Theatre Chapter 1: The Essentials

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TheatreChapter 1 The Essentials
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Chapter 1 The Art of the Theatre

• Theatre
• a performing art that requires an actor
  performing some form of story or idea for a live
  audience. It is also the modern English term for
  a building or structure where performances are
  held.

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The Key Elements of Drama

• According to Aristotle, a piece of theater should
  contain most or all of the following things (in
  order of importance)
• Plot the story, whats being told, whats going
  on.
• Character the people that hold your interest.

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The Key Elements of Drama

• Diction (speech)
• Music sets the mood or tone. This comes from
  actors voice, sound effects (door slamming,
  glass breaking)
• Spectacle the gimmick or thing that drives us to
  go see something.

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The Key Elements of Drama

• Thought The central theme around a play. Can I
  sum this whole play up in one sentence? That is
  what this is.

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The Key Elements of Drama

• Theatron TE-AT-RON
• origin of the word Theater. Ancient Greek word
  that means seeing place. This word defined the
  area where the audience sat during the
  performance.
• Dran
• Ancient Greek verb meaning to take action or to
  do something. It is from this word we get drama.

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DRAMA!

• Drama
• A specific form of theater that tells a story.
  Most plays are dramas.
• What is the essence of drama? If someone is
  dealing with drama in their life, they are
  experiencing conflict.
• The essence of drama is conflict.

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Licensing Act of 1737

• An English law that gave the Lord Chamberlain the
  authority to license plays. Fr over 200 years, no
  play could be performed on the English stage
  without authorization. This is often cited as one
  of the primary acts of theatrical censorship.

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The Basic Elements of Theatre

• 1) What is Performed
• 2) The Performance
• 3) The Audience. The most basic definition of
  theatre is someone performing something for
  someone else. A performs B for C.

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What is performed?

• What is the essence of theatrical performance?
• Possibilities
• The Staged performance of a text
• Storytelling
• Entertainment such as juggling or improvisation.

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The Audience

• The Audience completes the cycle of
  Creation/Communication.
• It also provides immediate feedback to the
  performers.

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3 Way Theatrical Interaction

• Performs ? Audience
• Audience ? Performers
• Audience ? Audience

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Conventions?

• Recognized social customs (shaking hands). In
  theatre, conventions are specific rules (no
  talking in the theatre, cell phone policies,
  etc.) and customs (ushers, flashing the lights
  before, dim the lights before the show starts)
  traditional to certain forms of theatre in
  certain societies. (Also programs, getting
  autographs, etc.)

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What makes theatre a unique art form?

• Theatre is often a collaborative art form.
• Theatre is live.
• Theatre is ephemeral.

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Say What?

• Collaborative multiple individuals combine their
  talents/efforts to achieve a goal.
• Ephemeral fleeting, short lived, momentary. That
  which is ephemeral can never truly be repeated.

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What makes theatre a unique art form?

• Good theatre holds a mirror up to life We get to
  see ourselves, or society, and out world being
  acted out on stage.

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What makes theatre a unique art form?

• Theatre is often a collaborative art form
  Theatre is live performance, and becomes a part
  of the past immediately after it occurs.

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What makes theatre a unique art form?

• Theatre is ephemeral Each performance is unique
  and those moments in time can never be repeated
  just as in real life.

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End of Chapter 1