Twentieth Century Theatre & the Theatre of the Absurd

1. Twentieth Century Theatre& the Theatre of the Absurd Photos in this lecture come from the film version of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead

2. What are the essential qualities of theatre? • It is live; it is shared; it is communal • Each performance is unique, susceptible to change and therefore dangerous • Unpredictable things could happen – someone forgets a line, drops something, the lights go out, or something happens in the audience. • It is the co-existence of the there and then and the here and now • While in the audience, we perceive what is happening on the stage as the time period portrayed, yet we sit there in our time watching it all happen.

3. The aim of theatre theory & practice in the twentieth century • Theatre has explored itself in relation to our in response to film and TV • Are these media [film & TV] ‘theatre’? They are the media through which most of us experience naturalistic, mimetic performance. • The response is no – theatre is not finished like a film or TV show. Even when TV is live, we are at home alone, not part of a group audience. Also, film and TV look more real – there is much more pretend in theatre. • Theatre in twentieth century isno longer a mainstream source of live entertainment and leisure • Other live entertainments are more popular, such as concerts, sports, comics, etc…

4. Directors and Actors • Directors became important and had a great influence on the course of theatre in the 20th century. • They often rewrote parts of scripts and completely reinterpreted a play into a different time period for example. • Performers also asserted themselves as creative artists, not merely interpretative artists. • Performers had a say in their roles and lines rather than just acting what was on a written page.

5. Realism vs. Symbolism & Expressionism • Realism • popular as it mimics television and movies • However, Playwrights felt they could do more with the field • Symbolism and Expressionism • more pronounced in theatre than in TV or film • share the characteristics of dreams • look to the common un-conscious of humankind • Distortion, Fragmentation or blending of characters occurs • Use of silence, repetition, &consciously symbolic lighting effects.

6. Theatre of the Absurd • A reaction to the disappearance of the religious dimension form contemporary life • Authors felt that life is meaningless; there is no hope of salvation – thus their plays reflected these ideas. • An attempt to restore the importance of myth and ritual to our age, by making man aware of the ultimate realities of his condition • Not everything is scientific and can be figured out – so plays showed illogic of life. • Shows that language is unreliable • There are so many clichés in language that it doesn’t convey real human thought • Language in plays can be purposefully confusing. As in Hamlet, language means something and sometimes nothing

7. Theatre of the Absurd • Settings are very generalized and could be anywhere • Identity is not fixed • Often the characters forget who they are! • Merging of the comic and tragic • However frantically characters perform only underlines the fact that cannot do anything to change their existence