Chapter 14 Flashcards
What kind of plays depict a descent from optimism to disillusionment or pessimism?
Expressionism
What “Verfremdungseffect” can be translated as…
Alienation Effect
Who argued that the subconscious was the highest plan of reality and attempted to recreate its workings dramatically?
Surrealists
What many historians believe that political and economic unrest set the stage for the rise of…
Totalitarianism
Who made his reputation at the Old Vic in London?
Tyrone Guthrie
What originated in Switzerland with a series of manifestos written by Tristan Tzara?
Dadaism
Who could more justifiably claim to have developed the concept of Epic Theatre?
Erwin Piscator
Who believed in dictatorial government and forcible suppression of opposition?
Fascists
Who idealized war and the developing machine age?
Futurists
What was the closest the United States has come to establishing a national theatre?
The Federal Theatre Project
Who used a narrator in “Our Town” to paint a picture of a small town life and set it against larger issues?
Thornton Wilder
Who believed theatre was not a literary event but a sensory one?
Antonin Artaud
What country’s theatre between the world wars remained the most commercially oriented theatre in the world?
America
What theatre was often referred to as America’s Moscow Art Theatre?
The Group Theatre
Who was sent to one of Stalin’s prison camps and died there in 1940?
Meyerhold
Lee Strasburg
Method Acting
Luigi Pirandello
Surrealism, “Six Characters in Search of an Author”
Elmer Rice
“Adding Machine”
Antonin Artaud
Theatre of Cruelty
Noel Coward
“Blithe Spirit”
Frederico Garcia Lorca
Spanish Plays
Cole Porter
American Musical Theatre
Aspects of Theatre of Cruelty
- Antonin Artaud believed that western theatre needed to be totally transformed and its literary tradition which emphasized language was antithetical to its ritualistic origins and western theatre artists should study Asian theatres.
- He did not believe texts were sacred; he felt that a script should be reworked to be relevant
- Theatre for Antonin Artaud was not a literary event but a sensory experience
- Artaud did not use the term “cruelty” to mean that theatre artists should literally assault their audiences - although some later avant-garde theatre artists did think of cruelty as actual physical confrontations with spectators, viewers sense should be bombarded
- He wanted to reorganize theatre space to make the audience the center of attention
Erwin Piscator
Epic Theatre
