ABSTRACT
If therapist presence sets the stage for psychotherapeutic work, process is the medium in which the drama of therapy unfolds. Extending this metaphor, an effective therapist attends to unfolding action in the consulting room much as a director might attend to a theatrical performance, with the crucial exceptions that the director him-or herself is also an actor on the stage, and there is no script for the performance! Instead, in the improvisational theatre that is therapy, the therapist directs the process by attending to subtle signals of possible extension, elaboration or intensi®cation of the action or emotion in promising directions, sometimes through explicit instructions or suggestions, but more commonly through her or his own responsiveness to the client's ``lines'' or performance.
