Drama Test 2
Well-Made Play
- waiting for transgression to emerge. Reinforces current societal values as just, tight plot, climax close to the close.
Climactic Structure
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Modernism
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Pictorialism
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Relativity
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Scribe
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She's the Man (2006)
- Aristotelian gender bending, like in Shakespeare's plays, to provide humor about the stereotypes of men and women. - Unlike Brecht's work there is catharsis as everything is happily resolved
The Threepenny Opera (1931)
- Brechtian use of song in which it is meant to alienate viewers and point out parts of the theme rather than allow them to empathize with the characters. - These characters talk about the ridiculousness of war and its glorification when it is terrible and violent. - The songs make important points about the theme.
Basic Cultural Context of Unit Two Playwrights
- Dioynsus (The Poor of New York) industrialism/capitalism/populism democratic spirit - appeals to melodrama, happy medium of commerce and art - Oscar Wilde (The Importance of Being Earnest) - Miss Julie idea of heredity (Darwin), psychology (Freud), environment (Marx)
Representational Acting
- inner life of characters found in naturalism
Versimilitude
- life-likeness
Genre
Kind or type
"Mazeppa" in Heller in Pink Tights (1960)
- melodrama - use of spectacle in staging as the woman is tied to the horse o stage and a nude body suit is used to simulate actual nudity. - The represents the illusionism required for melodrama to work
Melodrama
- type of theatre in which sensation, spectacle, story, sentiment, and safety are present. - It usually has a simple, universal plot line (i.e. good vs evil) and focuses on external conflict rather than internal character conflict
Epic Theatre
- used by Brecht, this type of theatre is characterized by its narrative format, analysis of its themes, and lack of catharsis
Characteristics of Melodrama and Farce
- Farce exaggerated style, aggressive and anarchic (not about affirming human potential, not gentle mockery, recognizable) Physical humor, indulges antisocial behavior, undermines conventional values - Melodrama not always soothing can be more involving than comedy and drama Gains popularity in the 19th century when it captures the peoples eye. Instant appeal to strike deep cores with spectators without being hard to follow Provokes sensation and interest in the viewer. Potentially a work of art that would inspire some to lay back and let things just happen, instead of going out and doing things yourself. Commercial style and meant for a mass audience - Capital-All about money
The Quick and the Dead (1995)
- Goes with melodrama - dramatic, in the nick of time, spectacle - Sharon Stone's character plays on the desperation of her trying to save the guy in time
Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
- Goes with melodrama - example of story and sentiment - Luke's hand being cut off and Darth Vader claiming he is Luke's father is an example. Action that goes on makes it easier to follow and understand. - Simple, direct conflict that is easy to understand: father vs. son, good vs. evil - does not delve deep into characters but relies on a simple story and novel visual effects
The Court Jester (1956)
- absurd plot - things go from bad to worse and nothing changes in farce no matter how hard the characters try to break the mold
Dramatic Closure
- all questions are answered in the play in the end (all conflicts are resolved)
Subjectivity
- allowing opinions and emotions to weigh in on decision making rather than looking critically and deciding based on all aspects of a situation free biases
Saturday Night Live! "Matt Foley: Motivational Speaker" (1993)
- an example of farce - he is a motivational speaker who discourages people rather than motivates them - he never gets any better at his job no matter how hard he tries - he just becomes more absurd
"Nell of New Rochelle" in Strike Up the Band (1940)
- an example of melodrama - it also represents the semi-illusionism necessary in the set and also has the dichotomy of good vs. evil in which good always win. - the presentation acting and simple plot line are also characteristic of the genre
Taylor Swift, "Mean" (CMA, 2011)
- an example of melodrama - woman is tied to the train tracks much like in "Under the Gaslight"
Anna Karenina (2012)
- artifice and expressionism - Anna feels that people are performing roles rather than acting out their true feelings so the movie is set in an actual theatre
Theatricality
- artificial and stylized
Epigram
- balanced statement expressing clever or comic thought
I Love Lucy/"Vitameatavegamin" (1952)
- basic comedy elements - what is unique in terms of farce: exploits what could go wrong for comedic effect, nothing ever works out
Identification
- being able to feel or share with the characters or understand where they are coming from
Naturalism
- branch of modernism that desired to imitate reality more fully. - it strove for illusionism, not just on the surface fully, and verisimilitude. - It focuses more on internal character conflicts and imitates reality
Stanislavski
- came up with acting techniques that were more realistic than the presentational acting
"Jersey Shore Gone Wilde" (2011)
- comedy of manners and short wisecracks of today's comedy instead of the more witty comedy used in The Importance of Being Earnest
Marx/Marxism
- critiqued capitalism??
