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Text Analysis Final
It's the Text Analysis Final!
59
Film, Theatre & Television
Undergraduate 1
12/14/2009

Additional Film, Theatre & Television Flashcards

 


 

Cards

Term
Playable Dramatic Values
Definition
Energize actors, directors and designers in their work.  (Always required to unleash a play’s potential).
Term

ARISTOTLE’S ELEMENTS OF DRAMA

Definition

People Care That Dogs Make Spam

*PLOT—Shows the progression of events and enables the playwright to reveal character and ideas.  (It is the car)

*CHARACTER—The controlling force, both typical and individual. 

*THOUGHT – (Sometimes called theme) Both general and specific.  The story of an individual with universal appeal. 

*DIALOGUE – Speech, tempo of the scene.  It should suit the character and background. 

*MELODY – Flow of language, the emotional content. 

*SPECTACLE – Set.

Term
Table work
Definition
all of the work that happens prior to blocking. 
Term
Painting with words
Definition

Using vocal pitch, tempo, rhythm and emphasis to create

images in the mind of the listener.

Term
Connections are made up of...
Definition

IMPLICATIONS—Hints or suggestions that are deliberate though not openly stated. 

INFERENCES—Deduction of unknown from known information, that is deduced from literal facts and their implications.

Term
Affective Fallacy
Definition
Affective Fallacy is allowing favorite ideas or enthusiasms or those of a community to intrude upon our judgment of the play.
Term
Fallacy of Reality Testing
Definition
Evaluating everything in the play on the basis of its likeness to real life.
Term
GIVEN CIRCUMSTANCES
Definition
A combination of past and present that make up the world or situation in which the action takes place.  They are the character’s context. 
Term
TIME OF COMPOSITION
Definition
When the play was written.
Term
TIME OF ACTION
Definition
When the play takes place.
Term
DRAMATIC TIME
Definition
Total time that passes during the on-stage action plus the intervals between acts.
Term
GEOGRAPHICAL LOCALE
Definition

Country, region or district.  Emotional associations evoked by geography can contribute strongly to the effect of a play, both for realism and for emotion responses. 

 

Term
SPECIFIC LOCALE
Definition
The play’s setting.  (Room, field, elevator…)
Term
SOCIAL  STANDARDS
Definition
Shared beliefs and behaviors that are accepted by the characters.  “Thou shalt not kill”. 
Term
EUPHEMISMS
Definition
a socially inoffensive term that’s used for an offensive one
Term
ECONOMIC SYSTEMS
Definition

--Mercantilism—colonialism with state control of manufacturing and exports.

--Laissez-Faire—(to leave alone) Business is permitted to follow the unwritten natural laws of economics. 

--Capitalism—private property, profit and credit form the basis. 

--Socialism—Involves public ownership of manufacturing, services and natural resources. 

Term
THE WORLD OF THE PLAY
Definition
All of the given circumstances plus the social standards they embody. 
Term
HISTORICAL
Definition
Pre-19th century. Background story is revealed early on in the play in extended rhetorical speeches.  (Elizabethan)
Term
MODERN
Definition
most of the background information still appears at the beginning of the play, but is broken into smaller pieces and among several characters.  It is sometimes called a below stairs scene (if the maid or lower class are speaking) or a cup of tea scene (if it is the upper class speaking).  (Moliére)
Term
RETROSPECTIVE METHOD
Definition
This is when the action moves forward while the past unfolds backwards.  It keeps revealing the most significant background information until as late as possible in the action.  (Sophocles, Ibsen, Strindberg, Hansberry, Wilson)
Term
MINIMALIST TECHNIQUE
Definition
This is often called Absurdist.  In the 1940s, playwrights began to push the limits of the retrospective method.  They did so by limiting the quantity of background story and disclosing it with intricate complicated hints rather than frank narration.  (Veiled hints and casual allusion).  (Albee, Beckett, Parks, Pinter)
Term
BEATS
Definition
Introduce, develop and conclude a single, small topic.
Term
SCENE
Definition
Scenes are shaped dramatically like a play in that they introduce, develop and conclude a single large event. 
Term
FRENCH SCENE
Definition
When any character has entered or exited the stage. 
Term
Point of Attack
Definition

When the on-stage action begins in relation to the background story at one end and the climax at the other.

*It is either early or late

Term
Early P.O.A.
Definition

Contains little background story and a long stretch of on-stage dramatic time between the opening curtain and the main climax. 

*The dramatic action takes place over years or decades.  Think plays like: Pericles, The Diary of Anne Frank or Angels in America.

Term
LATE P.O.A.
Definition

Contains a great deal of background story and a short amount of on-stage dramatic time between the opening curtain and the climax. 

