Polish-born director, writer, playwright, and scholar Braun (State U. of New York-Buffalo) sets down the approach to creative theatre directing that he teaches in his classes. It is based on the two premises that directing is an act of creating--of making something out of nothing--and that is also a craft that requires skills, techniques, methods, and tools to express the artistic energies and spiritual abundance of human life. After an introduction, he discusses shaping a theater style, creative text analysis, creating the human layer of the performance, performance space and time, action, mind and imagination, the director's practical preparations, implementing the project before rehearsals, creative rehearsals, and final rehearsals leading to the opening. The text is double spaced. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR.