What are the key elements that go into creating a work of art for the stage? Which are the most productive conditions and methods of rehearsal? In this collection of interviews, 18 international artists share their experience and offer practical advice on the creation of performance work. Their answers provide a goldmine of tried and tested approaches as they discuss the common problems and difficulties of creative work, their turning-point experiences, and ways in which they have challenged performers and themselves to go beyond conditioned reflexes to create groundbreaking new work.

On the evening of January 29, 1948, a new musical, 'Look, Ma, I'm Dancin'!', opened at New York's New Adelphi Theatre, marking the Broadway debut of a young playwriting team, Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee, who were responsible for the show's book. Forty-six years later, Lawrence and Lee are reworking their most recent play, Whisper In The Mind, for a potential New York production, but the intervening decades have seen major changes in the landscape of the American theatre. Many of these changes are discussed and debated in this collection of interviews and are exemplified in the careers of the dramatists included.