dramatherapy? Psychodrama?

[Edward Schreiber]

Here is an outstanding piece of writing by one of the preeminent  
Drama Therapists who has been also a student of Psychodrama.
Robert Landy has written a definitive book on the subject and in this  
piece he compares Drama Therapy with Psychodrama, looking at
the differences and similarities.   This is one of the FOREWORDS to  
the book, "To Dream Again:  Zerka Toeman Moreno Memoirs" in publication
now.

Best,

Ed



FOREWORD:  Robert Landy

Robert Landy, Ph.D., RDT/BCT, LCAT



On a recent trip to Greece, working with a group of drama therapists,  
I gave myself one day to take on the role of the tourist.  I inquired  
about a meaningful excursion, within striking distance of Athens, and  
was urged by my friends to visit Mt. Parnassus in Delphi, the site of  
the ancient oracle of Apollo and the mythical home of Orpheus and the  
muses. I immediately became excited and wondered if it were still  
possible to consult the oracle. I had no particular question to ask,  
but always carried around with me the usual existential concerns,  
especially while in foreign lands. Arriving at the foot of Mt.  
Parnassus, I began my ascent and soon came to the temple of Apollo,  
demarcated by six Doric columns. My body usually registers the  
presence of a spiritual center, but I felt little as I gazed at the  
ruins. Neither the muses nor Apollo was present for me and  
furthermore, I had nothing to offer or to ask. And so I proceeded up  
the mountain and soon arrived at an amphitheatre just above the  
temple. Again, as I stood among the usual complement of Autumn  
tourists, I felt little in my body. But there was more of the  
mountain to traverse and so I trudged on. Catching my breath for a  
moment, I saw a sign that read: Stadium.  As I approached, I saw,  
high above the temple and the theatre, the sports arena that I later  
learned was the site of the Pythian Games, the forerunner of the  
Olympic games. I wondered why the stadium was placed at the zenith  
and the temple at the nadir? For some unknown reason, I had trouble  
leaving the stadium, the most intact of the ruins on Mt. Parnassus.  
And then I became annoyed as I really wanted to bask in the light of  
the gods below. Extricating myself from the stadium, I descended, and  
just as I reached the theatre, I experienced a small electric jolt at  
the top of my spine, a tingling that rose to my head. Although the  
question I needed to answer was not yet formulated, it came to me  
through my body. It was something like—what drew me here and what did  
this mythical place have to say to my psyche? And the answer came  
right away—what drew me here was the wisdom of the ancient Greeks in  
designing harmonic spaces in nature; and the message of Delphi was  
that in the design, it is clear that the theatre, standing between  
the temple and the stadium, is the central locus of healing. It is  
both a physical place and a principle that integrates the body and  
the spirit.



As I read the memoirs of Zerka Toeman Moreno--not read, actually, but  
traversed, as the reading was a journey--the images of Delphi kept  
appearing before my mind’s eye. Zerka’s story is about a journey in  
search of a center, an integrative principle that is powerful enough  
to hold together the body and the spirit. In Zerka’s life narrative,  
the body is both frail and resilient, competing not against others,  
but within itself, an even greater Olympian task. We find the body  
center stage in Zerka’s descriptions of the loss of her arm and the  
discovery of a phantom double, of her sister’s cycles of mental  
illness and recovery, of the sweet demise of her beloved Moreno, of  
her attachment and loss of Merlyn Pitzele. Zerka describes the corpus  
of Moreno’s life work as played out in situ or on a psychodramatic  
stage through bodies in action.

In Zerka’s life narrative, this spirit is most present in living  
through Moreno’s understanding of humans as cosmic beings and  
Teilhard de Chardin’s understanding that “We are not human beings on  
a spiritual journey; we are spiritual beings on a human journey.” In  
her many reflections upon her life with Moreno, Zerka refers to that  
relationship as a cosmic journey, full of mystery and challenge.



At the center of Zerka’s corpus and cosmos, is, as I discovered in  
Delphi, the theatre, or, in Morenian terms, the principle of  
creativity/spontaneity. This principle not only led Zerka to the  
various psychodramatic theatres of America and indeed, the entire  
world, but also led her to the new world and her deep connection to  
Moreno, her mentor, collaborator and beloved. And so I will add that  
it is not only the theatre of spontaneity that stands between the  
corpus and the cosmos, but also the theatre of co-creation, of  
relationship.



