Performance training in Europe

This chapter aims to explore performance training across Europe through three case studies that illustrate how performance training permeates theatre practices beyond educational contexts, fostering a debate on the interrelation between education, performance, and professional theatre. To do so, the first case study addresses the division between text-based and devised theatre of the curricula in actor training in Spain. The second case study focuses on practice as research in the UK university system, a practice that blurs the limits between practice and research, between doing and thinking, and which directly connects the academic world with theatre practice. The third case study contrasts the strong traditional relationship between conservatoire training and professional theatre in Russia with developments in non-traditional theatre and performance, often linked with practitioners who have not followed a formal training route and who have sometimes engaged in political protest.