Popular entertainment Flashcards
Cruel sports
Mostly involved animals where they would get injured or die
Most of the time they would fight and audience would bet on the animals
Who enjoyed cruel sports?
All classes
Examples of cruel sports
Bear baiting
Bull baiting
Cock fighting
Bear baiting
Where a bear would be chained to a stake
And dogs released to attack it
Bets placed on which dog would last longest
Bull baiting
Chaining a bull at the horns and releasing bulldogs to provoke it
Cockfighting
Around 2-20 roosters put in a pit
With razors attached to their feet
Bets placed on the last standing
What was Elizabeth’s attitudes to cruel sports?
She loved them and would watch during royal progresses
She overruled an appeal to band bear baiting on Sunday
Examples of entertainment enjoyed by rich
Hunting
Hawking
Certain ball games
Forms of dance
Hunting
Included deer hunting by Nobles who would own a deer park
Popular because it was a sport and also provided food
Therefore nobles would go on great hunt picnics hunting rabbits and deer
Hawking
Training a falcon or hawk to fly on and off your arm and kill selected prey
Dance enjoyed by the rich
Would involve employed musicians to play foreign dance tunes
How did Elizabeth enjoy dance?
She practised a controversial dance called the Volta where the woman would leap into the air
With Robert Dudley
What ball games did the rich enjoy?
Tennis, both with rackets or with bare hands
What entertainment did the lower classes enjoy?
Hawking with sparrows
Archery
Dancing
Singing
Bowles
Football
Archery
All men expected to practise it after Sunday church
How did the lower classes enjoy dance?
Traditional country dances
How did lower classes enjoy music?
Learning an instrument like a recorder, lute, viola
Elizabethan football
Getting the ball to the other side by whatever means necessary, usually a mile away
No limit to number of players, no rules nor specified pitch
Popular Elizabethan playwrights
Christopher Marlowe
Shakespeare
Thomas Kyd
Thomas Dekker
What were strolling players?
Wandering musicians who toured the country playing music, acting and staying in inns
What were attitudes to strolling players by the government?
Because they made plays on rebellious stories like Robin Hood it might encourage others to
Also the large crowds would spread disease
How did the government respond to strolling players?
A law banning them unless given permission
How did the banning of strolling players cause the birth of theatre?
The actors would form theatre companies instead that would tour the countryside
However as they became more popular they decided to build permanent theatres
Name of the first theatre in England and who built it
The Theatre built by James Burbage
Other famous theatres built after the first
The Curtain
The Rose
The Swan
The Globe
What were features of the first theatres?
Round with an open space in the middle for the raised stage
Meant to reflect the ‘Universe’ at the time
Very vibrant and cheerful inside
How did early theatres ‘reflect the Universe’
Under the state was hell so demon characters emerged through a trapdoor
Stage was Earth
Canopy above was heaven
Richard Burbage
Son of James Burbage who built The Theatre
Tragic actor who stared in Shakespeare’s plays
Joint owner of the Globe
Edward Alleyn
Tragic actor who played lead roles in Marlowes plays
Will Kempe
Comedic actor who played lead roles in Shakespeare’s comedies
Thomas Pope
Member of an early theatre company the chamberlains men
Shakespeares colleague
Who went to the theatre?
All classes
Men and women
Attitudes to women attending the theatre
Stigma that if they did they were prostitutes so wealthy women would disguise themselves
How did Elisabeth enjoy theatre?
Performed in private playhouses, she wouldn’t attend them publicly
How did Nobles and gentry enjoy theatre?
Would pay for better seats with cushions and roof protection if it rained
How did commoners enjoy theatre?
Would have had the cheapest seats where stood in the pit
How did the theatres achieve special effects?
Using smoke, firing cannons or fireworks
Always in the afternoon because no artificial lighting
Support for the theatre
Cheap form of entertainment for all classes
Started the development of other creative media
Used as a form of propaganda
Enjoyed by the Queen and other nobles
Who was opposed to theatre?
Puritans
Religious leaders
Authorities
Why did Puritans oppose the theatre
The plays shows non religious qualities that were sinful
Might encourage others to sin
Why were religious leaders opposed to theatre?
Believed it had immoral language and was sinful
Why did authorities oppose theatre?
Believed it encouraged people to miss work = idle
A place for thieves to do crime
Could spread disease
What caused the development of the theatre?
Support from the Queen and Nobles
Diversity and quality of plays improving meant it developed
Was cheap for all classes
