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Chapter 8 CLass Notes
Introduction to the Theatre (THEA 1331 )
Houston Community College
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Chapter 8 GENRES GENRES Genre is a French term meaning a category or type of theatre.
Two most basic genres are: TRAGEDY COMEDY
Example of Tragedy: “Twelve Years a Slave”.
“Oedipus Rex” by Sophocles
SYNOPSIS: In the most well-known version of the myth, Oedipus was born to King Laius and Queen Jocasta. Laius wished to thwart a prophecy, so left him to die on a mountainside. However, the baby was found by shepherds and raised by King Polybus and Queen Merope as their own. Oedipus learned from the oracle at Delphi of the prophecy that he would end up killing his father and marrying his mother but, unaware of his true parentage, believed he was fated to murder Polybus and marry Merope, so left for Thebes. On his way he met an older man and quarrelled, and Oedipus killed the stranger. Continuing on to Thebes, he found that the king of the city (Laius) had been recently killed, and that the city was at the mercy of the Sphinx. Oedipus answered the monster's riddle correctly, defeating it and winning the throne of the dead king - and the hand in marriage of the king's widow, (and unbeknownst to him), his mother Jocasta.
Years later, to end a plague on Thebes, Oedipus searched to find who had killed Laius, and discovered that he himself was responsible. Jocasta, upon realizing that she had married both her own son, and her husband's murderer, hanged herself. Oedipus then seized two pins from her dress and blinded himself with them.
The playwright’s POINT OF VIEW is a huge factor in deciding if he wants to treat something as tragic or comic.
EXAMPLE OF PLAYWRIGHT’S POINT OF VIEW DETERMING GENRE Play: “Arsenic and Old Lace” READ p. 178 caption under SUSPENSION OF NATURAL LAWS IN COMEDY Daffy Duck : youtube/watch?v=GQjcJgHvkRg
TRADITIONAL TRAGEDY
MODERN TRAGEDY
CHARACTERISITICS OF TRADITIONAL TRAGEDY
Originated and perfected from past periods such as GREECE: Fifth Century BCE. ENGLAND: England, late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries
1. TRAGIC HEROES AND HEROINES
- Extraordinary characters—kings, queens, nobles
2. TRAGIC CIRCUMSTANCES
Terrible things befall characters in a tragedy.
3. TRAGIC IRRETRIEVABILITY
The tragic figures are in a situation from which there is no honorable avenue of escape; they must go forward to meet their fate.
4. ACCEPTANCE OF RESPONSIBILITY
The hero or heroine accepts responsibility for his or her actions and also shows willingness to suffer and an immense capacity for suffering.
KING LEAR
5. TRAGIC VERSE
- High language to address lofty concerns
- Considered the only means by which such heights and depths of emotion can adequately be expressed
She should have died hereafter. There would have been a time for such a word. Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, Creeps in this petty pace from day to day To the last syllable of recorded time, And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle! Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player That struts and frets his hour upon the stage And then is heard no more. It is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.
(Serious) HEROIC DRAMA •Serious drama with the characteristics of traditional tragedy, with two exceptions:
- A happy ending
- An optimistic worldview
(Serious) DOMESTIC DRAMA -Replaced Heroic Drama and represented modern society.
- Domestic Drama’s deal with the family or home. The power of domestic drama lies in its ability to present the audience with characters that are easily recognizable and identifiable.
(Serious) MELODRAMA •Eighteenth and nineteenth century popular theatre
The term comes from the Greek meaning: “Music drama” or “song drama”
MELODRAMA MUSIC youtube/watch?v=bzx5Q-WNgIE
Characteristics:
- Audience is drawn into the action
- Issues are clear-cut; there is a strong delineation of right and wrong
- Characters are clearly good or bad a type of stock character
- Exaggerated action—living in danger on the edge of calamity
- Strong emphasis on suspense. What’s going to happen next?!? Super hero movies of today are a prime example of Melodrama
MAN OF STEEL youtube/watch?v=T6DJcgm3wNY
COMEDY
•Humorous look at the world
TRAGICOMEDY •Blends comic and tragic together
CHARACTERISITICS OF COMEDY
SUSPENSION OF NATURAL LAWS
Jim Carrey DUMB AND DUMBER youtube/watch?v=w7jWLejhniA
COMIC PREMISE This is an idea or concept in a comedy that turns the accepted notion of things “upside down”.
This premise provides a springboard for comic dialogue, character and situations.
EXAMPLE: Lysistrata”: Aristophanes has the Greek women agree on a sex strike to end a war: they will not make love to their husbands until the husbands stop fighting and sign a peace treaty with their opponents
HANGOVER comic premise.
TECHNIQUES OF COMEDY
VERBAL HUMOR
PUN
FORMS OF COMEDY
FARCE
- Uses exaggeration on multiple levels, broad physical humor, stereotypical characters, pratfalls.
- Qualities of mock violence, rapid movement, accelerating pace
- Doesn’t try to be intellectual.
THREE STOOGES CLIP youtube/watch?v=M5ZOK5ia_A
BURLESQUE
Historically it was a send up of other forms of Drama or of a specific play the burlesque would mock those plays or dramatic forms.
In modern times it’s become associated with low comic skits and attractive women.
DOMESTIC COMEDY
Addresses family situations—similar to the “sitcom” form of today.
LUCKY’S SPEECH
LUCKY: Given the existence as uttered forth in the public works of Puncher and Wattmann of a personal God quaquaquaqua with white beard quaquaquaqua outside time without extension who from the heights of divine apathia divine athambia divine aphasia loves us dearly with some exceptions for reasons unknown but time will tell and suffers like the divine Miranda with those who for reasons unknown but time will tell are plunged in torment plunged in fire whose fire flames if that continues and who can doubt it will fire the firmament that is to say blast heaven to hell so blue still and calm so calm with a calm which even though intermittent is better than nothing but not so fast and considering what is more that as a result of the labours left unfinished crowned by the Acacacacademy of Anthropopopometry of Essy-in-Possy of Testew and Cunard it is established beyond all doubt all other doubt than that which clings to the labours of men that as a result of the labours unfinished of Testew and Cunard it is established as hereinafter but not so fast for reasons unknown that as a result of the public works of Puncher and Wattmann it is established beyond all doubt that in view of the labours of Fartov and Belcher left unfinished for reasons unknown of Testew and Cunard left unfinished it is established what many deny that man in Possy of Testew and Cunard that man in Essy that man in short that man in brief in spite of the strides of alimentation and defecation is seen to waste and pine waste and pine and concurrently
Chapter 8 CLass Notes
Course: Introduction to the Theatre (THEA 1331 )
University: Houston Community College
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