Theatre Directing and Performance Practice

Directions for Directing. Theatre and Method, a new textbook for directing methodology, by Avra Sidiropoulou, is now featured in the ground-breaking Routledge Performance Archive.

An integral part of Directions for Directing, this extensive web component contains interviews, master classes and video workshops by inspirational directors, actors, set and lighting designers, choreographers, and directing students, from the U.S., the U.K, Greece, Japan, Denmark, Spain and New Zealand.

Directions for Directing: Theatre and Method. Routledge, 2019.

Directions for Directing: Theatre and Method lays out contemporary concepts of directing practice and examines specific techniques of approaching scripts, actors, and the stage. Addressed to both young and experienced directors but also to the broader community of theatre practitioners, scholars, and dedicated theatre goers, the book sheds light on the director’s multiplicity of roles throughout the life of a play – from the moment of its conception to opening night – and explores the director’s processes of inspiration, interpretation, communication, and leadership. From organizing auditions and making casting choices to decoding complex dramaturgical texts and motivating actors, Directions for Directing offers practical advice and features detailed workbook sections on how to navigate such a fascinating discipline. A companion website explores the work of international practitioners of different backgrounds who operate within various institutions, companies, and budgets, providing readers with a wide range of perspectives and methodologies.

This is a manuscript version of the chapter on the Heterarchical Director, published in a new edition of Director's Theatre, edited by David Bradby, David Williams and Peter Boenisch.

Focusing on the case study of Improbable Theatre’s directing tandem Phelim McDermott and Lee Simpson (and their 2017 production of Lost without Words at the National Theatre London), this essay traces a lineage of the contemporary director, rooted in the paradigm of live improvisation and facilitative directing associated with the practice of Keith Johnstone. Drawing on the notion of heterarchy as a principle of self-organisation,  I suggest that the twenty-first century director can be characterised not only by an altered approach to authorship, but also to leadership and interpersonal relationships.

> Context • The thoroughly second-order cybernetic underpinnings of naturalist theatre have gone almost entirely unremarked in the literature of both theatre studies and cybernetics itself. As a result, rich opportunities for the two fields to draw mutual benefit and break new ground through both theoretical and empirical investigations of these underpinnings have, thus far, gone untapped. > Problem • The field of cybernetics continues to remain academically marginalized for, among other things, its alleged lack of experimental rigor. At the same time, the field of theatre studies finds itself at an impasse between post-structuralist semioticians and embodied cognitivists regarding key onto-epistemological issues. A program of research framing and utilizing naturalist theatre as a second-order cybernetic/cybersemiotic laboratory holds much promise in addressing both matters and lending credence to Ross Ashby's assertion that " the discovery that two fields are related leads to each branch helping in the development of the other. " > method • After establishing the nature of the onto-epistemological deadlock within theatre studies, this article examines the application of cybernetic heuristics within naturalistic theatre, leading to a second-order cybernetic analysis of its processes of production and reception and the outline of an experimental program for exploring these processes further. > results • Foundations for a model of naturalist theatre as a cybersemiotic laboratory grounded in a novel operationalization of Gordon Pask's conversation theory. > implications • The proposed laboratory could result in the generation of quantitative and qualitative research pertaining to several dimensions of second-order cybernetics; particularly cybersemiotics, which, as a result, may end up better positioned to help dissolve onto-epistemological deadlocks between constructivists and realists of all stripes across the academy and beyond. > Constructivist content • I argue that an analysis of naturalistic theatre's processes of meaning-making filtered through the constructivist ontological agnosticism of second-order cybernetics offers a productive middle way forward for those on both sides of the social constructivist/embodied cognitive realist divide, within and beyond theatre studies. The article draws upon the works of Gregory Bateson, Søren Brier, Ranulph Glanville, Heinz von Foerster, and Niklas Luhmann. >

