Theater

See also: Theater (homonymy),

The theater indicates at the same time the art of the dramatic representation, a particular literary kind (see theater) and the building in which are held the spectacles of theater (see theater).

Formerly, the word also indicated the Scène or the plate, i.e. all the hidden part of the public by the curtain.

With the illustrated direction, theater indicates a place where proceeds an important action. For example: a theater of operation (military).

Today, per hour of the arts known as multi-field, the definition of the art of the theater is increasingly broad (until merging with the expression Live performance), so that certain large directors do not hesitate to say only so that there is theater, it is just enough to have a Lieu, a Temps, a act and a Public.

It is about spectacle S in which Acteur S incarnate characters for an external glance (the Public), in a limited time and a space. The written dialogs are called plays, but there can be also theater without written text or even without any word. In contemporary creation borders between different the Performing arts (theater, MIME, Circus, Dance…) are increasingly thin, so that certain professionals the word theater by the words multi-field Spectacle , or Live performance does not hesitate to replace, thus stressing the interbreeding of the disciplines.

Origin

See also: History of the theater

It is initially at the time Greek antique that the theatron appears ( θέατρον , which comes from θεάομαι : to look at, contemplate). It then indicates the hemicycle intended for the spectators, a theater is thus in the beginning a place from where the public observes a spectacle. To the Rebirth, the significance extends not only to the unit from the building from spectacle, scene included/understood, but also with the dramatic art. It is only after the period of the traditional theater that the term indicates also the Littérature written especially for the stage performance.

The theater was born in Greece, where tragic contests exist since sixth century BC. It appeared in Rome at the end of third century BC the representations belong to the “plays” ( ludi ), official festivals of the city. In Rome, one builds initially theaters out of wooden, where only the spectators of the first ranks sat, then stone theaters: theater of Pumped in 55 av. J. - C., of Balbus in 13 av. J. - C., of Marcellus in 13 or 11 av. J. - C. In Campania, for example with Pompéi, one builds theaters hones some as of the 3rd century. At the time imperial, each Roman city has its theater, like Ostie in Italy, Orange as a Gaulle, Sabratha in Africa… The origin of the theater.

The etymology of the word bases the theater on the " glance ".

The first theater was undoubtedly a threshing floor for corn: the peasants, at the end of the harvests, played there of the saynètes in the honor of Dionysos, the god of the Wine and the Theater. Then, one built theaters out of wooden, fragile, sensitive to the fire and where only the spectators of the first ranks sat. From Ve century, the theaters are built out of stone, often with back of hill.

In the Roman theater, in the past in the Greek theater, the actors carried a mask: this accessory enabled them to be better seen spectators sitted on the steps sometimes moved away and to be about it better enendus, their voice being amplified as by our modern speaking pipes. There were tragic masks (a sad face), comic (a split face of a broad laughter) and even of the double masks (a tragic side, a comic side); the actors who made use of the latter were to play of profile! The actor (exclusively male) wears also clothing to stuffings indicators and a hairstyle very in height which are supposed to evoke the gigantism of the gods and the heroes that it incarnates. tragedy. (the sources are the Latin courses from which I profited)

The actor

See also: Actor

The Acteur of theater is difficult to define because in our daily life we all are actors. But rather of the social actors, because we live in company. We change role several times per day: with work, in family, between friends, etc These roles belong to our being, they are constituent. But we exaggerate sometimes the play. The social roles are essential: they give coherence to the company, give a place to each one. They are reassuring.

The real actor of theater plays in general one part at the same time, clearly definite, coherent and generally much more than in the real life. The actor knows that he is not really the character. The roles of theater are thus not constituent. An actor invests himself however in his role with his personality and its lived. It is often that which makes the role stronger, better. Nevertheless certain actors are shown to play all too much their characters in the same way, of Cabotin er. This problem of the Paradoxe on the actor is clearly exposed by Diderot.

