiers of Director/Playwright Interchange: Five Case StudiesA "Director's Director": Tennessee Williams and A Streetcar Named DesireA Tyrant Director? William Inge and Joshua LoganA Director's Distortion of a Modern Classic: Arthur Miller's Shift in StanceA Playwright-Director with a Classic: Albee's Direction of BeckettDirector, Playwright, and Cast: Caryl Churchill's Approach to TextTheatre Aesthetics and the LawContractual Provisions of the Dramatists' Guild, Inc.Collaboration and American Law: The Rights of Playwrights: Performance Theory and American Law by Robert HapgoodAfterwordWorks CitedGeneral BibliographyIndex