Devised Drama and Collaborative Creation
Devised drama is generated by the ensemble rather than a pre-existing script. You need to understand stimulus (image, poem, news article, object, theme), research and improvisation as generative tools, workshopping, fragmenting and montage, physical theatre, verbatim theatre, documentary drama, ensemble devising models (e.g., collaborative authorship, director-as-editor), and dramaturgical shaping (selecting, sequencing, refining). Key process vocabulary includes offer and accept, side-coaching, hot-seating, role-on-the-wall, status exercises, image theatre, and Viewpoints (spatial relationship, shape, gesture, tempo). You must also understand collaborative roles: facilitator, scribe, dramaturg, performer, designer, and how decisions are recorded and revised.
Traps in questions
A common trap is describing the process as a happy accident rather than a deliberate methodology. Questions may ask how you moved from stimulus to structure; answer with stages: exploration, selection, shaping, refinement, performance. Another trap is confusing improvisation (spontaneous in-the-moment creation) with devising (a longer collaborative authoring process). Be careful with ownership: examiners want to see your specific contribution within the ensemble, not a vague "we all did everything". Also expect prompts on audience impact, requiring you to explain how a devised convention (e.g., direct address, choral movement) communicated meaning.
Worked example
If asked to justify a structural choice: "Our stimulus was a bushfire evacuation notice (stimulus). Improvisations produced twelve fragments, which we sequenced as a montage of overlapping testimonies (process). We cut the linear narrative because the fragmented form better represented collective memory and disorientation (justification)." Rule of thumb: show stimulus → exploration → selection → shaping → refinement → performance, and name your own decisions at each stage.