18.11.2020 - Historical Context of Performance - Mrs Williams

 EXISTENTIALISM

Existentialism is a philosophical theory or approach which emphasises the existence of the individual person as a free and responsible agent determining their own development through acts of the will.  It is the theory behind the unconscious movement Theatre of the Absurd, which is perhaps more of a genre than a style.  Significant practitioners were not traditional theoreticians and directors, but instead were major playwrights.  The movement leapt onto the world stage in the form of unconventional plays, primarily by European (and later American) playwrights.  Absurdist theatre directly influenced much of European drama for more than ten years and within it lie some of the best plays of the 20th Century.

ALBERT CAMUS

Born: November 7, 1913

Died: January 4, 1960

Albert Camus was a French novelist, essayist, and playwright, best known for such novels as L'Étranger (1942), La Peste (1947) and La Chute (1956) and for his work in leftist causes.  He received the 1957 Nobel Prize for Literature.  Camus focused most of his philosophy around existential questions.  The absurdity of life, the inevitable ending is highlighted in his acts.  His belief was that the absurd - life being void of meaning, or man's inability to know that meaning if it were to exist - was something that man should embrace.  His anti-Christianity, his commitment to individual moral freedom and responsibility are only a few of the similarities with other existential writers.  More importantly, Camus addressed one of the fundamental questions of existentialism: the problem of suicide.  He wrote: "There is only one really serious philosophical question, and that is suicide." Camus viewed the question of suicide as arising naturally as the solution to the absurdity of life.

JEAN-PAUL SARTRE

Born: June 21, 1905

Died: April 15, 1980

Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre was a French philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and literary critic.  He was one of the key figures in the philosophy of existentialism and phenomenology, and one of the leading figures in 20th-century French philosophy and Marxism.  Some of Jean-Paul Sartre's plays include No Exit (1944), The Flies (1943), Prljave ruke (1948), The Respectful Prostitute (1946), The Devil and the Good Lord (1951), The Condemned of Altona (1959) and The Chips are Down (1947).

Bibliography

Existentialism and Theatre of the Absurd

Albert Camus

Albert Camus 

Albert Camus

Albert Camus

Jean-Paul Sartre

Jean-Paul Sartre

Jean-Paul Sartre

16.11.2020 - Historical Context of Performance - Mrs Williams

 SAMUEL BECKETT

Samuel Beckett was an Irish novelist, playwright, short story writer, theatre director, poet and literary translator.  He was born in 1906 in Dublin and died in 1989 in Paris.  Beckett's notable works include, Murphy, Watt, Molloy, Malone Dies, The Unnamable, Waiting for Godot and Endgame.  In 1969 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.  Beckett wrote in both English and French but his most well-known works were in French.  Waiting for Godot was successful in the Theatre de Babylone and ran for 400 performances.  This play focused on human despair and the will to survive in a hopeless world that offers no help in understanding.  This style of writing is known as the Theatre of the Absurd. 

THEATRE OF THE ABSURD

The Theatre of the Absurd movement consisted of different post-World War II plays which agreed with philosopher Camus's statement, that the human situation is essentially absurd and devoid of purpose.  Characterised by a fascination with absurdity in all its forms - philosophical, dramaturgical, existential, emotional - this is a drama form that pushes theatre to extremes, and which asks probing questions about what reality (and unreality) really looks like.  In Beckett's Waiting for Godot, plot is eliminated, and a timeless, circular quality emerges as two lost creatures, usually played as tramps, spend their days waiting without any certainty of whom they are waiting for or if he, or it, will ever come.  

