Theatre Brief

by Cohen, Robert

• ISBN13: 9780077333515
• ISBN10: 0077333519
• Edition: 9th
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2010-06-23
• Publisher: McGraw-Hill Humanities/Social Sciences/Languages

Summary

This lively introduction to theatre offers equal measures of appreciation of theatrical arts and descriptions of the collaborative theatrical crafts. The author's enthusiasm for and knowledge of the current theatre, highlighted by contemporary production shots from around the world, put the students in the front row.

Author Biography

ROBERT COHEN was the founding chair Drama at the University of California at Irvine, where he continues to serve as the department’s Claire Trevor Professor of Drama. He has also been a resident acting teacher at the Actors Center in New York, the Shanghai Theatre Academy, the Korean National Arts University, and the national theatre academies of Hungary, Finland, and Estonia. He is an accomplished stage director, scholar, playwright, drama critic, and teacher. A director by training (Doctor of Fine Arts, Yale Drama School), Cohen has staged thirteen professional productions at the Utah and Colorado Shakespeare Festivals, plus well over a hundred productions at Stages Theatre Center (Hollywood), Virginia Museum Theatre (Richmond), Theatre 40 (Beverly Hills), Image Theatre (Boston), Summer Repertory Theatre (Santa Rosa), the Medieval Drama Project (Irvine), the Manhattan Theatre Source, various universities, and several operas, videos and films. In addition to Theatre and Theatre: Brief Edition, he is also the author of many theatre books, including Acting One, Advanced Acting, Acting in Shakespeare, Acting Professionally, Acting Power, More Power to You, Giraudoux: Three Faces of Destiny, Creative Play Direction, and two dramatic anthologies. His essays have appeared in Theatre Journal, Theatre Topics, Theatre Forum, Theatre Survey, Modern Drama, Theater der Zeit, Essays in Theatre, On Stage Studies, The Drama Review, Contemporary Literature, Contemporary Literary Criticism, Slavic and East European Performance, Experiment and Innovation, and Dramatic Theory and Criticism. Cohen’s play, The Prince, published by Dramatic Publishing Company, has been professionally produced in Long Beach, Pittsburgh, Budapest, and in staged readings in New York and Los Angeles; his dramatic translations (The Bourgeois Gentleman, The Misanthrope, Clizia, Tibi’s Law) and opera translations (The Magic Flute, Carmen) have been both produced and published widely. For the past twenty years, Cohen has been the Southern California drama critic for Plays International, reviewing over two hundred plays. In 1999, he received the national Career Achievement award from ATHE - the Association for Theatre in Higher Education.

Table of Contents

Preface

Introduction

Chapter 1: What Is the Theatre?

The Theatre Building

The Company, or Troupe, of Players

The Occupation of Theatre

Work

Art

Impersonation

Performance

Live Performance

Scripted and Rehearsed Performance

Chapter 2: What Is a Play?

Classifying Plays

Duration

Genre

Tragedy

Comedy and Other Genres

Dramaturgy: The Construction of Drama and Dramatic Performance

Drama’s Components: The Vertical Axis

Plot

Characters

Theme

Diction

Music

Spectacle

Conventions

Drama’s Timeline: The Horizontal Axis

Preplay

Play

Postplay

Non-Aristotelian Theatre Events

Chapter 3: The Playwright

We Are All Playwrights

Literary and Nonliterary Aspects of Playwrighting

Playwrighting as Event Writing

The Qualities of a Fine Play

Credibility and Intrigue

Speakability, Stageability, and Flow

Richness

Depth of Characterization

Gravity and Pertinence

Compression, Economy, and Intensity

Celebration

The Playwright's Process

Dialogue

Conflict

Structure

The Playwright's Rewards

A Sampling of Current American Playwrights

David Mamet

Tony Kushner

David Henry Hwang

Neil LaBute

Lynn Nottage

Photo Essay: Playwright Neil LaBute

Chapter 4: The Actor

What Is Acting?

