Before speaking further about culture, I must remark that the world is hungry and not concerned with culture, and that the attempt to orient toward culture thoughts turned only toward hunger is a purely artificial expedient.
– Antonin Artaud, The Theater and Its Double,
Introduction.
To say that the theater of the 1950s was dominated by two dramaturgical theories is a gross simplification, a thoroughly Western perspective that ignores numerous non-European art forms for the sake of simplifying theatrical history. That being said, to those artists living an working in America after the Second World War, the theater of the 1950s certainly seemed to be dominated by two dramaturgical theories: Stanislavski and Brecht. Constantine Stanislavski founded The Moscow Art Theater in 1898. There, he developed his ideas of method acting and emotional recall, writing several books that would hugely influence European, and, eventually, American approaches to drama. In short, Stanislavski asserted that the over-intellectualization of acting was detriment to theater as a whole. Actors should, instead, work from the inside out, reflecting on their past experiences in order to produce a genuine emotional experience for both themselves and the audience. Bertolt Brecht, a Marxist director working within the German theater in the twenties and thirties, rejected Stanislavski’s ideas, arguing against overly emotional approaches to theater, which, he believed, restricted the audience’s ability to engage intellectually. Brecht’s Theater intentionally alienated its audience, throwing out theatrical illusion in favor of socio-political commentary and debate. Both Brecht and Stanislavski were hailed by the Social Revolutionaries of the early twentieth cent...
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... speech, trapped theater makers, forcing them to confront society on society’s terms. In order for theater to truly challenge society, Artaud asserted, it would need a new language.
The works of Gao Xingjian, while not necessarily a product of American Theater in the 1960s, offer alternative answers to the same essential questions of language and self. Moreover, unlike the Living Theater and its progenies, the theater of Gao Xingjian seeks to answer these questions in a pointedly “Zen” way. Some scholars go so far as to label Gao’s later work as “Modern Zen Theater.” Certainly, Gao’s theater gives us a model against which we may judge the American Theater we have already examined. Gao’s writing can be divided into at least three subcategories: “Social Dramas,” “Ritual Plays,” and “Xieyi” or “Zen Theater.” It is this final category that we are most concerned with.
Introduction(refer to pages 93-94): Many people had turning points. But not everyone had an impact on their country. Feng Ru from “Father of Chinese Aviation”, Jackie Robinson from “I never had it made”, and Melba Beals from “ Warriors Don’t Cry” all faced turning points and had an impact or their country. Aviation, Baseball, and schools were not the sam always 3 people named Feng Ru, Jackie Robinson, Melba Beals all had turning points in their lifetime and had an impact on their country or society.
The duration and cost of the production have been compared to other media which provide entertainment, such as television and film. A theatre performance is more expensive to attend than cinema. The play only lasted for 85 minutes, a film can go on for two hours or even more. This can have a big influence on why people would choose one medium over the other. Accessibility has also to be taken into account when investigating the relevance of theatre in the 21st century. Television is a medium which can be accessed from home, and usually doesn’t cost a lot of money, whereas theatre costs money and is harder to access. Although the production was Australian, the actors talked with an American accent. Bearing in mind that the play was written in America, which could make it harder for an Australian audience to familiarise with the dilemmas going on, on stage, while the themes discussed seem to be more relevant there than in Australia. Overall this play doesn’t contribute to the relevance of Australian theatre in the 21st century, due to the many other sources people can access for entertainment, and because the play seems to be more relevant for an American audience rather than an
Brecht, Bertolt. Brecht on Theatre: The Development of an Aesthetic. Hill & Wang New York,
2. Hsu, Tao-Ching. The Japanese Conception of the Theatre. Seattle. University of Washington Press, 1985.
Community performance can include political debates, social commentaries disguised as autobiographical self-debasing monologues as well as Renaissance Faires with their celebratory and informative performances. Each example can be said to include elements of Brechtian Alienation, even if they are not, perhaps, the performances that Brecht himself had in mind. However, the performances are important in that they force us to examine our own place within both the world of the theater and within our respective realities.
...pressing of emotions, identifying with other systems of thought. Theatrical arts have managed to transcend ethical issues, racial differences, and many other facets of discourse in society. If theatre is indeed an engine for social change it should not be held from the people who need it the most. Those who are incarcerated. Programs across the nation have already started to see success in the prisons they operate in, so to think about the effect that theatre in prison would have on a nationwide scale is indeed a beautiful thought. If theatre programs in prison would be funded by the states or nationally, potentially the idea of professional prison playhouses could become a reality, and the world would be introduced into a new era of art that is truly a beautiful thing to behold. Shakespeare writes in Hamlet, “We know what we are, but know not what we may be.”
