Dramaturg Laura Brueckner

Born and raised in Southern California, but an Alameda resident since last summer, Laura Brueckner, 35, is the Resident Dramaturg and Literary Manager at San Francisco's  Playground and also a Resident Artist at the City's Crowded Fire Theater Company.

Brueckner started doing dramaturgy while earning a degree in English at UC Berkeley and continued after graduation, working for a variety of theaters including the Berkeley Rep and ACT. Three years ago, she began studying for a Ph.D in theater at UC San Diego. 

Brueckner also sings as Lulu McCubbin in Lulu McCubbin's Rag Shop Cabaret.  And later this year, the multi-talented Brueckner will be directing the Broadside Music Hall at Mad Sal's Dockside Alehouse at the Dickens Christmas Fair.

Brueckner and fiance Kelly McCubbin plan to get married next May and make Alameda their permanent home. "I love the town," says Brueckner. "People are really sweet and you get to know people you live near you. Alameda is the sort of place you want to call your home." 

How did you get into theater? I was always a theater nerd and so I went to Los Angeles County High School for the Arts. As a tenth grader, I realized pretty quickly that I couldn't act and I couldn't direct and I couldn't dance! But what I did love was literary criticism class. So I'd show up early to get a good seat because we were going to talk about Euripides that day!  That should have been my first hint, but I didn't know what dramaturgy was back then.

You don't look very nerdy now. It's a carefully cultivated professional image.  I have databases on my computer that will calculate what the value of currency was during different decades of American history.

Give me some more evidence of your nerdy-ness. Another thing that made me excited recently is a database I recently found of accents.  It gives you a vocal sample of how English is spoken everywhere in the world—different parts of South America or Australia.  I was sourcing this for a particular show I was working on which is set in South Boston, Virginia . The dialect is not the slow, sweet, peach-pie kind of drawl. It's very specific.

What does a dramaturg do? It depends. If a script is still in development, I work with the playwright to answer any questions they might have about the script to make sure that what's coming across is what they want. So I help with any narrative gaps or characterization gaps.

As far as the actors are concerned, I put together research for them. My job is to give actors as much information as I can in order to help them make the choices that bring the play to life. So for example, working on The Glass Menagerie, I used the currency converter to help the actors understand why $50 is such a big deal for the family. When they have that kind of information, it really informs how they react to each other and to the different moments of the show.

If it's a playwright like Shakespeare or Calderon or Ibsen, I might do lots of historical research for the actors and also for the audience to read, especially if it's a strange play or one that's not often produced.

Dramaturgy is a labor of love and is rarely paid until you get many, many years under your belt.

What is digital dramaturgy? For a long time, dramaturgs have put together all this information, photocopied it and handed it to actors. When I was at Berkeley Rep, I saw how hard it was for actors to get everything done so I started putting together digital resources like blogs, websites, pictures, links, youtube clips so that no matter where the actor was, he could have access to them. Music or dialects can be posted online so the actors can practice along with the recording.

Do you have a favorite type of play? Weird ones! Where the creative team is taking on something that is unusual in the form or content, where someone is trying something new and really original. That gets my immense respect and I'm so ready to go there with them.