Theater Arts

Course Description
Theater Arts is a course intended to introduce learners to the fascinating world of Drama and
Performance. Students will gain an awareness of the creative, expressive and artistic experience
that the theatre provides. The course provides learners with an exciting overview of all the major
elements of theatre production such as scriptwriting, play production, acting, directing, design,
dance, movement, voice and speech. The course demonstrates the process of creating and
organizing these elements to end up ultimately with a live theatre production. The course will
intensify the learners’ understanding of the various personnel, equipment and disciplines that are
required to produce a theatrical performance. We will also examine the language and structure of
various plays ranging from the ancient Greeks to current contemporary playwrights. The course
will also allow learners to participate in theatrical production and performance.
Course Objectives
The learner should be able to:
1) Appreciate the various roles/aspects inherent within the theatrical process.
2) Identify theatrical conventions and exemplar plays of each major theatre period.
3) Ascertain the vocabulary and practice methods of critique and evaluation of live
performance.
4) Acquire the necessary techniques for interpreting and translating written texts into live
performances.
5) Recognize and evaluate elements of the production process, including different aspects of
playwriting, acting, directing, design, and criticism.
6) Participate in short dramatic performances.
7) Compare and integrate art forms by analyzing traditional theatre, dance, music, visual arts,
and new theater forms.
Theatre Arts
 Theatre arts, often simply referred to as theatre, encompasses a broad spectrum of creative
activities that converge to produce a live performance.
 This collaborative art form integrates elements such as acting, directing, set design, costume
design, lighting, sound, and more to convey a narrative or evoke emotions.
 Theatre is the branch of performing arts concerned with acting out stories in front of an
audience, using a combination of speech, gesture, music, dance, sound, and spectacle.
 It is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actors, to
present experiences of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place,
often a stage.
 The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of
gesture, speech, song, music, and dance.
 Elements of art, such as painted scenery and stagecraft such as lighting are used to enhance
the physicality, presence and immediacy of the experience.

1
 Places, normally buildings, where performances regularly take place are also called theatres,
as derived from the Ancient Greek théatron - a place for viewing.
 Modern theatre includes performances of plays, dance, music, opera, mime, spoken word,
puppetry, circus arts, stand-up comedy, etc.
 The art forms of ballet and opera are also theatre and use many conventions such as acting,
costumes and staging.
 Theatre arts are generally thought to have started between 600 and 200 BC.
 Their origins are deeply rooted in the religious inclinations of humankind.
Classical Geek and Roman Theatre
 Classical drama is a type of theatrical production or performance based on ancient Greek and
Roman culture.
 The dramatists writing during this period wrote in a distinct style, often telling stories of
heroes facing their fate and coming out victorious.
 These plays were simple and often focused on tragedy, but also held comedic elements as
well.
 Tragedy took its subject matter largely from myths and stories in the older narrative epic
poems, of which only two, the Iliad and the Odyssey ascribed to Homer, survive.
 This period is generally accepted as spanning from the 6th century BCE to the 4th century
BCE with its roots in religious festivals and rituals honoring the gods.
 Classical drama typically follows a three-act structure and often follows the classic story arc
of tragedy and redemption.
 Act one sets up the situation and introduces the main characters.
 Act two brings about rising action and climax to the story, followed by the resolution in act
three.
 Classical drama generally observed what later became known as the three unities: unity of
action, unity of place and unity of time.
 The dramatic works from this time were written by famous playwrights such as Aeschylus,
Sophocles, and Euripides.
 Characterization was an important part of classical drama.
 Each character had a distinct name, mannerisms, and motivations which made them stand out
in the story.
 This helped the audience to better relate to the characters and become invested in the story.
 Each character was also filled with a range of human emotions, the display of which was the
playwrights’ main source of drama.
 The theatrical elements of a classical drama also made a major difference in the quality of the
performance.
 Lighting and costumes could help set the atmosphere and further immerses the audience in
the performance.
 Music, sound effects and set design were used to add extra colour and keep the audience
engaged.
 Choral music recitations were also an integral part of classical drama.
 Unrelated to the main plot, the choral music would be recited and sung by a chorus.