WAITING FOR GODOT

Waiting for Godot's first performance was January 5, 1953.  Beckett wrote Waiting for Godot just after the end of the German occupation of France and during those years, Beckett and Suzanne, his future wife, were members of the French Resistance.  The French Resistance was an underground movemebt that rebelled against Nazi forces by passing secret information about the Nazis.  This information was passed using codes which were similar to the brief poetic language that the characters use in the play.  Beckett and Suzanne were forced to escape by fleeing to the French hamlet of Roussillon where they picked grapes such like the characters in Waiting for Godot, Vladimir and Estragon.  The blend of the coded speech and the waiting for, (Nazis to find them or the Allies to free them) has been linked to Godot of Beckett's own experience.  Some imagine that "Godot is a play about the Resistance; characters have code names, get beaten by the Gestapo, and carry on their assignments."  Waiting for Godot has links in the social context as waiting was the hardest part during the Cold War should the idea of a nuclear threat become real.  The relationship between the two characters could also link to the relationships within the French as in waiting for the expected showdown between the two superpowers. 

Beckett refused to elaborate on the characters beyond what he had written in the play.  He didn't have a visual image of Vladimir and Estragon when he wrote the play.  They are never referred to as 'tramps' in the text but they are often depicted as such on stage.  Normand Berlin wrote, "Because the play is so stripped down, so elemental, it invites all kinds of social and political and religious interpretations.".

ORIGINAL STAGING CONDITIONS

The first performance was in Paris, France, at the Theatre de Babylone on the 5th January 1953, and was performed in French.  The performance didn't receive any good reviews and the audience became quite rowdy.  The theatre only had 75 seats and the budget was very small so there was a fair bit of creativity.  For example, the director stepped in for Pozzo's character as the original actor dropped out, and had to strap pillows to him to get a more fitting physical appearance.  Another example was that the briefcase was found in the bin.  

The original cast was:

• Vladimir: Lucien Raimbourg
• Estragon: Pierre Latour
• Lucky: Jean Martin
• Pozzo: Roger Blin
• Boy: Serge Lecointe

There have been many different interpretations of the play since.

12.11.2020 - Historical Context of Performance - Mrs Williams

 GREEK THEATRE

• Used to celebrate religious festivals
• Used in parliament to announce big political changes
• Chorus used 
• Thespis - unknown if playwright, actor or priest - created "first actor" who broke away from chorus to speak as individual character
• Masks used

CREATION OF CHARACTER

• Aeschylus - using second & third actor which allowed interaction between characters
• Sophocles - created character by using chorus less and creating more dialogue between characters.

ROMAN THEATRE

• Influenced by Greek theatre
• The word "play" comes from the Latin word "ludus" 
• Terence - Roman playwright - introduced subplot
• Less influenced by religion than Greek theatre
• Loud and rude audience - didn't applaud and would shout insults and boo
• Audience was so loud they would repeat a lot
• Actors developed a code to tell audience about a character just by looking at them
• Black wig - young man
• Red wig - slave
• Yellow robe - woman
• Yellow tassel - a God

MEDIEVAL EUROPEAN THEATRE 

• Europe became more agricultural after fall of the Roman Empire
• Roman Catholic Church dominated religion, education and politics - had a strong influence on theatre
• Theatre "reborn" as "liturgical dramas" - written in Latin and performed by priests or church members
• Plots taken from the Christian Bible
• Performances held to celebrate religious festivals
• Later "vernacular dramas" written in common language
• Plays performed in town squares on wagon stages
• Three types of "vernacular dramas"
• Mystery plays - based on Old and New Testament
• Miracle plays - based on lives of the saints
• Morality plays - taught lesson through symbolic characters representing virtues or faults

COMMEDIA DELL'ARTE

ITALY

• Unique form of theatre for common people
• Required few props and no set
• Did not come from scripts but by "scenarios" which were an outline of plot
• Improvised the dialogue with comedic stunts "lazzi"
• Wore half masks - indicated to the character which character they were playing
• Worked in troupes (10-12) - few were women
• Plays based on stock characters
• Pantalone - elderly Venetian merchant
• Arlecchino - servant who was trouble maker