Mythical actors of theater

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Dynasties of artists of theater

  • Family Barrymore
  • Family Béjart
  • Family Brewer
  • Family Dasté
  • Family Dugazon
  • Family Hus
  • Family Redgrave
|}

The character

See also: Character of theater

The Theater as with the Cinema, a character is played by a Acteur put in the circumstances/situations created by a Texte or opposed by the vision of a Director/Réalisateur.

The director

The director with the theater takes a real dimension at the end of the 19th century. He acquires the place of “Master of the plate”. This upheaval is in particular caused by Constantin Stanislavski, author and Russian director born in 1863 with Moscow, which goes, at 35 years, to create with Vladimir Nemirovitch-Dantchenko the Theater of Art of Moscow. It creates there spectacles of Tchekhov in particular ( the Three Sisters , 1900) and there teaches a new practice of the theater based on body work, physical work and the refusal of the conventional play. This “system” (name given, by the contemporaries, with its way of working) which it describes in its book, training of the actor , influence his successors, of which Valère Novarina, Claude Régy or Jean Vilar which, in the foreword of the novel, states that “ he is not authentic actor which does not have, one day or the other, borrowed, knowingly or not, some of the paths ” of the book of Stanislavski.

What brings the theater?

Why, if we play already naturally of the roles, we started to play of the theater? In a general way, as we points out it Aristote in Poetic the , we react differently in the life, and vis-a-vis a work of Article a corpse in a state of decomposition horrifies us, but a still life charms us. There is thus a capacity suitable for the representation ( Mimésis ), with the play, which enables us to apprehend with pleasure what differently poses problem to us.

We thus play of the theater to deal with the mysteries and conflicts which worry us. We thus seek to create a social mirror , a more or less caricatural reflection of the company, which allows to include/understand best, and to better denounce its faults: this political role was particularly obvious in the ancient Greece, with the old comedy. But one can also remember this quotation of the Hamlet of Shakespeare “ for any thing so overdone is from the purpose off playing, whose end, both At the first and now, was and is, to hold, natural ace 'twere, the mirror up to ”; the theater is also a mirror tended to nature: the spectator, like the actor, comes to seek an answer, to build an identity. Finally the theater can have a cathartic effect, being used as discharge system with passions which are not authorized by the company. The theater can also be an entertainment, without another objective to change the ideas with its spectators, by the use of comic, in particular.

To note the work of Augusto Boal which approached a manner of making resolutely political theater, i.e. it made play people of the conflict situations by changing the position of the characters: for example, the director who had laid off such employee played the part of the employee. That made it possible to regulate certain conflicts. It is the origin of what one called the Théâtre forum, and in Belgium the Theater-action.

Edifying range

Molière itself said it, thus translating a currency of Santeul: the goal of the Comédie is to correct manners ( castigat ridendo mores ), which is also worth for the Tragédie. These two theatrical forms have a carried edifying indeed .
  • the comedy proposes “to correct the defects of the men by diverting them”, known as Molière. This author, while making laugh the spectators by comic passages drawn from the joke, a kind which he played a long time, turned into ridiculous them through human. He says it itself  : “ One wants to be malicious well, but one does not want to be ridiculous ”. He thus made fun of the pedantry in the erudite Women , of the false excessively pious people and of credulous in Tartuffe or Impostor , of avarice in Miserly the , of the bogus scientists - he aims to it in particular medicine - in the Hypochondriac , etc
  • the tragedy tries, it also, to correct the defects of the men, or rather their passions, in two manners:
    • initially by showing the damage which passions can cause: in the tragedies, impassioned are made kill, kill or commit suicide, become insane, such Oreste at the end of Andromaque of Racine (out of the scene, by respect of the Règle of the three units);
    • then, the Dramaturge S count on the “Catharsis” (of the Greek κάθαρσις: “purification”), or purging of passions : the spectators of a tragedy are thus supposed to purge themselves, to purify passions by living them by procuration by testing terror and pity, like writes it Aristote in its Poétique .

Kinds

See also: theatrical Kind

A theatrical kind is the result of a dramatic creation corresponding to a precise form. The spectator, knowing a given kind, will be able with what to expect. According to the presentation of work (tragedy, comedy…), it will have a stereotypic vision of work.

