Theater directing. Profession "Director": description, pros and cons

In Ushakov's explanatory dictionary of the Russian language we find the following definition. Director(from French régisseur - actor manager, and Lat. Rego - manage) - artistic director of a theatrical or cinematic production, combining all the work on preparing the performance.

The profession of a director is a profession of the twentieth century. Although since ancient times the theater has been managed: someone has always been at the head of the organization of its creative life. Thus, in the ancient Greek theater there is such a figure as joreg- a wealthy citizen who, subject to his exemption from taxes, carried out a theatrical production at his own expense. However, his responsibilities included not only material support for the stage action. Khoreg selected the choir (one of the main characters in the ancient Greek theater) and found a teacher to work with it - the horodidaskala, as well as musicians - a flutist who accompanied the choir, and a lyre player who accompanied the singing of the actors themselves with his playing, organized rehearsals, ordered scenery and props.

In the 18th and 19th centuries, the functions of the director were not so much artistic and creative as administrative and technical in nature and differed little from the duties of the current assistant director. Creative functions, which constitute the main content of modern directing art, used to be taken on by one of the most authoritative participants in the overall work - the author of the play, the first actor, artist or entrepreneur. But such random, “unofficial” direction rarely brought the task of creating the ideological and artistic unity of the performance to the end: discord between its individual elements, to one degree or another, turned out to be inevitable. The same thing happened in those cases when the team, without a single leader, tried to achieve the creative organization of the performance through the collective efforts of all participants. Previously, one had to put up with this out of necessity, being satisfied with the most insignificant successes along the way.

This was the case until the moment when the Moscow Art Theater began its triumphal march in Russia and in the world theater space under the leadership of amateur actor K.S. Stanislavsky and writer V.I. Nemirovich-Danchenko. This happened in 1898, and if earlier plays were staged, now they began to be created. From that time on, the director came to the theater and, in fact, took all the power there.

Today, no one will agree to recognize a performance as a full-fledged work of art, despite the excellent performance of individual roles and magnificent scenery, if it as a whole is devoid of stylistic unity and general ideological purposefulness (what Stanislavsky called the performance’s ultimate task). And this cannot be achieved without a director. Therefore, simultaneously with the growth of ideological and aesthetic requirements for the performance, the very concept of directing art expanded and deepened and its role in the complex complex of various components of the theater continuously increased.

Speaking about the need to achieve unity of all elements of the performance, K.S. Stanislavsky wrote: “This large, united and well-armed army simultaneously influences a whole crowd of theater spectators with a common friendly onslaught, forcing thousands of human hearts to beat at once, in unison.” Who should train, unite and arm this army in order to then throw it into the attack? Of course, the director! It is designed to unite the efforts of everyone, directing them towards a common goal - the ultimate goal of the performance. In other words, directing in the theater is the creative organization of all elements of the performance with the aim of creating a harmoniously integral work of art.

A theater director is, first of all, an interpreter and interpreter of dramaturgy, the author of an artistic stage composition. Interpretation is a special cognitive activity aimed not so much at acquiring knowledge from ignorance, but at translating previously existing meanings (scientific, ideological, artistic) into another language. Interpretations and interpretations of works of art combine intuitive and rational, emotional and intellectual, cognitive and creative principles.

It is the director, being the interpreter of the idea of ​​a dramatic work, who determines the concept of its production solution. The director's arsenal includes a variety of means of artistic expression. The performance, as V.E. Khalizev aptly put it, is not a scenic interlinear addition to a literary work, but a valuable artistic reality in its own right.

Directing is an author's art, and today we more often say not “Lenkom”, but the theater of Mark Zakharov, not “Sovremennik”, but the theater of Galina Volchek, not “Theater on Taganka”, but the theater of Yuri Lyubimov. Directing is a personal art. He is mainly interested in what is consonant with him as a creative individual in the play. The distinguishing feature of a truly creative, rather than rationally illustrative, stage interpretation of a dramatic work is best characterized by the words of the remarkable Soviet theater director Anatoly Vasilyevich Efros: “I can only stage it the way I feel.”