Київський національний університет культури і мистецтв Факультет режисури та шоу-бізнесу Кафедра режисури естради та масових свят КУРСОВА РОБОТА на тему: «МАЙСТЕРНІСТЬ ВЕДУЧОГО НА ЕСТРАДІ» Виконав: Студент ІV курсу Групи ТМ-71 Брацюня Івана Олександровича Керівник: Кандидат педагогічних наук Губа О.А. ВСТУП Мистецтво малих форм з самих різних і часом навіть несподіваних сторін вторгається в життя сучасної людини. Естрада, цирк, концерти самодіяльності більш гнучкі й загальнодоступні, ніж інші види мистецтв. Чимала роль у пропаганді цих мистецтв належить радіо і телебаченню. Завдяки доступності мистецтво малих форм набуває величезне виховне значення. Адже естрада і цирк за допомогою специфічних, тільки їм притаманних засобів допомагають усвідомити і побутові, і етичні, і громадські, і міжнародні проблеми нашого життя. З розвитком концертного життя стало швидко розширюватися і сфера діяльності ведучих. Мистецтво це рідкісне і майже не має аналогій в інших артистичних спеціальностях. Далеко позаду, залишився той короткий початковий період, коли ведучий був тільки «озвученою» друкованою програмою. Чим різноманітніше, різнохарактерні ставали концерти, тим ширше розсувалися рамки цієї професії. До філармонічним (симфонічним та камерним) концертам додалися тематичні, змішані, дитячі, усні журнали. У них виступають, як правило, ведучі. Різноманітність концертної програми завжди доставляє глядачеві задоволення. Однак кожному хочеться відчути логічний взаємозв'язок між номерами. Іноді осягнути її важко. Це викликає в аудиторії незадоволеність, часто навіть неусвідомлену, але заважає повноцінному сприйняттю концерту.

This thesis aims to recount the performance history of Euripides’ Bakkhai with special reference to nine eminent productions of the 20th century. First, I deal with methodological issues on how one gathers together the pieces of evidence from an ‘invisible’ performance. Given that the Bakkhai was only revived in the 20th century,
the review of its textual reception in Chapter 1 covers the gap between the textual and the theatrical re-usage of the play. Moreover, to review the literature would prove that
there is indeed a structural model already inbuilt in the text and subsequently applied to performance not necessarily as a footnote to classicist theories. Chapter 2 retells the
stage history of the Bakkhai through nine of the least documented productions of this ‘forgotten’ Euripidean tragedy. My Conclusions decipher the structural model of the Bakkhai and provide an explanation for its ‘otherness’ as a tragedy intended for the theatre of the mise-en-scène.

The proliferation of western theatre conventions, including the art of directing, is a major challenge to the development of theatre practice and practitioner in Nigeria. This problem has been enabled by issue of poor documentation that has continuously undermined the development of home grown inventiveness that besets the African society. Hence, the fantastic Nigerian directors who are demised or retired do not have a rich documentation of their approaches, techniques and styles for textual interpretation on stage, documented. This is a qualitative study that documents the directorial art, approaches, techniques and style of textual interpretation deployed by Rasaki Ojo Bakare in the performance of his Drums of War. The study captures data through observation by participation and also through in-depth interview, and the data are thereby analyzed qualitatively. This study captures the realistic and non-realistic performance theories to establish basis for the eclectic directing style of the director under study. The findings of the study include the justification for the Directors art in the task of casting, rehearsal procedure, performance attributes and audience response to the textual interpretation of the selected performance. Among other things, the study encourages and recommends the documentation of the African arts of the theatre, even in contemporary times. This is specifically important for the art of directing in Nigeria, so that the home-grown attributes and peculiarities of performance can be imbibed for the development of theatre practice in Nigeria.

Synthesizing the pedagogy of acting with new findings in Neuroscience and archetypal understandings of human ways of learning and seeing. This book contains practical exercises for directors, actors, and teachers to use combining these three elements.