The Good Woman of Setzuan
- discontinuity/episodes - stylized language - dialects in character (opposition that define them) - analysis and judgment - "goodness"; is it futile to be good in a society where goodness is not valued so high - Wong: A water seller. He interacts with the gods in dreams. His hand is injured by Mr. Shu Fu, who attacks him with a curling iron. - First God: The first of three gods who arrive at the city of Setzuan in the Prologue, looking for a good person. Their task is to find people on the Earth "living lives worthy of human beings." - Second God: The second of three gods who arrive at the city of Setzuan in the Prologue, looking ofr a good person. Their task is to find people on Earth "living lives worthy of human beings." - Third God: The third of three gods who arrive at the city of Setzuan in the Prologue, looking for a good person. Their task is to find people on Earth "living lives worthy of human beings." - Shen Te/Shui Ta: Shen Te is a former prostitute who has bought a tobacco shop with the money the gods gave her after she let them spend the night in her home when no one else would welcome them. After being taken advantage of for being so "good," Shen Te invents a male alter ego, Shui Ta, her supposed visiting cousin. Shui Ta is economically wise and does not give handouts the way Shen Te often did. - Mrs. Shin: The former owner of Shen Te's tobaccos shop. She demands a free handout of rice and money from Shen Te, since now she is too poor to feed her children. After witnessing Shu Fu injure Wong's hand with a curling iron, she convinces Wong to take the case to a judge but then betrays him by "getting on the right side of Mr. Shu Fu." - Unemployed man: He enter Shen Te's tobaccos shop asking for a free cigarette and she gives it to him. - Carpenter: The carpenter has installed shelves in the tobacco shop before Shen Te purchased it, and he dames one hundred silver dollars for his work. She does not have it, so her "cousin" Shui Ta argues the carpenter down to only twenty silver dollars. - Mrs. Mi Tzu: Shen Te's landlady. She demands six months' rent in advance, rather unfairly, and Shui Ta tells her that Shen does not have the money. - Yang Sun: An unemployed pilot with whom Shen Te falls in love. When she meets him, he is about to commit suicide because he cannot work as a pilot anymore. - Old *****: In scene 3, she sees Shen Te just before Shen Te meets Yang Sung about to hang himself. She is resentful of Shen Te for finding success in a profession other than prostitution. - Policeman: He arrests the boy of the mooching family after the boy steals food from the bakery around the corner from the tobacco shop. He convinces Shui Ta to put out a marriage advertisement for his his "cousin" Shen Te. - Old Man: He is a carpet seller. After his wife gives Shen Te a loan of two hundred silver dollars, he becomes anxious and wants it back. - Old Woman: She enters the tobacco shop in scene 2 to by a cigar for her husband, the old man, with whom she is celebrating forty years of marriage. - Mr. Shu Fu: A barber who wants to marry Shen Te. He injures Wong's hand by whacking it with a hot curling iron. He also writes Shen Te a blank check so she can pay her rent, and offers her the use of his cabins. - Mrs. Yang: The mother of Yang Sun.
Verfremsdungseffekt
- distancing effect, avoiding audience identification with characters in the play to induce conscious thought
Episodic Structure
- each scene is like a different episode on a TV show that when added up together give different lessons about life and/or criticizing life???
Farce
- exaggerated style of play
Black Swan (2010)
- expressionism - it is impossible to distinguish between the literal reality and what is going on in her head/her emotional world
Expressionism
- extreme emotional features and styles of play
Box Sets
- flats in 3D arrangement, make to look like an interior room on the stage, used in melodrama and naturalism
Subtext
- focusing on reasons behind the actions, naturalism
Montage
- found in melodramas - this is when the story lines of every character are checked in with towards the end of the play, like in Poor of New York when the Fairweathers are begging and all of them are seen trying to make ends meet
Supernaturalism
- fusing of naturalism and expressionism (Srindberg's Miss Julie)
Demystification
- goal of epic drama - this is to look back critically at a situation and to reason through its causes and solutions - getting the underlying truth
Zola
- heredity and environment, father of naturalism
Occult
- hidden, secret, beyond reason, supernatural, expressionism
Wit
- humor that relies on ideas and thoughts to be funny rather than resorting to obscenity
Wisecrack
- humor that uses obscenity to provide it comedic effect
Darwin
- ideas of genetics heredity, ideas of naturalistic fate
Mimesis
- imitation; imitation of the real world as in recreating instances in history
The Poor of New York
- melodrama: story and sentiment, sensation and spectacle, safety - presentational acting - restores status quo - plot directed - external conflicts - Captain Fairweather: Father and husband to the Fairweathers, dies in Act I leaving his money in the hands of, - Gideon Bloodgood: banker; everything he commits he does for the love of his daughter, - Alida Bloodgood: spoiled, above all else she desires to be admitted to high society and in order to do so attempts to buy the hands of, - Mark Livingstone: born into society, but has lost all his wealth; in love with the sister of, - Paul Fairweather: son of Captain Fairweather, impoverished clerk, looking for work so that he can support, - Mrs. Fairweather: wife of Captain Fairweather, willing to commit suicide to ease the burden of Paul and, - Lucy Fairweather: beloved of Livingstone, but willing to renounce her love so that he might regain his wealth. - The Puffys: Father, Mother, and son Dan. Puffy is a baker who has lost everything in the crash yet still attempts to help his lodgers, the Fairweathers. - Badger: a villainous clerk of Bloodgoods who undergoes a change of heart between Acts IV and V and successfully resolves the action in favor of the Fairweathers.