I came to psychodrama shortly after the passing of Moreno, in the  
mid-70s. I was on my own journey, seeking to discover creative forms  
of healing and to integrate my academic interests in theatre,  
psychology, education and literature. At the time, there was no  
organized field of drama therapy. I had studied Gestalt therapy in  
California with George Brown, who was chosen by Fritz Perls to  
transform public education through Gestalt principles. But despite  
Perls’ pronouncements, his work seemed derivative and incomplete in  
terms of its lack of focus upon the somatic and social dimensions of  
treatment. I also discovered the book Play, Drama and Thought by  
Richard Courtney, an Englishman working in Canada, who developed a  
field called developmental drama, based on the principles of  
educational drama, a practice that had been applied to primary and  
secondary education in England, Canada and the United States since  
the early part of the 20th century. Courtney became a mentor and I  
admired the breadth of his knowledge in social sciences, humanities,  
and dramatic arts, but after some time, I became disenchanted with  
his lack of focus and depth. Although their work was derivative of  
many of Moreno’s ideas, neither Perls nor Courtney spoke very much  
about Moreno.



After completing an interdisciplinary doctorate, I began teaching  
theatre at California State University in Northridge and worked  
toward developing an integration of theatre and psychology. While  
there, I met Lew Yablonski, who introduced me to psychodrama and  
sociometry.  For the first time, I felt I found a form that spoke to  
my need for integration. Lew led me in many directions, the most  
important of which was to the work of J.L Moreno. At that time, in  
the mid-1970s, Lew was experimenting with directing psychodrama  
sessions on television, a plan dreamed up by J.L years before. When I  
moved from California to New York in 1977, Lew introduced me to Jim  
Sacks, who became my teacher and trainer and exposed me to the more  
classical from of psychodrama in a gentle and wise fashion. In 1979,  
I become a faculty member in Educational Theatre at NYU, where I  
eventually developed the Drama Therapy Program. In 1980, I had the  
opportunity to produce two televisions programs on WCBS devoted to  
psychodrama and I invited Jim to direct the sessions. Descriptions of  
those sessions can be found in my book, Handbook of Educational Drama  
and Theatre (Greenwood Press, 1982).



As my psychodramatic social atom began to expand, I came closer and  
closer to Zerka’s inner circle before directly meeting her. I  
collaborated with Peter Pitzele on several projects, including an  
exploration of the literary and spiritual figure of Ismael and that  
of the biblical figures of Mary and Miriam. Peter’s father, Merlyn,  
lived with Zerka after Moreno’s death, and Zerka speaks of their  
relationship very warmly in her memoirs. Peter and I sought to  
integrate our mutual love of performance and healing, literature and  
religion. Peter was the first person I asked to teach psychodrama at  
NYU and over the years, I was fortunate to have several major figures  
in psychodrama work in our program—Bob Siroka, Tian Dayton, and Nina  
Garcia. Jonathan Fox, the step-son of Merlyn Pitzele, taught Playback  
Theatre at NYU, and he and I spent many lively hours speaking about  
playback and psychodrama, politics and personal journeys, myth and  
baseball. From Peter and Jonathan I learned not only bibliodrama and  
Playback Theatre, but I also learned about the family legacies  
emanating from Zerka. In further collaborating and engaging in long  
conversations with Tian and Nina, I also learned to deeply appreciate  
the spiritual and relational dimensions of the Moreno worldview. All  
of these extraordinary individuals, both mentors and friends—Lew and  
Jim, Peter and Jonathan, Bob, Tian and Nina, brought me up to the  
door. The next step was to enter.



