Playwriting: Foundational Concepts, Skills, and Practice

In this course, students analyze short and full-length plays, compose experimental exercises, write drafts of short plays, evaluate each other's writing, and revise a short play to develop the skills required to write for the stage. Students learn key theatrical skills and terms as they analyze varied plot structures, create vivid characters, and write realistic and stylized dialogue. Students examine theatre's collaborative process, and model possible relationships between environment, stagecraft, and the ways playwrights shape their texts. Scripts read for class discussions illustrate uses of key dramatic techniques while suggesting various approaches to theme, genre, character, and structure. Students develop practical critiquing skills while incorporating colleagues' feedback into script revision, with the aim of crafting compelling plays that appeal to both theater professionals and theatrical audiences.