02/07/2024
We are currently taking applications for the summer of 2024, and only applications begun before February 15th will be considered for scholarships. Enrollment is limited to a total of 8 directing students per two-summer cohort. Early applications will get early decisions, and applications will be closed after 8 students have been accepted and those students have paid their deposit.
If you’d like to have a zoom meeting with the program director to discuss the program, please use this link to the program's website and request further information.
https://www.hollins.edu/programs/certificate-in-new-play-directing
At present, you cannot apply online, and you will also need to request a paper application.
If enrolled this summer, you’d be taking:
THEA 510: Playscript Analysis (4) Gogerty (Analytic)
Required of All First Year Students
T TH 9-Noon
Intensive critical analysis of the playscript as a blueprint for production covering representative texts from a range of theatre styles, genres, and periods. Plays are considered in both their original historical/cultural context as well as implications for contemporary audiences. Course covers major approaches to dramatic criticism and the tools used in theatre research. (Required for all first-year students)
THEA 520: Narrative Theory (4) Ristau (Creative)
Required of All First Year Students
W F 2-5
Introduction to the basics of storytelling and the creation of dramatic texts using both organic and formulaic models with an emphasis on the one act play. Students will learn to observe the world for meaning, build characters, place characters in settings, write monologues, create dialogue between characters, and lay the groundwork for longer, more substantive work. (Required for all first-year students)
THEA 524: DIRECTING THE NEW PLAY (4)
Directing Certificate, Playwriting Elective, Dramaturgy Elective, MA Elective
T TH 2-5
Focused instruction on directing and rehearsal techniques with particular emphasis on approaching the new play when the playwright is attending rehearsals. Students who complete this course will have the confidence to determine whether problems lie in the unfinished text or in the performer’s approach to the play and how to come up with practical ways to differentiate between them.
THEA 561: Directors and Playwrights in Collaboration (2) Ristau (Collaboration)
Directing Certificate, Playwriting Elective, MA Elective
M 9-Noon
Guided instruction leading up to the reading of a new play in Festival and functioning as a production meeting with participation of the playwright and performers discussing process and progress toward the presentation of the work to the public. All students enrolled in the certificate in New Play Directing will be required to direct a reading in the Hollins Playwright’s Festival, which presents ten new play readings to industry professionals from all over the world. This course is designed to guide directing students through the process of collaboration from the initial read and interview with a playwright, development of concept in consultation with the playwright, and included practical exercises to ensure that when it comes to the test the playwright and director are on the same page. Monday meetings function as a kind of production meeting for the festival readings and will include Festival playwrights. Repeated each summer.
New Cohort begins Summer 2024Under special circumstances permission to begin certificate programs in off years may be given by the program director. The New Play Directing Certificate provides practical experience […]
