Literary Theory and Theatre Practice: A Comparative Study of Watching the Script and the Simulated Environment for Theatre

This paper describes the results of our recent work on a 3D prototype called the Simulated Environment for Theatre (SET), which we undertook based on a growing realization that our earlier 2D prototype, called Watching the Script, reified some fundamental biases that would render it less useful for stage directors than we had originally hoped. Having produced the two prototypes, our next step is to carry out a user study to compare their usefulness. We intend to present the results of this user study, combined with a discussion of the meaning of the two designs.