2
 This usually added an element of foreshadowing of the outcome and often helped to move
the plot along.
 The ancient Greek and Roman theater was mostly concerned with the religious ceremonies of
the people.
 The very words theatre, drama, tragedy and comedy are Greek in origin; so are scene,
episode, music, chorus, character, mime, and dialogue.
 The Athenians, with their dramatic festivals honoring Dionysus, are credited with laying the
foundation for Western theatre.
 During the sixth century BC, Athens became the most prosperous city in Greece.
 This prosperity allowed Athenians to spend energy and money on artistic activities.
 Thespis, the reputed creator of drama brought theatre arts to Athens by combining music,
dance human and the tales of the Greek mythology.
 In ancient Greek religion and myth, Dionysus is the god of wine-making, orchards and fruit,
fertility, festivity, insanity, ritual madness, religious ecstasy, and patron of the theatre arts.
 The Athenians dedicated a large area above the temple of Dionysus for the four yearly
festivals for Dionysia.
 At the foot they levelled a performance space; and the whole area was known as the theatron
– place or viewing place.
 The processions and sacrifices to Dionysus led up to competitions in honor of the god, held
before a seated gathering of the people.
 Many such festivals included competitions in music, song and dance.
 The Athenians also organized a competition of choruses in an elaborate song with circular
choreography.
 In Dionysian Theater all plays were performed by chosen male Athenian citizens.
 The actors would wear masks, which served as neutral mediums through which the actor
transformed into a character and still retain their identity.
 Tragedy was deemed predominantly serious, while comedy was considered humorous.
 Greek tragedy was also developed out of early religious celebrations, specifically from
Dionysian rites of fertility ceremonies.
 The Greeks would gather in the Amphitheatre to watch a trilogy of tragic plays.
 The subjects of the tragedies were the misfortunes of the heroes, religious myth and history.
 Greek tragedy addressed itself to serious dimensions of life and human characters, the
standards defined by Aristotle.
 Aristotle stated that in tragedy, there was to be a central character with some particular
“tragic flaw” (hamartia).
 The hero is doomed from the start, and his downfall is usually due to excessive self-
destructive pride called hubris.
 This character is led into despair, death or misery through some sort of error, either in
himself or in his action.
 Greek tragedy was based on the notion that:
 man learns from suffering
 the experience often leads into new and enlarged awareness of both self and existence
 the audience should be purged of both pity and fear by time the tragedy comes to an end

3
 In Greek tragedy, the tragic hero is usually a man of noble stature, usually a king, or a leader
of men, and so his fate affects the welfare of a whole nation or a considerable number of
people.
 Peasants do not inspire pity and fear as great men do, and so the sudden fall from greatness to
nothing provides a sense of contrast.
 His death, though perceived to be a waste of human potential, is usually not a pure loss
because it results in greater knowledge and awareness.
 Comedy is a genre of fiction that consists of works intended to be humorous or amusing by
inducing laughter
 The first comedies were mainly satirical and mocked men in power for their vanity and
foolishness.
 The first master of comedy was the playwright Aristophanes.
 Aristophanes’ plays feature sharp wit, a keen political eye, and a penchant for farce, satire,
and physical pratfalls.
 Much later Menander wrote comedies about ordinary people and made his plays more like
sit-coms.
 According to Aristotle, comedy should show people as worse than they are in real life.
 In this way, by making the audience laugh at the exaggerated flaws of people, a comedy can
teach valuable lessons.
 Aristotle also believed that comedy is needed because it makes people happy.
 For him, to reach happiness was to reach an ideal state.
 The Roman Empire later adopted and adapted Greek theatrical traditions, further shaping the
evolution of theatre.
 The expansion of Rome helped spread drama to many places in Europe and the
Mediterranean world.
 Roman theatre was more varied and sophisticated than that of any culture before it.
 Seneca is the most important Roman tragedian.
Medieval Theater
 Most of the classical theatre and learning was, however, lost in mediaeval times.
 After the fall of Rome, and the end of Roman theatre, there was no formal theatre for several
hundred years.
 The Middle Ages were dominated by religion and the study of theological matters.
 Christian doctrine and values were the measure of everything and the Church viewed drama
as evil and a means of corruption.
 In the 6th century, the Emperor Justinian permanently closed the theatres.
 Theatres were considered by many to be a diabolical threat to Christianity.
 Church fathers such as Augustine characterized the stage as an instrument of corruption.
 Acting was considered sinful because its imitation of life was considered a mockery of God's
creation.
 Actors were officially excommunicated, denied sacraments, including marriage and burial.
 However, faced with the challenge of teaching of Biblical beliefs and stories to the illiterate
masses, the clergy had to devise dramatic performances to help the church.

