Collaborative Stage Directing: A Guide to Creating and Managing a Positive Theatre Environment

by Jean Burgess

Collaborative Stage A Guide to Creating and Managing a Positive Theatre Environment focuses on the director's collaboration with actors and the creative team, and the importance of communication and leadership skills to create and manage a healthy working environment. Speaking directly to the student, this compact resource walks the aspiring director through basic principles of group dynamics, active listening, open-ended questioning, brainstorming, and motivational leadership, supported by examples and case studies offered by current professional and academic directors. With a focus on preparing the student director for resume-building opportunities beyond the studio lab, Collaborative Stage Directing challenges readers with reflective activities, a series of guiding questions to apply to three short plays, and an extensive checklist to assist them with independent directing projects. As an easy-to-use resource, Collaborative Stage Directing works as a supplement to a classic directing text or as a stand-alone guide.

136 pages, Kindle Edition

Published May 30, 2019

About the author

Jean Burgess is an author of both fiction and nonfiction, a playwright, an editor, a workshop presenter, and a former theatre educator.

Her debut fiction, That Summer She Found Her Voice: A Retro Novel, about a young woman’s journey of self-discovery as she tours the US with a swing band in the late 1970s, is currently available for pre-order on Amazon and is scheduled to be published by Apprentice House Press on April 9th, 2024.

Her nonfiction, Collaborative Stage Directing: A Guide to Creating and Managing a Positive Theatre Environment, was published by Routledge/Taylor & Francis in 2019.

Jean holds an MA in Theatre from Northwestern University and a Ph.D. in Educational Theatre from NYU.

Reviews

[Bree Glasbergen · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is practical, intuitive and actionable. I particularly enjoyed the self reflection tasks and actionable insights. The foreword is perceptive as writing to different types of directors is helpful. For example I am a student learning how to be a director in a learning environment and would get something different out of it than someone teaching or experienced. Well worth a yearly reread, I think.