The director’s task is to infect the viewer who comes to his performance with his ideals, values, and philosophy of life. However, one should also listen to the thoughts of the outstanding Soviet film director G.A. Kozintsev (“Hamlet”, “King Lear”, etc.), who warned that “not coming forward with your assessments of what is happening is the most difficult thing in directing. The simplest thing is to make assessments... It’s quite good to avoid drawing conclusions at all. Let people judge. My job is to convince: it could be, and not “that’s how I think about it.”

The director, according to the typology of V.I. Nemirovich-Danchenko, is also a mirror, reflecting the individual qualities of the actor and the facets of his creative talent. In an acting performance in a play, as a rule, all the elements of acting technique are present. But in relation to each performance separately, the director is faced with the question: which of these elements should be brought to the fore in this performance, so that, grasping them as links in one unbreakable chain, he can pull out the entire chain. So, for example, in one performance the most important thing may be the internal concentration of the actor and the stinginess of expressive means, in another - naivety and speed of reactions, in the third - simplicity and spontaneity combined with vivid everyday characteristics, in the fourth - emotional passion and external expression, in fifth, on the contrary, restraint of feelings. The variety here has no limits; the only important thing is that each time exactly what is needed for a given play is established. The ability to find the right solution to a performance through a precisely found manner of acting and the ability to practically implement this solution when working with actors determines the professional qualifications of the director.

Directing and pedagogy are so closely related that it is sometimes difficult to draw a line between them, to find the point where one profession ends and another begins. The director, as a sensitive educator, must be able to discern the true acting talent and reveal it. K.S. Stanislavsky accurately noticed that for the organic cultivation of a role, no less, and in other cases much longer, time is needed than for the creation and cultivation of a living person. During this period, the director participates in the creative process in the role of a midwife or obstetrician.”

And finally, the third “hypostasis” of the director is his organizational work, namely, building the rehearsal process, which includes his entire creative team - from the actor to the stagehand. The director’s tasks in this context are to convince, practically organize, captivate, infecting the team with his plan, ultimate task, and faith in the success of the future stage action.

Summarizing the essence of the director's profession, let us turn to the thoughts of G.A. Tovstonogov, who wrote: “The director is always compared to a source of creative energy, the rays from which diverge in all directions: to the actor, to the playwright, to the viewer. The director is the point of intersection of time, poetic ideas and the art of the actor, that is, the viewer, the author and the actor. This is a prism that brings together all the components of theatrical art into one focus. Collecting all the rays refracting them, the prism becomes the source of the rainbow."

The system of K.S. Stanislavsky arose as a generalization of his creative and pedagogical experience and the experience of his theatrical predecessors and contemporaries, outstanding figures of world stage art. It, being a practical guide for the director and actor, became a theoretical expression of that realistic direction in stage art, which Stanislavsky called the art of experience, requiring not imitation, but genuine experience at the moment of creativity on stage, creating anew at each performance a living process according to a pre-thought-out logic life image.

Thanks to the discoveries of K.S. Stanislavsky, the creative principles of stage art were revealed much more fully in the active completion of a play - the transformation of its text into a director's score. “We recreate the works of playwrights,” wrote K.S. Stanislavsky, “we reveal in them what is hidden under the words, we put our own subtext into someone else’s text... we create, as the final result of our creativity, a truly productive action, closely connected with the innermost intention plays."

K.S. Stanislavsky in his works “The Actor’s Work on Himself” and “The Actor’s Work on the Role” reveals the essence of the various elements of stage creativity, the study of which is necessary for the clearest understanding of the method of effective analysis of the play and the role. But concepts end-to-end action and super task are the most frequently used. K.S. Stanislavsky himself wrote the following about the super-task and the cross-cutting action: “The super-task and the cross-cutting action are the main vital essence, the artery, the nerve, the pulse of the play. The super task (wanting), the end-to-end action (desire) and its implementation (action) create a creative process of experiencing... Let us agree for the future to call this basic, main, all-encompassing goal, which attracts to itself all tasks without exception, causing the creative desire of the engines of the psychic life and elements of well-being of the artist-role, the ultimate task of the writer’s work”; without the subjective experiences of the creator, it is dry, dead. It is necessary to look for responses in the artist’s soul so that both the ultimate task and the role become alive, vibrant, shining with all the colors of true human life.”

