DRAMA DIVISION / DEVISED THEATRE
Devised Theatre & New Work Creation
Making original theatre from the ground up — without a pre-existing script, without a single author, and without the safety of a tradition telling you what to do next.
Theatre without a script
For most of theatre history, the actor's job was clear: learn the playwright's words, follow the director's instructions, perform the role as written. Devised theatre breaks that contract. In devising, the performers are the writers. The director is a collaborator, not a commander. The text — if there is one — emerges from the room, not from a desk.
This is not a fringe curiosity. Companies like Complicite, Forced Entertainment, Punchdrunk, Gecko, Frantic Assembly, and the Wooster Group have been making some of the most celebrated theatre in the world through devised and collaborative processes for decades. At major conservatories — LAMDA, Central, East 15, CalArts, Dell'Arte — devising is now a core part of actor training, not an elective.
THE CASE FOR DEVISING
Why devising matters for every actor
Even if you never make a devised piece professionally, the skills you build in devising will transform your work in every other context:
- You learn to generate material — instead of waiting to be given words, you develop the ability to create them. This makes you a more valuable collaborator in any rehearsal room.
- You learn to work without a net — devising requires tolerance for uncertainty. You will spend days not knowing what the piece is. This builds artistic courage.
- You learn to edit — devising produces too much material. Learning to cut, shape, and structure what the room creates is a dramaturgical skill that serves everyone.
- You learn to listen to the ensemble — devised work cannot be dominated by a single ego. It requires genuine collaboration and the humility to let go of your ideas when better ones emerge.
- You become an artist, not just an interpreter — devising shifts the actor from executing someone else's vision to owning their own creative voice.
Methods and approaches
Devised theatre draws from multiple traditions. At The Global Conservatory, students encounter all of them.
PHYSICAL
Body-First Devising
Starting from the body rather than the word. Using movement, gesture, rhythm, and spatial composition to find the story. Drawing on Lecoq, Viewpoints, and contact improvisation to generate material that is visual, visceral, and alive.
TEXT-BASED
Source Material Transformation
Starting from a novel, a poem, a news article, an interview, or a historical document — and transforming it into theatre. Adapting, fragmenting, collaging, and reimagining texts that were never written for the stage.
VERBATIM
Documentary Theatre
Creating performance from real interviews, transcripts, court records, or community testimony. The tradition of Alecky Blythe and Anna Deavere Smith. Actors become researchers and ethical custodians of real stories.
AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL
The Personal as Performance
Using your own life, memory, and identity as raw material. The solo show, the personal essay for the stage. Where theatre meets memoir, and where the most honest work often lives.
SITE-SPECIFIC
Immersive & Place-Based Work
Creating theatre for a specific place — a warehouse, a forest, a hospital, a bus. The audience moves through the work. The architecture becomes a collaborator. The Punchdrunk and dreamthinkspeak tradition.
The devising process
Every devised project is different, but the general shape follows a recognisable arc from stimulus to sharing.
Research and Stimulus
Gathering material. Reading, watching, listening, visiting, interviewing. Building a shared bank of images, texts, questions, and provocations.
Exploration
Getting the material on its feet. Improvising around themes. Trying physical scores, spoken texts, songs, projections, objects. Generating more than you will ever use.
Selection
What is working? What keeps coming back? What do the performers care about? What does the audience need to see? Identifying the core material from everything generated.
Structuring
Putting the pieces in order. Finding the through-line, the arc, the rhythm. Deciding what begins the piece, what ends it, and how the audience travels between those points.
Refining
Running, editing, tightening. Cutting what does not serve the whole. Strengthening transitions. Deepening the moments that matter most.
Sharing
Performing for an audience. A work-in-progress showing, a full production, or a filmed version. The piece is not finished until it meets the people it was made for.
Who this is for
- Actors who want to make their own work — if you are tired of waiting for someone to cast you, this is where you take control.
- Writers who want to work with performers — devising teaches you to write from the body and the room, not just the desk.
- Directors and emerging theatre-makers — building the collaborative skills that define contemporary directing practice.
- Drama school students and graduates — many conservatory programmes now culminate in a devised project. Arrive prepared.
- Community and applied theatre practitioners — devising is the backbone of participatory theatre, theatre for social change, and drama therapy.
Also in the Drama Division
Make Your Own Work
Work with a teacher who has made theatre from the ground up — and who can guide you from first impulse to finished performance.