I first met Zerka from a distance, in an old grainy film, shot in the  
1960s. Moreno was working at Camarillo State Hospital with a young  
emotionally vulnerable man who, with some trepidation, was about to  
go home after an extended hospitalization. From Moreno’s interview  
with the young man, it became clear that his parents were not able to  
provide a good enough environment for him to flourish. At some point,  
requiring an auxiliary to enable the young man to face his  
infantilizing mother, Moreno brought in Zerka as the man’s ex- 
girlfriend. In this role and in the role of the young man, taken on  
through role-reversal, Zerka modeled the strength necessary for the  
young man to stand up to his mother. Moreno’s intensity and  
insistence was complimented by the containing feminine energy of  
Zerka. I must admit that I was at first surprised by her missing  
right arm and wondered how the young man in the film felt. But then I  
saw Zerka as a wounded healer, just the right person to take on the  
mantle of the strong maternal guide, leading this young man and  
scores of others toward discovery of their missing parts, toward  
completion.



I came closer to Zerka as I participated in workshops at professional  
conferences. And then, in 1997, I invited her to deliver the keynote  
address at a drama therapy conference at NYU, where I collaborated in  
presentations with both Tian Dayton and Peter Pitzele. Zerka’s  
address, published in The Qunitessential Zerka, was erudite and  
inspiring. It led me back to the Greeks, as innovators of healing  
through performance, and forward to the surprisingly fresh ideas of  
Moreno.



Most recently, as I conceived of a new book about the history and  
present status of the action psychotherapies, I invited Zerka to  
write the foreword. Not only did she write a challenging and  
provocative piece, but she offered to read the manuscript and provide  
an in-depth critique. As I wrote and edited and even as I allowed the  
completed book to float into the world, Zerka remained close. Her  
voice via email not only reminded me of details, but also fill in  
critical historical and conceptual holes. In these on-going  
correspondences, I sensed that I was connected to a source beyond any  
other that I could find in my research. Zerka lived through the  
history of action psychotherapy, and Zerka in large measure co- 
created that history. Like Laura Perls, who co-created Gestalt  
Therapy with her husband, Fritz Perls, Zerka’s voice was significant  
in building the foundation of a new discipline. Zerka spoke out,  
leading sessions internationally, taking over the Moreno Institute  
when J.L. became infirm, writing important articles, disseminating  
the message of psychodrama and sociometry throughout the decades.  
With the publication of these memoirs, Zerka solidifies her own place  
within the pantheon of “geniuses,” as Moreno referred to his favored  
students, who walked through the psychodramatic portals.



I have many reactions to Zerka’s memoirs. Keeping with the motif of  
journey, Zerka’s story is one of criss-crossing geographical,  
historical and psychic borders to find her place in the world. A risk- 
taker who is always a few steps ahead of her time, she leaves Europe  
as the Nazis march forward to the inevitable destruction and  
holocaust. She leaves New York City and a safe entry-level job to  
cast her lot with the charismatic and married Moreno and move to the  
exurb of Beacon, New York. She returns to New York with Moreno as he  
establishes an institute on Park Avenue and the Upper Westside. Of  
the many stories she tells of her commutes between New York and  
Beacon, the most moving to me are those of the aging man and young  
woman returning home on a snowy evening from the Beacon train station  
late at night, after a long day of office work and psychodrama  
training in the city, walking silently, side by side, each in their  
own separate thoughts, each deeply attached to the other. As Moreno’s  
health fails, Zerka again ventures out into the world, most  
poignantly returning to Europe and re-visiting her past. And then  
after Moreno’s death, Zerka expands her geographical horizons,  
bringing a life’s work that is now her own to new continents and  
cultures, such as China and Taiwan. She is able to bid goodnight and  
goodbye to her adored husband and venture forth again into a new  
relationship with Merlyn, and then, once again having lost the  
territory of intimacy, to continue the journey with more travels,  
more trainings, more writing and then, re-settled in Virginia, to  
embrace her extended family and reflect upon a life deeply-lived.