The Notebook (2004)
- naturalism - more character centered unlike melodrama - focuses on authenticity and verisimilitude, unlike other forms of expressionism
Miss Julie (1999)
- naturalism and expressionism
Miss Julie
- naturalism: material truth, empathy, stable work, cause & effect, daily behavior - representational acting - complete illusionism - environmental design - combined naturalism and expressionism - Miss Julie: The play's 25-year-old tragic heroine, she is doomed to a cruel demise. Fresh from a broken engagement-an engagement ruined because of her attempt to master her fiance-Miss Julie has become "wild," making shameless advances to her valet, Jean. Miss Julie's behavior is supposed to signal sickness. Raised by a shockingly "feminist" mother, Julie is simultaneously disgusted by and drawn to men. Julie is sado-masochistic. She wants to enslave men, but she also desires her own fall. - Jean: The other major character of the play, Jean is the manor's thirty-year old valet, chosen as Miss Julie's lover on Midsummer's Eve. Though initially, coarse, he pretends to be gallant when seducing Miss Julie. His cruelty reveals itself after he has slept with her. Jean suffers from class envy. He simultaneously idealizes and degrades Julie. Eventually, he becomes a sadist, reveling in Julie's ruin. - Christine: a relatively minor character, Christine is the manor's thirty-five year old cook and Jean's fiance. She gossips with Jean about Miss Julie, and believes wholeheartedly in the class sytem. - Diana: Miss Julie's dog, she is said to look like her mistress. Diana symbolized Julie, for she has sex with a mongrel dog that belongs to the gatekeeper. - Serena: Miss Julie's canary, she is beheaded by Jean. Her decapitation symbolizes the way Jean injures Julie.
Director
- new role added to theatre production with the advent of naturalism. - as the plot and characters become more complex and focused on inner conflict, a director was needed to guide the message and theme of the production
Illusionism
- on stage, the creation of a more life-like setting and presentation so as to convince viewer of the authenticity of the story. - The more realistic the visuals of the production are, the less realistic the actual production needs to be as the realistic setting is enough for people to buy into it, like melodrama
Presentational Acting
- physical aspects of the theatre - the actors acknowledge the presence of the audience either directly or indirectly
Freud
- psychologist, ego vs. alter ego
Dramatic Passions
- represent emotions through posture and facial expression: joy, fear, anger, grief, pity, hatred, jealousy, wonder, love, scorn.
