Hur arbetar regissörer och dramapedagoger med barn med ”personregi” - alltså med feedbacken som hjälper till att ett barn hittar ett uttryckssätt som är trovärdigt, ett sätt att spela som är livligt. Hur gör man och varför? Vad är det för en typ av handling, interaktion? Syftet med arbetet är att förstå och tydliggöra en ganska dold och mystisk verksamhet; att inspirera alla intresserade till utvecklat egen verksamhet; att lyfta fram en interaktion där barnen blir hjälpt till och värdesatt i deras spontana tillvaro. Arbetets metodik är inspirerad av ”grundad teori” och närmar sig den konkreta sociala interaktionen genom att föra öppen strukturerade samtal med regissörer och dramapedagoger som är verksamma i stora mest kommunala barn/ungdomsteater: Vår Teater/Kulturskolan, Enskedespelet, Sagateatern Lidingö, Ung teater Täby, Skara Skolscen samt Stockholms Stadsteater och Dramaten. Utifrån det material föreslås en systematisering av de olika metoder hur man arbetar som regissör med just personregi. Teoribakgrunden är Daniel Stern och Anders Brobergs utvecklingspsykologi å ena sidan; och de implicita teorierna i internationella skådespeleri/regihandböcker å andra. Resultatet visar att det finns en skillnad i regiarbetet när det gäller 7-12-åringar respektive 12-20-åringar. Med de yngre arbetar man utan text. Däremot bygger verksamheten i alla åldrar på stolpmanus som regissören arbetar fram med barnen utifrån improvisationer i en ömsesidig inspirerande process av att hitta-på och ta-upp. I nästa steg är huvuduppgiften för personregissörerna att hjälpa till att försätta barnen i den specifika stämningsfulla situationen som scenen kräver. Som personregins metoder (i alla åldrar) för finarbetet dyker många olika ”verktyg” upp: kognitiva (1) som att prata om ”varför” någon gör något (a), vad någon ”vill” med en handling eller mening (b) eller om hur man ska ”tänka” medan man spelar en mening (c); kroppsliga (2) som att hitta nya rörelsemönster och uttryckssätt (a) eller agera ”som-om” man vore själv rollfiguren (b); samspelsmässiga (3) som att ta upp impulser från den andres blick eller situationen själv. Hur sceneriet exakt ska se ut bestämmer man sent i repetitionsarbetet. Alla är överens om att personregins arbete utgör en unik och värdefull situation där en vuxen hjälper ett barn att hitta sin fantasi och att våga gestalta en annan varelse.

“Directing Rebecca Gilman’s Boy Gets Girl…” reviews the process of directing Boy Gets Girl by Rebecca Gilman, presented on October 26-29, 2017, in the Cristian H. Moe Laboratory Theater at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale, Illinois. This document chronologically details the year-long production process for the director, beginning with the preliminary research and discussing the development of a concept, through formulating designs, conducting rehearsals and observing performances, and concluding with a post production evaluation. This document begins with Chapter 1, exploring the preliminary research which developed into the director’s concept and vision for production. Chapter 2 explains the pre-production process, including design and production meetings, dramaturgy, and publicity. Chapter 3 details the production process, including auditions, callbacks, rehearsals, and performances. Chapter 4 is a personal reflection and committee evaluation of the overall production, including the recognition of opportunities for future growth as a director.