Another motif that catches me fully is that of the double. Not only  
do we learn about the origins of Moreno’s double in psychodrama, but  
we also are privy to Zerka’s broad understanding of the concept as it  
plays out in psychodramatic treatment, in literature, in early  
childhood development, as exemplified in her observations of her son,  
Jonathan, and even in her own life. I think of Zerka’s complex  
relationship with various psychic doubles—her mentally ill sister  
through whom she meets Moreno; Moreno, himself, who refers to Zerka  
as his instrument and yet through whom she discovers her singularity  
and ability to become the one to spread and expand the canon of  
psychodrama and sociometry; her son, through whom she discovers her  
maternal role; Merlyn, through whom she discovers another side of her  
femininity; and most deeply, her right arm, through which she  
discovers her creativity, unique beauty and integrity, and through  
which she discovers her primary role as wounded healer. Not only was  
Zerka J.L. Moreno’s right hand, she was also the one to embody the  
ideas and deliver them wholly formed, not only in words, but also in  
the double of words, in action.



Zerka speaks often to the genius of Moreno and the fact that he often  
referred to his committed students as geniuses. Although not directly  
characterizing Zerka as a genius, she learns secondhand that he saw  
her as such. So what is the genius of Moreno? And what is the genius  
of his instrument, Zerka, who becomes a force and a voice in her own  
right?



For one, Moreno’s life and work exemplified the range of modernism  
and existentialism in art, therapy and culture. His example set the  
stage for intellectuals and practitioners in various disciplines. One  
example is Martin Buber, in the fields of theology and philosophy,  
whose notions of encounter and dialogue were preceded and influenced  
by Moreno in his thought and publications.



In theater, Moreno’s work led to the movement of improvisational  
drama and theatre which has a long history stemming from the  Greeks  
to the Italian commedias of the Reanissance, but which became popular  
in the mid-twentieth century in many forms. Viola Spolin popularized  
theater games in the 1950s which have been used in theater  
performance, in education and various forms of arts therapy.  
Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, with the advent of such groups as the  
Living Theatre and the Open Theatre, who stood for a radical re- 
thinking of the cultural conserve and indeed, the conservative  
culture, improvisation reached an audience of young people yearning  
for change, if not revolution. These experiments were highly  
influenced by Moreno’s early work in forms of spontaneous and  
transformational theatre.



Although there is no evidence of Moreno’s connection to his  
contemporary, Bertolt Brecht, the great German playwright and  
innovator of socially conscious theatre, Moreno’s experiments in  
sociometry and sociodrama foreshadowed many of the epic theatre ideas  
and intentions. Moreno’s ideas also inspired Augusto Boal who  
introduced theatre of the oppressed to South America and Europe in  
the mid-twentieth century. Even Moreno’s early theatrical texts  
presaged the modernist experiments of such writers as August  
Strindberg, William Butler Yeats and Samuel Beckett.



In the field of psychotherapy, Moreno’s work provided a clear model  
for those who developed active forms of treatment, with or without  
attribution to Moreno. The entire discipline of group psychotherapy  
was in fact based in many of Moreno’s seminal ideas concerning  
community, encounter and relationship. Before Moreno, group  
psychotherapy was rarely practiced, if at all. Moreno began his group  
experiments in Vienna in the early part of the twentieth century and  
later advised governmental and community organizations following the  
two World Wars as to the efficacy of group treatment of emotionally  
disabled veterans, long before the diagnosis of post-traumatic stress  
disorder became accepted by mainstream psychiatrists. Moreno’s ideas  
were recapitulated by many of the pioneering group psychotherapists  
in several schools of psychotherapy. Examples include psychoanalysis  
exemplified by the work of the Americans, Hyman Spotnitz and Lou  
Ormont, and the British, S. H. Foulkes and Wilfred Bion. Other group  
therapists whose work reflects that of Moreno include Irvin Yalom in  
existential therapy, Fritz Perls in Gestalt therapy and Eric Berne in  
transactional analysis, as well as many who developed encounter  
groups in the 1960s. Moreno also influence the field of family  
therapy as can be seen in the work of Virginia Satir and others who  
regularly used role-playing and role-reversal in their treatment.



Individual psychotherapists who used action and dramatic approaches  
in their theory and practice were also indebted to Moreno’s  
pioneering work. Several of these include psychoanalysts such as Carl  
Jung, Wilhelm Reich and Sandor Ferenczi; feminist and relational  
psychotherapists such as Carol Gilligan, who regularly applies  
theatre to her understanding of human behavior;  cognitive-  
behavioral therapists who often employ forms of behavior rehearsal;   
constructivists, such as the pioneering George Kelly, who used a  
dramatic approach called fixed-role therapy; and expressive  
therapists in movement, drama, poetry, art and music, who apply so  
many of Moreno’s ideas and techniques. The influential Henry Murray,  
who directed the Harvard Psychological Clinic for many years and who  
was credited with inventing the Thematic Apperception Test, built a  
psychodrama theatre at Harvard and developed and supported various  
dramatic, projective approaches toward assessment and treatment of a  
range of social, cultural and psychological phenomena.