The kind is thus, above all, a convention which gives a framework, a precise form. It is a first implicit exchange between the artist and the spectator.

See, for example, the Comedy, the Mime, the lovesong, the Tragedy, the Tragicomédie, the lyric Tragedy, the medieval mysteries, the puppet theater, the Theater forum, the Theater of improvisation, the Theater in the open air, the Theater of street, the experimental Theater, the Art performance, the Dance-theater (or theater-dance), the Web-theater with the experiments of Star, the Theater workshop of improvisation, the Theater of the absurd , the Tale, the Re-examined …

For a few years has appeared a new kind: the theater testimony. The first spectacles tackled the question of the dramas lived by the personnel having undergone lay-offs (the red eyes for the employees of Lip; 501 blues for those of Lewis). Then spectacles appeared testifying to the horrors of the genocides of the end of the 20th century: Olivier Py and his Requiem for Srebrenica, or Jacques Decuvellerie with Rwanda 94.

Festivals

See also: Festival of theater

The most famous festival in France is the Festival of Avignon . There exist many festivals, in particular in summer period. Some concentrate on a particular kind (Aurillac for the Théâtre of street, or that of Charleville-Mézières for the theater of Marionnette S, for example) or remain general practitioners while trying most of the time to program a spectacle with a Tête of poster to attract the public.

Famous authors

See also: Playwright

See also the detailed lists Playwrights alphabetically and Playwrights by chronological order
See also the category Playwright .

Theater and Internet

A long time diabolized, at the same time for their questioning of the practices in progress, but also like symbol of values quite distant from those of the theater, the innovations on Internet were regarded a long time as “dispensaries responsible for the regression of the theater” (speech of Georges Terrey, president of the French private Theaters in 2004). Today, nobody any more thinks of disputing what the Internet brings to the theater:

  • a popularization: sites as With the theater or Sidelong glance publish each week of the opinions built and structured on the principal parts with the poster. Each one can thus from now on easily choose the part which corresponds to its waitings among the many parts with the poster, without to have to consult each week what is published in the press
  • a democratization: sites of ticketting on line (like Ticket réduc, Theater one line or Ticketac) gradually encouraged the theaters to follow a more aggressive marketing policy which today spread
  • an access facilitated to information: few theaters from now on neglect to communicate on the Net. History, programming, reservation, are as many facilities for the amateurs of theater.

Sites gates as Théâtre ESA count from now on the whole of the sites (opinions, theaters, merchants) which can help each one in its research.

Thus, in September 2006, the Comédie-Française opened its doors with the actors of the market, that is to publish on the Web of the opinions on the parts, or to propose cheap rates with the spectators.

For as much, the theater has evil to emerge fully on Internet. If the theater calls upon new technologies more and more (data-processing, video), Internet appears for the theatrical medium only like one display case, a tool for consumption. But for some time, following the example Air of Theater, certain sites want to be innovating, by offering a genuine tool for discussion to the spectators and while trying to support the meeting artists/spectators. Video side, only tvtheatre.fr proposes video criticisms but also reports.

In addition, the experiments theatrical and choreographic, on line and interactive, of the group of creation Star, remain a rare example of use of tool Internet in the dramatic construction industry and the setting in scene.

Brief bibliography

  • Michel Corvin (to dir.), encyclopedic Dictionary of the theater , Paris, Bordered, 1995,2 vol. -.
  • Jacqueline de Jomaron, the theater in France , Paris, Armand Colin, 1992. Rééd. The Book of Pocket, 1998.
  • Jean Duvignaud, Sociology of the theater , Paris, PUF, 1965. Rééd. Quadriga, 1999.

See too

Related articles

External bonds

  • Catherine Naugrette, '' the theater: comic and tragic ''
  • the site of the professionals of the spectacle: current events, magazines, guides…

Beats-smg: Tētros Be-X-old: Тэатар Fiu-vro: Tiatri Nds-nl: Theater (keunstvorm) Simple: Theater

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