Where is real?
As part of an opening exercise in a recent dramatic theory class, my students were asked to respond with coloured Sharpies to a variety of prompts scattered on chart paper […]
Tag Archives: documentary
The Thing that Doesn’t Fit
During my PhD studies at the University of Toronto, I had the great privilege of having for my supervisor Shakespearean scholar par excellence Alexander (Sandy) Leggatt. This was back when […]
How is verbatim theatre like a live rock concert?
In his book Liveness, Philip Auslander cites Lawrence Grossberg who writes: the importance of live performance lies precisely in the fact that it is only here that one can see […]
Zola’s bastards: The (non?)realism of the 21st century real
Here is a perhaps odd question: Are theatres of the real (documentary, verbatim, immersive, site-specific performance) realistic/naturalistic or non-realistic/non-naturalistic? What makes me ask? I am (re)reading essays in Get Real: […]
The readymade real: selectivity and the frame
Last weekend I had the privilege to attend the Festival of Original Theatre conference 2016 presented by the students at the Graduate Centre for Study of Drama, Theatre and Performance […]
Onions and torture make me cry
Last Sunday I had the chance to watch Belarus Free Theatre‘s performance of Trash Cuisine at LaMama in New York via livestreaming on HowlroundTV (Archived temporarily? here). Disingenuously framed as […]
What seashells have in common with zombies
** Tidying up my WordPress blogs today (I have a few) I found this post from last September that never got published, a thought hovering on the edge of the […]
Documentary theatre then and now
It would be impossible to discuss reality-based theatre in Canada (what I am starting to call “documentary theatre”) without acknowledging the scholarship of Alan Filewod. His 1987 book Collective Encounters: […]
Defining the field
Defining the field is one of the primary objectives of this research program. There are numerous terms already in use when talking about performance that includes real elements and each […]
Is theatre real?
I finally got my hands on a copy of Authenticity: Brands, Fakes, Spin and the Lust for Real Life by David Boyle from Robarts Library through interlibrary loan. (Thank you […]
Upsurges of the Real: a performance research blog 