I sometimes describe myself as someone who has an opinion on everything, and I can make a decision 100% of the time when needed, but maybe 25% of the decisions will be wrong. I’m trying to get across to someone that the role I take on as producer is someone who will fill a gap, creatively or practically, when needed. I may not be the best person to have an opinion about something, but I can offer a subjective view. I also suggest to aspiring producers that they are often fulfilling the role of an advance informed audience member.
Last weekend I was invited to Weeps in the Netherlands for the reading of a new musical drama developed by a highly regarded Dutch performer with a desire to change the kind of work, the mix of creatives, and the audience recognition / connectivity for future work. My challenge was that the presentation would be all in Dutch and the work was original – so not a lot of familiarity for a mono-linguist like me.
The role I was asked to fulfill was to be an audience member (in this case an ill-informed one), and to sense whether I could critique the show to see where further development was needed in storytelling, dramatic arc, and musical theatre content.
It proved a very enjoyable and rather fascinating experience for me.
I am used to watching shows like Les Misérables and Miss Saigon around the world performed in new and reproduction productions in the main language of the intended audience. Here the story is known, the songs and arc is not going to change, and my role is to talk with the director if I sense there is an energy change which could be counterproductive. I know the plot and I know the lyrics.
After the event the director of the development house I was in, with whom I had worked on Les Miserables in Berlin, wondered why I hadn’t just got a literal AI generated translation of the work to follow. It would have taken a minute. I’m so glad neither the writer nor I thought of it. My focus would have been on reading rather than absorbing.
I did ask the writer for a very rough synopsis. Not all the plot but just a few elements which they felt I would only get if I had heard key lines. For example in this piece we start in the present and then drop back a number of years for Scene 2. The stranger who arrives to upset the setup is a plumber. That sort of thing. The writer send me a 4 minute voice memo which I listened to in the corner of the foyer before going in. It was enough and invaluable.
My way of watching a new work in a reading has developed over the years. I have always been someone who needs to write down stuff. I can still just about read my writing afterwards, and then I can write a report/thoughts in memo form afterwards.
I will share my scrawling method of dramaturgy in case it is useful both to the observer and to the person considering creating a reading:
I number the scenes or moments as I go, and add a tiny 3-10 word summation of where I am/ who/what “Man giving eulogy at funeral”. I note down any line or emotion which hits me. I wonder why something is spoken, or the role we the audience have outside the 4th wall. As we move forward I jot the moment down when I get an emotional connection, or lose energy.
All of these things come from the visual signals I am getting from the actors. In this case I was blessed by it having a very slight staging sense – the characters moved four music stands and a couple of seats to create a visual picture.
I am also listening to the audience. Since the 8-10 other people at this very first reading of the work understand Dutch I know when there is a biting line, or a joke, without the need for my understanding. It really helps having a cast in a reading who look/sound like the characters we are meant to be envisioning. When the production happens they will have added costumes, wigs, makeup etc – but now we are seeing them in casual clothes with a hint of character to help us get under the skin of the role we are watching.
In the back of my head I have in mind the perceived wisdom of how a play or musical is structured. That’s not to say a writer can’t break all conventions, but they are best done knowingly. There is a reason why the beginning of Act Two in a musical will often have a relatively unimportant choral moment – it allows the audience to settle after their ice cream or email/cigarette break and return into the magical world of suspended disbelief which is needed in almost all drama. Here, in this reading, Act Two started with a very dark and I sensed important moment. I noted this. It is not for me to re-think this moment, but it is useful to have this reflection passed to the writer when it is work in progress.
I am also thinking, even with just my 4 minute voice memo plot in my head, who this work is for. Why is this writer, and this cast, telling this story at this time. What are the key things which might make me (the audience member reading a flyer or seeing an advert) decide to spend my money entering the writers world. And if I am drawn by one particular magnet – a star, or a musical, or a gritty scary horror image or whatever – am I getting what is ‘on the tin’. There are times when the writer intentionally plays tricks with us. I remember a wonderful piece I read back in the 1990s called 1918. I presumed it was a World War 1 drama, but throughout the piece there is no mention of the war. It is a story where we the audience know what is in the background as a looming legacy for these characters as they go through another story of their relationships and life. The writer intentionally wanted to wrong-foot the audience.
As I am witnessing and noting the beats of the show I am looking for what David Wood, the prolific and inspiring writer and champion for theatre for young people, calls ‘Suddenlies’. These are the moments in a scene where we the audience get an emotional jolt to move us forward on the path set by the writer. They are the things that keep us awake and alert. The things that give us a laugh or an emotional punch. For children’s writing David counts the number of suddenlies on every page of his script. I was doing something similar when watching this foreign language drama. If a speech or a song goes on for too long then we can sense a drop in energy in the audience.
Jeremy Sams, the composer, translator, director, musical director, and inspiring mentor for writers, talks of song moments being ‘Rooms’ or ‘Corridors’. Moments of reflection for a character as they hold in a moment. They may enter the emotional room through one dorrway, but they will usually leave changed in someway through another door. The Corridor songs allow the characters and the audience to move forward through time or space. They are changed by the end of the song and are, often literally, in a different place.
Just listening to songs offered here in a reading in a language foreign to me, it is difficult sometimes to identify a room or a corridor, but its always fun to try. And this is where I say I will make a decision (or have an opinion) 100% of the time – but 25% of the time I will be wrong. The author can then reflect back that I just missed it because of language or setting.
At the end of this Reading I had four pages of nearly readable notes, and I enjoyed deciphering them on the Eurostar heading back from Amsterdam to London. My role was to be deeply opinionated but throughout remind the writer that I was just one relatively ill-informed audience member. I am also not the target audience for this particular piece – although I can’t wait to be in an audience seeing it in full Dutch language production.
A writer going through the workshop and reading process can get multiple conflicting well meaning opinions about their writing. It is always good to give us, the audience or opinionated know-it-alls, a clear brief on what the writer needs to hear about. In this case the writer wanted to know whether, without Dutch, I understood the arc of the emotional drama. They also got, asked for or not, reflections on when I felt something might be more or less musicalised to help with the flow of the energy. And they wanted to know whether this new story could translate into international markets in the future.
This writer also had the challenge on the day that their leading actor was poorly so they even had to step into delivering one of the roles themselves. I hope that a week later, when the cast were sharing part of the work with an illustrious gathering of Dutch theatre producers and influencers, that the actor will be back and the writer can revert to their most necessary role. To pace at the back of the room nervously listening to the audience reaction every beat of their book.
I look forward to catching up with the writer as they consider the future pathway for this work. I’m so pleased they are taking it slowly, allowing time to assimilate all the reflections coming back and then move through a re-write phase, a workshop phase with the new version, and then eventually a pitching session for potential theatres and co-producers. This is a year’s pathway which could/should/will I hope lead to an audience first cheering the show in a Dutch theatre in the Fall of 2026.
I am so pleased my notes were welcomed. I got a lovely voice memo from the writer bemused as to how I had understood so much of their new work without speaking a word of Dutch. Well that is the power of theatre, supported by a fine cast who inhabit the emotional depth and journey of their characters, and a very simple staging to help me know what the physical interaction is between this family of characters. It worked really well.
Can I recommend Ghostlight by Michael M. Chemers as a handbook for dramaturgs, and Writing for Children by David Wood as a structural guide which is really helpful for family/musical theatre. Plus of course anything around the Heroes Journey
Do add comments and thoughts to this blog which may be useful to writers and dramaturg/producers think about how to witness new work.