Cette thèse propose d’étudier l’oeuvre tant cinématographique que télévisuelle d’un cinéaste singulier, Jacques Rozier, au regard des différents dialogues qu’elle engage entre l’art et la vie afin de questionner ce couple conceptuel. Auteur d’une oeuvre prolifique et figure emblématique de la Nouvelle vague avec Adieu Philippine (1963), Rozier constitue un modèle de cinéaste atypique tant par ses méthodes de création par la forme que prend son parcours du milieu des années 1950 à aujourd’hui. Son rapport à l’écriture cinématographique se caractérise notamment par une conception de la création comme aventure justifiant l’invention de conditions de tournage susceptibles de faire advenir l’imprévisible. Ces méthodes engagent ainsi un type de relation au réel, à la technique, aux acteurs, au tournage, soit plus généralement à la mise en scène, qu’il s’agira de qualifier. Naviguant au gré du vent, il ne cesse d’effectuer des va-etvient entre long et court métrage, fiction et documentaire, cinéma et télévision, culture savante et culture populaire. En s’intéressant à l’ensemble de ces objets autant du point de vue de l’étude esthétique que de l’analyse génétique en passant par la compréhension des modalités de fabrication ou de réception par le spectateur, il s’agit de définir une stylistique et d’interroger le fonctionnement des différents mécanismes d’interactions, de circulations et de débordements en jeu dans ce travail. / This doctoral dissertation aims to investigate the cinematographic as well as televisual work of a singular filmmaker, Jacques Rozier, in the light of the different dialogues it engages between art and life in order to interrogate this conceptual couple. Author of a prolific work and emblematic figure of the French New wave with Adieu Philippine (1963), Rozier represents an atypical template of filmmaker, both because of the ways he used to create and of the shape taken by its career from the mid-1950s until today. His relationship with cinematographic writing is notably characterised by the conception of creation as an adventure, justifying the invention of a shooting environment allowing the unpredictable to happen. Such methods thus engage a kind of association with reality, with technique, with performers, with shooting, infact more generally with mise-en-scène, which is going to be characterised here. Sailing with the wind, he is continually going back and forth between long and short films, between fiction and documentary, between cinema and television, between intellectual and popular culture. By focusing on all these items in terms of aesthetic study as well as genetic analysis, and through an understanding of the terms of creation or reception by the viewer, it is about defining stylistics and interrogating the operations of the different mechanisms of interactions, of motions and of overflows involved in this work.

This document gives an account of my artistic efforts in creating my thesis film Fathers and Sons. This document includes sections that cover the writing, casting, production design, principal photography, and editing of my film. I give special attention to the writing process in Chapter 2, because of its personal significance to my growth as a filmmaker. This chapter details the evolution of my original story concept from a drama to a comedy. The ultimate goal of my film was to create a personal work of art. This document self-reflects on how well I was able to achieve this goal, and what I learned along the way.

A self-analysis of the work of a theater director on the play Arcadia, by Tom Stoppard. Through a detailed retelling of all aspects of the production—research, design, script work, rehearsals, and performance—artist strengths and weaknesses are identified, and lessons are articulated that can be applied to future productions of Arcadia, and subsequent work of the director.

In this thesis, I seek to answer if applying the art of mindfulness to my directorial process can provide a greater experience of satisfaction and promote stronger effectiveness in the level of communication and cooperation amongst the collaborative artists in our theatremaking process, compared to previous departmental productions. This thesis will explore my journey and cultivation of mindfulness from both a personal and artistic perspective. I define the mindfulness-based principles of Mindful Decision Making, Mindful Listening & Loving Speech, and Shifting Negatives to Positives, and provide case studies of their application in my two production processes William Finn’s A New Brain and Sarah Ruhl’s Dead Man’s Cell Phone, which were a part of UMass Amherst Theatre’s 2014-2015 season.

This written portion of my thesis chronicles my experience as director and producer of Visionary Futures: Science Fiction Theatre for Social Justice Movements, in collaboration with playwrights, activists, actors, designers, and a dramaturg. In this thesis, I explore the process of creating a meaningful thesis project during the Covid-19 pandemic. I discuss the idea of visionary fiction as created by adrienne maree brown and Walidah Imarisha and how to create theatre within that genre. This thesis chronicles the development and production of three new plays of visionary fiction that wrestle with contemporary social issues, all designed for digital performance. I share my process pairing each writer with an activist to create work that envisioned more just worlds while also being responsive to the current moment. I explore the opportunities and challenges of reimagining the generative writing process, making theatre within a digital medium, and being creative during a global pandemic. This thesis also includes the full text of each play and links to the recordings of the digital productions.

