PLAYWRITING

DAVID EDGAR

HOW PLAYS WORK

The Theory and Practice of Playwriting

David Edgar is not only one of Britain's foremost practising playwrights, but he is also a pioneer in the field of playwriting studies. How Plays Work grew out of Edgar's teaching on the University of Birmingham's MA course in Playwriting Studies, which he founded and now chairs. The result is an invaluable and unique guide to the process of play construction.

The book analyses the basic elements of dramatic structure - action, plot, character, dialogue, genre. Drawing on a wide variety of fluminating examples from the work of wellknown playwrights and screenwriters, Edgar first looks at how plays work and then how playwrights can make their own plays work most effectively.

How Plays Work is a masterclass in the art of the playwright by an accomplished and successful practitioner.

DAVID EDGAR is the author of over sixty plays for the stage, and has a wide experience of small-scale community and touring theatre, as well as film, television and radio. flis plays include Destiny, Maydays, Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, Nicholas Nickleby for the RSC; and The Shape of the Table and Entertaining Strangers for theNational Theatre. His latest RSC play, Pentecost, won the Evening Standard Award for Best Play of 1995.

THE NEW POLEMICAL REVIEW OF THE PERFORMING ARTS

LIVE 6 The Story Teller
edited by David Tushingham

Despite all predictions to the contrary, narrative remains a key ingredient across a broad spectrum of current British performance practice. In its now customary interview format, Live 6 sets out to explore the phenomenon of storytelling. What are the stories we are currently telling each other in the theatre, what could they and what do they reveal about us? What is different about stories told on stage from those in non-theatrical situations or in print? And can we - whether theatre practitioners or not - acquire skills to make the stories we tell more interesting?

In its four-year history Live has received praise from many theatre professionals. Richard Eyre described it as 'very interesting and provocative', while the Guardian hailed it as an 'eye opener' on the world inside performance.

1 85459 431 1