Within the field of psychodrama, itself, Moreno has influenced each  
new renovation. These include axiodrama, bibliodrama, Playback  
Theatre, sambadrama, as well as many new forms of sociodrama and  
social theatre. In educational drama, Moreno has also influenced  
socially relevant forms of Theatre-in-Education, applied theatre,  
theatre in prisons and ethnodrama.



Moreno’s genius was in his invention of the healing forms and  
cultural forms of psychodrama, sociodrama and sociometry, based in  
the simple and elegant principles of creativity and spontaneity. As  
will become clear in the reading of these memoirs, Zerka’s genius was  
first in co-creating, developing and sharpening many of the original  
ideas and practices. Secondly, her genius was in assuring that  
Moreno’s influence would continue unimpeded in philosophy, theatre,  
psychotherapy and education, in fact, all disciplines that subscribe  
to the primacy of creativity and spontaneity as essential means of  
making sense of human existence. Within the history of action  
psychotherapy, J.L. Moreno and Zerka Toeman Moreno are the  
architects, builders, renovators and restorers of a system with roots  
in ancient civilizations and braches that reach far into the future.



Throughout my career as a drama therapist, I am often asked about the  
differences between psychodrama and drama therapy. I often respond in  
a simple fashion by saying that psychodrama evolved from the Morenos  
and drama therapy evolved from several pioneers. I also say that  
psychodrama as reality-oriented concerns protagonists playing the  
roles of themselves in relationship to significant others, whereas  
drama therapy is more often metaphorical, the dramatization of a  
fiction, with protagonists playing those other than self. Further,  
psychodrama is more directive than some forms of drama therapy, such  
as developmental transformations, where the therapist becomes an  
actor in the protagonist’s drama.  Psychodrama most often leads to a  
catharsis on the part of the protagonist, whereas in some forms of  
drama therapy, such as role method and narradrama, this is not  
necessarily the case.



Classical psychodrama is a well-proscribed form, with clear  
techniques defined and handed down by the Morenos and their numerous  
students and trainees. Also, it is based, in part, in a theoretical  
model of role-theory, which has been articulated in the several major  
texts written by Moreno and refined by Zerka and others over the  
years. The Morenos’ theoretical work is also based in an  
understanding of sociometric principles that seek to explicate the  
social and political nature of human beings. The theory, however, is  
incomplete and difficult to quantify.



Drama therapy, on the other hand, is an eclectic form, with many  
techniques, some loosely defined. Several schools of drama therapy  
have been delineated in the United States, Britain and other  
cultures, such as role theory and method, developmental  
transformations, integrative five-phase model, narradrama,  
therapeutic storymaking, therapeutic theatre, ritual drama,  
transpersonal drama therapy, among others. As there are several  
models of practice, so, too, are there several theoretical models,  
although few are well developed and quantifiable. The most clearly  
developed theory in drama therapy is that attached to a more  
conventional field, such as psychoanalysis, as in the work of Eleanor  
Irwin and others, or play, such as developmental transformations.  
Role theory, as developed by Landy, has roots in Moreno’s role theory  
as well as that of the social psychologists in the mid-twentieth  
century and several theatre theorists, most notably Constantin  
Stanislavski, Bertolt Brecht, Antonin Artaud and Jerzy Grotowski.



Many in drama therapy claim that drama therapy, based in ancient  
healing forms, such as those practiced by the pre-Christian Greeks or  
earlier non-western shamanic healers, precedes psychodrama by  
thousands of years.  Further, some, like John Casson (2004), argue  
that drama therapy evolved from early performative experiments in  
mental institutions in nineteenth century Europe and later theatrical  
developments in Russia in the early twentieth century.



