THEATRE

THEATER DEFINITION
• Theatre (or theater, as spelt by
American) is the branch of the
performing arts defined by Bernard
Beckerman as what “occurs when
one or more persons isolate in
time and/or space, presented
themselves to another by others
 ACTING & DRAMA
• Acting is an activity in which a story is told
by means of its enactment by an actor or
actress who adopts a character—in theatre,
television, film, radio.
• DRAMA is a collaborative form of fine art
that uses live performers, typically actors or
..... tragedy is opposed to comedy). In the
modern era, tragedy has also
been defined against drama, melodrama,
the tragicomic, and epic theatre.
THEATER PLAY
TYPE OF THEATER PLAY
• Musical
• Musicals are plays that are performed in completely in song and dance form. Musicals were
made immensely popular by London’s West End to New York’s Broadway theatre.
• Fringe Theatre
• Fringe theatre is a form of theatre that is experimental in its style and narrative. One of the
highlights of fringe theatre is that it’s pretty frugal in nature – in terms of technicalities,
production value etc. In its earlier days, fringe plays were held in small scale theatres and
little rooms above pubs. Often, these kind of plays are also full of edgy and unconventional
stories, led by one person and wrapped in a single act. This helps a fringe play stay low cost
and have multiple showings in one day.
• Immersive Theatre
• Immersive theatre is perhaps the most interesting and interactive form of theatre there is
today. Unlike conventional forms of theatre, where the line of communication is just one way
i.e. performers to audience, in an immersive theatre, the audience too plays an active part in
the performance, in however small a way it may be. This kind of play transcends the
limitations of venue, narratives and flow of a story. The play may be staged in a dilapidated
building; it may be set up as a treasure hunt across town or may even usher the audience
from room to room. The audience is also involved in the plot movement – i.e. a member of
the audience may be asked a question or to choose between two doors. It’s like watching a
film in 3d, but even more experiential.
• Melodrama
• Melodrama is a form of theatre wherein the plot, characters, dialogues are all exaggerated in
order to appeal directly to the audience’s emotions from the very beginning. Orchestral
music or songs are often used to accompany the scenes or to signify specific characters. This
form of theatre was most popular during the 18th and 19th century.
• Autobiographicals
• Autobiographical plays are, as the name suggests, plays told from a first person perspective.
The lead walks (or talks, for that matter) the audience through his life and its many moments.
Autobiographicals can either be a solo play or a multi-character play.
• Comedy
• Now, don’t we all know what a comedy play is! Comedy plays could cover various themes
spanning satire, malapropisms, characterizations, black comedy and so on. Shakespearean
plays explain that if a play has a happy ending then it’s a comedy, but over the years, comedy
has come to denote so many other things – one of them being conveying a social message to
the audience in a more palatable format.
• Melodrama
• Melodrama is a form of theatre wherein the plot, characters, dialogues are all exaggerated in order to
appeal directly to the audience’s emotions from the very beginning. Orchestral music or songs are often
used to accompany the scenes or to signify specific characters. This form of theatre was most popular
during the 18th and 19th century.
• Autobiographicals
• Autobiographical plays are, as the name suggests, plays told from a first person perspective. The lead
walks (or talks, for that matter) the audience through his life and its many moments. Autobiographicals
can either be a solo play or a multi-character play.
• Comedy
• Now, don’t we all know what a comedy play is! Comedy plays could cover various themes spanning satire,
malapropisms, characterizations, black comedy and so on. Shakespearean plays explain that if a play has a
happy ending then it’s a comedy, but over the years, comedy has come to denote so many other things –
one of them being conveying a social message to the audience in a more palatable format.
• Tragedy
• Tragedy
• Tragedy play is based on human suffering and emotionally painful events. These plays have evolved from Greek tragedy plays
that focused on a single theme and plot, to its present day form that tackles multiple themes, storylines and sub-plots.
Earlier tragedy plays chronicled only the royalty and people in places of immense power, however over the course time they
have become the stories of the common man’s struggle.
• Historic Plays
• These plays are based on a historical narrative – they are either an enactment of a historical event or personality, or an
adaptation of the same. This genre has been best defined by William Shakespeare’s plays like Julius Caesarand Henry IV.
• Farce
• Farce is a variation of comedy, wherein the play uses absurd and exaggerated events in the plot. A farcical play is loaded with
ridiculous and highly preposterous elements; in such a play the character sticks out like a sore thumb from his surroundings.
It can be said that farce mostly relies on slapstick humour.
• Solo Theatre
• Again, like the name suggests, solo theatre is led by only one actor. These plays could be anything, from comic acts to
theatrical representations of poetries and stories. This style of theatre stems from the rich and ancient history of oral
storytelling present in almost every culture for a thousand years, where people gather around one person who enacts out
the whole story (including multiple characters). What makes solo plays so interesting is the fact that actor has to make sure
the act does not get boring or monotonous for the audience; s/he has to keep adding different strokes and shades to his
performance. Internationally, Sir Patrick Stewart has enacted all 43 characters of Charles Dickens’s novel A Christmas
Carol (which is the only novel to be turned into a Solo act).
• Epic
• An epic is often mixed up with a tragedy play, although both are completely different concepts. In an epic, the focus is less
on making the audience identify with the characters on stage and more on bringing out the connection with the setting of the stage.
Epic theatre is more about scale, and it relies on making people react to the story more rationally than emotionally.
 THEATRE AND CULTURE

• When and where theater first originated is unknown,

but its impact on culture is evident throughout history.
It is thought that the first theatrical performances
arose from rituals and religious ceremonies. These
ceremonies were coupled with myths or stories. Over
time, the myths themselves separated from the ritual
aspect and soon were performed for the primary
purpose of telling a story. The earliest example of
theater is thought to have occurred in ancient Egypt.
Ancient cultures in Greece, India, and China also had
early forms of theatrical performance.
 CULTURAL INFLUENCE

• Western theater history traces its origins back to the

theater of the ancient Greeks. Surviving Greek
tragedies and comedies are still performed by theaters
across the world today, translated into many different
languages or in some cases adapted to suit
contemporary audiences. Ancient Greek drama was
originally performed in an outdoor amphitheater. The
stage, or orchestra, was a circle where the action took
place. Behind the orchestra was a skene, or a tent or
building in which the costumes and masks were stored.
The audience sat in the theatron, or seats that rose up
and around the orchestra area.
 JAPAN
• In Japan, there are two forms of theater that survive today. The first
is Noh theater, which is the oldest form. The second is Kabuki
theater, which began in the 1600s, during the Edo period. Noh
theater is generally considered to be aristocratic. The actors wear
masks and elaborate costumes. A key part of a Noh performance is
the specific, stylized choreography of the main character. Zeami was
one of the most well-known and celebrated Noh playwright and
performer.
• Compared to Noh, Kabuki has much more humble origins. The first
Kabuki performance was danced by a woman, Okuni. In the 1600s,
Kabuki theater was typically performed in the red light district and
featured themes Japanese Kabuki actor that were considerably less
refined than those of Noh theater. Both forms are still enjoyed in
contemporary Japan and around the world.
 CHINA
• Theater has a long history in other countries
around the world. In China, theater was a
popular form of entertainment during the
Yuan Dynasty. Chinese theater featured
stunning tricks such as acrobatics and mime.
During the Song Dynasty, opera became a
popular form of theater in China. In India,
Sanskrit theater, which dates back to the 8th
century BCE, was a very stylized form of
theater