Cumhuriyet Dönemi Türk Tiyatrosu'nun köklerinin yazar ve oyuncunun gelişimine dayayarak geliştiği, 20. Yüzyıl Tiyatrosu'nun aksine yönetmenin Türk Tiyatrosu'na oldukça geç bir zamanda kimliğini kabul ettirdiği gerçektir. Türk Tiyatrosu'nda yönetmen olgusunun seyirci tarafından fark edilişi gecikmiş bir hamle olabilir, ancak Cumhuriyet Dönemi Türk Tiyatrosu'nda kumpanya mantığının kırılması, Darülbedayi ve Devlet Tiyatroları'nın kurulmasıyla yönetmenlik kavramı biraz daha gelişmiştir. Yönetmenin kendi kimliğini tam olarak ortaya koyması 1960'lı yılları bulmuş olabilir, öte yandan Peter Brook, Ariane Mnouchkine örneklerinde olduğu gibi, Türkiye'de bir Yönetmen Tiyatrosu'ndan zaten söz edilemez. Zira, Türkiye'de bir tiyatro ekibi ve salonu olan, çalışmalarını böyle bir ortamda tutarlı olarak geliştiren bir yönetmen'den söz bile edilemez. Cumhuriyet öncesi Türk Tiyatrosu oyunculara endeksli gelişmiş ve kumpanya mantığıyla ilerlemiştir. Cumhuriyet Dönemi'nde Carl Ebert gibi Batı'lı eğitmenlerden de destek alınarak, öncelikle oyuncu eğitimine geçilmiş , ardından çeşitli yarışmalar açılarak tiyatro yazarları desteklenmiştir. . Ödenekli tiyatrolarda halen yerli yazar kotası vardır, ancak yönetmen kotası yoktur. Ödenekli tiyatrolar kendi yönetmenlerini usta oyuncular ya da yönetmen kadroları arasından seçmekte, kendi kadrolarından oyun projesi beklemekte, nadiren konuk yönetmenlerin projelerini hayata geçirmektedirler.. Nilüfer Belediye Tiyatrosu geçen yıl yeni bir adım atarak, yönetmenlerin projelerinden yola çıkan bir repertuar anlayışı oluşturmuştur. Benzer bir uygulama İKSV Tiyatro Festivali'nde de vardır, ancak proje değerlendirmelerinde yönetmen kimliğinden öte, ekip başvurusu göze alınmaktadır.

It is customary in our country to divide the current theatre culture into
representatives of, as it were, three temporal layers: those who began their activities during the “Khrushchev Thaw” of the 1960s and filled it with ideas of hope associated with that time; those who began to work in the 1970s; and those who began in the 1980s. These three tiers essentially define theatre life in this country today.

In this essay, we explore what is at stake for Kurdish theatre artists who develop their theatre praxis in a permanent state of emergency imposed by the Turkish government, and why it matters to act, both in the general sense and in the theatrical one, in a language that is neither the accepted one of the nation nor of the majority culture. This essay discusses interviews with five prominent Kurdish theatre artists, some based in Turkey and others currently in exile in Europe. The respondents included costume designer Ismail Oyur Tezcanli (based in Turkey), playwright Yusuf Unay (in Turkey), actor and director Mîrza Metin (currently in Germany), instructor and director Rezan Aksoy (in Germany), and director Celil Toksöz (in the Netherlands, though not in exile).

How could a basketball team function if the following questions were at the top of their training and performing lists?
Do you mind if I touch you?
Don't we need a 'violence coach' for this?
Should we bring in an Intimacy coach to avoid distress?
When did actors stop being athletes of the heart, mind, and body? Is this the culmination of the in-going, psychologically analytical, open wound style of acting promulgated by the Strasberg Method folks? Is it about the idea that acting is emotion? Does it concern the film close-up wherein actors reveal their tortured hearts with tears?

Or perhaps the reason for the required questions has to do with the overall fearfulness in the US population as a whole, stemming from a Puritan background that seems to have reared it punitive head.

Or maybe it is a result of the 'build self esteem' teaching movement that swept the country a few decades ago where every child was given a reward and not taught how to deal with overcoming obstacles through conflict.

Whatever the reason, conflict and story telling seem to be losing the battle as we retreat from true interaction between and among actors and seek self-inflicted emotion.

Actor training today is mostly solo, ingoing, and introspective. We do very little to encourage the conflictive interaction at the heart of drama outside of combat class. We leave action in the head, relate it only to plot, and never fully explore what releasing the conflict physically might uncover. In our acting training the powerful senses of touch and smell presented by another's body are not fully addressed. We shy away from these vital and powerful ingredients because we literally fear the archetypal sensuality, sexuality, and violence of which theatre is made.

If we still lived in a literary world, wherein theatre was an auditory event dressed up with costumes, witnessed by other literary people, we might not need anything more.

However, the latest neuroscientific research tells us that the perception of action whether fully accomplished or only intended is what keeps people engaged, merely to see what is going to happen.

How do we create actors who are 'actors' rather than 'feelers'?

My search as an acting specialist is to find a way to reinvigorate the stage, to equalize the creative relationship between directors and actors, and to explore what moves audiences and what doesn't. As a result, I have written a book entitled, Acting, Archetype, and Neuroscience: Superscenes for Rehearsal and Performance, Routledge, 2016.