Many in psychodrama argue that Moreno’s forms of action sociometry  
and psychodrama, originally developed in Vienna in the early  
twentieth century, precede drama therapy as a coherent discipline by  
some 50 years. These same people argue that many of the techniques  
regularly employed in drama therapy are derived from classical  
psychodramatic warm-ups and such standard fare as empty-chair,  
doubling, mirroring and role-reversal.



My point of view, articulated in The Couch and the Stage (2008) is  
that psychodrama and drama therapy are more alike than different and  
that determining comparative origins is much like unraveling the  
mystery of the chicken and the egg. Both disciplines are essentially  
dramatic, in that an actor assumes a role and explores unresolved  
issues within the safety of the role. Both believe in dramatic action  
as the preferred method of treatment. Both encourage emotional  
expression, favoring catharsis characterized by a balance of feeling  
and reflection, a moment referred to by Moreno as a catharsis of  
integration. Both work with the notion of a move from everyday  
reality into dramatic reality, referred to by Moreno as surplus  
reality and status nascendi and by drama therapists as the playspace  
and the imaginal realm. Both offer a structure of warm-up, action and  
closure, the latter of which, in most cases, concerns a reflection  
upon the therapeutic enactment. Both view the creative process as the  
primary path toward healing, and both place the spontaneous moment of  
the here and now at the center of the healing process. Both view  
human beings as integrative and psychological treatments as  
pertaining to the whole person in mind, body, emotion and spirit. As  
such, both forms work simultaneously and three levels: personal,  
relational and cosmic.



I am a drama therapist who is conversant and at ease in psychodrama  
and sociodrama, in bibliodrama and Playback Theatre. When I  
approached Zerka in 2006 and asked her to write the Foreword to my  
new book, I received so much more than I anticipated. Zerka opened  
the door and all I needed to do was to enter. Once inside, I realized  
that I had entered a house with many new rooms that, when  
illuminated, looked very familiar.  When Zerka in 2008 asked me to  
write the Foreword to her memoirs, I retraced my steps even as I  
ventured out further into a history that remains in process,  
unfinished, as are all old, stalwart homes. The theatre that I  
discovered in Delphi, standing between the stadium and the temple,  
was the home that Zerka invited me into. It holds the past and the  
future firmly in the present. It holds the old world of classical  
Europe and the new world together in the tiny sphere of the whole  
world. It holds those who have passed and those who are arriving in  
its shiny crucible. It holds the corpus and the cosmos together in  
the axis of creativity-spontaneity. It welcomes all of you who will  
read this marvelous memoir to come hither and celebrate the journeys  
of Zerka and through her eyes, that of a small circle of geniuses  
whose lives are dedicated to procreating that which is most vital,  
most brilliant and most simple in us all.



References

Casson, John (2004). Drama, psychotherapy and psychosis: Dramatherapy  
and psychodrama with people who hear voices. London & New York:  
Brunner-Routledge.



Courtney, Richard (1989). Play, drama and thought. Toronto: Simon &  
Pierre Pub.

Landy, Robert J. (1982).  Handbook of educational drama and theatre.  
Westport, CT: Greenwood Press.



Landy, Robert J. (2008). The Couch and the Stage: Integrating Words  
and Action in Psychotherapy. Lanham, MD: Jason Aronson.



Moreno, Zerka T. (2006). The quintessential Zerka: Writings by Zerka  
Toeman Moreno on psychodrama, sociometry and group psychotherapy.  
London & New York: Routledge.





On Jul 19, 2009, at 10:39 AM, HV Psychodrama wrote:

> Has anyone come up with a clear and concise explanation of the  
> difference between drama therapy and psychodrama...I would like to  
> post this on my website as I frequently get calls from people  
> seeking training or therapy who are confused between the two.
> Rebecca
> Hudson Valley Psychodrama Institute
> 68 DuBois Road
> New Paltz, NY 12561
>
> Ph: (845) 255 7502
> E-mail: hvpi at hvc.rr.com
> Visit us at our website: http://www.hvpi.net
> Grouptalk mailing list
> List at grouptalkweb.org
> http://grouptalkweb.org/mailman/listinfo/list_grouptalkweb.org

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