Making contemporary theatre reveals how some of the most significant international contemporary theatre is actually made. The book opens with an introductory chapter which contextualises recent trends in approaches to theatre-making. In the ensuing eleven chapters, eleven different writer-observers describe, contextualise and analyse the theatr

LIST OF FIGURESCONTRIBUTORSPREFACE: Andy LavenderACKNOWLEDGEMENTSIntroductionWitnessing postdramatic theatre-makingJen Harvie1.The Builders Association: Super Vision (2005)Digital dataflow and the synthesis of everythingAndy Lavender2. Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui: Myth (2007)Mapping the multipleLou Cope3. Complicité: The Elephant Vanishes (2003/04)‘The elephant and keeper have vanished completely… They will never be coming back’Catherine Alexander4. Elevator Repair Service: Cab Legs (1997) to Gatz (2006)Reversing the ruins: the power of theatrical miscomprehensionSara Jane Bailes5. Forced Entertainment: The Travels (2002)The anti-theatrical directorAlex Mermikides6. Rodrigo García and La Carnicería Teatro: Une façon d’aborder l’idée de méfiance [One Way to Approach the Idea of Mistrust] (2006)Approaching mistrustLourdes Orozco7. Gekidan Kaitaisha: Bye Bye: the New Primitive (2001)Theatre of the body and cultural deconstructionAdam Broinowski8. Robert Lepage and Ex Machina: Lipsynch (2007)Performance transformations and cyclesAleksandar Saša Dundjerovic9. Richard Maxwell and the New York City Players: The End of Reality (2006)Exploring actingSarah Gorman10. Not Yet It’s Difficult: Blowback (2004)Unmaking Blowback – a visceral process for a political theatrePeter Eckersall11. Luk Perceval: Platonov (2006)Rules for a theatre of contemporary contemplationZoë SvendsenPOSTSCRIPT: Andy Lavender and Jen HarvieSELECT BIBLIOGRAPHYIndex

Making contemporary theatre reveals how some of the most significant international contemporary theatre is actually made. The book opens with an introductory chapter which contextualises recent trends in approaches to theatre-making. In the ensuing eleven chapters, eleven different writer-observers describe, contextualise and analyse the theatre-making practices of eleven different companies and directors, including Japan’s Gekidan Kaitaisha and the Québécois director Robert Lepage. Each chapter is enriched with extensive illustrations as well as boxed-off ‘asides’, giving the reader different perspectives on the work. Chapters usually focus on a single production, such as Complicite’s 2003-04 The Elephant Vanishes, allowing detailed investigations of complex practices to emerge. The book concludes with a brief manifesto for making contemporary theatre by the editors, plus a bibliography suggesting further reading. Making contemporary theatre is a rich resource for the theatre-making student and the theatre-goer alike, full of diverse examples of how the most exciting theatre is actually made.