Theatre Architecture: Proscenium Stage
- revealed from behind curtains - sets were very realistic - elevator system to shift scenery - electric lights
Horror of Dracula (1958)
- safety - little conversation is needed to explain what is going on in the melodrama - good beats evil - this movie was originally rated X because of the red color of the blood
Comedy of Manners
- satire in today's world?? - today's social standars vs. other time frames?? (old way of witty responses to today's wisecrack comments)
Mean Girls (2004)
- satire of contemporary manners
The Great Dictator (1940)
- scenes not fluent and broken up - never fully immersed before next scene
Importance of Being Earnest (2002)
- sense of heaviness of victorian culture - in layers of clothing, formality, stuffed room with brocade and ornate - sense of oppressiveness
Wedding Crashers (2005)
- similar to Bunburying, but difference in time and manners of the day
The Importance of Being Earnest
- society, manners, identity - public faces vs. private lives - social criticism - tests the limits and validity of the class system - John (Jack/Ernest) Worthing, J.P.: The play's protagonist. Jack Worthing is a seemingly responsible and respectable young man who leads a double life. In Herfordshire, where he has a country estate, Jack is known as Jack. In London he is known as Ernest. As a baby, Jack was discovered in a handbag in the cloakroom of Victoria Station by an old man who adopted him and subsequently made Jack guardian to his granddaughter, Cecily Cardew Jack is in love with his friend Algernon's cousin, Gwendolen Fairfax. The initials after his name indicate that he is a Justice of the Peace. - Algernon Moncrieff: The play's secondary hero. Algernon is charming, idle, decorative bachelor, nephew of Lady Bracknell, cousin of Gwendolen Fairfax, and best friend of Jack Worthing, whom he has known for years as Earnest. Algernon is brilliant, witty, selfish, amoral, and given to making delight paradoxical and epigrammatic pronouncements. He has invented a fictional friend, "BunBury," an invalid whose frequent sudden relapses allow Algernon to wriggle out of unpleasant or dull social obligations. - Gwendolen Fairfax: Algernon's cousin and lady Bracknell's daughter. Gwendolen is in love with Jack, whom she knows as Ernest. A model and arbiter of high fashion and society, Gwendolen speaks with unassailable authority on matters of taste and morality. She is sophisticated, intellectual, cosmopolitan, and utterly pretentious. Gwendolen is fixated on the name Ernest and says she will not marry a man without that name. - Cecily Cardew: Jack's ward, the granddaughter of the old gentlemen who found and adopted Jack when Jack was a baby. Cecily is probably the most realistically drawn character in the play. Like Gwendolen, she is obsessed with the name Ernest, but she is even more interested by the idea of wickedness. This idea, rather than virtuous-sounding name, has prompted her to fall in love with Jack's brother Ernest in her imagination and to invent an elaborate romance and courtship between them. - Lady Bracknell: Algernon's snobbish, mercenary, and domineering aunt and Gwendolen's mother. Lady Bracknell married well, and her primary goal in life is to see her daughter do the same. She has a list of "eligible young men" and a prepared interview she gives to potential suitors. Like her nephew, Lady Bracknell is given to making hilarious pronouncements, but where Algernon means to be witty, the humor in Lady Bracknell's speeches is unintentional. Through the figure of Lady Bracknell, Wilde manages to satirize the hypocrisy and stupidity of the British aristocracy. Lady Bracknell values ignorance, which she sees as "a delicate exotic fruit." When she gives a dinner party, she prefers her husband to eat downstairs with the servants. She is cunning, narrow-minded, authoritarian, and possibly the most quotable character in the play. - Miss Prism: Cecily's governess. Miss Prism is an endless source of pedantic bromides and cliches. She highly approves of Jack's presumed respectability and harshly criticizes his "unfortunate" brother. Puritan though she is, Miss Prism's severe pronouncements have a way of going so far over the top that they inspire laughter. Despite her rigidity, Miss Prism seems to have a softer side. She speaks of having once written a novel whose manuscript was "lost" or "abandoned." Also, she entertains romantic feelings for Dr. Chasuble. - Rev. Canon Chasuble, D.D.: The rector on Jack's estate. Both Jack and Algernon approach Dr. Chasuble to request that they be christened "Ernest." Dr. Chasuble entertains secrete romantic feelings for Miss Prism. The initials after his name stand for "Doctor of Divinity." - Lane: Algernon's manservant. When the play opens. Lane is the only person who know about Algernon's practice of "Bunburying." Lane appears only in Act I. - Merriman: The butler at the Manor House, Jack's estate in the country. Merriman appears only in Acts II and III.
Les Miserables (2012)
- song sequences in many modern melodramas where the songs provide windows into the characters' thoughts and feelings. - The songs are meant to inspire empathy and to allow viewers to become part of the story, rather than the distancing provided by Brecht
Proscenium Stage
- stage that looks like a TV screen. - it separates the audience from the play by having a clear division between the two.
Tableau
- still image created by posing of actors within in a scene to convey some theme or image (they hold the presentational acting pose)
Dialectics
- strong oppositions in conversation, found in good woman of S.
Miss Julie (Swedish, Froken Julie) (1951)
- the scene is a combination between expressionism and realism in the modernist style. - The dream sequences show a person falling become a swan (expressionism) and the conversation between Julie and Jean represents the naturalist elements.
Independent Theatre Movement
- theater's whose sole purpose was to be able to give controversial plays a chance to be shown???
Piscator
- thought that plays should focus on social conflicts and people's relationships to society, like Brecht thought