How the Plays Are Engineered

I'm fortunate enough to be able to take a class in Dramaturgy with Alan Armstrong this semester, and I enjoyed his phrasing of this point: understanding the ways the plays were "engineered" is essential for making them meaningful for modern audiences. Terms like "original practices" can raise all sorts of hackles because there are so many different interpretations of what practices actually are original, but without understanding what the plays are designed to do, and how they are built to do it, you'll never be able to adapt the text for modern production. Of course, this also means one must have a thorough understanding of how modern plays are engineered, and what modern audiences expect.