Autumn

This class explores the new play development process from first to second draft and will culminate in a staged reading at the end of the quarter. All the roles of a traditional production process will be a part of this class, with students serving as: playwrights, directors, actors, and dramaturgs. What happens once the playwright is ready to invite in collaborators to develop a script? How does each person bring their unique point of view to the play? How can this process serve both the play and the artists involved? The class is studying the art, theory and process of development as well as working on our feet to try our hands at what we are discovering. We will work to develop student plays in which a first draft is already written. Students interested in taking on these designated roles of a production team (actors, directors, dramaturgs) should select either TAPS 20450 New Play Development: Playwrights and Dramaturgs OR TAPS 20451 New Play Development: Directors and Actors. Once enrolled, course instructors will assign tasks taking into consideration student interest. For further information on the course or how to enroll, please contact ddemayo@uchicago.edu. Playwrights with a complete, 8 Theater and Performance Studies first draft of a play are encouraged to submit their work for the companion course TAPS 24050 and will be selected the quarter before this course is offered. To apply, please send your script and note of introduction to ddemayo@uchicago.edu.

This class explores the new play development process from first to second draft and will culminate in a staged reading at the end of the quarter. All the roles of a traditional production process will be a part of this class, with students serving as: playwrights, directors, actors, and dramaturgs. What happens once the playwright is ready to invite in collaborators to develop a script? How does each person bring their unique point of view to the play? How can this process serve both the play and the artists involved? The class is studying the art, theory and process of development as well as working on our feet to try our hands at what we are discovering. We will work to develop student plays in which a first draft is already written. Playwrights with a complete, first draft of a play are encouraged to submit their work for this course and will be selected the quarter before this course is offered. To apply, please send your script and note of introduction to ddemayo@uchicago.edu. Students interested in taking on any of the other designated roles of a production team (actors, directors, dramaturgs) should select either TAPS 20450 New Play Development: Playwrights and Dramaturgs OR TAPS 20451 New Play Development: Directors and Actors. Once enrolled, course instructors will assign tasks taking into consideration student interest. For further information on the course or how to enroll, please contact ddemayo@uchicago.edu.

This workshop will explore the underlying mechanics that have made plays tick for the last 2,500-odd years, from Euripides to Shakespeare to Büchner to Caryl Churchill, Suzan-Lori Parks, and Annie Baker, etc. Students will be asked to shamelessly steal those playwrights' tricks and techniques (if they're found useful), and employ them in the creation of their own pieces. Designed for playwrights at any level (beginning or advanced), the workshop's primary goals will be to develop a personal sense of what "works" on stage within the context of what's worked in the past, and to generate a one-act play, start to finish.

This course adapts curriculum originally designed for the various schools of modern improvisation (including the iO, the Annoyance and The Second City). Listening skills, the ability to work well with others as a team, and building scene work organically are highlighted. You will leave this class a better communicator, with interpersonal tools that support other facets of your life.

This course employs a practice in the fundamental theory of play direction and the role of the director in collaboration with the development of textual analysis. By examining five diversely different texts using three different approaches to play analysis (Aristotle, Stanislavski, Ball) students begin developing a method of directing for the stage in support of the written text. In alternating weeks, students implement textual analysis in building an understanding of directorial concept, theme, imagery and staging through rehearsal and in-class presentations of three-minute excerpts from the play analysis the previous week. The culmination is a final five-minute scene combining the tools of direction with a method of analysis devised over the entire course.

This course is designed to introduce students to foundational concepts and critical skills relevant to the study of theater and performance. In addition to wide-ranging readings and discussions, students will attend a variety of performances and screenings representing a cross-section of genres, interpretive styles, and institutional settings. Although the course will be directed by Prof. Buxbaum Danzig, it will be divided into discrete units, each led by a different instructor from the TAPS teaching staff. Thus, students will gain exposure to a variety of teaching styles, areas of expertise, and approaches to the field. The course is open to all undergraduate students as an elective; it also serves as a required course for all TAPS majors and minors.

This course is a practical introduction to writing for musical theater. Students will analyze and discuss character development and dramatic structure across musical theater scripts, scores, and songs, and they will apply these lessons to their own writing. Students will develop treatments and excerpts towards new works of musical theater, and as individuals or in teams they will write, workshop, and present ten-minute musicals at the end of the quarter. No prior experience in script writing or songwriting is required.

This course addresses techniques and modes of observation and their application to scene study. Observation study is used to strengthen acting choices, build the physical world of the play, and create original, vital characterizations. It also serves to deepen awareness of group dynamics; integrate symbolic, psychological, and physical meaning in a character's behavior; and guide the process of breaking down a scene. Students will perform observation exercises and apply their discoveries to scene work.

This course introduces the basic elements of a literate screenplay, including format, exposition, characterization, dialog, voice-over, adaptation, and the vagaries of the three-act structure. Weekly meetings include a brief lecture period, screenings of scenes from selected films, extended discussion, and assorted readings of class assignments. Because this is primarily a writing class, students write a four- to five-page weekly assignment related to the script topic of the week.

Though we often imagine a divide between the physical practice of dance training and the intellectual practice of dance history and theorization, in reality they overlap: movement training is embodied research and a form of intellectual labor, while dance theorization and scholarship is deeply connected to the physicality of thought. This course offers an introduction to dance with an integrated approach to thinking and doing. Students will explore a range of embodied research methodologies that draw from improvisational forms, codified techniques, and social and cultural dance practices. No prior dance experience is required for this hybrid seminar/ studio course.