4
 Most of the Bible was written in Latin, so common people could not understand its teachings.
 The performance of these stories in the Church marked the first positive stage in the
development of drama.
 Medieval theatre encompasses theatrical activity in the period between the fall of the Roman
Empire in the 5th century and the beginning of the Renaissance in the 15th century.
 The rebirth of theatre in Medieval times owes its origin to the church.
 Drama started in the monasteries and convents, then moved to the church altar, to the church
steps, and finally out into the town square.
 Medieval drama is primarily characterized through its use of religious subject matters from
the Bible or the lives of saints.
 Passages from the Bible, especially those that are inherently dramatic, would be portrayed in
the church, usually around the altar as a backdrop.
 This is what became known as liturgical drama, an early form that was performed in
churches.
 Liturgical drama staged passages from the Bible as part of Christian worship.
 Because they were religious or moral in tone, these plays instructed people how to behave
 The other type of Church-based Theatre is known as vernacular drama.
 Vernacular refers to the everyday speech of the people, so this type of drama was presented
in the speech of the congregation.
 These were still stories taken from the Bible but told in the language that everyone would
understand instead of Latin.
 The plays were usually paraphrases of the verses in the Bible that told the story.
 They often included references to significant local events or were performed in response to a
social need or issue.
 Vernacular drama developed into two forms: mystery plays and miracle plays.
 The mystery plays presented a series of stories from the Bible, but not necessarily directly
from the Bible.
 They are called mystery plays because they concern the mysteries of the Bible.
 Common themes included the stories around Christ’s passion, the birth of Christ, and the
miracles of Christ.
 Morality plays were also presented in the vernacular, but they did not tell the stories from the
Bible.
 Instead, they presented life lessons and illustrated the path to salvation based on medieval
Church doctrine.
 These plays were very aware of their audience’s interests and limitations and thus would
blend comic elements with the serious lessons to keep the audience interested.
 They would also include music and sometimes dancing interludes that turned these plays into
an event.
 They often used Biblical characters but tended to focus more on characters that were more or
less contemporary with the audience that was viewing the play.
 The characters were sometimes allegorical, that is they represented concepts – personified –
instead of actual characters.

5
 In the Morality Plays the main characters were Life, Death, Repentance, Goodness, Love,
Justice, Mercy, Gluttony and Vice.
 These plays were allegorical, interesting, and they featured broad farcical elements.
 The Morality Plays still contained the character of the Devil of the Miracle Plays, and the
role of Vice was to torment the Virtue with mischievous pranks.
 His chief duty was to tease the Devil by beating him with a bladder or a wooden sword at
every opportunity.
 The Morality Plays generally ended with the triumph of Virtue, and the Devil was driven to
the hell-mouth, vice on his back.
 EVERYMAN is the best-known Morality play, and this has been revived recently in some
parts of the world.
 The medieval plays were usually performed on a raised platform with no curtain or
proscenium.
 In fact, it was often just a bare that allowed the audience to sit on three sides of it.
 The area behind the platform was usually used for the actors to prepare and make entrances.
 It was elevated to allow the audience to see better since the audience would just be standing
or sitting on the ground in front of the platform.
 For the Mystery plays, there developed a common type of scenery that was used in many
places in Europe, called mansions.
 A mansion was a kiosk-type of construction that would open up and the inside would be
used as the backdrop for a particular scene.
 These would be created to establish a basic background, or scenic location, for the story
being told.
 In some locations a series of these would be built or placed on a long platform stage to allow
for the presentation of several morality plays in succession.
 Another type of stage used was the wagon stage used for both mystery plays and morality
plays
 wagons served as portable platform stages that could be taken to the audience or to the town
square to allow a play to be performed without having to erect a stage.
Renaissance Theater

