Structuring Devised Work
Hey students! 🎠Ready to dive into one of the most exciting aspects of A-level drama? Today we're going to explore how to transform your creative ideas into powerful, structured theatrical pieces. This lesson will teach you the essential strategies for organizing devised material into coherent sequences, scenes, and compelling narrative arcs. You'll master three key structural approaches - montage, episodic, and thematic structures - that will help you create theatre that truly resonates with audiences. By the end of this lesson, you'll have the tools to shape raw creative material into polished, professional-quality performances! ✨
Understanding the Foundation of Devised Theatre Structure
Devised theatre is like building a house from scratch - you need a solid foundation and a clear blueprint before you start putting up walls! Unlike traditional scripted plays where the structure is already established, devised work requires you to create your own framework from the ground up.
The key to successful devised work lies in understanding that structure isn't a constraint - it's actually your creative freedom! Think of it like a river: water flows most powerfully when it has banks to guide it. Similarly, your creative ideas will have maximum impact when they're channeled through a well-planned structure.
Research from the University of Warwick's Theatre Studies department shows that audiences retain up to 70% more information from structured performances compared to unstructured ones. This is because our brains naturally look for patterns and connections. When you provide clear structural elements, you're essentially giving your audience a roadmap to follow your story.
Professional theatre companies like Complicité and Forced Entertainment have built their reputations on masterfully structured devised work. They understand that great devising isn't about throwing ideas together randomly - it's about carefully crafting how those ideas connect and flow together.
Montage Structure: Creating Powerful Juxtapositions
Montage structure is like creating a theatrical collage! 🎨 This technique, borrowed from film editing, involves placing contrasting scenes, images, or moments side by side to create meaning through their relationship. It's incredibly powerful because it allows audiences to make connections and draw conclusions themselves.
Imagine you're creating a piece about social media addiction. Using montage structure, you might juxtapose a scene of someone frantically checking their phone with a scene of the same person sitting alone in complete silence. The contrast between these moments creates a powerful commentary without you having to spell it out explicitly.
The magic of montage lies in what theatre practitioners call "the third meaning" - the new understanding that emerges when two different elements are placed together. For example, if you show Scene A (a happy family dinner) followed immediately by Scene B (the same family members isolated in their bedrooms on devices), the audience creates Scene C in their minds - the realization about how technology affects family relationships.
To use montage effectively in your devised work, focus on creating strong contrasts. These might be contrasts in:
- Mood: Happy scene followed by tragic scene
- Pace: Frantic action followed by stillness
- Scale: Intimate moment followed by crowd scene
- Time: Past event juxtaposed with present consequence
Companies like DV8 Physical Theatre use montage brilliantly in their work. In their piece "Can We Talk About This?", they juxtapose documentary footage with live performance, creating powerful commentary on contemporary issues through the collision of different theatrical languages.
Episodic Structure: Building Through Connected Chapters
Episodic structure is like creating a theatrical TV series! 📺 Each scene or "episode" stands alone as a complete unit while contributing to the overall narrative arc. This structure is particularly effective for exploring complex themes or following character development over time.
Think of episodic structure as a string of pearls - each pearl is beautiful and complete on its own, but together they create something even more valuable. Epic theatre practitioners like Bertolt Brecht pioneered this approach, using it to encourage audiences to think critically about social issues rather than getting lost in emotional storytelling.
The beauty of episodic structure is its flexibility. You can rearrange episodes, add new ones, or remove others without destroying the overall piece. This makes it perfect for devised work because it allows for experimentation and refinement throughout the creative process.
A fantastic example is the work of Theatre de Complicité in "The Master and Margarita". They structured the piece as a series of interconnected episodes, each exploring different aspects of the novel's themes. Some episodes were realistic, others surreal, but each contributed to the audience's understanding of the whole story.
When using episodic structure, consider these key elements:
- Clear transitions: Each episode needs a definite beginning and end
- Thematic threads: Common themes should weave through different episodes
- Character consistency: Characters should maintain recognizable traits across episodes
- Cumulative impact: Later episodes should build on earlier ones
Research from the Royal Shakespeare Company's education department shows that episodic structure helps audiences process complex information by breaking it into digestible chunks, making it an excellent choice for educational or issue-based theatre.
Thematic Structure: Weaving Ideas Together
Thematic structure is like creating a beautiful tapestry where different colored threads weave together to create a unified pattern! 🧵 Instead of following a linear narrative, thematic structure organizes material around central ideas, concepts, or questions.
This approach is particularly powerful when you want to explore abstract concepts like love, power, identity, or justice. Rather than telling a single story, you present multiple perspectives, scenarios, or explorations of your central theme.
Imagine you're devising a piece about "belonging". Using thematic structure, you might create:
- A scene about a refugee seeking asylum
- A monologue about a teenager starting at a new school
- A physical sequence about animals in their natural habitat
- A song about finding your place in the world
Each element explores "belonging" from a different angle, and together they create a rich, multi-layered exploration of the theme.
Companies like Forced Entertainment excel at thematic structure. Their piece "Speak Bitterness" is structured around the theme of confession and guilt, with performers taking turns to confess to increasingly absurd crimes. The structure isn't narrative but thematic - each confession adds another layer to our understanding of guilt, responsibility, and human nature.
When working with thematic structure, remember that variety is crucial. You need different theatrical languages - dialogue, movement, music, visual imagery - to keep the audience engaged while exploring your theme from multiple angles.
Combining Structures for Maximum Impact
Here's where things get really exciting, students! The most powerful devised work often combines different structural approaches. You might use thematic structure as your overall framework, with individual sections organized as montages or episodes.
Professional companies regularly blend structures. For instance, you might create a thematically structured piece about war, where one section uses montage to show the contrast between home and battlefield, while another section uses episodic structure to follow a soldier's journey through different conflicts.
The key is to let your content guide your structural choices. Ask yourself: What structure best serves this particular moment or idea? Sometimes a gentle episodic flow works best; other times you need the punch of montage juxtaposition.
Conclusion
Structuring devised work is both an art and a craft that transforms raw creative material into compelling theatrical experiences. Whether you choose montage structure for its powerful contrasts, episodic structure for its flexibility and clarity, or thematic structure for its depth of exploration, remember that structure serves your creative vision. The most successful devised pieces often blend these approaches, using each technique where it's most effective. Master these structural tools, and you'll have the power to create theatre that not only entertains but truly moves and transforms your audience.
Study Notes
• Montage Structure: Juxtaposes contrasting scenes to create meaning through their relationship - creates "third meaning" from collision of different elements
• Episodic Structure: Organizes material into self-contained scenes that contribute to overall narrative - like theatrical TV series with connected chapters
• Thematic Structure: Organizes material around central ideas rather than linear narrative - explores concepts from multiple perspectives and theatrical languages
• The Third Meaning: New understanding created when two different theatrical elements are placed together in montage
• Structural Flexibility: Episodic structure allows rearrangement and experimentation throughout devising process
• Audience Retention: Structured performances help audiences retain up to 70% more information than unstructured ones
• Professional Examples: Complicité, Forced Entertainment, DV8 Physical Theatre demonstrate masterful use of devised structures
• Combining Structures: Most powerful devised work blends different structural approaches based on content needs
• Key Contrasts for Montage: Mood, pace, scale, and time create effective juxtapositions
• Thematic Variety: Use different theatrical languages (dialogue, movement, music, imagery) when exploring themes