Richelle Sutton Case Study

Richelle Sutton, the dramaturg for The Mill on the Floss, did an overall great job in directing and encouraging the post-show discussion. The first “win” she had was when she introduced herself confidently and opened up the discussion for others. The confidence was actually a huge factor in setting up an educated, friendly environment. By asserting herself and asking specific, purposeful questions, the audience immediately knew that it was an important discussion. Also, by opening the discussion up for questions, Richelle showed that she had the ability to tuck away all of her research in order to listen to what the audience had to say. Her ability to put the audience first likely allowed people to ask thought-provoking questions that they’d
been cultivating for the 3-hour period of the show. The second well-done portion of this post-show discussion was Richelle’s ability to tie all of the questions and conversations together. I can’t articulate exactly what she said, but she had the ability to take a person’s question or comment and relate it back to the show in one fluid motion. This method created a circular discussion that allowed us to continually return to the show as a whole; in fact, it was a method that really served to keep the entire conversation on track without the audience even realizing it. While the majority of the post-show discussion went very well, there was one area that could’ve improved during the discussion as a whole, and that was attentiveness. As the discussion went on, it seemed as though the dramaturg didn’t follow the conversation as closely as she could have. There were multiple people who had hands raised with questions, but most likely due to the dramaturg’s position closer to the back and exit door, she started closing the session, voicing that she guessed no one else had questions. I think that this could be easily remedied by placing the dramaturg closer to the front as he or she directs the conversation.