THE HISTORY OF THEATRE 

 Part 1.

From drunken revels & competitions,  through to religion, censorship & politics.

This section is designed to give students an insight into Theatre History . For more detailed information, there are many  resources available (including online)

_____________________________________________________

ORIGIN

Although there are records of Ancient Egyptian rituals, the first time that Theatre, as we know it, was written to be performed was  in 6th century BC Greece and it was for an annual festival competition .

The festival was in honour of the god Dionysis.

Dionysis was a Greek god of fertility and wine (Bacchus in Rome). His devotees (both male and female) would dance themselves into a drunken frenzy. Carrying long phallic symbols they tore to pieces and devoured the raw flesh of sacrificial animals whilst in their altered state of “ecstasy”.

The Bacchanalia, orgies in honour of Dionysis, were introduced in Rome around 200 BCE. These infamous celebrations, notorious for their sexual and criminal character, got so out of hand that they were eventually banned by the Roman Senate.

A more acceptable way to honour Dionysis was to hold a festival where authors would be asked to write for this annual competition.

______________________________________________________________________________________

All the actors were male, and they all played multiple roles, changing masks to suit character and mood. The two masks above represent the masks of Comedy and Tragedy .

Greek Theatre: from the 6th century BC

The performance of the plays by each author took a full day, in front of a large number of citizens in holiday mood, seated on the slope of an Athenian hillside to hear the play (hence "Auditorium").

At the end of each festival, a winner was chosen.

At one such festival, a priest of Dionysus, named  Thespis, engaged in a dialogue with the chorus. He becomes the first actor.

Actors, ever since, have been proud to call themselves Thespians.

Thespis was also the first winner of a theatrical award. He takes the prize in the first competition for tragedy, held in Athens in 534 BC.

______________________________________________________________________________

Greek Tragedy: 5th century BC

Only a small number of tragedies survive from these annual competitions in Athens.  

The earliest is written by  Aeschylus.

Aeschylus adds a second actor, increasing the potential for drama. He first wins the prize for tragedy in 484 BC. He is known to have written about eighty plays, of which only seven survive.

Sophocles wins his first competition in 468 BC, defeating Aeschylus.

Sophocles is credited with adding a third actor. Although he  wrote about 120 plays, again only seven survive intact. Of these Oedipus the King is  considered to be his masterpiece.

The youngest of the three great Greek tragedians is Euripides.

More of Euripides' plays survive (19),

but he wins less victories than his rivals.

___________________________________________________________________
 

Greek comedy: 5th century BC

From 486 BC there was an annual competition for comedies at Athens - held as part of a three-day festival in January. Only one comic author's work has survived from the 5th century. He is Aristophanes.

Eleven of Aristophanes' plays survive, out of a total of forty.

Comedies relied on  satirising contemporary shortcomings by placing them in an unexpected context, whether by means of the plot or through  ridiculous characters.

________________________________________________________________

The Greek stage

In the 4th century the first  stone auditorium is built, the Theatre of Dionysus, in Athens.

The main feature of the stage is a circular space on which the chorus dance and sing. Behind it was a temporary wooden back wall called a skena  (the word "scenery" comes from this).

The stage was a full circle, (this stage changed shape at a later date) in keeping with the traditional circular dance - the choros . This stage was called the orchestra (orchester, a dancer).

______________________________________________________________________________

THE DARK AGES

After the fall of Rome around  600 A.D., came a period known as the Dark Ages (600-1000 A.D) . Little is known about this period (which is why it is called the Dark ages!) although there are references to actors, minstrels &  jugglers, in popular pagan festivals. The Church tried its best to stamp out these rituals and rites.

 

 ______________________________________________________________________________

Liturgical drama: 10th century

Theatre was "reborn" within the very institution that tried to shut it down (if you can't beat 'em...)

With the approach of the first millennium, in the late 10th century, Christian churches introduce dramatic effects in the Easter liturgy to enliven the theme of resurrection.

In about 970 the bishop of Winchester introduces a custom. During the Easter morning service in Winchester three monks enact the arrival at the tomb of the three women, while another (as the angel in the story) sits beside the high altar. The angel, intoning in Latin, asks the women whom they are seeking? Jesus of Nazareth, they chant in reply. He says Jesus is not here, he has risen, go and tell the people. The three turn to the choir with a joyous Alleluia! resurrexit Dominus ('the Lord is risen'), and the choir launches into the Te Deum.

From these small beginnings developed the great tradition of medieval Theatre.

So many aspects of pagan rites found their way into Christian ceremonies: Christmas was not celebrated in December till the 4^th century, to take advantage of the winter festivals; and Easter replaced the Spring festivals)

 ______________________________________________________________________________

Mystery plays: 12th - 16th century

In about 1170, French priests  moved a performance to a platform outside their church and performed it in the language of the people. Their French play, the Mystère d'Adam , introduced some very popular characters in medieval imagination -  wicked devils, who could not have enacted inside the church.