“We are loved in those plays,” Stanislavsky asserted, “where we have a clear, interesting super-task and a well-detailed through-action. The ultimate goal and end-to-end action are the main things in art.”

The supertask has a wonderful feature. One and the same correctly defined super-task, obligatory for everyone, will awaken in each performer his own individual responses in the soul. The director’s task is to formulate it clearly, clearly and understandably, since the definition of the super task gives meaning and direction to the work of the entire creative team. Russian film director Alexander Mitta expressed himself very figuratively about the need for a clear formulation of the ultimate goal by the director (regardless of the type of art): “Forget capricious sighs: ah, I feel it, but I can’t express it in words! Employees must be inspired by the idea, but how will they understand their part of the overall task if the director crawls through the script like a bug on wallpaper, not seeing its perspective, not knowing the course with which he is steering his ship.”

The path to realizing the ultimate goal - end-to-end action - this is that real, concrete struggle taking place before the eyes of the audience, as a result of which the super task is affirmed. For an artist, the end-to-end action, according to K.S. Stanislavsky, is a direct continuation of the lines of aspiration of the engines of mental life, originating from the mind, will and feelings of the creative artist. If there were no cross-cutting action, all the pieces and tasks of the play, all the proposed circumstances, communication, adaptations, moments of truth and faith, etc., would languish separately from each other, without any hope of coming to life.

An outstanding film director who was also noted for his work in the theater, S.M. Eisenstein characterized the essence of directorial creativity this way: “From cue to cue in a written play, one must be able to establish a single process of action. Expand a dry line of a task into a varied, polysyllabic and rhythmically united action. This is the first thing a director who aspires to construct stage action, and not to recitatives from rolls of roles, should be able to do.”

However, directing in cultural and leisure activities is an independent area of ​​directing art with its own goals, objectives, principles and techniques. These features are determined by the general content and content of cultural and leisure activities. It is no coincidence that we find the following in I.M. Tumanov: “Components such as song, dance, and pictorial (plastic) composition replace in the mass imagination the psychological justification for the behavior of heroes. The emotionality characteristic of this genre involves instantly switching viewers from one object to another without detail or psychological motivation. In other words, dramaturgy and direction of mass action should be structured in such a way as to find in the external form of presenting the material an internal image that corresponds to its idea, rhythm, and breathing.”

Self-test questions

1. Describe the professional activity of a director in theatrical art.

2. How V.I. Nemirovich-Danchenko defined three functions of the director?

3. What did K.S. Stanislavsky understand by super-task and end-to-end action?

Literature

1. Kozintsev, G.M. Collected works in 5 volumes. T.5 / Kozintsev G.M. – L. Art, 1986. – 622 p.

2. Basics Stanislavsky system / textbook. allowance; comp. N.V. Kiseleva, V.A. Frolov. – Rostov n/d: Phoenix, 2000. – 102 p.

3. Stanislavsky, K.S. My life in art / K.S. Stanislavsky. – M.: Art, 1983. – 610 p.

4. Stanislavsky, K.S. An actor's work on himself. / K.S.Stanislavsky. – M.: Art, 1956. – 387 p.

5. Tovstonogov, G.A. Mirror of the stage: Articles. Recordings of rehearsals. Book 1 / G.A. Tovstonogov. – L.: Art, 1980. – 311 p.

The director's profession belongs to the category of creative ones, and its essence lies in directing the creative process of creating a work - a film, a play, a circus performance, a variety show, etc.

A representative of this profession is responsible only for the creative side of creating a work. This distinguishes the director from the producer, who raises money for the project and resolves financial, technical, and organizational issues. However, there are masters who combine both roles and avoid possible conflicts of interest (commerce and creativity).

