#classical theater

[leresq]

The Dropout crew needs to put on a full and complete stage performance of a less widely known but still classic Shakespeare play like Julius Ceaser or King Lear.

[your-average-mess-on-all-fronts]

Just watched the mousetrap today. Leslie and Christopher became friends after it ended, and that is a fact because I said so.

[crazygriffinlord]

RIP Tom Stoppard

So I woke up this morning and found out that one of my favorite playwrights, Tom Stoppard, has passed away. This is just sad, although he was very old, and I was planning to direct one of his plays, The Real Inspector Hound, for a student production. Now this production will mean more to me then originally planned because initially this play was going to be: a) me testing a spooky theory I nhave about this play, b) a chance to stand up to a production at my college using AI for the script, c) a welcome to my new theater company, and d) a chance to say goodbye to my theatre teacher. Now as well as all that, my student production will be a way to pay tribute and memorialize him.

Tom Stoppard was a really important playwright for me. When I first performed The Real Inspector Hound and my high school, his humor opened my mind up to modern theater and helped me let go of some longstanding prejudices I used to have. Then I got a set of all his plays one year and read through all of them in a whole school year. The ones that really stuck out to me were (of course) Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead for the chemistry between the two characters as they talked about the inevitability of death, and Arcadia for its talk about how time changes some things, but some things just stay the same. And of course his translation of the Seagull was phenomenal!

As an ally to the British-Jewish community(although I don't think I'm a really good ally), this tragic event has also made me feel more sorry for them than I already feel. 2025 has not been a good year. Having your cultural fantasy writer be exposed as a monster at the beginning of the year is already enough on its own, but having your cultural playwright die at the end of the year, I can see why most want to lose hope. But here's my message to any British-Jewish people reading this: Don't lose hope, don't give up. Life may throw you curveballs in life but you can leap over them to follow your goals, no matter what it takes. I believe you can recover from this and bounce back up. You are loved and you matter. Keep living and the world will be a better place! I have hope for the future and I hope you believe in it too!

-J.

PS: If he turns out to be evil after his death, then...well...I don't wanna think about it.

[shakespearenews]

Review: In ‘Seize the King,’ ‘Richard III’ Goes to Harlem

[twostarsinonesphere]

me: god i hate directors

me: oh wait

me: i am a director

[crazygriffinlord]

Hello Tumblr!

Hi my name is Jesse, my pronouns are she/they/he, I love theater, The Onceler, Undertale, 70s cartoons, Asterix, birds, eating, and collecting old books. I am an ally to the trans and Jewish communities, a feathery, a prominent player in my school's theater department, an aspiring voice actor, and a source of joy and brightness to everyone!

[drjacquescoulardeau]

La Célèbre Pompe Romaine est Funèbre

https://medium.com/@JacquesCoulardeau/la-c%C3%A9l%C3%A8bre-pompe-romaine-est-fun%C3%A8bre-5da84e0a6e44

CYRANO DE BERGERAC – LA MORT D’AGRIPPINE – 1647

La première surprise que l’on rencontre avec cette pièce est l’identité de cette Agrippine. Qui ne connait pas Agrippine la Jeune . . . Mais il ne s’agit pas d’elle qui fut immortalisée par Händel dans on opéra Agrippine. En fait il s’agit de sa mère, Agrippine l’Aînée . . .

[pilferingapples]

Classical Tragedy, Beloved of the Bourgeoisie

or, why the Romantic Army was so sick to the teeth of Classical Theatre!   

Before looking at what the Romantics attempted to do in the theatre, it is necessary to discuss the characteristics of the Classical theatre against which they were revolting....

The Classical drama has five acts and, with the exception of some of Moliere's comedies, is written in verse. Apart from the lyric choruses of Racine's biblical tragedies, the verse form is invariably the Alexandrine, a twelve-syllable line used in rhyming couplets. 

The regular Alexandrine has a caesura after the sixth syllable and a pause at the end of the line.  Occasionally, for dramatic emphasis, lines are broken into three equally accented groups if four syllables each.  Run-on lines or enjambments are extremely rare.  The language of the play is "elevated" and contains none of the commonplaces or vulgarities of regular speech.  (Vigny was criticized in 1829 for using the word mouchoir, handkerchief, in his verse translations of Othello, which demonstrates how ridiculous adherents of the formal style could become, for without the use of the handkerchief Othello's motivation becomes dramatically less plausible.)   

In Classical drama there is supposed to be no mixing of genres; tragedy must not have comic relief, and comedy should not have the overtones of tragedy...The proper subject of tragedy was a man (or woman) of elevated stature struggling against an inexorable and predetermined fate; for comedy the portrayal of the foibles and vices of society. Comedies and tragedies alike observed the rule of the three unities of time, place, and action: a single plot must occur in one place within twenty-four hours. In the Classical Theatre, and especially in tragedy, there was little concern for verisimilitude in settings or costumes, and the actors used the declamatory style of speech. 

Needless to say, with all these restrictions and conventions, any dramatist but a genius would be  stifled.. 

  I get asked about what exactly Classical Theatre was a fair amount, so here’s a pretty solid explanation from Robert Emmet Jones’ study of Gerard de Nerval’s work (some paragraph breaks and trimming of example by me). So that’s what Bahorel is so disgusted about in 1828!