“The theatre was created to tell people the truth about life and the social situation,” says Stella Adler. Theater is unique and intriguing because it blends literary and visual arts to tell a story. Before Theater 10, I viewed theater on the surface level: cheesy plot lines with dramatic scenarios for entertainment purposes. Throughout the course, I have learned what it means to appreciate theater, such as understanding Brechtian and Chinese theatre; however, I believe understanding theater’s ability to convey crucial historical and social messages, such as in the production of RENT, is more relevant and important for theater appreciation.
Willett, John, trans. and ed. Brecht on Theatre: The Development of an Aesthetic. New York: Hill and Wang, 1986.
Applied Theatre work includes Theatre-in-Education, Community and Team-building, Conflict Resolution, and Political theatre, to name just a few of its uses. However, Christopher Balme states that “Grotowski define acting as a communicative process with spectators and not just as a production problem of the actor” (Balme, 2008: 25). Applied Theatre practices may adopt the following “theatrical transactions that involve participants in different participative relationships” such as Theatre for a community, Theatre with a community and Theatre by a community Prentki & Preston (2009: 10). Whereas, applied theatre one of its most major powers is that it gives voice to the voiceless and it is a theatre for, by, and with the people. However, Applied Theatre practitioners are devising educational and entertaining performances bringing personal stories to life and build
The ideas of Bertolt Brecht (1898-1965) changed the theatre in many ways. Brecht along with Erwin Piscator developed the style of Epic theatre style contrasting to previous accepted styles. Presentational in form, Epic theatre is a vehicle for social comment through techniques such as: alienation, historification, eclectic influences (highly Asian), constructivism in scenery, disjointed and illogical scene placement, ordinary clothing and lighting, the use of music to detach the audience from emotion, placards and signs and projected images. Didactic in nature Brecht’s works aim to challenge the audience to assess socially accepted norms and educate them to injustices often overlooked by the public. The Caucasian Chalk Circle (Brecht, 1944) written during the time of Nazi Germany occupation has a clearly political and social focus.
Pieces written and produced were created to shine a light on the social problems within America, as well as the growing concern about money and personal financial wellbeing as well. American theatre was already established during this time, thanks to the “two potent young dramatists: Arthur Miller, who turned the ordinary man into a figure of tragic stature in Death of a Salesman (1949) and drew a parallel between U.S. Sen. Joseph R. McCarthy’s anti-Communist ‘crusade’ of the 1950s and the Salem witch trials of 1692 in The Crucible (1953), and Tennessee Williams, who created a world festering with passion and sensuality in plays such as A Streetcar Named Desire (1947) and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1954).” (Rea) America had had a history at this point in time with using theatre as a device to reflect society, something once again seen by the popularity of Sondheim and Andrew Lloyd Webber who used their art to highlight the emphasis society had placed on the rich and classism. In the sixties and seventies, there was also an exaggerated emphasis on the development of African American, Asian, and Hispanic theatre companies in an attempt to further diversify a white-dominated field. Women’s companies and LGBT+ friendly companies also became popular during this time. Both of these things showed a transition in a field dominated by straight, white men to an artform that could better represent our culture and society by being
...er new wave in the 1880’s, it didn’t reach the United States until the 40’s. The first American avant-garde performance was in 1948 at Black Mountain College in North Carolina. According to writer and art historian and professor, Arnold Aronson: “In the roughly thirty-year period from the mid-1950’s to the mid 1980’s there was an eruption of theatrical activity in the United States that would ultimately reshape every aspect of performance and have significant influences both at home and abroad” (Qtd in DiLorenzo). The modern avant-garde theatre performance emerged when theatre decided to liberate itself from drama. This began with the new dynamic concept of the naturalistic "milieu" and its consequences in the art of stage direction. It matured with the poetic theatre of symbolist suggestiveness and imagination and the work of such visionaries as Appia (Glytzouris).
Theatre will always survive in our changing society. It provides us with a mirror of the society within which we live, and where conflicts we experience are acted out on stage before us. It provides us with characters with which we identify with. The audience observes the emotions and actions as they happen and share the experience with the characters in real time.
For thousands of years, people have been arguing that theatre is a dying art form. Many people think theatre is all just cheesy singing and dancing or just boring old Shakespeare, but there is much more to theatre than those two extremes. Theatre is important to our society because it teaches us more about real life than recorded media. Theatre has been around for thousands of years and began as a religious ceremony that evolved into an art form that teaches about the true essence of life. Theatre can incorporate profound, and provocative, observations of the human condition that can transcend time; lessons found in Greek plays can still be relevant to the modern world. People argue that the very essence of theatre is being snuffed out by modern
Brecht’s theatre could be used as an effective vehicle for social change. His style of epic theatre highlights social issues and portrays them in a way so that viewers have no emotional ties and only clear, unbiased opinions, making it easy to make decisions on the social justices and injustices of the stories. Epic theatre can be used to alter opinions as it educates people and severs ties of empathy so that people can clearly use their minds to make judgements. This would be helpful for changing societal beliefs as people are inclined to depend on emotions to make evaluations which is sometimes ineffective.