What types of directors are there?

Stage director

The production director is the main person who is responsible for everything that happens on the set or on stage. Actors, cameramen, sound engineers, screenwriters, decorators and other specialists report to him - he organizes them and is responsible for the final result. Therefore, the word “director” is not always used in relation to him.

Theater director

The tasks of the theater director include organizing and conducting all activities for staging the play - from working on the text of the play, selecting performers and scenery to staging the work, synchronizing the actions of the actors and their compliance with both the storyline and the artistic concept (both the author of the play and his own ).

Film editor

The profession of editing director (or film editing) hides an ordinary editor who brings together pieces of filming into one work (film, TV show, commercial, clip). Of course, this is not an ordinary technician who presses buttons on a computer, but a specialist who works side by side with the director, who knows all the subtleties and nuances of the future film and, in addition, knows how to perform all the technical functions.

The main task of the editing director is to make the output what the chief director expects.

Places of work

The position of director is provided for in many organizations producing entertainment and entertainment products:

• in film companies and film studios;
• in theaters and circuses;
• in large advertising agencies.

And some other organizations.

History of the profession

Before the advent of cinema, the profession of a director belonged to the theatrical field. At all times, there have been people who staged plays, performances and various shows. These could be playwrights, actors or someone else, but they were the progenitors of future directors.

The popularity of the theater and more complex productions around the second half of the 19th century gave birth to the profession of director. The Meiningen Theater, directed by Ludwig Kroneck, can be considered her birthplace.

Directors appeared in cinema almost immediately with its emergence: in the documentary genre - the inventors of cinema themselves, the Lumière brothers, in the fiction genre - Georges Méliès, in the animation - Emile Reynaud.

Over time, this activity became more diverse; not only film and theater directors appeared, but also circus directors, organizers of large public events, etc.

Director's responsibilities

The list and scope of specific tasks and responsibilities of the director can vary significantly depending on the direction and specifics of the activity. For example, a film director does the following things:

• writes or selects a script;
• determines the overall artistic style of the painting;
• selects actors and directs them;
• supervises the work of decorators, costume designers, screenwriters, cameramen, editors, assistants and other specialists;
• manages the installation procedure (sometimes participates in it).

For comparison, we will describe some of the functions of a television director who creates programs and broadcasts:

• creates scripts;
• accepts ready-made stories and programs;
• participates in editing television programs and advertising videos;
• works live.

Requirements for the director

The basic requirements for the director are simple:

• higher specialized education;
• experience in a certain field of directing: film, theater, television, etc.

At the same time, “profile” specialists (editing directors, sound engineers, etc.) are sometimes required to know the relevant equipment and software.

How to become a director

Becoming a director, especially a high-level one, is not so easy. To do this, you need to obtain a higher education in the specialty “director” - for example, graduate from the directing department of VGIK, a theater academy, a cultural institute, or another specialized university.

Moreover, it is advisable to choose an educational institution immediately according to the desired specialty: very few manage to retrain, for example, from a theater director to a film director during the course of their career.

Director's salary

How much a director earns is a big question. Famous artists make millions, but they always risk that their next creation will fail and they will end up in the red.

In addition to famous directors, there are also a lot of unnamed specialists. Their incomes are usually not very high. A director's salary can range from 30 to 250 thousand rubles per month (depending on the employer and the level of projects).

Theater director

Theater director- a person whose duties include staging a play. The director takes responsibility for the aesthetic side of the performance and its organization, the selection of performers, the interpretation of the text and the use of stage tools at his disposal. The appearance of the term dates back to the first half of the 19th century, when the systematic practice of directing a performance arose.

