A Director Prepares: Seven Essays on Art and Theatre [Paperback]

Anne Bogart (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 8, 2001 | ISBN-10: 0415238323 | ISBN-13: 978-0415238328 | Edition: 1

A Director Prepares is a thought-provoking examination of the challenges of making theatre. In it, Anne Bogart speaks candidly and with wisdom of the courage required to create 'art with great presence'.
Each chapter tackles one of the seven major areas Bogart has identified as both potential partner and potential obstacle to art-making. They are Violence; Memory; Terror; Eroticism; Stereotype; Embarrassment; and Resistance. Each one can be used to generate extraordinary creative energy, if we know how to use it.
A Director Prepares offers every practitioner an extraordinary insight into the creative process. It is a handbook, Bible and manifesto, all in one. No other book on the art of theatre comes even close to offering this much understanding, experience and inspiration.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Bogart (directing, Columbia Univ.) is the artistic director of the SITI Company, an ensemble-based theater company that she founded with Tadshi Suzuki. Her book is aimed at the practitioner but has value for the avid theater goer as well. What we see on stage, as a whole, is a culmination of bits and pieces, steps forward and backward, as a work of "art" is created and then presented. In each essay, Bogart discusses one of seven concepts violence, memory, terror, eroticism, stereotype, embarrassment, and resistance that can work as an obstruction or catalyst to this creative process. The concepts themselves are thought-provoking, and Bogart's text is even more so. For Bogart, these concepts incite energy (positive or negative) that both actors and director absorb and radiate. One suspects that the energy acts on the viewer (and reader) as well. A quote by Jeanette Winterson on the first page clearly illustrates Bogart's passion and love of the theater experience: "Art is the burning bush that both shelters and makes visible our profounder longings." For all theater collections. Susan L. Peters, Univ. of Texas Medical Branch on Galveston
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

No Instructions, No Theory, No Intimate Personal Revelations: Just Some Pith Observations, Lively Vignettes and Deeply Held Beliefs from One Accomplished Director.

Open this short clutch of essays by Anne Bogart, and you will set loose a thousand passions, principles and debates to keep you and your friends up at night over a bottle of booze...We will all find something to disagree with in this book, but Bogart knows that this is necessary and good. Her essays will nuture, provoke, instruct and encourage for years to come.
–David Herskovits, Artistic Director, Target Margin Theater

The concepts themselves are thought-provoking, and Bogart's text is even more so.
–Susan Peters, Library Journal, November 2001

In A Director Prepares: Seven Essays on Art and Theatre, [Bogart] provides insight into her own artistic development, while offering straightforward advice to both the novice and the experienced director...[She] offers directors both inspirational and practical solutions to common problems.

Bogart has undeniably distinguished herself as a superior director, and with this pubication, she is successful in providing a practical text that encourages self-discipline, experimentation, and artistic growth among theatre practitioners.
–Carrie Kathryn Lee, Bowling Green State University Modern Drama, Spring 2002

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 168 pages
• Publisher: Routledge; 1 edition (July 8, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0415238323
• ISBN-13: 978-0415238328
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.1 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #195,649 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Landmark for Theater, September 4, 2003

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"dynamicoverture" (Atlanta, GA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Director Prepares: Seven Essays on Art and Theatre (Paperback)

Bogart writes from her years of experience and vision in A Director Prepares. Readers merely looking for a book on "how to direct" may want to look elsewhere: this manifesto takes on serious issues faced by theater artists every day. While other books "on directing" explain how to get actors from point A to point B, A Director Prepares examines the shoulders that theatermakers stand on: artistically, historically, politically. And it's not just for Bogart/SITI Company disciples. Like the creation of theater, A Director Prepares requires heightened attention and a clean slate every time you dive into its pages. It's inspiring, but also a challenge to theater makers to rethink how we approach our processes and to question upon whose shoulders we stand.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars How any theater artist prepares, August 15, 2004

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tobb delow (Delray Beach, FL USA) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: A Director Prepares: Seven Essays on Art and Theatre (Paperback)

The title is misleading since the book is really about the process of making art--specifically making theater--and will be valuable to anyone involved in the collaborative process.

Some have complained that this book does not tell one "how to direct." But Bogart's book is about how to find one's voice as an artist and how to wrestle with material--topics that are rarely treated with the sanity that this book does. Reading it will help you figure out how to direct(or act or design) in your own individual way.

9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Inspiring and unpretentious, February 25, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: A Director Prepares: Seven Essays on Art and Theatre (Paperback)

Far from being a prescription about how to direct, this book offers the wisdom of Anne Bogart's experience as a collaborator, investigator of the human condition, and artist committed to making theatre that is alive and relevant. I have had the pleasure of knowing and studying with Anne, and this book codified and elaborated on so many of the things I wished I'd written down at the time. The book illuminates her way of working more than it promotes any particular aesthetic, and in that, I think it should be incredibly helpful and informative to all theatre artists at any stage in their careers. Some reference point for Anne's work or the work of her SITI Company might make the more esoteric sounding parts of the book clearer for the reader, but all in all, this is a great read.