Directorial Dynamics and Artistic Synthesis in the Staging of Esiaba Irobi’s Hangmen Also Die

This study examines artistic synthesis, multisensory communication, visual spectacle, audience participation, and interdisciplinary collaboration as fundamental principles of African Total Theatre through an experimental staging of Esiaba Irobi’s Hangmen Also Die. The study argues that Irobi’s dramaturgy extends beyond text-centred dramatic representation, requiring an integrated performance approach in which acting, stylised movement, music, dance, ritual, costume, lighting, sound, scenic composition, symbolism, and audience interaction operate as mutually reinforcing theatrical mechanism. Using a qualitative, practice-based approach, the study analyses the experimental production as staged at Pinnacle Theatre, Akwa Ibom State University, in 2025. Particular attention is given to the rehearsal process and the ways in which artistic elements could be deliberately integrated in stage production. Findings reveal that artistic synthesis could enhance the coherence of the performance by connecting dialogue with choreography, percussion, lighting, costume, and scenic composition. It is further revealed that multisensory communication could serve to intensify the audience’s emotional and intellectual engagement by transforming political concepts such as oppression, resistance, violence, and liberation into embodied theatrical experiences, and same applies to visual spectacle which could bolster poetic and political imagery into symbolic stage pictures through costume, colour, lighting, props, masks, and spatial composition. Audience participation was found to affect the conventional separation between performers and spectators, thereby restoring the communal and participatory qualities associated with African performance traditions. The study concludes that Hangmen Also Die is particularly suited to Total Theatre staging because its political themes and dramaturgical structure depend upon the synthesis of multiple performance languages out of which artistic integration consequently transforms the play from a predominantly text-based dramatic experience into a multidimensional, sensory, communal, and politically engaging theatrical event.

Keywords: African Total Theatre Esiaba Irobi Multisensory Communication Visual Spectacle Experimental Theatre

Authors

• Oto-obong Etido Nkorok
  Department of Performing Arts
  Akwa Ibom State University, Nigeria
  nkorokotobong@gamil.com
• Ekaette Brian Edem
  Department of Performing Arts
  Akwa Ibom State University, Nigeria
  ekaeebrian@aksu.edu.ng