History of the profession

Current status

Patrice Pavy, in The Dictionary of the Theatre, notes that the evaluation of a director's work mostly comes down to questions of taste and ideology, rather than aesthetics. Therefore, it is worth stating that the director simply exists (which is especially noticeable in the case when he is not up to the task). Moreover, the stage's need for a director is periodically challenged by other participants in theatrical creativity. The actor demands freedom from too tyrannical instructions; the stage designer wants to involve both actors and audience into his play device without an intermediary; the theater “team” refuses to recognize the differences in the troupe, takes care of the performance itself and offers collective creativity; finally, the entrepreneur, the producer, demands a connection between art and commercialization.

Notes

see also

• Directing art

Links

Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.

• Stage director
• Director Viktyuk

See what “Theater Director” is in other dictionaries:

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The history of the emergence of the director's profession

In the course of various reforms and changes in political, cultural, social life, the well-established one began to falter and required restructuring. The destruction began with a breakdown in the harmony of dramatic action; the accepted hierarchy in the work of the troupe disintegrated. Previously, it was customary that the entire action was built around one of the characters, one person played the main role on stage throughout the entire play. There was a kind of pyramid of the troupe, the top of which were the premieres, the next step were those who played supporting roles, and even lower in this hierarchy were the tertiary performers.

But plays began to appear where the action covered more than one storyline, and there were several heroes, instead of one main one. The three-level hierarchy was replaced by an ensemble; first one or another performer came to the fore, depending on the development of the play. Such dramaturgy no longer allowed one actor to carry out spontaneous directing; roles were no longer created around which the entire action was revolved. During the course of the play several centers emerged. Playwrights were also losing their importance. At the same time, the role of decorators increased, which further deepened the conflict situation. The authors of the plays did not want to give up their positions; they tried to impose their opinions on the performers and artists through multiple stage directions and author’s instructions.

Initially, the director came from among actors and playwrights and only later became an autonomous figure. Although this process was quite rapid, the responsibilities of a representative of the new profession gradually changed and did not take shape immediately.

The tasks of the first directors of the Russian theater

1. Initially, he was required to resolve organizational issues.
2. Then the updated position of directors appeared - this is the recruitment of a troupe, the choice of repertoire, actors of a certain type, placement in suitable buildings.
3. Another area of ​​activity is organizing the creative process of working on a play.
4. Greater importance began to be given to the preparatory stage. It included: searching for materials, for example, for historical productions, reading a play, and rehearsing.
5. There was a need to unite the troupe around one person, submit to his will and maintain discipline. The director began to solve this problem.
6. His equally important responsibility was the function of educating the team in accordance with the repertoire and rules.
7. There is a need to educate the audience in new traditions and rules.
8. The expansion of functionality was especially expressed in, for example, the creation of complex mise-en-scenes. They could only appear with the assistance of the director, who saw the stage from the auditorium. Mise-en-scène, along with plastic arts and words, became the language of production.

When all this was concentrated in the hands of one person - the director, then he, and not the playwright or actor, became the author of the performance. His concept and composition became the basis; this made the performance itself more holistic.

In Europe, this position appeared in the second half of the 19th century. In Russia, this process proceeded at a slower pace, for which there were historical reasons. Russia was a young theatrical state. The development of this type of art in both capitals was slowed down by the monopoly law. According to it, only imperial theaters could operate in Moscow and St. Petersburg, while private enterprises existed in the provinces. The monopoly was abolished in 1882, this served as the basis for the emergence of private stage venues, but they found it difficult to compete with the existing ones, so they opened and closed, unable to withstand the competition.

Moscow Art Theater as the cradle of Russian directing

By the time the Moscow Art Theater appeared, the capital's public was already ready and was looking forward to the birth of the new temple of Melpomene. The historical one outlined the fundamental ideas of the existence of the new theater. During their famous conversation the following questions were discussed:

• stage ethics,
• technical side of things,
• process organization,
• repertoire,
• building relationships within the team and between two leaders.

On all counts, they already had a special plan for reforming the old complex stage body, and these ideas did not contradict, but only complemented each other. Dual leadership made it possible to use Stanislavsky's organizational talent - he was given the production part, and Nemirovich was responsible for the literary side of the process. The troupe included Moskvin, Knipper, Meyerhold and other amateur actors from the Alekseevsky circle and graduates of the Philharmonic Society. The new directors’ program for the future of the theater came together right away; not everything was accomplished at first; some things came easy; others took many years to achieve.

