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Shakespeare's Influence On Modern Theatre

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Drama is one of the most intriguing forms of literature. Unlike typical literature, drama is put into the form of a script in which actors must take the roles of the characters and act out their given dialogue in front of an audience. Drama is particularly composed of dialogue, the lines spoken by the characters, stage directions, the actions in which the actor must take, and scenes, the events of each play which are acted out. Plays do not typically contain narrators that tell the story. Instead the actors depict the characters within a story and present it to an audience. Dramatic theater, presumably started within ancient Greece, where the citizens performed presentations as a devotion to religious gods or to “mark the coming of spring.” …show more content…

For instance, plays were able to be depicted at night due to the implementation of candles, which allow for more lighting. Although, his was still an issue since actors now needed to be over the candle in order to properly illuminate themselves, which was highly dangerous. Additionally, other factors, which influenced modern day theatre, would be implemented such as, an easier system in order to set up the scenery or setting of the play, and women were finally introduced into acting. Within the twentieth century, plays began to take a major revolution. Infact, technology advancements enabled a variety of opportunities for plays, such as electric lights, which were safer and provided a vast amount of lighting for the actors, and microphones, which allowed the actors to speak loud enough that the entire audience could hear them. Additionally, the setting of plays became more realistic allowing for the fourth wall to be eliminated, essentially getting rid of the original chorus. Theatres also became enclosed, allowing for the elimination of weather and audible issues. As plays became more realistic, playwrights introduced “surrealistic stage settings”, where the setting reflected the current conflict or dream, and they introduced the “expressionist stage setting”, where the costumes or scenery were distorted in order to reflect the current struggle or “unbalanced mind.” Separate stages were also introduced in order to blur the line of reality and the play, for the audience members. However, although the most common theatre stage is the picture-frame stage, theatre is not, in under any circumstances, limited to only one

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