1. Theatre Terms
Jargon for the stage

2. Acting Terms
These are words that deal with the actors craft as well as what you need to know when you are acting.

3. Audition
An opportunity to try out for a play.

4. Aside
When an actor speaks directly to the audience.

5. Bit
A small role
A small action or interaction to take place on stage.

6. Book
Script

7. “Break a leg!” Wishing an actor good luck.
It’s bad luck to say good luck.

8. Cheat Front
Facing your body toward the audience, and your face toward another actor on stage.

9. Cue
Signal to begin a line or action.

10. Curtain call
The bow at the end of the play.

11. Ensemble
A cast where there is no lead.
All parts are equal.

12. Entrance
When an actor comes on stage.

13. Improvisation
Creating a brief acting scene with no preparation of the spur of the moment.

14. Monologue
Passage spoken by only one person.

15. Off Book
Have script memorized.

16. Pantomime
Telling a story without using words or props.

17. Principals
Main characters.

18. Projection
Making your voice extend to the whole audience using your diaphragm.

19. Up Staging
Drawing focus from the person who is supposed to be in focus.

20. Warm Up
A verbal and physical exercise to get the actor pumped up for the production.

21. Parts of the Stage
These terms are the names of parts of the stage, and types of stages.

22. Arena Staging Theatre in the round/ Black Box.
Stage in the center with bleacher seating on all four sides.

23. Backdrop
Pained canvas hung to represent a setting.

24. Backstage
Area behind the set.

25. Cyclorama (cyc)
Background curtain that covers the back of the stage.

26. Downstage
Area closest to the audience.

27. Dressing Room
Where actors get ready to go on the stage.

28. Flat
Rectangular frame covered with canvas to use as scenery.

29. Fly
Anything flown in to the staging area.
Verb – to fly in a fly

30. Green Room
Where actors wait to go on stage.

31. House
Where the audience sits.

32. Proscenium
Picture frame through which an audience sees the play.

33. Scrim
Gauze screen used to create effects when combined with light.

34. Stage Left
When standing on the stage, it’s your left.

35. Stage Right
When standing on the right, it’s your right.

36. Thrust Staging
Low platform stage with seating on three sides.

37. Upstage
Area of the stage that is farthest from the audience.

38. Wings
The sides of the stage in which actors wait to go on.

39. Directing and Technical Terms
These words have to do with the stage direction used by the director, as well as terms associated with the different technical aspects of theatre.

40. Black Out
Lights out.

41. Blocking
Movement of actors on stage.

42. Blocking Rehearsal
Practice where director places the actors in pictures and designates movements.

43. Call
Time actors are to be at the theatre.

44. Callback Second stage of auditioning process.
Director wants to see the actor again.

45. Counter
Moving in the opposite direction of the cross made by another actor.

46. Cross
Move across the stage.

47. Dark
A night of no performance in a run.

48. Director
“God” Makes all of the decisions.

49. Doubling AKA - Double casting Two casts for the same show…
Or playing more than one part.

50. Dressing the stage
Decorating the scenery.

51. Focus
Where the audience should be looking on the stage.

52. Gel Thin sheet of gelatin available in a wide range of colors.
Used in front of a light to color the beam.

53. Gobo
Usually aluminum and inserted into the light to create a pattern on the stage.

54. Go Up
Time the show begins.

55. “Lights Up”
When the lights come on the stage.

56. Notes
When the director tells the actors what they didn’t get right.

57. Pace
Tempo and speed of the show. 

58. Prompt Book Stage manager’s “bible”
Copy of the script with all notes and cues in it.

59. Props
Anything an actor picks up and uses on stage.

60. Read Through
Cast reads their parts out loud with out physically acting it out.

61. Run
The days a play is being put on.

62. Run-Lines Recite lines as quickly as possible to get
the lines down pat.

63. Run-Through
Rehearsal where the acting does not stop for working.

64. Stage Directions
The parts in a script that tell the actor what to do.

65. Strike
To dismantle and put away everything used in the show.

66. Techie
Technical crew member.

67. Tech Rehearsals
Rehearsals devoted to adding and perfecting the technical aspects of a production.

68. The End
Commit these words to memory, as you will be tested on them on Tuesday of next week.