Theatre directors

[Wong]

Could anyone tell me the difference between an autocratic director and one that is more of a collaborator. Examples of any such directors would be good so that I may compare them. Have scanned the net and found nothing so far. Please help if you can.

Thanks

[noxlumos]

Hi, an autocratic director has a very clear vision of what he is trying to achieve and does not really wish for cast or other participation in suggesting methods of executing that, he merely wishes the cast to take his direction rather than explore their own interpretation of the characters or plot.

A collaborative excercise would involve a lot of input and discussion from all cast members, each person explaining their ideas in a group atmosphere and then a group decision being made about which way all of the characters evolve and how the direction should be concentrated.

In practice it's very hard to get a good result with anything that is too democratic as most of the time is taken up with exhausting exchanges involving everyone's input and not very much work gets done at all and all too often ersentment amongst the cast creeps in, when one person's ideas are celebrated and another's aren't.

I would never involve myself in a democratic direction unless i absolutely had to no matter how much I respect the cast.

Examples of Autocrats are Gaddi Roll, Ken Loach, Bill Gaskell and examples of people keen to explore the democratic are Peter Gill, Gari Jones,Nina O' Leary as well as many purposefully set up "actor's collectives" that work on a collaborative basis per se.