 Renaissance theater emerged in 16th-century Europe, blending classical influences with

medieval traditions.
 The period was characterized by a revival of the arts and sciences.
 The rediscovery of ancient Greek and Roman texts sparked interest in classical dramatic
forms.
 Aristotle's Poetics provided a theoretical framework for dramatic structure and unity.
 The period marked a cultural shift in the humanities, reflecting changing societal values and
artistic expression while laying the foundation for modern Western theater.
 During this period literature, art, and theatre all flourished in Europe significantly.
 The English Renaissance theatre is associated with Queen Elizabeth I (1533-1603), who
reigned from 1558 to 1603.

6
 It was specifically focused on literature and theatre, which both became widely popular.
 Queen Elizabeth had a great interest in the arts and was known for having a personal flair for
the dramatic too.
 Under her reign, the profession of theatre expanded significantly: theatres were built all over
London (and other major cities), and professional theatre companies were established.
 Many of these companies were funded by wealthy patrons, with the Queen herself financing
some of them.
 There was also establishment of permanent theater buildings in London during this time.
 Thematically, under Queen Elizabeth I, English theatre began to produce plays that focused
on secular topics.
 This was in stark contrast to the often heavily religious plays of previous periods.
 Politics, love, and philosophical themes were commonly explored during the Renaissance.
 After Queen Elizabeth's death in 1603, King James I (1566-1625) took the throne, and like
his predecessor, he delighted in theatre.
 He personally became the patron of Shakespeare's theatre company which was renamed the
'King's Men'.
 The outbreak of the English Civil War (1642-1651) saw Oliver Cromwell and the Puritans
take over the leadership of England.
 As part of their conservative religious policies, theatre in England was subsequently banned
in 1642, ending the period of English Renaissance theatre.

Characteristics of Renaissance Theatre

 Renaissance plays marked a significant departure from medieval dramatic traditions

 They incorporated classical elements while developing new forms of expression which
reflected the cultural and intellectual developments of the Renaissance period.
 Blank verse vs prose
 Blank verse (unrhymed iambic pentameter), became the standard for serious drama.
 Shakespeare used blank verse for noble characters and elevated speech.
 Prose was often employed for comic scenes, lower-class characters, or intimate
conversations.
 Alternation between verse and prose created rhythm and emphasized character
distinctions.
 Blank verse allowed for greater flexibility and naturalism in dialogue compared to
rhymed verse.
 Five-act structure
 It was derived from classical Roman drama, particularly the works of Seneca.
 Each act served a specific dramatic function:
 Act I: Exposition (introducing characters and setting)
 Act II: Complication (developing conflicts)
 Act III: Climax (peak of dramatic tension)

7
  Act IV: Falling action (consequences of climax)
 Act V: Resolution (tying up loose ends)
 Not all Renaissance plays strictly adhered to this structure, but it influenced dramatic
composition.
 Stock characters
 Recurring character types that appeared in multiple plays
 Allowed audiences to quickly understand character roles and relationships
 Common stock characters included:
 The clever servant (often providing comic relief)
 The young lovers (facing obstacles to their union)
 The braggart soldier (boastful but cowardly)
 The wise fool (offering insightful commentary disguised as nonsense)
 Playwrights often subverted or added depth to these stock characters.

