In this interview, Elise Dewsberry, Artistic Director of the Academy for New Musical Theatre, explains the multifaceted nature of her role in a developmental theatre company, which includes selecting works for presentation, overseeing a writer curriculum, and mentoring adult creators with professional backgrounds. She clarifies the term "dramaturg," contrasting its classical function of historical research with its modern role as an advocate and sounding board for writers of new musical theatre, likening it to a film story editor. Dewsberry describes how she mediates between writers and producers, balancing artistic intent with commercial considerations, and acts as a diplomatic liaison to resolve creative conflicts. She recounts the challenges that arise when collaborations deteriorate, including personality clashes and financial disputes that can lead to litigation, emphasizing the emotional toll of such breakdowns. To prevent these issues, she stresses the importance of early, simple collaboration agreements that delineate ownership of book, lyrics, and music and outline exit strategies, comparing them to prenuptial agreements. The conversation offers practical insights into the responsibilities of artistic leadership, the supportive role of dramaturgy, and the legal safeguards essential for successful musical theatre development.
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My main title is Artistic Director of the Academy for New Musical Theatre. So that's my main title.
So number one, let's define what is an Artistic Director.
Well, you know, it's different things depending on what kind of an organization you work for. Because I work for a developmental company, it's a little bit different if I were the Artistic Director of a producing theatre company. I'd be in charge of choosing the pieces that were gonna be presented. I do a bit, I also do that. I have a lot to do with choosing the pieces that we're going to present in concert, that we're gonna present at our stages festival. They're all works in development, so I have a lot to do with overseeing that. I also oversee our curriculum, our writer curriculum, and teach the writers that are working with us. Teach is a strange word to use in the organization we're in because it's all grownups who are who have other very successful careers. Like our composers, often their day job is a film composer, and our writers, their day job might be writing for TV sitcoms or something like that. So I like to think of myself more as a mentor than a teacher.
Now you also go by another term, a dramaturg, and dramaturgy, and all of the mispronunciations that go with that.
Yes, dramaturg, dramaturgy, all kinds of stuff.
Number one, how do you pronounce it?
I say dramaturg. Well, you know, there's a book. I'm not sure that I— dramaturge? I think I probably say dramaturge. Yeah, there's a lot of controversy about it.
But let's throw away the pronunciation.
Yeah, what the heck does it mean? Exactly. I know, and when I first heard it, I started out my career as an actress and a singer, and I was involved in musicals, and I did a lot of plays and a lot of musicals. And the first time that I was involved with a new musical, I didn't think I was very interested in new work. I wanted to do the classics. I was a typical actress. I wanted to do the great roles and all that stuff in my youth. And the first time I got involved with a new musical was at a summer theatre outside of Toronto. I was based in Toronto, and there are a lot of summer theatres in the Canadian Shield around Toronto where the resort towns are. And this place, the Muskoka Festival, had a new musical theatre workshop, and those of us who were up there doing other shows were the actors that they used to workshop the shows. So I did a reading of my first new musical and fell in love with the process and the idea and being able to create new roles. And after I'd done a couple of those, the artistic director at the theatre came up to me one day and said, "I think you have the makings of being a dramaturg," or dramaturge, and I said, What is that? What the heck is that? Classically, the dramaturge in classical usage in a theater is the person who's responsible for the history of the piece. So if a director's doing Richard III or if they're doing a play that takes place in 15th century France or whatever it is they're doing, the dramaturge's job is to research the time period and give the director and the actors all the information they can possibly have. About that time period to make it a fuller, richer experience, and they often will write a little article about it that winds up in the program to give more background. In new work, however, because there's so much more to be done in new work, a dramaturg becomes an advocate for the writer, someone who helps the writer figure out what it is they really want to say and what is the best way to say it, and is the sounding board. Sometimes I think that a better analogy is, in film they have story editors, that do a similar function. Probably the biggest difference being, I think, with story editors, sometimes they might actually take over and start doing the writing, whereas a dramaturg really doesn't do that. A dramaturg doesn't do any of the writing. They're just the sounding board, the feedback person, the person to really hold your toes to the fire and say, "What is it that you really want? And if this is really your lead character, then how come they're not in this scene, or they're not singing in this moment, or this moment isn't happening, or I don't really understand?" And I feel, especially because in the other half of the Academy, when we're not just working with, in our curriculum, with people who are studying and working out how they want to perform in the craft, we also work with producers all over the country in developing works that they're interested in, with teams they're interested in. And in that case, I feel like I'm an advocate between the writer and the producer, because Often I know what the producer wants, what they think is going to sell in their theater, what they think their audience wants, what they need for budgetary reasons or theme reasons or whatever it is. And I know what the writer intends and what they want their show to be. And it helps to have an advocate in the middle because sometimes those things aren't necessarily the same thing. And a producer will be pushing for something the writer doesn't want their piece to be. The writer will be trying to make it something the producer doesn't want to produce. Produce. And I feel like it's my job to step in and try to smooth ruffled feathers and try to see if there's a way for the team to proceed that will make everybody happy. So I'm sort of a diplomat.
