Christine organised a meeting-up of mid-level writers the other night at Nitro, and one of the things we talked about was when and if to have a director involved in the development process. There were various opinions. One serious concern, though, is how few directors are out there who are specialists specifically in musical theatre who you might trust to help in development, if you should so wish.
Every morning, I walk by the Urdang on my way to the studio, and see all those kids sweating in class. There are any number of very fine performance and drama schools turning out trained talent; but, to my knowledge, none of them have a specific module for training directors or choreographers to work on musicals? How short-sighted is that?
I know of a couple recent productions where the choreographer came from Frantic Assembly, a company whose work I admire and enjoy enormously. And the choreographer for the upcoming 'Ghost' has come out of music videos. But both of these are entirely different skills from developing a number that is going to tell a story, as part of a bigger story,with a theatre dance vocabulary, and then being able to set it on a group of trained dancers as part of a musical.
Last autumn, I was at the Bush, talking with a producer there, raising this question, and she said 'Well, directors always learn by assisting other directors'. For drama, that is perfectly true and it has worked well for many years (in conjunction with the drama schools that have a 'Directing' module or degree). But how often is there an opportunity for an aspiring practitioner to work with someone of the level of Jerry Mitchell or Matthew Warchus, to really learn craft?
What don't they get? Musicals are different!
SOME school mush be coerced into addressing this. Hmmmmmm.
