Theatre practitioners and their methodologies

A group wants to make a piece that forces its audience to confront and argue about a social injustice rather than simply feel sad about it. Which tradition should they look to, and why?

1. 01Clarify the intention

   The aim is to make the audience think critically and engage actively with an issue, not to be moved to private sympathy - a political intention.

2. 02Match it to a tradition

   That points to the epic/political tradition (Brecht, Boal), which is built precisely to keep the audience thinking and, in Boal's case, to make them intervene, rather than to absorb them in empathy.

3. 03Rule out an unsuited tradition

   The psychological/naturalist tradition (Stanislavski) would encourage exactly the emotional immersion the group wants to avoid, so it is the wrong tool for this intention.

4. 04Name a usable method

   From the chosen tradition they might use Brechtian alienation devices - direct address, placards, songs that break the action - or Boal's forum theatre, stopping the scene to invite the audience to change it.

Result: The group's intention (critical engagement) is matched to the epic/political tradition and to specific methods, showing how knowing the traditions lets you choose the right practitioner tool for a purpose.

A character stands at a door, about to confront the person who wronged them, but hesitates. How would a Stanislavskian actor build this moment truthfully?

1. 01Establish the given circumstances

   The actor fixes the facts: who is behind the door, what the wrong was, how long the character has waited, what they stand to lose - the full situation the play supplies.

2. 02Apply the magic 'if'

   The actor asks 'what would I do if I were this person, at this door, now?' - generating a truthful impulse rather than a generic 'nervous' gesture.

3. 03Find the objective and the conflict

   The scene objective is to confront and get justice; the hesitation is the inner conflict between that objective and fear, which the actor plays as a real, specific struggle.

4. 04Use emotion memory if needed

   To fuel the fear and resolve honestly, the actor might draw on a personal memory of a dreaded confrontation, letting a true feeling inform the moment rather than indicating an emotion.

Result: The hesitation is built from circumstances, imaginative belief, a clear objective in conflict, and honest feeling - so the audience reads a real person's struggle, which is exactly what Stanislavski's system is designed to produce.

A scene shows a wealthy employer paying a desperate worker a pittance. How would Brecht stage this to make the audience think about the social relationship rather than just pity the worker?

1. 01Fix the social point

   The point is the power and inequality in the transaction - the audience should see and question the social relationship, not simply feel sorry for the worker.

2. 02Build a gestus

   Create a readable gestic image: the employer seated high, barely looking up, extending the coins so the worker must stoop and reach - one picture that shows the whole relationship of power and need.

3. 03Add an alienation device

   Interrupt the scene with a placard stating the worker's weekly wage against the employer's, or a song addressed to the audience about the price of labour, so the audience steps back to consider the facts.

4. 04Use demonstrative acting

   Have the worker briefly step out and address the audience - 'this is what I accepted, because I had no choice' - showing the choice rather than drowning it in emotion, keeping the audience critical.

Result: The transaction becomes a gestic, alienated moment that makes the audience examine an unequal social relationship - the thinking, political response Brecht's method is designed to produce, contrasted with the empathy Stanislavski would seek.

A piece needs a nightmare sequence that makes the audience feel a character's descent into panic, not just watch it. How would you approach it in Artaud's tradition?

1. 01Reject the naturalistic route

   Rather than a believable, psychologically explained scene, aim to affect the audience's senses directly so they experience the panic bodily - the Artaudian goal.

2. 02Build the soundscape

   Create an oppressive, distorted soundscape - overlapping whispers, a heartbeat rising to a roar, sudden dissonant stabs - filling the space so the audience cannot rest.

3. 03Use light and movement as assault

   Flood the audience with sudden, disorienting light changes and strobing darkness, and surround them with performers moving in ritualistic, repetitive, threatening patterns.

4. 04Break the safe separation

   Reconfigure the space so the audience is encircled or moved through, implicating them in the nightmare rather than letting them watch it safely from a distance.

Result: The sequence works on the audience's senses and their place in the space to make them feel the panic - the visceral, immersive effect Artaud sought, achieved through sound, light, movement and the actor-audience relationship rather than psychological realism.

Your group wants to open a devised piece about grief with a wordless physical sequence rather than dialogue. How might you use a physical company's devising method?

1. 01Choose the method

   Adopt a Frantic Assembly-style physical approach: generate movement through structured tasks rather than deciding choreography in advance, so the sequence grows from the ensemble.

2. 02Set a building-block task

   Give the group a concrete task - for example a repeatable sequence of contact and release between two performers passing a single gesture - and build a vocabulary of movements from it.

3. 03Shape it to the theme

   Select and order the strongest movements so the sequence traces the emotional arc of grief - reaching, holding, letting go - letting the physicality carry the meaning without words.

4. 04Set it in design

   Support the sequence with a spare set and focused light so the audience reads the bodies clearly, in the physical, image-led style of the company.

Result: A wordless grief sequence is devised through a physical company's task-based method - showing how a practitioner's methodology becomes a concrete rehearsal-room technique that generates original, meaningful theatre.