What considerations are at play when adapting and translating works for the stage? Content in this section explores work that is adapted from one form into another, or is translated between languages. A great place to start is the Translating the Future series, in which renowned translators from around the world discuss their craft.
The Latest
Video
Ukrainian Drama Showcase
Theatre Festival of Staged Readings and Artist Talks
Saturday 9 May and Sunday 10 May 2026
New York City
Essay
Slow-Motion Gives Forced Migrants the Chance to Move at Their Own Speed
by Dmitrii Zenkov
15 April 2026
Video
Symposium and Book Launch for Latin American Plays in Translation
Six New Plays Translated for an English-Language Audience
Documentary Screening With Tony Torn and Original Members of the Cast (NY)
Thursday 11 May 2023
New York City
Join us for a screening of Reza Abdoh’s extraordinary site-specific work Father was a Peculiar Man,an adaptation of Dostoyevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov staged in New York City’s Meatpacking District in the summer of 1990. Produced by Anne Hamburger’s En Garde Arts, Father was a Peculiar Man showed how brilliantly Reza applied his specific site-based approach that he developed in Los Angeles to New York City’s urban infrastructure.
Glenda Y. Nieto-Cuebas and Erin A. Cowling continue their interview with Octavio Solis, focusing primarily on the development of his most recent adaptation from Spanish Baroque literature: Quixote Nuevo.
Playwright Octavio Solis reinvents early modern Spanish theatre in several of his plays, often instilling these classics with a Texano perspective. Glenda Y. Nieto-Cuebas and Erin A. Cowling interview Solis about his adaptation process and the way that growing up on the Mexico-United States border has shaped his work.
When Campo Santo decided to film their production of Star Finch’s Side Effects early in the COVID-19 pandemic, they were embarking on a creative journey that felt entirely novel and a little overwhelming. In this conversation, the production’s directors discuss development of the production’s aesthetic and the generative process they embarked on at the intersection of “film” and “play.
Fumbani Innot Phiri Jr. interviews playwright and director Inno Katz about his career and his efforts to redefining Malawian theatre by focusing on local stories in both English and Chichewa.
Bright Phumayo Chayachaya’s Umunthu Theatre pulls together political theatre, poor theatre, theatre for development, and educational theatre to create productions that centralize Malawian narratives. In this interview, he discusses the company’s genesis and the need to bring audiences back to theatre.
Maxwell Ciphinga, better known as Max DC, has weathered massive changes in the audience, form, and funding of Malawian theatre throughout his four-decade career. In this interview, he shares his perspective on the industry and discusses his policy and producorial work as the president of Malawi’s new National Theatre Association.
Monica Payne recaps the 26th international Gdansk Shakespeare Festival, where artists from around the globe adapted, deconstructed, and celebrated Shakespeare’s plays through boldly contemporary productions.
Melissa Lin Sturges shares her experience attending Olney Theatre Center’s bilingual production of The Music Man, which was presented in both English and American Sign Language.
Jordan Ealey and Leticia Ridley interview award-winning and acclaimed playwright Dominique Morisseau about her recent Broadway productions of Ain’t Too Proud: The Life and Times of The Temptations and Skeleton Crew; the future of Detroit theatre and performance; and reckoning with American history. Ealey and Ridley discuss Morisseau’s practice of reparative creativity and the ability for theatre to serve as a rehearsal for true change.
Theatremaker Latrice Richardson addresses the ongoing misogynoir in storytelling by detailing one of her past experiences and advocates for better representation of Black women in theatre.
With Parmida Ziaei (Seda, Seattle) & Shadi Ghaheri (Peydah, NYC)
11 May 2022
In the greater conversation about MENA or SWANA identity, many national and ethnic groups do not neatly fit into that category or are in between geographic areas. One of the largest groups that are both within and without what is considered the “Middle East” is Iran. So many Iranian leaders are making intentional space for the diversity and specificity of their culture by creating companies for Iranian artists. In this episode, we highlight two Iranian theatre companies: Seda Iranian Theatre Ensemble in Seattle, WA, and Peydah Theatre Company in NYC.
