Regietheater

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noun

The modern practice of allowing a director freedom to diverge from the original intentions of the playwright or operatist, for example by changing the geographical and chronological setting, or by adapting the work to highlight issues of race and gender.

Scrabble 16

Meanings

nounRegietheater (uncountable)
  1. uncountableentertainmentThe modern practice of allowing a director freedom to diverge from the original intentions of the playwright or operatist, for example by changing the geographical and chronological setting, or by adapting the work to highlight issues of race and gender.
    1 more example

    If nothing he [Patrice Chéreau] did for the screen had the genre-shaking impact of his stage work — his 1976 “Ring” cycle at Bayreuth helped usher in an era of Regietheater, or director’s theater — he did raise eyebrows with the sexually explicit “Intimacy” (2001), starring all of Mark Rylance, the corseted Olivia in the “Twelfth Night” that just ended its Broadway run.

    2014 February 28, Rachel Saltz, “It Takes a Funeral: So Much Angst”, in The New York Times, →ISSN

Origin

  1. GermanRegietheater“director's theater”
  2. EnglishRegietheater

Borrowed from German Regietheater (“director's theater”).

Full word history & related roots →
Cite this entry
APA

Regietheater. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Regietheater

MLA

“Regietheater.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Regietheater. Accessed November 4, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “Regietheater,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Regietheater.

Source: Regietheater on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.