Following an exciting discussion about dramaturgy in Wales inspired by last year's Dirty, Gifted and Welsh event and continued in our online Writers' Group, NTW has now appointed a group of six dramaturgs to work with the company over the next year supporting writers and exploring the characteristics of theatre writing in Wales.  We had an extraordinary set of applications to join the group - over thirty people put themselves forward, including many fantastic writers.  It was genuinely a very difficult decision to choose the panel, but we can now announce that the group for the first year will be:

Janys Chambers, Richard Hurford, Mathilde Lopez, Ace McCarron, Louise Osborn and Gary Owen.

During our online discussion we explored a lot of questions, including the thorny issue of the collective noun for dramaturgs - (I think the winner was 'a question of dramaturgs'), and the more fundamental subject of what exactly a dramaturg is ('the guardian of the idea' was a rather nice poetic response).  We also agreed that the group would include 4 writers and 2 theatre makers from other disciplines.  So Janys, Richard, Louise and Gary are our writers (though several of them do other things), Ace is our designer, and Mathilde our director.  Everyone in the group is actively involved in working with other writers and wrote passionately in their applications of all the things a dramaturg could be.  It will be an honour to work with them.

The group will meet four times over the year, and we will share as much as possible of the conversations and conclusions online in the Writers Group.  (The group has been so intrinsic to this initiative that it feels, for now at least, like the natural home for these discussions rather than a separate Dramaturgs Group.)  Members of the group will also be available to writers who have commissions or seed commissions with NTW to give dramaturgical support.  

Of course I hope that this will be an initiative with a future, and that many of the people who didn't end up in the group this time will bear with us and be part of the wider discussion and potentially join future incarnations of the group.

A big thanks to everyone who did the thinking work to get this off the ground.