Neoclassical Theater

 Neoclassicism covers the period from the end of the English Renaissance in 1642 to the
culmination of the French Revolution in 1793.
 Neoclassicism is a philosophy of art and life that emphasizes order, balance and simplicity.
 Ancient Greeks were the first great classicists - later, the Romans, French, English and
others produced classical movements.
 Neoclassicism in theater is characterized by decorum and rigorous adherence to the classical
unities.
 The dominant forms of the theater during this period were tragedies, which focused on the
upper social classes, and comedies, which focused on the lower social classes.
 Dramatic unities of time, place, and action; division of plays into five acts; purity of genre;
and the concepts of decorum and verisimilitude were taken as rules of playwriting.
 The three main neoclassical playwrights were Jean Batiste Moliere (1622-1673), Jean Racine
(1639-1699) and Pierre Corneille (1606-1684).
 The greatest or most popular playwright was undoubtedly Jean-Baptiste Poquelin or Moliere
(1622–1673)
 Moliere's Comedies were popular among all classes, depending on whom the subject matter
happened to be about.
 Furthermore, Moliere insisted on truthfully depicting the vices and follies of all people.
 He used the same keen eye for human foibles that many standup comics use to create
memorable characters.
 His comedies have elements of commedia, but are more realistic than the stereotyped
characters of commedia.

Characteristics/Ideals of Neoclassical Theater

8
 The French academies had great influence over drama during this period.
 Scholars and students of these academies believed that they had found ideals for producing
theatre.
 The major neoclassical ideals for producing proper theater were called the “Neoclassical
Rules of Drama” and they included the following:

Decorum

 Decorum refers to the ideal which deals with the behavior of characters on stage; characters
had to behave in a manner suiting the station of life they were portraying.
 This ideal stated that the characters had to behave in a manner suiting the station of life they
were portraying.
 The behavior had to be consistent with the age, profession, sex, and rank of the character.
 A king had to act like a king; a servant had to act like a servant, etc.

Verisimilitude

 Neoclassical theatre emphasized the importance of verisimilitude, which referred to the

illusion of reality created within the dramatic work.
 Playwrights aimed to create plausible and lifelike characters and situations that resembled
real-life experiences.
 This emphasis on verisimilitude reflected the neoclassical belief in the power of reason and
rationality.
 Consequently, situations had to ring true to life, and much like the modern realists, the
action, location, and characters had to be realistic.
 Verisimilitude means that things that were not "true to life," like ghosts, apparitions, and
supernatural events were forbidden.
 Thus the setting, circumstances, characters, dialogue, actions, and outcomes in a work are
designed to seem true, lifelike, real, plausible, and probable.

The Unities of Time, Place, and Action

 Time, Place, and Action were ideals first introduced by Aristotle during the Greeks Golden
Age over 1,000 years earlier.
 According to him, if something is going to be true to life, then it must conform to the basic
unities of time, place, and action.
 Originally, the unity of time meant that the action of the world of the play must all occur
within the span of time that the play takes place.
 The unity of place conforms to the fact that the audience is seated and is not moving from
location to location, so the action of the play must take place within a single setting.
 Action that occurs offstage (like a duel or another piece of the story) could not be shown on
stage, but it could be reported by someone who had witnessed it.

9
 The unity of action means that there can only be a single story.
 All of the action that takes place must serve the primary story: no subplots or episodic plot
structures were acceptable.
 Thus plays that occur over long periods of time, in many locations, and involve multiple
subplots in addition to the main plot do not observe these rules of drama.

Division of Plays into Five Acts

 Neoclassical drama adhered to a strict five-act structure, which had its origins in ancient
Greek plays.
 Each act served a specific purpose in the overall development of the plot:
 Exposition: The first act introduced the characters, setting, and initial conflict, setting the
stage for the subsequent events.
 Rising Action: The second and third acts focused on the development of the conflict,
introducing obstacles and complications that heightened the tension.
 Crisis or Climax: The climax, often occurring at the end of the third act, marked the peak
of the dramatic tension, where the conflict reached its highest point.
 Falling Action: The fourth act witnessed the consequences and resolution of the climax,
leading the play towards its conclusion.
 Denouement: The final act, also known as the resolution or denouement, tied up loose
ends and provided a sense of closure to the play.
 The Neoclassicists emphasized spectacle and devised special effects like flying machines
called "glories", trapdoors, and sound effect machines to create thunder, rain, or wind.
 And, since the theatres were now indoors, stage lighting was now needed.
 Candles were placed as footlights along the front of the stage and up the sides of the
proscenium. The "house" or audience area was lit as well with large chandeliers.

10
11