The Paradox of Acting - from Socrates to Stanislavsky

Acting Today

Acting from the Inside: The Stanislavsky Legacy

Emotion Memory

Acting from the Outside

The Actor as Virtuoso

Putting It Together

Magic

Becoming an Actor

The Approach

The Actor's Instrument

Voice and Speech

The Psychological Instrument

Photo Essay: Actor Patrick Stewart

Movement

Discipline

The Actor's Routine

Audition

Rehearsal

Performance

The Actor in Life

Chapter 5: The Director

The Arrival of the Director: A Historical Overview

Teacher-Directors

Realistic Directors

Stylizing Directors

The Contemporary Director

Photo Essay: Director Susan Stroman

Director and Producer

Vision and Leadership

Play Selection

Conceptualizing

Designer Selection

Director-Designer Collaboration

Photo Essay: The School for Wives

Casting

Implementation

Staging

Actor-Coaching

Pacing

Coordinating

Presenting

The Training of a Director

Chapter 6: Designers and Technicians

The Design Process

What Design Does

Scenery

Scenic Materials

The Scene Designer at Work

Photo Essay: Scene Designer Tony Walton

The Scene Designer at Work

Lighting

Modern Lighting Design

The Lighting Designer at Work

Photo Essay: Lighting Designer Don Holder

Costumes

The Functions of Costume

The Costume Designer at Work

Photo Essay: Costume Designer Catherine Zuber

Makeup

Sound Design

Photo Essay: Sound Designer Scott Lehrer

Projection Design

Special Effects

Digital Technologies in Theatre Design

The Technical Production Team

Photo Essay: Stage Manager Michael McGoff

Chapter 7: Theatre Traditions: East and West

The Origins of Theatre

Ritual

Storytelling

Shamanism, Trance, and Magic

The Beginnings of Traditional Drama

Traditional Drama in Sub-Saharan Africa

Egyptian Drama

Theatre in the West

Greek Drama

Roman Drama

Medieval Drama

Renaissance Drama

The Royal Theatre

The Romantic Theatre

Theatre in the East

Indian Sanskrit Drama

Indian Kathakali

Chinese Xiqu

Japanese Nō

Japanese Kabuki

The Theatrical Tradition Today: East and West

Chapter 8: The Modern Theatre

Realism A Laboratory Pioneers of Realism Naturalism

Antirealism

The Symbolist Rebellion

The Era of "Isms"

Stylized Theatre

The French Avant-Garde: Ubu Roi

Intellectual Comedy: Man and Superman

Expressionism: The Hairy Ape

Metatheatre: Six Characters in Search of an Author

Theatre of Cruelty: Jet of Blood

Philosophical Melodrama: No Exit

Theatre of the Absurd: Waiting for Godot

Theatre of Alienation: The Good Person of Szechuan

Comedy of Contemporary Manners: Bedroom Farce

Political Satire: Serious Money

Chapter 9: The Musical Theatre

The Role of Music in Theatre History

The Development of the Broadway Musical: America's Contribution

Musical Comedy: Gershwin, Kern, Darktown Follies, and Rodgers and Hart

A Golden Age

The Contemporary Musical

The Emergence of Choreographer-Directors

Stephen Sondheim

Black Musicals

Foreign Invasions: British, French, Swedish, and Disney

Musicals of the Twenty-first Century

Chapter 10: Theatre Today

What's Happening?

A Theatre of Postmodern Experiment

A Nonlinear Theatre

An Open Theatre

A Diverse Theatre

Photo Essay: Theatre in the Borderlands

A Global Theatre

A Macaronic Theatre

A Theatre of Difference

A Theatre of Nontraditional Casting

Spectacular Theatre

Verbatim Theatre

A Dangerous Theatre

A Theatre of Community

Movement Art and Dance-Theatre

Solo Performance

Three Theatre-Makers in the Theatre Today

Peter Brook

Robert Wilson

Julie Taymor

Theatre Today: Where Can You Find It?

New York City

Broadway

Off-Broadway and Off-Off-Broadway

Regional American Theatre: Not for Profit

Boston

Chicago

Los Angeles

Minneapolis

Seattle

Washington, D.C.

Shakespeare Festivals

Summer and Dinner Theatres

Amateur Theatre: Academic and Community

International Theatre

Beyond North America

Conclusions about Theatre Today?

Chapter 11: The Critic and the Dramaturg

Critical and Dramaturgical Perspectives

Social Significance

Human Significance

Artistic Quality

Relationship to the Theatre Itself

Entertainment Value

Critical and Dramaturgical Focus

Professional Criticism

Professional Dramaturgy

Student Criticism and Dramaturgy

We Are the Critics

Glossary

Selected Bibliography

Credits

Index