Goals
The pedagogical limitations of working on scenes and speeches out of context were the impetus to creating a course focused on roles. All acting choices ought to be guided by the intentions of a full production, but class work often fails to deal with the big picture of how an actor goes about creating the arc of a performance from start to finish. It is in production that actors have the opportunity to work on the whole of a role. One of my goals in creating this course was to provide actors with formats and exercises that would allow them to work on a role without being in rehearsal. The other was to share with actors the power and coherence of a thematic approach to performance. Developing a Role aims to teach actors how to translate what a play is about into acting choices.

A basic premise
Ensemble actors need to be inside the same play – that is, they must share an understanding of what matters in the world created by the script. They should, moreover, act on that understanding by making choices inspired by the issues that informed the writing and are embedded in it. The basic idea is quite simple and too much neglected: actors should act what a play is about.

In my article I am going to present the artistic method used by Krystian Lupa, nowadays the most important theatre artist in Poland. This prominent director and pedagogue has kept for years a kind of intimate journal that is published both in the form of articles and books. However, while anounsing the discussion of the artistic method haven't I overstepped the horizon of the Lupa's notion of his work in theatre? In his text entitled "Utopia-letters to actors", Lupa describes an exercise in which actors are asked to transfer onto a piece of paper what they see with their "inner touch". As he explains, the pain we feel takes different shapes in our imagination. However how to draw them on a piece of paper? While observing novice actors participating in his workshops, Lupa points to the incertitude on their faces and hope that a miracle will happen and some of them will be able to perform the task. Later on, he explains that the hope that it will be fine "goes with its roots to the marvels of childhood-to this not fully trustful magic-when one closes their eyes and tries spells that are supposed to raise them into the air or cause the surrounding world ceases to exist. (...) Yes-all this dispute is from such a borderland. Unfortunately, I haven't told them about it-they had an impression that they deal with a serious method, no matter how unreal and absurd." Then, how to discuss a method that maybe is not totally serious? How to remain faithful to the text whose inherent value is its personal character, strengthened by highly artistic, literary language? This is how Lupa writes and works. His ability to spin never-ending monologues during rehearsals is legendary, and the monologue itself appears in his reflections under the name of an "interior monologue," as the main tool of actor's work. Thus each attempt to explain notes of this prominent director will be a betrayal of his lecture, and an attempt to systematise his notes will deprive them of their most attractive aspect. This is what happens in the majority of the cases when one tries to explain methods of creative work of artists. On the other hand, it is difficult to remain

This book is an insiders’ account of the groundbreaking Moscow production
of Chekhov's The Seagull directed by Anatoly Efros in 1966, which
heralded a paradigm shift in the interpretation and staging of Chekhov’s
plays. It is a unique glimpse behind the curtain of the laboratory of new
Russian theatre in the twentieth century. Efros' articles about Chekhov and
The Seagull, his diaries, interviews and conversations, and most
importantly the original rehearsal records combine to form an in-depth
account of of the director and his working process. This is an essential
book for anyone with an interest in Chekhov and the history of modern
Russian theatre.

> Context • The thoroughly second-order cybernetic underpinnings of naturalist theatre have gone almost entirely unremarked in the literature of both theatre studies and cybernetics itself. As a result, rich opportunities for the two fields to draw mutual benefit and break new ground through both theoretical and empirical investigations of these underpinnings have, thus far, gone untapped. > Problem • The field of cybernetics continues to remain academically marginalized for, among other things, its alleged lack of experimental rigor. At the same time, the field of theatre studies finds itself at an impasse between post-structuralist semioticians and embodied cognitivists regarding key onto-epistemological issues. A program of research framing and utilizing naturalist theatre as a second-order cybernetic/cybersemiotic laboratory holds much promise in addressing both matters and lending credence to Ross Ashby's assertion that " the discovery that two fields are related leads to each branch helping in the development of the other. " > method • After establishing the nature of the onto-epistemological deadlock within theatre studies, this article examines the application of cybernetic heuristics within naturalistic theatre, leading to a second-order cybernetic analysis of its processes of production and reception and the outline of an experimental program for exploring these processes further. > results • Foundations for a model of naturalist theatre as a cybersemiotic laboratory grounded in a novel operationalization of Gordon Pask's conversation theory. > implications • The proposed laboratory could result in the generation of quantitative and qualitative research pertaining to several dimensions of second-order cybernetics; particularly cybersemiotics, which, as a result, may end up better positioned to help dissolve onto-epistemological deadlocks between constructivists and realists of all stripes across the academy and beyond. > Constructivist content • I argue that an analysis of naturalistic theatre's processes of meaning-making filtered through the constructivist ontological agnosticism of second-order cybernetics offers a productive middle way forward for those on both sides of the social constructivist/embodied cognitive realist divide, within and beyond theatre studies. The article draws upon the works of Gregory Bateson, Søren Brier, Ranulph Glanville, Heinz von Foerster, and Niklas Luhmann. >

