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Fletcher Final Vocabulary
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32
History
Undergraduate 3
05/01/2011

Additional History Flashcards

 


 

Cards

Term
theatre of cruelty
Definition

•    Developed in the 20s by Antonin Artaud
•    Reality = people drowning in society. They need to return to their PRIMAL SELVES.
•    Branched off of surrealism.
•    Audience shouldn’t feel safe or separated
•    Theatre should be CRUEL – break off scab of society
•    Total Theatre: theatre should SURROUND spectators in the performance space
•    Harsh lights, loud noises – feeling of unsafeness
•    Jet of Blood – play by Artaud
•    The Theatre and its Double – theatrical theory by Artaud

Term
absurdism
Definition

•    Given the term “absurdist” by Martin Esslin
•    Out-of-whack; alienated from all sense
•    Abstract setting and story/situation
•    Little/no link to specific reality
•    Common references, but they no longer have significance/power
o    Old jokes, worn out routines
o    Going through the motions
•    Distrust of language
o    Fear of banality
o    Simple communication is impossible
•    Circular structure
•    Situation  = theme
•    Funny and sad at once

Term
existentialism
Definition

•    No universal guarantees. No access to “Truth”
•    Existence precedes essence – choose to live – to live is the bravest thing
•    Playwrights who used existentialist themes and REALISTIC conventions:
o    Albert Camus (Caligula)
o    John-Paul Sartre (No Exit)
•    Playwrights who used existentialist themes and UNREALISTIC conventions:
o    Eugene Ionesco (Bald Soprano, Rhinoceros) – communication doesn’t work
o    Samuel Beckett (Waiting for Godot) – life after apocalypse of meaning
o    Jean Genet (The Maids, The Balcony) – reality of fantasy
o    Harold Pinter (The Homecoming) – dark pauses/interruptions in reality
o    Edward Albee (The Sandbox, Three Tall Women) – corruption and lies sustain life

Term
postmodernism
Definition

•    Post-WWII trend in art, literature, ideas
•    Incredulity toward metanarratives (stories about how the world is)
•    “Truth” doesn’t exist, or if it does it is inaccessible
o    Truth is relative on grand scales
o    Truth is still compelling on local/small scales
•    Representation changes what you’re representing
o    Performance: re-presenting, imitating (mimesis)
o    Performative: an act that changes/creates reality (“I declare you guilty”)
o    Simulacrum: a representation that replaces reality (gangsters watch the Godfather for ideas, Jersey Shore creates a new fashion style)
•    Focus on creating, not discovering, truths
•    Anxieties about “original/real” and “copied/fake”

Term
epic theatre
Definition

•    Erwin Piscator and Bertold Brecht
•    Reality contains injustice and presents it as “just the way things are,” natural
o    Theatre should question ideology
o    Theatre should call given-ness of status quo into question
•    Agit-prop (agitation propaganda). Uses nonrealistic techniques to directly address political issues, alter audience’s attitude/behavior
•    Piscator staged political plays (Good Soldier Schweik)
•    Brecht began as expressionist, got with Marxism

Term
thingspielen
Definition
•    Outdoor theater, started in pre-war Germany in 1930s
Term
lehrstücke
Definition
•    Brecht’s “teaching plays”. Had clear, simple lessons about communism
Term
verfremdungseffekt
Definition
•    Distancing/alienation effect in Brecht’s theatre.
Term
anti-hero
Definition
•    In Brecht’s plays. You can’t be entirely for or against them
Term
living newspaper
Definition
usually agit-prop. Plays about current historical happenings, current news
Term
agit-prop
Definition
agitation propaganda. Uses nonrealistic techniques to directly address political issues, alter audience's attitude/behavior
Term
happening
Definition
performance events involving elements of structure, improvisation, and audience participation. Allan Kaprow.
Term
environmental theatre
Definition

•    Richard Schechner
•    6 Axioms
o    Continuum of pure/art and impure/life
o    All space is used for performance AND audience
o    May be in transformed/found space
o    Focus is flexible and variable
o    Each production element speaks its own language
o    Written/spoken text is not essential to performance

