World Building in Games at Graduate Musical Theatre Writing

The Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program hosted a World Building workshop for its students, imparted by Clara Fernández-Vara, faculty at the Game Center, with facilitation from Fred Carl and Robert Lee, Musical Theatre faculty. The two-day workshop focused on three narrative principles: world building, creating characters, and understanding conflict. Used for both the development of narrative games and the creation of musical theatre works, these principles provide a natural link between the two disciplines, and offered students an opportunity to collaborate in new ways. At the conclusion of the workshop, Graduate Musical Theater Writing Program students used their developing thesis musicals as the basis for creating prototype games exploring the themes, characters and conflicts of their projects, enabling them to engage with their material from a different perspective.