THE ROLE OF MANAGEMENT IN EFFECTIVE ACTOR-AUDIENCE COMMUNICATION

Abstract

G ood audiences, says Brian Hansen (1991:9), 'get good shows. Conversely, it can be stated that good shows make good audiences. For, just as a good audience will mspire the actors to give of their best, a good performance will in tum bring out the best response in the audience. Whichever way one looks at it, a successful theatre depends largely on skilful management, on the ability to create effective actor-audience interaction for effective communication. Theatre, at its best, involves efficient collaboration between the stage and the auditorium, which are under the control of two different forms of management. As with any good business enterprise, the ultimate success of theatre, whether in the educational or professional scene, depends on sound management. There are as many definitions of management as there are those who care to define it, and there is no need to belabour the issue in this article. However, for the purpose of our discussion, we can broadly define management as the application of the basic principles of human interaction to resolve problems of human relationship in any endeavour that requires one form of collaboration or the other, towards the successful attainment of predetermined objectives. In a practical sense, management is an essential activity. which involves the coordination of individual efforts for the achievement of group goals. Since planning is at the core of all forms of management, failure to plan, as the popular saying goes, invariably means planning to fail. Applied specifically to the theatre, management has many roles to play at the different stages of planning, production, performance and appraisal of any theatrical enterprise, with a focus on the welfare of both the audience and the performers. To that extent, the two complementary areas of production the stage and the auditorium fall under different forms of management, working in harmony towards achieving the intangible end-product of theatre which is performance.