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Robert Lepage’s Scenographic Dramaturgy

The Aesthetic Signature at Work

  • Book
  • © 2018

Overview

Authors:
  1. Melissa Poll

    1. Department of English, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, BC, Canada

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  • Explores Robert Lepage's work through the new lens of 'scenographic dramaturgy'
  • Speaks to the theatre-making process from the interdisciplinary perspective of a professional actor and scholar
  • Offers the first case study of Lepage’s infamous, sixteen-million-dollar adaptation of Der Ring des Nibelungen at the Metropolitan Opera

Part of the book series: Adaptation in Theatre and Performance (ATP)

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Table of contents (7 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-xi
    Download chapter PDF

  2. Introduction

    • Melissa Poll
    Pages 1-18

  3. Scenographic Dramaturgy & Auteuring Adaptations

    • Melissa Poll
    Pages 19-50

  4. The Nightingale and Other Short Fables: Co-authoring Atypical Opera

    • Melissa Poll
    Pages 51-87

  5. Adapting Wagner’s Siegfried: Making Music Visible at the Metropolitan Opera

    • Melissa Poll
    Pages 89-121

  6. ‘Le Grand Will’ in Wendake: Ex Machina and the Huron-Wendat Nation’s La Tempête

    • Melissa Poll
    Pages 123-150

  7. Auto-adaptations: Re-‘Writing’ The Dragons’ Trilogy and Needles and Opium for the Twenty-First Century

    • Melissa Poll
    Pages 151-184

  8. Conclusion

    • Melissa Poll
    Pages 185-194

  9. Back Matter

    Pages 195-199
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Keywords

About this book

This book theorizes auteur Robert Lepage’s scenography-based approach to adapting canonical texts. Lepage’s technique is defined here as ‘scenographic dramaturgy’, a process and product that de-privileges dramatic text and relies instead on evocative, visual performance and intercultural collaboration to re-envision extant plays and operas. Following a detailed analysis of Lepage’s adaptive process and its place in the continuum of scenic writing and auteur theatre, this book features four case studies charting the role of Lepage’s scenographic dramaturgy in re-‘writing’ extant texts, including Shakespeare’s Tempest on Huron-Wendat territory, Stravinsky’s Nightingale in a twenty-seven ton pool, and Wagner’s Ring cycle via the infamous, sixteen-million-dollar Metropolitan Opera production. The final case study offers the first interrogation of Lepage’s twenty-first century ‘auto-adaptations’ of his own seminal texts, The Dragons’ Trilogy and Needles & Opium. Though aimed at academic readers, this book will also appeal to practitioners given its focus on performance-making, adaptation and intercultural collaboration.

Reviews

“The strengths of this book can get hidden beneath overly technical academic language but overall, it makes a series of points very strongly and should be of value to readers who care about the inimitable work of Robert Lepage.” (Philip Fisher, British Theatre Guide, britishtheatreguide.info, July 10, 2018)

“This volume is a wonderful addition to the study of Lepage’s work which accomplishes something entirely new. By combining a study of his rarely discussed operatic work, alongside an investigation of his smaller and more personal productions, Poll manages to create a more all-encompassing critical approach to the complex directorial approach of one of the world’s most enigmatic directors. For Lepage scholars this is a must-read text which brings together what appear to be disparate elements of this director’s approach into something cohesive and complex.” (Christie Carson, Royal Holloway University of London, UK)

Authors and Affiliations

  • Department of English, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, BC, Canada

    Melissa Poll

About the author

​Melissa Poll is SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellow at Simon Fraser University, Canada. Her research on Robert Lepage, performance-making, interculturalism and contemporary theatre criticism has been published in Body, Space & Technology Journal, Interventions/Contemporary Theatre Review, Canadian Theatre Review and Theatre Research in Canada. 

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