Tuesday, August 06, 2013
Why theatre authors are more powerful than screenwriters.
Law Offices of Gordon P. Firemark: Authors in theatre enjoy privileges and approval rights not held by their screenwriting brethren. Sometimes, this can lead to trouble for producers and playwrights alike.
A recent article at The Guardian asks: “Should a playwright have the final say over a production?. The piece reports on an issue that arose recently when a disgruntled Australian playwright made a very strong statement against a production of his play.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
I was always taught that the playwright has the final say when it comes to how the production should be presented. But after six weeks here at CMU and designing the lights for a piece in BOAL, it made me realize how much of a team effort theatre really is when it is done well. Now, we cannot through the idea of contracts and copyrights out the window because they really are protecting people. But this doesn't mean that each member of the team should be flexible and WILLING TO LISTEN. There is no one right way to do something, but there are many different visions. It is just a matter of everyone working together to make that happen.
Productions should be a collaborative process, and playwrights are no exception. Although the production, is the original work of the playwright they should not have the absolute final say in every production of their show. There is not one way to produce a show, and by no means is there a right way. That said, it is still important to respect the wishes of the playwright; copyrights and contracts exists to protect writers. However, playwrights and directors need to be willing to cooperate and collaborate with each other in order to make a production the best that it can be.
It is hard for me to comment on this article without bias, being the daughter of a playwright, but I can understand both points of view. From what I have been told, one of the most common cases of playwrights refusing to allow the dialogue to change is when a company wishes to perform their piece without any profanity or vulgar language. High schools, some colleges and some other companies may be limited to plays like that and want to alter a play to fit their restrictions, but I understand why playwrights would not want their work changed - in this case and others. Even though these places want to share the work of these writers with a few small changes, those words or lines were not just thrown in for fun. Playwrights can take as long as five years or more to come to a final draft of a play that is ready for production. Every word in there is put there on purpose and has a meaning. If a character swears, they swear for a reason. If someone does something that the director doesn't find fits into the play, before considering cutting it they should make sure that they think heavily on why the author wanted it in there in the first place. Nothing just happened to fall onto the page and write itself.
On the other hand, I do agree with Carmen's statement that theatre should be a collaborative process. Especially if it is the world premiere of a play and the author is on hand, it is always worth having the discussion - should this really be in here?
I don't know that I see this so much as an issue of playwrights having too much power, as much as an issue of screenwriters having too little. When a screenwriter can see their script utterly changed by the production team, I see a problem. That said, I do think that there has to be a line. When a small change is made to a script, such as dropping or changing a line, it doesn't always impact the overall effect of the show. In such cases, giving the playwright veto power seems absurd to me.
Post a Comment