The play ends with devils arriving to tie Adam and Eve up in chains, before dragging them off with a great clatter of pots and kettles. They and their victims vanish into a hole from which smoke belches forth.

The flaming mouth of Hell is set to become a standard and increasingly spectacular element in the mystery plays.

Sometimes the plays were very complex – in cycles – that someone was hired to oversee. The master copy of the script was called the Register – sometimes the producing company / guild could monopolise or censor it or ban it --
The Keeper of the Register was an important position and had much control. (Ps.. censorship became the duty of the government. It was eventually abolished....in 1968!)
 

The Master of Secrets – was in charge of the machines (secrets) – the special effects.
 
 

          The scenes had

Heaven on the right,

Hell on the left,

and Earth in the middle.

Therefore, angels, resurrection – had to use flying.
 
Trap doors – appearances and disappearances (Lot’s wife turning into salt, etc.) Fire – the hellmouth – was usually depicted as a fire-breathing monster .

Special effects were often very intricate: 17 people were needed  to operate Hell machinery in Belgium in 1501.

Dissention within the church led to prohibition of religious plays in Europe (Queen Elizabeth, the Council of Trent, 1545-1563 – outlawed religious plays.).

By late 16^th century, drama of the medieval period had lost its force.

Professional actors were still needed, but no longer amateurs.

Secular plays were most often performed by professional actors attached to noble houses.

Professional Theatre rose. Theatre was no longer a community venture but a commercial one. The theatres returned to the classics for stories.

______________________________________________________________________________
 

meanwhile...

Commedia Dell'Arte: 16th - 18th century

Italy in the 16th century, home to Opera,  launched Europe's most vigorous tradition of popular theatre. The phrase Commedia dell'arte (comedy of the trade) merely implies professional actors. There is a record of such a company performing in Italy in 1545.

Since it was essential to attract attention, slapstick plays a large part in the routine. So does improvisation, adapting the comic sketch to suit the audience's responses. Though each company performs its own material, certain characters become widely established - and the use of masks and bright costumes made them immediately recognisable.
 

Popular characters included Pantalone and Harlequin (pictured), Il Capitano, Il Dottore, Columbine, the Lovers and the Zanni.
 

From this we get Slapstick, Zany comedy, Stock characters, Punch and Judy, Pantomime, Comedy sketches... and a lot of laughs.

Goldoni wrote "A servant of two Masters" in 18th-century Venice giving a new "written" direction for Commedia .

______________________________________________________________________________

London's Theatres: 1576-1599

In 1576 James Burbage, an actor,  built a permanent playhouse in Shoreditch - just outside the city of London to the north, so as not to require the permission of the puritanical  magistrates.

Burbage gives his building the obvious name, the Theatre. It follows the form of an inn yard, with galleries enclosing a yard open to the sky. At one end a stage projects beneath a pavilion-like roof.

A second playhouse, the Curtain, rises close to the Theatre in 1577.

A third, the Rose, opens in 1587 on the south bank of the Thames in the area known as Bankside.

In 1594 a fourth theatre, the Swan, is built .

There are now two theatres to the north of the city and two south of the river. But soon the balance shifts to Bankside. James Burbage, builder of the original Theatre, dies in 1597. Two years later his two sons dismantle the building and carry the timber over the river to Bankside, where they use it as the basis for a theatre with a new name - the Globe. This is where many of Shakespeare's plays are first presented.

Ordinary commoners, the groundlings, stand in the open to watch plays for a penny.

Others pay a second penny to climb to a hard seat in the upper gallery.

A third penny gives access to the two lower galleries and a seat with a cushion.

A few places in the first gallery, to left and right of the stage, are reserved for gentlemen who can afford a shilling.

______________________________________________________________________________

Marlowe: AD 1587-1593

The year 1564 sees the birth of two poets, Marlowe and Shakespeare, who between them launch the English theatre into the three decades of its greatest glory. Marlowe makes his mark first, in a meteoric six years (from 1587) in which his life and his writings are equally dramatic.

From his time as a student at Cambridge Marlowe was rumoured to have been involved in the Elizabethan secret service. This, combined with a fiery disposition, brings him into frequent clashes with the authorities.

He is in prison in 1589 after a street fight.

He is deported from the Netherlands in 1592 for the possession of forged gold coins.

He is arrested for some unknown reason in London in 1593.

And twelve days later he is murdered.

Marlowe's first play, acted with great success in 1587, is an event of profound significance in the story of English theatre. Tamburlaine the Great introduces blank verse which becomes the medium for all the glories of Elizabethan and Jacobean drama.

______________________________________________________________________________

Shakespeare: AD 1564-1616

During Shakespeare's time one Londoner in eight went to the theatre each week.

A city of 160,000 people

a weekly audience of 20,000.

There is only one comparable example of such a high level of attendance at places of entertainment ..........

cinemas in the 1930s!

part 2 to follow