*The dramatic action takes place over moments, hours, days, weeks or months.  Think plays like: Oedipus Rex, Romeo and Juliet, A Doll’s House and Raisin in the Sun.

Term
PRIMARY EVENT
Definition

The most important incident in the background story, one that so energizes the characters that it produces in them the conditions necessary for the play to take place. 

(ex: RAISIN—the death of Walter Sir.  R&J—the houses feuding)

Term
INCITING ACTION
Definition
The single event that sparks the main action of the entire play. 
Term
COMPLICATION/OBSTACLE
Definition

When planned behavior encounters difficulties as it tries to reach its goal. 

Obstacles create the complication.  Complications are interpersonal.

Term
OBLIGATORY SCENE
Definition
An open confrontation about the play’s main conflict shared between at least 2 major characters.  (Ex 1: Walter vs. Lena act 1 scene 2.  “money is life” “no, freedom is life”. 
Term
CRISES
Definition
Points in the action when the tension reaches a peak and a change in the course of events becomes necessary. 
Term
CLIMAX
Definition
A prominent peak of emotional intensity in the unit, scene, act or play.  They may be either Minor or Major
Term
MINOR
Definition
A (basic) peak of emotional intensity
Term
MAIN/MAJOR CLIMAX
Definition
A composite term to describe 2 physical activities that unfold simultaneously in performance
Term
Recognition
Definition
A change from ignorance to knowledge.  Used and developed by Aristotle. 
Term
Reversal
Definition

A change in fortune. 

              Bad to Good

              Good to Bad involving a catastrophe or violence. 

Term
RISING ACTION
Definition

All events leading up to the main climax.

Including: Point of Attack, Inciting Action, Complications, Obstacles, Crises and Climaxes. 

Term
FALLING ACTION
Definition

Often called a Denouement or Resolution

This includes all events following the Major/Main Climax. 

Term
FREYTAG PYRAMID
Definition

Named after a German critic who developed the tool.  The pyramid charts the scene or plays rising Action, Main climax, and falling action. 

 

Term
COMPLEX PLOT
Definition
Plays that contain both a recognition and a reversal.
Term
SIMPLE PLOT
Definition

Plays that may contain either a recognition or a reversal or maybe neither. 

 

Term
OBJECTIVES
Definition
The characters goals or basic future desire/plan of action
Term
MAIN/MAJOR/SUPER
Definition
One that arises from the whole play and governs its limits.
Term
MINOR/SECONDARY
Definition
These are tied to beats, units, scenes, acts, and defines their limits. 
Term
THROUGH-LINE
Definition
This ties together all of the characters secondary objectives together under the control of character’s main objective.
Term
STANISLAVSKI’S GUIDELINES FOR DISCOVERING OBJECTIVES
Definition

1)   Should come from the character’s goals.

2)   Should be directed at the other characters (not self nor audience).

3)   Should describe the inner life of the character (not the physical nor outer life)

4)   Relate to the plays main idea

5)   Should be framed in the form of an active concrete verb. 

Term
DRAMATIC ACTION
Definition
Tactics described with active verbs that characters use to achieve their goals/objectives.
Term
CONFLICT
Definition

To strike together

*There are different forms

*Conflict between character and…

                                                                      -Environment (raisin)

                                                                      -Destiny

                                                                      -Nature

                                                                      -Ideas

 

Term
ROLE CONFLICT/CONFLICT OF ROLE
Definition
Characters opposing views of each other or a conflict of attitudes.
Term
CONFLICT OF OBJECTIVES
Definition
Characters opposing goals/objectives.
Term
WILLPOWER
Definition
Plays depend on strong willed characters to make things happen.  They impose their wills on everyone else regardless. 
Term
VALUES
Definition
What characters are for/against in the word. 
Term
COMPLEXITY
Definition
The capacity for awareness equals a character’s complexity. 
Term
PSYCHOLOGICAL/INTERNAL ACTION
Definition

Advances the plot using:

 

ASSERTIONS—The simplest statement of fact.  They identify people, places, things and events.  Sometimes characters deceive themselves or lie about themselves or events.  (Act 1 scene 1 in Raisin)

ACCUSATIONS—Composed of announcements, accusations and rhetorical questions.  (Walter and Benetha). 

PLANS—They are practical and economic way of advancing plot.  Discussion equals action.  (Lena)

COMMANDS- An urgent necessity, causing events that characters must carry out.  (Lena)

Term
PHYSICAL/EXTERNAL ACTION
Definition
Blocking, entrances and exits.
Term
FRENCH SCENE
Definition
Any time a character enters or exits
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