Information about the 2021 Directors Lab will be available on this page in December 2020. Please check back then. The 2020 Directors Lab has been cancelled due to Covid-19.
It is a series of workshops, shared sessions, rehearsals, investigations, and discussions with master artists that provide the emerging directors with an intensive investigation of their craft while fostering collaborative relationships among a peer community of artists.
The Directors Lab is geared toward professional directors in early career stages and is free of charge. The Lab is not open to students, or those planning to return to school. It is designed for emerging directors who are working professionals, who have finished their studies. And studies are not required - many Lab directors are working directors who have never gone to college. The Lab also seeks directors working in a wide variety of ways – from new play directors, to Broadway AD’s, to directors in experimental theater, in church drama ministries, in opera, in devised work, in theme parks and cruise ships, in theaters newly founded in small communities. All are welcome. Last year the Lab accepted 68 directors from 22 countries and 13 US states.
What makes up a successful creative collaboration in the theater? The 2019 Lab drew on our directors’ personal experiences: the rehearsals they have led themselves, the rehearsals they have observed and ones from the past they had read about, to explore many models of collaboration.
In the 2018 Lab we were interested in making it possible for directors to try something they haven’t yet done, with the support, expertise and encouragement of others who might know something about what they dream of trying to do.
This summer of 2017 was a Lab for people who wanted to change, to think in new ways and to figure a lot of things out.
Members of the 2016 Lab submitted a new play by a playwright they admired.
Why we love them, how to direct them?
The 2014 Lab broke the directors into smaller groups and invited them to explore in depth a dozen ways of approaching the questions and challenges of finding the rights audiences now and in the future.
A play goes from the page to the stage
This year, the Lab explored the comic play - how does comedy work?
The Lab focused on slowly exploring Strindberg's A DREAM PLAY with Directors, Actors and Designers.
We explored a variety of plays to find their moments of transcendence and their roots in ritual.
What is your innate theatrical identity?
New and classical plays were explored in week-long rehearsals and rehearsal techniques were shared.
A look at play development: rehearsal work, collaborations with actors & playwrights organizations.
Looking to the past, the Lab explores how artists have banded together to create something new.
How do directors and playwrights find each other today? Work together? What needs to change?
Revisiting previous Lab topics, including Greek and symbolist drama, adaptations and devised work.
Fifty emerging directors explore political theater through readings and discussions.
The largest Lab to date involved 200 participants working on productions of 16 plays.
How do acting, design and playwriting define a theatrical style? What is our style today?
Over three weeks, directors, actors, designers and dramaturgs explore A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM.
The Lab produces twenty-nine works at venues from SoHo to Harlem.
15 teams of directors, writers, actors and designers explore new works; Lassalle directs Molière.
Investigating solo performance, new musical theater, and plays written for specific communities.
The Lab presented as many plays as possible in readings, rehearsals and productions.
Seminars, symposia, discussions and active work on daily projects with leading theater artists.