Directing groups (DGs) are moieties installed onto organic molecules to confer regioselectivity in subsequent reactions. DGs have found utility in selective CH activations catalyzed by transition metal (TM) catalysis on starting materials with multiple CH bonds. Despite their utility, DGs are scarcely used in industrial applications due to the generally wasteful nature of conventional DG strategies and their associated increase in step-count. Transient directing groups (TDGs) have been developed to overcome these limitations, with additives reversibly forming adducts with compounds of interest prior to the DG-mediated CH activation, in one-pot processes. However, the use of TDGs still requires harsh conditions to achieve significant yields, hindering broad applications. Chemoenzymatic catalytic cascades have attracted attention due to the mild and environmentally friendly nature of biocatalysis, with the greatest challenge being compatibility issues between biocatalytic and traditional chemical transformations. Here we propose a concurrent chemoenzymatic catalytic cascade that would enable TM-catalyzed DG chemistry via flanking biocatalytic reductive amination to install, and oxidative deamination to remove, a TDG. Preliminary efforts have identified some incompatibilities arising from the biocatalytic portion of the cascade, namely substrate specificity and organic co-solvent tolerance, that need to be addressed to achieve the proposed chemoenzymatic cascade in a one-pot concurrent protocol.

The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020 decimated the theatre industry. Nevertheless, the Department of Theater at Southern Illinois University Carbondale elected to produce live performances of Tuck Everlasting: The Musical to satisfy the thesis requirements of its graduate students and continue the education of its undergraduate students. This document chronicles the production amidst the pandemic from its inception through its closure from the director’s perspective by detailing the pre-production, production, and post-production phases. Pre-production examines the play analysis, directorial interpretation, design process, and casting. Production recounts the processes of executing rehearsals and developing production elements, including complications from COVID-19. Finally, post-production considers the final product through performance and self-reflection, addressing areas of success and opportunities for growth.

AN ABSTRACT OF THE THESIS OFClaude Ryan Towery, for the Master of Fine Arts degree in Theater, presented on April 1, 2022, at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. TITLE: THE FAMILY THAT PLAYS TOGETHER STAYS TOGETHER: DIRECTING HAY FEVER BY NOËL COWARD MAJOR PROFESSOR: Professor Olusegun Ojewuyi From the spring of 2021 to the spring of 2022, the period of time during which this document was written, the Covid-19 pandemic was still ongoing. The pandemic’s cataclysmal events precipitated a paradigm shift across cultures and societies around the world – a shift that affected countless vocations, leaving many confused and uncertain as to how they would continue working, supporting themselves and their families, pursuing their dreams, etc. Every theatre practitioner in the United States was negatively affected in some form or another, and many lost their jobs. Questions as to how theatre could continue and/or survive ran the gamut. This document chronicles how my thesis production survived. The Family That Plays Together Stays Together... reviews my process and journey of directing Noël Coward’s Hay Fever, and the challenges and triumphs that came with directing a theatrical production during a worldwide pandemic – a journey that has forever changed me and my perception of this art form and the world around me. This paper, in chronological order, details all the phases necessary in bringing this production to fruition. Chapter One includes the preliminary research, playwright’s biography, play analysis, and directorial interpretation of the script (vision & concept). Chapter Two details the pre-production process, examining the design and production meetings, dramaturgy, and marketing. Chapter Three delineates the production process, auditions and casting, rehearsals, the development of techniques employed, and performances. Chapter Four is a personal reflection of the pitfalls, discoveries, and changes I i would make if I were to direct this play in the future. The final chapter also includes a section on techniques and practices that will help me grow in my craft as a director, artist, and academician. I have come up with a phrase that summarizes my directing of Hay Fever, my graduate school experience, and practicing theatre during a worldwide pandemic; “Life is but a game, and a game that must be played to the finish.”