The Importance Of The Theatrical Space And How It Can Influence An Audience Essay

The set used for Vernon God Little was highly symbolic and simplistic; when we walked into the theatre we could visually see that there were flowers, cards and memorable items attached on the audiences seats above our heads, which already created a sombre atmosphere around the theatre.

.In Happenings and Other Acts, Mariellen R. Sandford - associate director of The Drama Review (TRD) since 1985 - has collected important essays, interviews and performance texts that help explain the complicated and intriguing nature of Happenings and Live Performance. The book itself is described as a collection of “invaluable documents from a period that radically changed our perception of the function of the artist, the role of the observer, and the relation between art and everyday life.” (Sandford, 1995)

Throughout theatre history performances have changed to become more than the mere spectacles for audience to go and mindlessly observe, there have been many different factors effecting this change either through environmental, political or economic circumstances which has resulted in theatre becoming more meaningful whilst providing a wide range of genres. However in this essay I will be discussing the importance of feminism in modern theatre through the beginning and height of modernism, and how waves of feminism have influenced theatre today.

On June 28, 2015, I went to see The Songs of Sinatra produced by Collin College Theatre. Since the show was a revue it will difficult to talk Aristotle’s components because there was no plot, characters, or theme. Instead this paper will focus mostly on costume/set design, spectacle, and music.

While writing and narrative (poetic or otherwise) were considered as means of survival, theatre remains outside the circle of literary survivalism. Indeed, according to Anne Ubersfield, “performance is a perishable thing.” (xxii) It is usually considered as an event that is bound by the present. The belief in the historicity of the theatrical event still dominates the critical approaches to theatre. Many contemporary critics maintain that on the stage, “drama takes place and takes time too.” (Worthen xi) They believe that it is “an historical event.” (Styan 6) that is limited in terms of space and duration. It cannot last beyond the performative moment.

“Theatre is a physical and visual medium, but the play’s not always the thing. There is a strand of theatre – the physical and the visual – that speaks a completely different language from the traditional well-made play and spans theatre, puppetry, dance and visual arts. This work uses the language of gesture, an area of theatre that in the past was dubbed mime and thought of as entirely silent. Nowadays such pieces frequently include spoken text, but the body speaks as eloquently as the voice, and one of the great strengths of this form is that it can often mine the emotions that fall in the silences between words.” (Gardner, 2014)

Commedia dell'arte literally means“comedy of the actors.” One side was comedic theatre that included improvisation, the other was plays that were based on written texts. The art-form came into being around 1550 and reached its height of success in Italy around 1650. During this time, the great stars of Italian comedy performed, including Flaminio Scala, Francesco Andreini and his wife Isabella. The deaths of those performers and an economic decline in Italy made the drop in the popularity of the commedia dell'arte, which continued to be an important form of theatre until 1780. It can be used effectively in drama today to form characters, add humour or base storylines off of.

Commedia dell’ Arte theatre emerged as a new form of stage entertainment in Italy in the late 16th Century, and reached the height of its artistic and commercial success in 1650; then flourished in Europe for two hundred years. Commedia was seen as one of the highest forms of entertainment, and is now considered to be the template of almost every practice of theatre. Commedia troupes performed for and were accessible to all social classes, and remarkably was also the first practice of theatre to use women. The exact origins of Commedia dell'Arte are still undetermined, but scholars believe that it was inspired by Atellan farces in Rome, Latin comedies of Terence and Plautus, Commedia Erudita (written comedy) of the Renaissance; and from clowns

Upon reading the essay topic, I was planning on playing devil’s advocate - I was going to write about how I believe there is very little truth behind theatre. In fact, I thought I had a relatively convincing argument. Theatre is the art of storytelling manifested on the stage through the means of an actor portraying a character; this is to say they are pretending to be somebody which they are not. In this sense, there is a lack of truth. I was to argue that phenomenology has more to do with the significance a spectator places on an event/word/action/etc. than any contribution made by the actor. However, I had developed this idea prior to watching Rodenburg’s video and soon came to realize that this opinion is not only both misinformed and ignorant, it is disrespectful to those responsible for the creation of theatre, as well as any person who has ever felt any sort of emotion while spectating a performance piece. For the purpose of this essay, I will start by defining phenomenology and discussing Martin Heidegger’s theory of presence and truth. This will be followed by a reflection on truth and presence and a connection with my own experiences in the theatre.

‘The offstage area of the naturalistic theatre is just as important as the stage itself.’ (Jakovljevic 436)

The work of a team and active participation craft the stage performance. Beyond the actors onstage, designing the set, costumes, lights and sound all cause a massive influence on the audience’s experience. Viewer’s unique opinions can alter and influence actor’s moods, characterizations and in certain venues, their reactions can affect the story. Improvisation or interactive theatre rely on people from the audience, sometimes for their creative input or for them to join actors onstage. However, in traditional theatre, performances can change in small or large ways dependent on audience reactions; humor can be tweaked or minor costume changes if certain aspects “just aren’t working.”

All my life I have enjoyed the art of theater, so when my assignment was to watch a show I was excited. My friend Sigrid was doing a production in the theater of the Florida International University that was a mixed medium show. Not only was it a play but it was also a dance and concert all at the same time. Not technically a musical but it did have each element one at a time. The show was called A Sea Challenge, A Response to Global Threat.

Held by many to be the holy grail of modern theatre texts, almost sacred in many quarters. The Holy Theatre essay is a way of seeing theatre: creating and attending theatre as if it were a holy rite, a myth based ritual

In recent years, a form of performance which relies as much on the audience as it does an artist has be growing increasingly popular among those who appreciate the meta. There is a sort of curiosity associated with participating in art and the creation of art which is refreshingly different from what is often found in performance. In this paper, I will focus on the audience and their role in watching, thinking about, interpreting, and changing performance art, I will not be interested in the intention of any artists. It is especially important to focus on the interactions and feelings which are formed from attending and participating in performance (even if that participation is simply viewing). Thus, the works that I will be examining will have no spoken words because I feel that words serve to distract from the interpretation of audience-in-performance that I will put forth. Therefore, the pieces I have chosen are a kind of Invisible Theatre (a term that I have co-opted from Augusto Boal), this Invisible Theatre serves as the foundation of the analysis I will offer and is crucial to the discussion of the role and effect of audience (277).

Seeing it has given me a new view on theatrical structure. The performance was divided into four sections with three intervals were each one of them was a different form contemporary dance performance presented in varying moods. In my opinion the red thread of the performance was the simplicity of the staging props with focus on light-sculpted space along with smoke and music and dance compilation. In this case, the role of technical appliances is just as or even more significant to the staging convention as the performer’s role itself.