Rachel Dickstein, Artistic Director of Ripe Time, takes us through her experience with Center Theatre Group’s completion commission for their adaptation of SLEEP. She also spotlights some necessary and helpful relationships with tour presenting partners, the Association of Performing Arts Professionals, as well as champion and friend Diane Rodriguez.
Robert Hubbard sits down with Dr. Nicolette Bethel and Philip A. Burrows to discuss their creation of the annual Shakespeare in Paradise Festival in the Bahamas.
The ancient Roman comedies of Plautus have inspired playwrights from Shakespeare to Sondheim. But they've also been seen as grim reminders of the oftentimes horrifying world of ancient Rome, where violence and slavery were commonplace. Dr. Amy Richlin joins Mike Lueger to talk about her book Slave Theater in the Roman Republic, which explores how Plautus's plays gave voice to enslaved persons during this era.
Featuring Meme Garcia, Lauren Gunderson, Avi Amon, Réal Vargas Alanis, and Fran Astorga
Thursday 21 October 2021
United States
In this panel invited playwrights featured a part of the New American Theatre Festival discuss their process of creation and adaptation. Playwrights include Avi Amon, Lauren Gunderson, Réal Alanis, Meme Garcia and Fran Astorga. The conversation will be moderated by Amrita Ramanan. We will discuss with each writer leaning into the power of joy and decentering the tropes of trauma.
Margarita Kompelmakher details the Alliance Theatre’s process of adapting Working into a community-engaged production that both modeled grassroots organizing and told the story of the work of organizers in the city.
Episode 4: Transference and Transposition - Notes from across the boundaries of the original medium
Thursday 29 April 2021
South Africa
Presenting Unrehearsed Futures: Theatre Making livestreamed on the global, commons-based peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv Thursday 29 April 2021 at 5 a.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4) / 10 a.m. BST (London, UTC +1) / 11 a.m. SAST (Cape Town, UTC +2) / 2:30 p.m. IST (Mumbai, UTC +5:30) / 7 p.m. AEST (Hobart, UTC +10).
Fumbani Innot Phiri Jr. details the creative process of the production of The Vagina Monologues that took place during 16 Days of Activism in Malawi and offers his thoughts, as an audience member, on the show’s big impact.
Reviving a Baroque Puppet Tradition / Recupera los títeres de una tradición perdida
8 April 2021
Emilio Williams sits down with Jesús Caballero to talk about the lost puppetry genre called la máquina real and Jesús’s company in Spain that works to reimagine this Baroque art form. / Emilio Williams entabla una conversación con Jesús Caballero sobre un género de teatro de títeres olvidado de nombre la máquina real y los esfuerzos de Jesús y su compañía en España por recuperar esta tradición barroca.
Virginia Grise’s Stage Adaptation of Helena Maria Viramontes’s Their Dogs Came with Them
17 March 2021
Manuel Muñoz reflects on Virginia Grise’s adaptation of Their Dogs Came with Them, which took place in fall 2019 under the colossal concrete freeway ramps of the I-10 freeway that dissect South Tucson from the edge of the Sonoran Desert.
A New Way of Performance Watching for an Old Classic
4 March 2021
Merve Parla shares her experience with Netherlands-based dance company Club Guy & Roni’s recent production of Swan Lake, an interactive experience with both offline and online components.
The English premiere of a work written in Chinese and English exploring different possibilities to devise translated theatre.
Wednesday 11 November 2020
United States
Musical Theatre Factory presented the Tropical Angels, a new musical reading livestreamed on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Wednesday 11 November 2020 at 3:30 p.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC -8) / 5:30 p.m. CST (Chicago, UTC -6) / 6:30 p.m. EST (New York, UTC -5).
Jean Tarbox discusses Wesleyan University’s Zoom adaptation of The Method Gun as a radical invention that invited audiences to see and interpret reality on a deeper, more perceptual basis.