Conference paper
“Spaces of Loss:  Heterotopic Scenographies in Contemporary European Theatre Practice”

School of English
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
International Conference: The Politics of Space and the Humanities
15-17 December 2017

Abstract

Whether it houses private concerns or public disquiet, contemporary performance space has become an echo chamber of anxiety and desire, reflecting the multiple raptures between the individual and its environment. It also foregrounds perennial ambiguities that relate to how we perceive the world around us, a world that paradoxically appears more global and yet more isolated than ever. In the work of many experimental directors, it expands and distends to allow for allegory to enter the domain of the private, while, in some cases, intermedial design forms relentlessly interrogate the loss of identity in an increasingly dehumanized world. Theatrical space, consequently, becomes intensely heterotopic –“counter-sites” and “places outside of all places”, as Foucault would argue—engaging the audience in a visceral understanding of what lies within, underneath and beyond the solid structures of stage design.

Productions by European enfants terribles Ivo van Hove, Thomas Ostermeier, and Romeo Castelluci, among others, use set design both as a physical environment and a mental landscape –featuring spaces of tentative intimacy and surveillance, but also of sexuality, obsession and void. For some, scenography is a witness to the decay of humanistic values, bearing testimony to an ailing society and to a time of profound ideological unrest. For others, it becomes an opportunity for introspection and real community. For all of them, scenography is an invitation to an immersive experience of both loss and reconstitution –of metaphysical and civic identity, actual or imagined homelands and emotional connection.

Often regarded in distinction to normative directing practice in the theater (Schneider and Cody 125), auteurism –understood also in terms of a scenic écriture– invests in the redefinition of the notion of text as an open field of interpretive possibilities and in the shifting of emphasis from traditionally inscribed narratives to open-ended, dynamic events, defying given perceptual codes. The art of the auteur, which has infiltrated theatre practice since the last couple of decades of the twentieth century, has been steadily informing the choices, methods and collaborative processes of theatre directors in Greece. Three artists in particular, Michael Marmarinos, Yannis Houvardas and Theodoros Terzopoulos, have been at the forefront of experimentation with the very form of the theatre, displaying, throughout an extensive body of work, a stylistic consistency, a significant degree of control over the end product, an enhanced sense of aesthetics, and a strong point-of-view with regards to the birth, “meaning” and reception of performance.

The article explores the ways in which Marmarinos’, Ηouvardas’ and Terzopoulos’ work has come to form a trend –soon to be a legacy– among the younger generations of theatre artists in Greece. Examples from their most representative productions will be brought to the fore, in an attempt to illustrate and further substantiate their status as auteurs, especially vis-à-vis the practice of a. devising (Marmarinos) b. recontextualization (Houvardas) and c. physical dramaturgy (Terzopoulos). Influences from a variety of theatre traditions will also be discussed, in so far as these have helped shape new stage forms and idioms bearing each director’s unique stamp, a trademark which characterizes their work.

A new take on the character of Clytemnestra and the ancient myth of the house of Atreus, the poetic monologue "Clytemnestra’s Tears" (written and directed by Avra Sidiropoulou) was initially presented at Dipylon Theatre in Athens in April 2004, subsidized by the Hellenic Ministry of Culture. It was performed by highly acclaimed, award-winning actress, Ms. Themis Bazaka. The production became part of the official repertory of La MaMa ETC in New York City, in May-June 2007. It was funded by The Alexander S. Onassis Public Benefit Foundation, the Ioannis F. Costopoulos Foundation and the Hellenic Culture Organization.

"Theatricality of Robert Lepage" is an exploration of the creative process of one of the most innovative theatre directors working today.

"Ultimately it offers the reader a valuable 'Resource' - and assistance to further study that is of some significance." Contemporary Theatre Review

In 2016 Rob Hastie was appointed to the Artistic Directorship of Sheffield Theatres, the largest complex of theatres outside of London, comprising the thrust-stage Crucible, the shape-shifting Studio and the proscenium-arch Lyceum theatres. In this interview he talks about his recent productions of Coriolanus (2020) and Julius Caesar (2017), the dynamics of directing in different theatre spaces, the processes of creating theatre, and why Shakespeare's plays matter today.

