MAHINDRA TRANSMEDIA ARTS SEMINAR: Magda Romanska, Transmedia Dramaturgy of Pre- and Post-Pandemic Theatre

Magda Romanska, Emerson College
Oct 9, 5 pm
Click to register: Transmedia Dramaturgy of Pre- and Post-Pandemic Theatre

The classical, Aristotelian dramaturgy of two-dimensional linear storytelling traditionally used in theatre and film no longer works in transmedia narratives, which in addition to deploying familiar plot-driven structural devices (inciting incident, climax, denouement), often incorporate multiple access points, serendipity, immersion, world building, role play, seriality, and time/space co-presence. The vertical and horizontal structure of transmedia narratives has unpinned our previously familiar dramaturgical concepts, demanding a whole new vocabulary and structural understanding of how meaning is created in the three-dimensional paradigm of multiplatform storytelling. With the Covid-19 pandemic forcing theatre to adapt new technologies and new transmedia dramaturgy, new questions emerge: how are we to analyze, think critically, and develop narratives that use multiple structural and architectural frameworks?

metaLAB is partnering with the Mahindra Humanities Center to sponsor the Transmedia Arts Seminar, chaired by Magda Romanska and Hana Worthen.