Dramaturg as context manager

Dramaturgy implies a keen perception, an extensively sought orientation, and a steadfast purpose in the process of interpreting and creating an artwork. Dramaturgs love texts, and texts are everywhere: not relegated to written or verbal words, they exist as you walk, as you gaze, as you breathe. Within the premise that texts are compositions of signs in every form – as Jacques Derrida proclaims, “all is text and all is writing [écritwre]” ¹ – dramaturgy may be seen as what animates the text; it is the spirit of the text. Dramaturgy is also a political practice. Dramaturg-director Bertolt Brecht was concerned with producing a political theatre that would galvanize historical consciousness and ignite social change; he therefore broke away from mimetic representation and provoked spectating awareness through distancing/estranging effects and other “epic” techniques. ² Brecht’s political aesthetics, however, is inseparable from a specific historical context, namely the need to discontinue the dramatic illusion produced by well-made naturalistic drama that tended to elicit passive empathy from the audience. Following Augusto Boal, who claims that “all theatre is necessarily political,” ³ I consider that playtexts may produce oppositional political effects in many forms and through different techniques, without being committed to conveying a prescriptive political message. In effect, a contemporary political dramaturgy should address the micropolitics of power or the ways normative values and institutionalized modes of production permeate personal relationships and individual desires.