Authors Intentions

All this is all very well and good... I am suprised however that Mamet hasn't yet reared his head. Or Neil Labute or any playwright operating within the realms of social realism. Because quite simply these plays don't survive outside of their social context. Try doing a Mamet monologue without doing an American accent, it dosen't work. I agree with Mamet, if the playwright has an intention he wants expressed the playwright has to be good enough to make it unavoidable. Also the socio-economic backgrounds of the characters influence the way in which the character interprets dialogue and the way the character thinks. The actor must then be sensative to these things because I can assure you the playwright is. If the playwright is not then they probably shouldn't be writing. As for plays of different styles that don't rely so heavily on the social relaties of the characters. There will still be clues and evidence within the script as to what kind of person the character is. You can ignore these things if you wish and people do, but when I have seen it done it just makes the play awful. A good playwright will never leave good actors and good directors in doubt as to how they should play the character. Beckett uses rhythm, memory, lies, games, routines and deception. Pinter uses pauses, social context and conflict. Mamet uses rhythm, social context and conflict. Shakespeare uses Rhythm, verse, soliloquy and characters commenting on eachother's natures. Barthe is used as a justification for abusing the role of the writer and allowing the Director and actors to impose whatever half or fully baked ephemeral toss and meanings they want to upon an already sound text. In short what I am saying is that your decisions must always be supported and justified by the text which of course come from the writer. If it comes from the writer then it must have been somewhere in the realm of his/her intention, if it was not then I would call it bad writing or poor directing. And that's my two cents