The recent discovery of three 13th-century plays by the Egyptian dramatist Ibn Dāniyāl offers many new insights into the medieval theatre. The second of these plays provides detailed scripts and scenarios for street performers of this era, a type of record that does not exist for similar performances in Europe.

In 2007, Routledge published Theory for Performance Studies as part of its Theory 4 series, listing Philip Auslander as author. When, in August, The Chronicle of Higher Education revealed that much of the book was lifted word-for-word from the template for the series, Theory for Religious Studies by Timothy K. Beal and William E. Deal, TDR editor Richard Schechner convened via email and phone conversations a “ TDR Forum,” asking leaders in the field to respond to the book and the series. Schechner and other respondents address issues of plagiarism, corporate takeovers of academic publishing, and the dumbing down of performance studies, asking why a notable scholar such as Auslander would undertake such an egregious piece of “scholarship.” Deal and Beal answer some questions put to them by Schechner, and Routledge's Claire L'Enfant and Talia Rodgers offer their perspectives.

In May 2007, David Levine's experimental performance in Brandenberg attracted international attention for its unique blending of endurance art, land art, concept art, site-specific performance, and traditional theatre. A key innovation was its challenge to the distinction drawn by Michael Kirby in the 1960s between the “matrixed” action of traditional theatre and the “nonmatrixed” action of the Happening. By creating a dramatic matrix for an actor placed in what is essentially a Happening, Levine has, in his terms, “short-circuited” this distinction.

Animal presence unsettles practices of spectatorship and reframes assumptions about embodiment and affect in four differently exemplary animal performances, including one dating back to the 18th century. In all of them, the ethics of watching other animals, human or nonhuman, and the call for evaluation and judgment is complicated by recognition of the multiplicitous and mysterious nature of pain and pleasure.