Give us an example of one of those train crash crazy moments that you've been involved with where you think, and I picked this career because—
well, I don't know. You know, I suppose the worst is when you're, you're working with collaborators that where it's falling apart and they're angry. And if it gets it gets to litigation, that really hurts. And it has happened a couple of times. And I'm obviously not going to be specific, but there have been a couple of times when it's gotten to the point where the collaborators are so upset with each other that they have to take each other to court. And that's really sad, especially because, as I said, sometimes the answer is to walk away. And so it really hurts me when people can't see that moment and just say, it's time to walk away and allow my collaborators— where it gets dicey is when For instance, a composer will walk away and say, you know, you can't go anywhere even with the book and lyrics. You can't even go find a composer to change it and move on without me. I'm going to stop this project in its tracks and contest it if you try to even move on with another composer, and vice versa. And I think that's really sad, because what you should be able to do is walk away and say, look, I'm taking my music with me, I'm going home. Go find yourself a composer and go on with the idea. I'm sorry it didn't work out. The problem, of course, sometimes happens— either it's personalities that conflict, but things can really get dicey when money really shows up. And that's why we always say at the Academy for the Musical Theater, the most important thing when you begin a collaboration, even in the very, very early moments, is get a collaboration agreement, even if it's a simple one-page piece of paper at first, because you don't need a really complicated one until later when you're when the show's done and you're looking for production, then you're going to want something more elaborate and involve lawyers and all of that stuff. But when you begin, you can start with a very simple collaboration agreement that basically says, I'm the book writer, I own the book. I'm the lyricist, I own the lyrics. I'm the composer, I own the music. And if we decide we don't like each other at some point, I get to walk away with my toys and you get to walk away with yours. Because otherwise, if you don't have a collaboration agreement, then your collaborators have a case for saying this was a merged work from the minute we started, because there's no piece of paper saying it isn't. And therefore, even though I'm the composer, you can't walk away with your book and go find another team.
Right, I gave you the idea for that scene when we were having a discussion. That's my idea. Yeah, yeah.
And it doesn't even matter even if you don't feel that. As far as the law is concerned, the idea is merged if you don't say otherwise. The minute you talk about it, and so it's a piece. The book and the lyrics and the music live together unless you very clearly say, "We're not ready for that yet." Right, and in the perfect world, they should.
Once you get to a point where everything is on the table, where you're working towards the same end goal.
Right, and usually an early collaboration agreement will say, "Here's when we think it should merge." Yeah. When we have a first-class production, when we have a regional production, or whatever, it's up to the team to decide when they want to consider it merged. But they shouldn't consider it merged in the early days, and the problem is, just like a marriage, everybody thinks it's going to be beautiful, but sometimes it isn't, and you just need to have your exit strategy planned. I'm not a big fan of prenuptial agreements with marriage, but I certainly am with musical theatre collaborations.