Through the manifestation of the concept of a sign we discuss the question of how the meaning and significance takes place in a theatre environment, as we analyze the process of signification/communication in a theatrical stage reality. This semiotic perspective helps us to develop the idea of ​​a theatre performance as a theatrical text created by actor and space, and accepted by the audience. This text includes at its core two aspects of signification - linguistic/non-linguistic and performative (physical action), which actually stimulates the diversity of signification on stage. We explore the premise that as a text, as a semiotic construct of signs and sign formations, a theatrical performance is defined by a set of codes that are generally supra-theatrical cultural codes, and which are based on secondary sign systems of the performance - literature, music, art, mythology, religion, even the theatre itself as art. We indicate that the performative codes (sign systems) normally function simultaneously in a performance (paradigmatically) or linearly (syntagmatically), and thus they actively produce meaning [signification]. The signs that the viewer gets from variative sign systems on the stage are accepted under the principle of simultaneous contact, which themselves are in syntagmatic relation among themselves when producing signification. Quoting De Marinis 1993 [1982] , and in the process of reasoning, also De Toro 1995, we classified the performative text as a macrotext or text-of-the-text produced by variative series of partial performative texts that in the context of the overall performance constitute unique expressive result, a compilatory product of speech, music, costumes, gestures, dance, body sculpturing, etc. Thus, we conclude that the elements of the general performative text interact and they are united in one sense that constructs the theatrical text as performative expression. Theatre semiotics as a general principle, and in particular the ideas of the Prague structuralists, helped us look at theatre performance from the perspective of an interaction between actors and space in their overall verbal/nonverbal communication. In view of our reasoning up to this point we finally confirm the position that the actor and stage space are fundamental components not only of the theatrical text but of the theatrical performativity as a whole.

Produced by Persona Theatre Company, Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s novella A Meek Girl (1876) was adapted for the stage in a multimedia version starring award-winning Greek actor Nikos Giorgakis, in the role of a lonely embittered pawn maker, who has to come to terms with himself and the world around him. The novella was originally inspired by a real incident in Russia. It tells the story of a pawn maker, committed to making money, who eventually and through a single tragic occurrence, challenges the truth of his long-held philosophical and moral beliefs. It was presented at Studio Mavrohichali, Athens (2012), supported by the Pushkin Institute in Athens.

Το αντικείμενο της εργασίας μου είναι διπλό: από τη μια, η ανάδειξη μιας ιστορίας, ενός ρωμαϊκού μύθου, που αποτέλεσε τη βάση για τη συγγραφή τριών θεατρικών έργων με έντονα χαρακτηριστικά πολιτικού θεάτρου ―το ένα είναι δείγμα του γαλλικού κλασικισμού και τα άλλα δύο είναι γραμμένα τον 20ο αιώνα― και από την άλλη, η παρουσίαση μιας μετα-δραματουργικής επεξεργασίας των τεσσάρων κειμένων (δηλαδή των τριών θεατρικών έργων και της αρχικής ιστορίας), που είχε ως αποτέλεσμα τη δημιουργία ενός κειμένου pastiche στα αγγλικά, το οποίο υπήρξε το κειμενικό υλικό για το στήσιμο μιας παράστασης που σκηνοθέτησα στο Λονδίνο τον Απρίλιο του 2013. Ο στόχος της παράστασης ήταν να λειτουργήσει, επίσης, ως σύγχρονο πολιτικό σχόλιο.

Here I start out with the belief that if: the text as literature is subject to a hermeneutical treatment, the theatre as action is a consequence of this hermeneutical process, and it is the prime reason for its appearance. Theatrical performance is the product of a triple hermeneutic dependence, in which the audience interprets already interpreted essences, senses and meanings transforming them into other essences, senses and meanings that are already constituted as a theatrical PRESENTATION - a primary text (author), a hermeneutic discourse on this text - interpretation (director), and a secondary hermeneutical discourse on the already presented interpretation - over-interpretation (spectator). I find out that the theatrical act is a variety of sign communication systems that are language constructs. In the course of the reasoning I brought out the idea that each théâtralité is determined by the presence of other components in its distinctiveness - verbal expressions, gestures, facial expressions, mannerisms, physical and psychological conditions, visual imagery, music and sound environment. It is emphasize that this communicative base is seen by the spectator and exists as a reality at a pure psycho-cognitive level, built in the mind of the recipient as text constructed of multiple sign formations.

