Double Take -- by Mark Sproxton

Curled up on a comfy sofa with a cup of hot coffee at the ready, not a sound turns the woman's attention from the pages in her lap. She's reading the script for a new play carefully combing the words for context, flow and continuity. She has a meeting with the playwright and wants to ensure she has some valid questions about the play.

"There is no career path," Vanessa Porteous, dramaturg with Alberta Theatre Projects, says of her job. "I think of it as a function. Every new play will have had some dramaturgy whether by the writer's friends, producers, designers.... I don't consider myself a professional dramaturg, I just happen to be the person in charge of making sure it happens in the best possible way. I was trained as an actor. I was hired because my boss wanted someone with creative interests. This is a field for generalists and not specialists."

Extremely few dramaturgs work in Canada. This job includes working with the playwright from the early drafts of a play, through rehearsals and beyond, and working with the play's director. "It's important to ask the right questions of the writer and be a sounding board for the writer and directors," she said.

Coming from a background including a bachelor of arts and a bachelor of fine arts degree in acting, Porteous said her years volunteering in theatre and at centre-stage helped provide great experience for her current work. "In any context in the theatre you learn," she said. "All those years I volunteered backstage I learned how plays work and how rehearsals work."

But Porteous does more than dramaturgy. She also directs plays for ATP. In either role she works the typical schedule of most in theatre: days, evenings and weekends, often into the wee hours of the morning. And also like most jobs in the arts, she isn't getting rich.

She does, however, enjoy the work tremendously, particularly the directing. "I like making stuff up and working with other creative people," she said. "I like the moment of creation."