Term
globalization
Definition

•    US-style democratic capitalism becomes global norm
•    Neither all-good nor all-bad
•    Mixes global and local (“glocal”)
•    Can inspire fear/anxiety/violent backlash

Term
performance art
Definition

•    Aesthetic events that use performance elements
•    Visual art in motion
•    In 60s, 70s:
o    In streets, museums; not theatres
o    Focus on process rather than product
o    Focus on body/living bodies in space
o    Lasts only as long as it lasts
o    Challenges artist/audience distinction
o    Highlights/critiques conventions of spectatorship
o    Social/political commentary
o    Often: installations, or interactive space-based setups

Term
metanarrative
Definition
•    A story/saying about how the world is
•    Ex: “life sucks, then you die”
Term
performative
Definition
•    Changes, creates reality. Performs an action
•    Ex: I hereby declare you guilty; I curse the ground you walk on
Term
simulacrum
Definition
•    Replaces reality
•    Ex: Barbie, The Godfather example
Term
camp
Definition

•    Attitude combining two levels of awareness
o    Literal: pastiche. Recreation, imitation, paying homage
o    Parody
•    Can’t tell if it’s pastiche or parody
•    Look Around You - BBC

Term
pastiche
Definition
literal. recreation. imitation. paying homage.
Term
Little Theatre
Definition

•    AKA Art Theatre. 1910s.
•    Interest in art beyond entertainment
•    Focus: to free productions from large-scale, commercial theatre
•    Jane Addams Hull House
•    Provincetown Players (1915)

Term
Poor Theatre
Definition

•    By Jerry Grotowski
•    A form of theatre stripped of extraneous elements (excessive lighting/sets/sound, grand costumes, etc.)
•    Towards a Poor Theatre by J. Grotowski, theorerical work

Term
Civic Drama/Pageantry
Definition
•    By Percy MacKay in early 1900s
•    Performances that would take over whole towns
•    Pageant and Masque of St Louis
Term
theatre of the oppressed
Definition
•    Augusto Boal
•    For communities/groups of people going through trauma, difficult experiences
•    Workshops facilitated by “joker” that use games, image theatre (forming physical images about oppression, then talking about them), forum theatre, cop-in-the-head (creating an image on stage, talking about the different voices in the lead actor’s head)
•    Everyone is a spectator and actor: “spectactor”
Term
guerilla theatre
Definition
•    Hit and run theatre event
•    Used by The Living Theatre
•    Commedia dell’arte + agit-prop
•    Spontaneous, surprise performances to unsuspecting audiences
Term
off-broadway
Definition
•    50s, 60s
•    99-500 seats
•    Experimental alternative to Broadway
Term
off-off broadway
Definition
•    50s, 60s
•    Fewer than 99 seats
•    Still more alternative, experimental than Off-Broadway
Term
direct action
Definition
•    Staged actions of civil disobedience (usually nonviolent, like sit-ins)
Term
burlesque extravaganze
Definition
•    Burlesque = parody with rhymes, songs, puns
•    Increasingly featured women in scantily-clad male drag (“leg shows”)
•    1866: The Black Crook. Burlesque combines with ballet corps to create burlesque extravaganze.
•    Became more of a tease show in early 1900s. Precursor to AMERICAN MUSICALS
Term
chautauqua
Definition
•    Travelling culture circus, late 1800s-1920s
•    Lectures on music, education, culture, etc.
Term
applied theatre
Definition

•    Theatre for social good
•    Not necessarily political or activist-based
•    Educational Theatre (TIE – Theatre in Education)
•    In sub-literate communities (AIDS education dramas in Africa)
•    For elementary education, using theatre to learn math, science, life lessons (Viola Spolin is a practitioner)

Term
community-based theatre
Definition
•    Theatre to, for, and within a community.
•    Not like BRLT
•    Called community theatre outside US
•    Cornerstone Theatre Company in California
•    Go to communities, interview people about what life is like there, what issues they face, what things they love, and perform drama (with everyone involved) for that particular community
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