The careers, directing accomplishments, ideas, and techniques of
six distinguished directors of the European stage--each considered
a master of the art--are surveyed in depth by author Samuel L.
Leiter in this groundbreaking study. Konstantin Stanislavsky,
Vsevolod Meyerhold, Max Reinhardt, Jacques Copeau, Bertolt Brecht,
and Jean-Louis Barrault, representative of the broad spectrum of
directorial art as it has developed in this century, are examined
in six exhaustively detailed, yet compact chapters. In Leiter's
informative introduction, salient aspects of the director's art
exemplified by these innovators are identified and examined: choice
of repertory from the intellectually provocative to the escapist;
stylistic attitudes toward production from Stanislavsky's
"spiritual naturalism" to Meyerhold's biomechanics and
constructivism; rehearsal methods from the dictatorial to the
openly collaborative; and a continuing fascination with the shape
and function of the performance space. Many of the directors emerge
as multifaceted hommes de theatre--writing, directing, acting,
designing sets and lighting, and producing. The theoretical
writings of the majority of these great directors have become the
foundation for Western theatre thought in our time. Each chapter
contains capsule descriptions of the landmark productions of the
individual director and the volume concludes with a section of
brief chronologies for each person and a select bibliography. A
single director is the subject of each of the six chapters, which
are organized into numerous subsections that discuss the
individual's career, his overarching conceptions of theatre art and
directing, and finally his actual working methods.Almost every
chapter has information on a director's repertory, major
productions, theoretical concerns, techniques of working with
actors, playwrights, designers, and composers, casting methods,
production preparations, and rehearsal processes. Taken as a whole,
these chapters reveal the wide divergence of directorial styles and
techniques and the multiplicity of approaches open to exponents of
the art. The separate chronologies and select bibliography are
especially helpful. Students of stage directing and their teachers,
active professionals in the field, and literate general readers who
seek a broader understanding of twentieth century theatre and stage
direction will find this a handy and invaluable resources. This
work could be profitably used as a text or supplementary reading
for classes in stage directing and is a companion to Leiter's From
Belasco to Brook: Representative Directors of the English-Speaking
Stage (Greenwood Press, 1991).
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