The Director as Collaborator, 2nd Edition

Chapter 4Directing Elements

A director may have a good sense of what drives a play—what we have been calling the core action—but unless he or she can translate it to the stage in a compelling way, the interpretation may add little to the inherent power of the dialogue, characters, and action, and may in fact detract from it. I use the phrase directing elements to refer to the fundamental building blocks that help directors achieve their interpretations. Directing elements shape the pattern of a play in production in the same way that tones, notes, rhythms, melodies, and harmonies shape a piece of music, or size, shape, color, patterns, and spatial relationships shape a painting.

Almost every script contains textual elements that offer clues to ...