Presented as part of the Humanities Research Centre Seminar Series

In this paper I examine a decade of collaborations with Pedro Almodóvar, exploring ways in which a direct engagement with those who ‘make’ culture can assist in understanding how that culture is constructed and consumed. Exploring the interview as a methodology, I hope to delineate how it opens up different perspectives on a piece of work, providing modes of highlighting process and craftsmanship, dismantling and dissecting some of the modes of constructing a piece of creative practice, unpicking the contributions of those who form part of the directorial brand, and probing what is legible to different audiences. As much a contemplation of modes of seeing and way of working, this paper also offers reflections on Almodóvar’s own commentaries on his work and how they provide a unique window into his filmmaking.

Maria M. Delgado is Professor and Director of Research at Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, University of London and an Honorary Fellow at the Institute for Modern Languages Research at the School of Advanced Study, University of London. She has published widely in the area of twentieth-century Spanish theatre and film with a particular interest in the work of performers and directors and the intersections between stage and screen cultures. She has further research interests in European theatre and contemporary Argentine theatre. Her books include Federico García Lorca (Routledge, 2008), ‘Other’ Spanish Theatres (Manchester University Press, 2003), and ten co-edited. She is editor of Contemporary Theatre Review and a contributing editor to European Stages and TheatreForum. She also co-edits the Theatre/Theory, Practice/Performance series for Manchester University Press and the ‘Studies in Modern Theatre’ series for Cambridge University Press.

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