Those who have lived in blissful ignorance of the terms "dramaturg" and "dramaturgy" — yea, ignorant even of the existence of such creatures — can sleep peacefully no more. With the recent dismissal of a lawsuit brought by Lynn M. Thomson, dramaturg for the Broadway musical, Rent, the media has deemed "dramaturgy" newsworthy enough to force us to face our ignorance. Ms. Thomson was suing for recognition as a collaborator on the script and lyrics, as well as for a 16 percent share of the author's royalties. She plans to appeal. (Authorities believe the royalty amount could provide up to $250k a year, perhaps up to a total of $250,000,000.)
Although many pundits are claiming this a battle fought for the rights of the dramaturg, I think they're failing to realize that it's been resolved primarily as a case about one party's claim of authorship. The court did not recognize that claim.
I have seen the duties of a dramaturg described as anything from assisting in the assemblage of preparation, background and research materials for authors, creative team and actors to ghostwriter. For more details and attempts to describe the function of dramaturgs, see Winston D. Neutel's very informative and scholarly The Dramaturgy Pages. The site contains definitions, resource materials, and links to other dramaturgy sites (there aren't many).
Another place to go for information about the role of the dramaturg is Dramaturgy Northwest, created by the Northwest Region of LMDA (Literary Managers and Dramaturgs of the Americas) and the University of Puget Sound. This site is rather sketchy and thrown together at the moment, although it may be fairly young. There you'll find a page supposedly devoted to descriptions of dramaturgy programs — programs.htm — although at the moment you'll find only a single description of the program at Brooklyn College (written by the plaintiff in the above mentioned lawsuit herself).
The rec.arts.theatre.plays and rec.arts.theatre.misc newsgroups have been carrying on a long discussion about the validity of dramaturgy under the unfortunate title of "The parasitic dramaturg." You can read the postings through the DejaNews service (the discussion has gone on long enough to have to be split between current and archived listings).
"The
parasitic dramaturg - pt 1"
"The
parasitic dramaturg - pt 2"
Finally, some links to pages devoted to Rent, the musical, in no particular order.
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