The ideal was a troupe without hierarchy, created on creative and social equality. The entire process of preparing and working on the play at the Moscow Art Theater was structured differently than was previously accepted. Much attention was paid to the preparatory stage of the production: reading the play, its analysis, multiple and dress rehearsals. The preparatory process also involved the education of the viewer: it was forbidden to walk around the hall during the action, enter after the third bell, or interrupt the action with applause.

Nemirovich paid great attention to the quality of dramaturgy in the repertoire. There was nothing random here, but there were no restrictions on style or theme. The first ten years in the repertoire could be traced in several directions:

• historical and everyday life (A. Tolstoy),

• intuitions and feelings (Chekhov),

• socio-political (Ibsen, Gorky),

• social and everyday (Hauptmann, L. Tolstoy),

• fantasy, symbolism (Ostrovsky, Maeterlinck).

The first was the play “Tsar Fyodor Ioannovich” by A. Tolstoy. The drama was in keeping with the stated goals of the new temple of Melpomene. Both directors drew inspiration from the tours of the Duke of Meiningen's troupe, from there they took the desire for historical authenticity, harmony in every element of the action, and careful study of crowd scenes. The production was successful, but Nemirovich said that the Moscow Art Theater was not born with this premiere, but much later, in a modest series of working days.

The following performances were announced in the repertoire:

• "Antigone" by Sophocles,

• "The Seagull" by Chekhov,

• "Hedda Gabler" by Ibsen,

• "The Merchant of Venice" by Shakespeare,

• "The Sunken Bell", "Hannele" by Hauptmann,

• Pisemsky’s “arbitrary people.”

It was “The Seagull” that marked the birth of a new stage venue. The premiere, which took place on December 17, 1898, was not noisy, the hall was half empty, but it was with this play that success began. This and others: “Uncle Vanya”, “Three Sisters”, “The Cherry Orchard” radically changed the dramatic art of the new century.

The Moscow Art Theater immediately became fashionable and beloved by the intelligentsia, who saw their ideals in its productions.

The role and significance of the Moscow Art Theater

The revolutionary ideas of Stanislavsky and Nemirovich were developed. By 1910, the director's theater was divided in two. The first is literary and psychological, separating the stage and the auditorium with an invisible wall. The second is with improvisation, similar in spirit to commedia dell'arte. At the same time, all kinds of performing arts of both directions existed; they mutually influenced and complemented each other.

Fifteen years since the significant meeting of Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko:

• The Moscow Art Theater appeared, it developed its influence on the dramatic art of the early 20th century,
• a new creative profession of director was born,
• the author of the play has changed,
• the birth of a new profession helped the formation of the dramatic stage as an independent art,
• Directing, which grew out of the Moscow Art Theater experience, began to develop in different directions.

New theater directed by V.S. Meyerhold

After four seasons, Meyerhold, the leading actor of the troupe, will leave it, deciding to try himself in a new role as a director. First, he will create the “New Drama Partnership”, then he will try himself, working in a branch of the Moscow Art Theater. He will try to free himself from the excessive natural truth of the Meiningen school. His studio will embody the idea of ​​conventional dramatic art.

The theory and practical implementation of symbolist theater was reflected in the work of Maeterlinck. Based on this and developing the idea of ​​static performance, Meyerhold, at the end of 1906, staged the play “Balaganchik” at Komissarzhevskaya’s in St. Petersburg. There is no literary source in the booth theater. According to the dramatic plan, the actor becomes the center of improvisational action. The action is based on a script - a series of dramatic situations, but not with specific characters, but with masked images without individual features, where the stage space and the objective world are conventional. The performers had to study the techniques of past eras in order to use the techniques of grotesque and farce in the game.

