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Whether you are an actor, director, designer, or playwright, we all seem to think that script analysis begins, well…at the beginning. What if that’s not true? What if our work begins at the end? Sometimes people begin their analysis thinking, how should I say this line? What does this mean symbolically? What is the great big idea? And some are just befuddled as to where to start. Our focus as the creators should be on identifying action, intention, motives, and how they build to the end. Leave the big ideas to the audience to wrestle with, but they can’t do this unless the story, in all its marvelous complexity, is told thoroughly. The truth is, analysis can’t begin until we’ve read the script with a clear mind and then begin to work backwards.
Dorset Players member Luke Krueger will be offering a script analysis class beginning on September 29, 2026. This free course will run every other week for 6 classes (ends December 8th). The course will focus on using the techniques espoused by David Ball in his book Backwards and Forwards. Ball advocates looking at the end of plays and tracing their causal links back to the beginning to show how the events, settings, and nature of the characters lead to what ultimately is the inevitable, yet compelling climax of the play. Additionally, Luke will utilize a little bit of Aristotle’s Poetics, Sanford Meisner, and the beat work he learned from Circle Rep founder Marshall Mason, when he studied with him at Arizona State University. Luke will also tap into his own experience as a playwright to lift the curtain, so to speak, on the process of creating a play
The goal of this course is to demystify the process of script analysis: It is not an exercise in ivory tower philosophical naval gazing. Good script analysis is rooted in the etymology of the word drama derived from the Greek word dran - to do or take action. By the end of the course, participants will have a place to start and a process for when they begin that focuses on how the action crafts the story so what comes is entertaining for the souls and engaging to the minds of the audience.
While there will not be any written assignments, there will be reading assignments between classes to form the basis of the class discussions. Please contact the Business office at 802-867-5570 or info@dorsetplayers.org to sign up for this workshop.
Luke Krueger is a well seasoned veteran of theatre having published many of his plays, and garnered nice accolades for his work as an actor. He has held faculty positions in the English and Theatre Departments at a number of colleges and universities, most recently Northern Illinois University (NIU). At NIU he was a visiting assistant professor of theatre and a member of the Honors College faculty and member of the Graduate School faculty (Scholar designation). At NIU he taught script analysis, theatre history, contemporary theatre, and playwriting. Luke has worked in the literary departments of Northern Stage (White River Junction) and Urban Stages, an off-Broadway company in NYC. In 2006, he was the first playwright to hold the position of Emerging Writer-in-Residence at Penn State-Altoona. He holds an MFA in playwriting from Arizona State University and a BA in English from Miami University (Ohio). He is a member of the Dramatists Guild of America.
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