..."Ύστερα από πολλαπλές αναγνώσεις όμως-και με μια πιο διερευνητική διάθεση -διαφαίνεται μια άλλη όψη του έργου κάτω από την επιφάνεια της σκληρότητας: η Πλαστελίνη είναι ένα βαθιά ανθρωπιστικό κείμενο, σπαραχτικό, τρυφερό, το οποίο χάνει την ιδιότητα του αυτή όταν κανείς κοιτάξει μονάχα μέχρι τη σκληρότητα. Η ίδια η ωμότητα του έργου, όπως την βιώνει ο πρωταγωνιστής,  είναι αυτή που καταπνίγει την πραγματική του ταυτότητα. Το έργο και οι χαρακτήρες του «πλάθονται» και ετεροκαθορίζονται ξανά και ξανά από συνθήκες, γεγονότα, καταστάσεις, τοποθεσίες αλλά, κυρίως, από άλλους ανθρώπους"...

The perspective of a semiotic analysis and the need for a unifying centre suggest the need to decoding the mechanism of theatrical modelling, and namely, what in theatrical practice has been defined as mise-en-scéne – to-set/embody-something-on-the-stage. I am looking at it as a structuralist formation, a theoretical construct and a radical object of knowledge, and not just as a profane result of director’s (creative) interference with the dramatic and/or performative text. I am viewing the thesis that theatre performance is characterized by a dual function of the actor in the process of production of signs (actor's discourse) and the semiotizing of his very reflection to what is happening in the stage space (stage performance). Reconstructing the performative text in their minds, viewers perceive the whole corpus of the system configured of individual sign subsystems, namely as a theatrical performance, built with all the components surrounding the action - speech, gesture/mimics/movement, mechanization, sound. Theatrical performance is viewed as a semiotic code for the creative world of the creators of the show (director, actor, designer, composer, choreographer) presented as a mise-en-scéne and reproduced as a performative text and as an active matrix for the production of meaning. A more careful scrutinizing of the terms to-set/to-embody-something-on-the-stage revealed the existence of prior knowledge coming from experience, which is transformed by the creator of the show and pre-set as understanding (i.e. what is likely to be understood by the perceiver), following the convention that, in essence, the primary semiotic practice of theatre performance is to transform all objects in obvious signs/sign formations that are suitable to be recognized. Here I consider the role and impact of collective cultural archetypes on individual artistic activity and perception, treating these archetypes from an aesthetic perspective. I am postulatе the idea that the aesthetics of the mise-en-scéne, in contemporary theatre practice, is based precisely on the cultural experience set in personal conscious/unconscious of the theatre artist and of the spectator himself. Which leаds me to the conclusion, that the deep archetypal reflection of mise-en-scéne harmonizes the roles of the individual and the collective unconscious (or conscious) as a set of complementary perspectives of an optimal sign semiosis. This is a semiotic perspective that on the stage, in the flow of coordinated action and strict geometry of movements, in the style of arranged performative articulation and technical vision, emphasizes the signifying nature of the theatrical performance as a process of communication and representation.

> Context • The thoroughly second-order cybernetic underpinnings of naturalist theatre have gone almost entirely unremarked in the literature of both theatre studies and cybernetics itself. As a result, rich opportunities for the two fields to draw mutual benefit and break new ground through both theoretical and empirical investigations of these underpinnings have, thus far, gone untapped. > Problem • The field of cybernetics continues to remain academically marginalized for, among other things, its alleged lack of experimental rigor. At the same time, the field of theatre studies finds itself at an impasse between post-structuralist semioticians and embodied cognitivists regarding key onto-epistemological issues. A program of research framing and utilizing naturalist theatre as a second-order cybernetic/cybersemiotic laboratory holds much promise in addressing both matters and lending credence to Ross Ashby's assertion that " the discovery that two fields are related leads to each branch helping in the development of the other. " > method • After establishing the nature of the onto-epistemological deadlock within theatre studies, this article examines the application of cybernetic heuristics within naturalistic theatre, leading to a second-order cybernetic analysis of its processes of production and reception and the outline of an experimental program for exploring these processes further. > results • Foundations for a model of naturalist theatre as a cybersemiotic laboratory grounded in a novel operationalization of Gordon Pask's conversation theory. > implications • The proposed laboratory could result in the generation of quantitative and qualitative research pertaining to several dimensions of second-order cybernetics; particularly cybersemiotics, which, as a result, may end up better positioned to help dissolve onto-epistemological deadlocks between constructivists and realists of all stripes across the academy and beyond. > Constructivist content • I argue that an analysis of naturalistic theatre's processes of meaning-making filtered through the constructivist ontological agnosticism of second-order cybernetics offers a productive middle way forward for those on both sides of the social constructivist/embodied cognitive realist divide, within and beyond theatre studies. The article draws upon the works of Gregory Bateson, Søren Brier, Ranulph Glanville, Heinz von Foerster, and Niklas Luhmann. >