RENAISSANCE AND REFORMATION

ITALY

• Development of the proscenium or "picture frame stage"

ENGLAND

• "Apron stages" - more open
• Audience surrounded stage and sometimes on stage
• Emphasis on dialogue 
• Continued to have moralistic themes
• Later religious themes were replaced by themes of loyalty to the government
• Performers were organised into troupes or companies who developed a repertory of plays that they could perform
• 16th Century - England's government swung back and forth between Catholics and Protestants
• Playwrights believed to support Catholic Church by reviving plays written in Latin
• Playwrights believed to be Protestants by reviving Greek plays
• Could be put to death for reviving the "wrong" play based on who was in power
• Many avoided reviving classical plays and wrote non-political and non-religious plays
• Theatre dangerous through political problems
• Civil unrest inspired by performances
• Theatres associated with temptation to spend time watching plays than working
• Associated with prostitution so women were banned from theatres
• Plague closed theatres
• Lead to licensing of acting companies - more control of theatre by state

ELIZABETHAN THEATRE

• William Shakespeare, Christopher Marlowe, Ben Jonson
• Encouraged more natural style of speaking and acting
• Theme of "good government"
• Shakespeares characters more "human" - positive and negative aspects explored
• Plays still presented in open-air theatre - sometimes at court

THE REPUBLIC AND THE RESTORATION

FRANCE

• 1642 - English Parliament closed theatres in England
• English actors went to France
• Theatres in France focused on scenery & creating spectacle
• Included costumes, dance, clever scenery requiring scene changes - more emphasised than acting
• Used proscenium style of stage
• Allowed women to perform - French influence on England in 1660 for women to perform

18TH CENTURY THEATRE

• Became popular pastime
• Actors assumed poses and performed their lines in a "sing-song" manner
• Dressed in modern fashionable clothes
• Rivalry between actresses on who would wear the finest dress
• Pantomime popular and promoted the development of spectacular staging, slapstick and special effects

DAVID GARRICK 

• Successful actor, producer and theatre manager 
• Wrote more than 20 plays 
• Emphasised a more natural form of speaking and acting that mimicked life
• Inspired movement towards realism and naturalism
• Banished the audience from stage - actors performed among furnishing and scenery
• More commercial 

LIGHTING AND STAGE ADVANCEMENTS

• Gas lighting introduced in 1817 in London's Drury Lane Theatre
• By end of century - electrical lighting on stage
• Mechanisms for changing scenery developed - fly-lofts, elevators, revolving stages

19TH CENTURY THEATRE 

MELODRAMA

• Poor quality of lighting - emphasised action and spectacle not acting
• Melodrama created
• Comes from "music drama" - increase emotion or signify characters
• Performed through gestures and body poses
• Simplified moral universe - good and evil
• Special effects - fires, explosions, earthquakes
• Traditional form - villain poses threat, hero or heroine escapes - ends with happy ending
• Playwrights poorly paid

"THE ERA OF THEATRE GREATS"

• Began the movement of realism
• Audience watching through "fourth wall" spying on characters
• Henrik Ibsen - wrote in Norwegian
• George Bernard Shaw - wrote in English
• Anton Chekhov - wrote in Russian
• Konstantin Stanislvaski wrote several works on the arts of acting
• Method still used today and considered the best training for actors
• Jack Nicholson, James Dean, Marlon Brando, Robert DeNiro, Al Pacino, Benicio Del Toro, Johnny Depp

20TH CENTURY - MODERN THEATRE

• 2 world wars - social and politixal upheaval
• Realism movement and naturalistic acting style
• Other theatre movements - Theatre of the Absurd
• Grew out of the post-modern movement - life had no meaning and there is no God 
• Style grew out of Europe in the late 1940s

THE END

• Constantly changing in reaction to audience's tastes, political and social movements and advances in technology
• Musical Theatre, Theatre of the Oppressed, Improv Theatre, Children's Theatre, Cabaret etc.