ABOUT THE PROGRAM
This project will aim to develop a regional network of 14 – 18 cultural leaders (‘Production Leaders’) who will receive training in the basic principles of dramaturgical practice to give them the capacity to apply dramaturgical skills to the development and production of new work, thus creating potential for high quality contemporary performance in 7 geographically isolated regional centres across Australia.
The program aims to train/develop the professional skills of key artists (mainly independent artists) in regional centres who drive the development and production of work.
Training in dramaturgical skills in these ‘Production Leaders’, will give them the ability to draw from this knowledge, what is required for their particular project. The project will give them the ability to interrogate work from a dramaturgical perspective. It will build the confidence of these artists as cultural leaders in regional centres and increase their ability to drive the development of quality new work.
The program is not about developing dramaturges, rather it is about developing the dramaturgical eye of producers and directors/producers ‘Production Leaders’ in regional centres. The identified ‘Production Leaders’ may be working across a range of performance practice and will be able to utilize basic dramaturgical practice to interrogate the elements of performance making regardless of the medium they are working in. There is a broad range of practice taking place in regional centres and this project aims to support ‘Production Leaders’ working across a range of performance making.
The regional partners are:
- Mudlark Theatre – Launceston (Artistic Director, Stuart Loone)
- Street Theatre – Canberra (Artistic Director, Caroline Stacey)
- Crossroad Arts – Mackay (Artistic Director, Steve Mayer-Miller)
- Creative Regions – Bundaberg (Artistic Director, Rod Ainsworth)
- Full Throttle Theatre – Townsville (Artistic Director, Madonna Davies)
- JUTE Theatre – Cairns (Artistic Director, Suellen Maunder)
- Darwin Theatre Company – Darwin (Artistic Director, Samantha Young)
JUTE and its regional partners will lead the way nationally with this unique program. There are many directors/producers who are good at their jobs but they are not necessarily skilled at identifying structural issues within new work. We believe the entire industry can benefit from practitioners, other than dramaturges, developing better dramaturgical skills. What the industry needs, and certainly in regional centres that require even more DIY than metropolitan artists, is more dramaturgically skilled ‘Production Leaders’.
A good dramaturgical understanding of the work can lead to, amongst other things:
- A well structured work, be it text or non-text based
- The ability to work with a creative team to develop a vision for the work that fits the form to the content.
- The ability to articulate themes explored by the work to potential investors, partners, creative teams, marketing & promotional materials and eventually to an audience.
JUTE and its regional partners in Queensland, Northern Territory, ACT and Tasmania, will work together to develop cultural leaders in ‘production dramaturgy’ in each of the partnering centres.
Each of the partners identified are Artistic Directors of companies and cultural leaders in their own right within their community. These are the people on the ground in regional centres who have the ability to identify and support 2-3 potential ‘Production Leaders’ within their centres.
Peter Matheson is nationally recognized as a highly skilled dramaturge. Peter has been chosen for two reasons, apart from his technical skills:
- Peter already has strong relationships in each of these centres and understands the realities of working within these environments. This means that the regional partners will not need to spend time building new relationships (with only 2 weeks of residency in each centre, this will be important)
- Peter has already been working dramaturgically with a range of performance makers in regional centres, including all forms of performance - text based narrative theatre, puppetry, performance art, dance and creative movement.
- Peter has become a strong advocate for regional practitioners, connecting them to people outside of the region and promoting their work to other centres.
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