Theater History
THE AGE OF REALISM
Nineteenth Century
Charles Darwin’s Theory of Evolution / which made many peoplequestion God’s existence, and there fore place more responsibilityon mankind for enforcement of values and proper behavior.
America’s emergence as a credible country / America succeedingwithout royalty, education available to everyone: common peoplebecame more interested in reading about other common peopleand their and their challenges.
Novelists, like Charles Dickens (England), started dealing withthese themes and so did other playwrights.
So the Age of Realism –the age of the common man- began.
Founding Playwrites
Henrik Ibsen of Norway: (considered father of realism) The Pillars ofSociety, A Doll’s House, and Enemy of the People.
Arthur Miller: (student of Ibsen) Death of a Salesman
Anton Chekhov of Russia: The Cherry Orchard, The Seagull, and UncleVanya.
George Bernard Shaw: Pygmalion, Man and Superman, and Arms andthe Man.
Theater in India
Sanskirt Theater / a heroic, romantic drama
Shankuntala, a heroic, romantic drama, was a form of Sanskirt theater
Emergence of Directors
Ensemble work being more important than ever, someone needed tomold and direct the acting into a single, unified, whole, thus the positionof Director emerged.
Duke of Saxe-Meiningen / started the “star system” star actor played allthe leading roles.
Also taught the actors to work as a tight knit group, or ensemble.
Constantin Stanislavski / Method Acting by which actors brought forthhonest characterizations from within themselves, rather than resorting tothe commonly used external characterization. Teaching them to listen andreact to other characters, instead of only acting when they spoke.
Non-Realistic Theatre
Theater of Symbolism / showed meaning and emotion through theirnon- realistic plays.
American’s Thornton Wilder / Our Town
Theatre of the Absurd / tried to find meaning in a world that has nomeaning.
America’s Samuel Becket / Comédie
Asian Theatre
Ancient China placed such high emphasis onentertainment in A.D. 714, the emperorestablished a school for training. “The PearGarden”, had over 11,000 students at one time.
In 1790, performers were summoned for allover empire to celebrate the emperor’s birthday,which is know to westerners today as The PekingOpera, the national theater of China.
Asian Theater cont.
Japanese Theater has produced the finest theatrical heritagein the Orient. There are 3 types of Japanese Theatre:
NOH THEATER / was developed by a father and son team.
Japanese actors are considered some of the most disciplined,controlled actors in the world.
DOLL THEATRE /imported from Korea. Uses four foot highpuppets.
KABUKI THEATRE / Mix of several oriental theaters, and is themost popular in Japan. Chickamatsu wrote between 25 and50 plays and is considered Japan’s great playwright.
