Background Characters in Docudrama Anonymous College

When creating a docudrama (a piece of art that recreates events that transpired in the past), it is imperative that the individuals onstage are portrayed as realistic characters and that the historical events are depicted as they truly happened—with as little bias or judgement as possible. This desire to remain objective has given birth to the subgenre of verbatim theatre, wherein the characters represented onstage speak the exact same words of their real-life counterparts. Playwrights Anna Deavere Smith of her series On the Road: The Search for American Character and Moisés Kaufman of the Tectonic Theater Project have come to embody this fact-finding philosophy with grace and efficacy. Their plays Fires in the Mirror and The Laramie Project seek to represent the events of the past and, if unable to uncover the truth of the events, aim to at least showcase the perspectives of the people involved in their respective crises.

One of the most important choices an artist needs to make in creating a piece of investigative theatre is what portion of the material is included in the final product—and in what order. In the performing arts, this sequence of decisions typically consists of arriving at a location, interviewing witnesses,...