Russian directing of the Silver Age

He brought to the world five great directors on the world stage, each of whom left his own unique mark on art. M. Chekhov described them as follows:

• Konstantin Stanislavsky - with devotion to the truth of inner life,
• Vladimir Nemirovich-Danchenko - with precision of thinking, a sense of structure and integrity,
• Vsevolod Meyerhold - with a demonic imagination to see evil in everything,
• Evgeny Vakhtangov - with rich theatricality,
• Alexander Tairov - with a desire for beauty.

These directors expanded the boundaries of dramatic art, pointed out the possibility of choice in the creative method of creating a performance, and convinced that on stage everything is acceptable and everything is possible. And they themselves remained in Russian theatrical history as the great masters of Russian director's theater, becoming the founders of many, many subsequent trends and schools.

Directing is a creative and very difficult profession. In order to become them, they need an extraordinary mind, assertiveness, seriousness, literacy, and originality. Directing is a difficult task, because in a very short period of time you need to create something that will illuminate the souls of the audience with a bright flame and enter the minds and hearts of people. They make the pages of imperishable books come to life before our eyes. But this must be done in such a way as not to discredit the famous works of the classics, but to elevate them. And very often it turns out that theater directors are very limited in both means and capabilities.

About the profession

The profession of a theater director is inextricably linked with creativity. He interprets works in his own way, conducting them through the prism of his own consciousness. This requires tireless leadership of a team of actors, working with each of them individually. Often this becomes the basis for the success of a performance. In addition, the theater director controls the composer, the set designer, and other indirect participants in the action. He is also a production director.

In order to stage a performance, you need to develop a special rehearsal plan. This is also the responsibility of the theater director, and he conducts all rehearsals himself. In fact, he is the main man of the play.

Historical reference

The profession of theater director dates back to the second half of the nineteenth century. But the very concept of the profession appeared in the ancient Greek theater, although then the role of the teacher or didascal was played by the author of the dramatic work himself. During the Renaissance, everything was exactly the opposite.

Very often, the main member of the artistic troupe became the playwright and director. Such cases are known in Italian, Spanish and German theaters.

The very origin of theater director as a profession occurred much later. In the nineteenth century, the following trend could be observed in the theater: plays were staged for the prima, for leading actors. Everything was done for them: roles and plays were changed. The main indicator of the quality of the performance was the acting skills of certain artists. Changing scenery and music did not mean anything; it happened that some plays were performed with the same scenery.

Twentieth century theater director

The theater director these days is the head of the stage. Everything and everyone is subject to his plan. Even when the audience begins to talk about this or that performance, the work of the director always comes first. There is even such a famous expression: “The director dies in the actors.” It means that the theater director is blamed for all acting and stage mistakes. He must be not only a good organizer, but also a psychologist, because artists are subtle, sensitive people. In addition, he himself must possess acting skills, must be able to and know everything: even how the scenery is made.

In a modern theater? This is, first of all, a person who interprets the play according to his vision of the stage images in which the characters of the play appear. It is he who must find the main plot thread and build the entire action around it. At the same time, he must correctly place emphasis on those moments that are designed to attract the attention of a modern person, on what, in the opinion of the theater director, is reflected in modern reality.

The theater director creates his own world for the characters in the play, surrounds it with scenery, sets the desired rhythm, and selects the necessary musical accompaniment. All this is included in the plan for staging the play. The main goal of a theater director is to convey to the viewer the main idea of ​​a dramatic work.

The task of a theater director is to skillfully realize his idea of ​​staging a dramatic work that is already familiar to the audience so that it sounds in a new way, interests people and makes them come to the performances again and again. To do this, he must most accurately convey his ideas to the actors, set designers, costume designers and sound engineers, so that they understand and implement on stage what is required of them. After all, the performance is a huge effort of all these people. And the task of the theater director is to unite them around a single idea, make them imbued with it and give all their strength, put their soul into the performance.

To successfully solve these problems, a theater director must be a good psychologist, have a sense of modernity and high intelligence, have a good imagination and a broad outlook. To manage other people, and this is what a theater director does, a person must be able to manage himself. Therefore, he must have high self-control and self-discipline.