 Primitive/Ancient Dances  Entertainment  Sort out identities  Storytelling / imitating events  Religion  Remnants today: hula, Native American snake, corn, sun dances  Dances evolved into rituals  Masked representative of gods prayed, chanted as tribe watched  Often performed in front of a temple – evolved into drama with a speaking actor  Primitive/Ancient Dances  Entertainment  Sort out identities  Storytelling / imitating events  Religion  Remnants today: hula, Native American snake, corn, sun dances  Dances evolved into rituals  Masked representative of gods prayed, chanted as tribe watched  Often performed in front of a temple – evolved into drama with a speaking actor

 Explain  Actions of gods or heroes  Origins or elements of nature  Generally handed down through word- of-mouth  An important mirror of the values and beliefs of a society

 Probably first practitioners of definite drama  Around 3000 B.C.  Pyramid plays  Abydos Passion Play (resurrection)

 The “Golden Age” of Theatre ( B.C.)  Origins in rites paying homage to Dionysus, the god of wine and fertility  Public celebrations around stone altars at the foot of hilly vineyards  Much dancing and singing; evolved into competing choral groups  Eventually became a huge festival, the City Dionysia, that everyone attended. Three playwrights each had a day in which to present 3 tragedies on one theme and a satyr play (farce) that provided comic relief at the end  Tragedy comes from the word tragos for “goat song”

 The first winner of the City Dionysia, in 534, was Thespis  He introduced a chorus leader, who spoke opposite the chorus and became the first actor  He also introduced the use of masks

 Chorus around altar  Audience on benches placed on sloping hills, looking down on chorus  Evolved into what became today’s amphitheatres – concentric semi-circles of stone carved into the hillside  Amazing acoustics – seated up to 25,000, no microphones  Orchestra area: circular space at base of hill  Skene: small building behind orchestra with 3 doors for entrances

 Skene became scenery – backdrops painted on boards and leaned against the skene  Proskene became the proscenium arch  The chorus of citizens is similar to today’s musical/opera choruses  Offstage violence; bodies wheeled on stage  Masks (helped audiences see and hear)  Sound effects, i.e., drums for thunder  And…

 “God from the machine”  Originally a mechanical device for raising and lowering the gods  Today, a deus ex machina is any device, such as a rich uncle, that unexpectedly occurs to resolve the problems in the play

 Rise of Rome, decline of Greece around 3 rd century B.C.  Theatre became more mass entertainment, very violent  Competed with chariot races, circuses, staged battles scenes, etc.  For many gods, not just one  Very frequent performances  Shows became short and usually comic – similar to today’s sitcoms

 Free- standing  Pulpitum in front of back façade  Vomitorium direct access from stage to exterior

 When Rome fell in 476 AD, the Christian church took over and all theatrical activity was banned  Very gradual emergence of Liturgical Drama ( )  In churches or monasteries  Chanted or sung  In Latin  Performed by choir boys or clergy members  Short, part of the service

 Gradually arose in a period of stability after many years of war  Trade guilds established  Towns ruled by those high up in guilds  Local language, spoken (not sung in Latin)  Performed by laymen  Mystery plays (bible stories)  Miracle plays (lives of saints)  Morality plays (taught right/wrong, abstract characters)  Passion plays by the late middle ages

 No permanent stages  Mansions represented locations  Platea multipurpose open area around the mansion  Some stationary sets  Pageant wagons (the origin of today’s parade floats) – sponsored by the appropriate guild  No masks except on devils  Regular people in street clothes  Gods, saints and angels in church clothes  Fantastical costumes and special effects for devils

 Flourishing of visual and literary art that began in Italy  Focus on the genius and beauty of humans  In theatre:  A shift from simultaneous to sequential settings  Return to Greek classics  Addition of perspective art

 Wandering troupes, flexible, could perform anywhere – expanded throughout Europe  Stock characters: young lovers, miserly old man, old lecher, stuck up (but gullible) scholar, cowardly braggart, sassy servants  All masked except lovers  Outline scripts with a lot of improvisation and comic bits  The servants, called zanni, acted “zany”  Broad, often bawdy humor

 Shakespeare  “Wooden O” stages that facilitated quick changes of scene  Largely bare stages with balconies and traps  All classes – “groundlings” to royalty

 Attempt to re- create the relationship between music and speech from Greek Tragedy – a failure, but a new art form was born!  Lots of spectacle: drama/dance/ music/ special effects  From perspective art: the proscenium becomes a picture frame, and the stage is raked to add dimension