Each theatrical sign (verbal/non-verbal) is associated with the performance itself in the context of large-scale interaction and such a semiotic approach presents to the perceiving spectator a micro-world, constructed by the specific theatrical mechanism of signification in theatre. This significant environment is dominated by the stage figure as a basic constructive component: a complex product, which is a consequence of the interrelation between dramatis personae towards represented character, which the Prague Structuralists define as the basic component of performance (especially in: Veltruský but also in: Mukařovský, dramatic figure; in: Zich, actor’s figure). The stage figure as a constructive element of the actor’s sign is a complex structure, a synthesis of elements, linguistic и paralinguistic signs, which configure a system within the system into a whole corpus of performance. Thus the specifically semiotic perspective is defined by a presented on the stage (regardless of whether we’d call it a dramatic or a stage figure), which in its turn is categorised as transformation or the basic structural element of performance, which by means of theatrical action as a signifier (signatum) leads to producing signification/sense (signantia) (Veltrusky). An actor’s presentation on the stage as sign of the signs, i.e. the foundation of an acting sign generates the construction of veritable thèatralitè. Every thèatralitè develops an open system of transformation/transmutation or the transmutation of something into something else (in Bogatyrev — transformation in a different form) which systematizes the sign components on the stage and organises the creation of stage semiosis by the actor, transformed into an image, through the stage space, costume, musical environment up to the communication with the spectators and their interpretation. The construction of the stage figure and the perceiving of the dramatic character are a direct result of the communication and the creative activity of the binary opposition actor/spectator with the consequently constructed common idea of the audience, perceiving the signifying-in-the-sense of-significant. Here the character is already represented by the sign, typifying a certain code providing insights, which is what converts the represented as sense and meaning in the mind of the recipient. In the triple interdependency between actor/stage figure/dramatis personae, the very creative aesthetics of the stage presentation is configured. The entire system of signs, which sign’s constructions on the stage evince, is fleshed out only as a coherent whole and a final explication of a series of notions in the mind of the perceiving spectator, a figment of their imagination.

Dr. Avra Sidiropoulou (Open University of Cyprus) and Professor Andy Lavender (University of Surrey) discuss contemporary approaches to adapting and interpreting Shakespeare's plays. With reference to specific productions by Ivo van Hove, Forced Entertainment, She She Pop and Cheek By Jowl, among others, the discussion considers key areas including Shakespeare's stories, staging dynamics, character construction, political resonances and design opportunities. Over the course of the conversation Andy and Avra will consider what makes Shakespeare especially attractive to theatre practitioners and audiences, and explore various innovations made by contemporary directors and companies. The conversation ends with an account of the work of the directing students of the Open University of Cyprus, as an introduction to the performance that follows.

This discussion is part of the all-day Shakespeare event ‘Those Scenes We Loveth’, organized by the M.A. Programme in Theatre Studies of the Open University of Cyprus.

Sunday, December 18th, 19.00 at Booze Cooperativa, Athens.

The triptych-trilingual production of Clytemnestra’s Tears is a follow-up to the Greek production of the one-woman play by Avra Sidiropoulou, which was originally presented at Dipylon Theater in Athens. It was staged for only 7 performances at Tiyatro Oyunevi İSM 2 in Istanbul in June 2004.  This tri-lingual project envisioned by Persona Theater Company brought together a Greek, a Turkish and a British actress and was funded by the European Union within the framework of the Micro-Project Programme for Turkish-Greek Civic Dialogue. The role of Clytemnestra was performed by Ms. Themis Bazaka (Greece), Derya Durmaz (Turkey) and Kristin Linklater (U.K.).