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Greek Theater
From Ancient Chant
to Modern Theater
Introduction to Greek Theater
2500 years ago, 2000 years before
Shakespeare, Western theater was born in
Athens, Greece. Between 600 and 200 BC,
the ancient Athenians created a theater
culture whose form, technique and
terminology have lasted 2 millennia. They
created plays that are still considered
among the greatest works of world drama.
Ancient Greek Theater
Their achievement is truly remarkable when one
considers that there have been only 2 other
periods in the history of theater that could be said
to approach the greatness of ancient Athens Elizabethan England and, perhaps the 20th
Century. The greatest playwright of Elizabethan
England was Shakespeare, but Athens produced
at least 5 equally great playwrights. The 20th
Century produced thousands of fine plays and
films, but their form and often their content are
based on the innovations of the ancient
Athenians.
The Cult of Dionysus
Ancient Greek Theater
evolved from religious
rites dating back to at
least 1200 BC
In 500 BC, in Northern
Greece (Thrace) a cult
arose that worshipped
Dionysus (god of fertility
and procreation)
An essential part of the
rites of Dionysus was the
dithyramb
Dithyramb means
“choric hymn”
This chant or hymn
was accompanied by
mimic gestures and
music
The dithyramb was
performed by a chorus
of about 50 men
Dithyramb
The performers wore costumes, danced, and
played drums, lyres and flutes,
They described the adventures of Dionysus.
The dithyramb was given a regular form and
raised to the rank of artistic poetry about 600 BC.
It became one of the competitive subjects at the
various Athens festivals.
It attracted the most famous poets of the day.
From Dithyramb to Drama
As time went on, the dithyramb started to
cease to concern itself exclusively with the
adventures of Dionysus and began to
choose its subjects from all periods of
Greek mythology.
In this way, over time the dithyramb would
evolve into stories in “play” form:
DRAMA.
Golden Age of Greek Theater
The most prominent city-state in Greece by
600 BC was Athens where at least 150,000
people lived.
In Athens the rites of Dionysus evolved into
what we know today as theater .
Thespis
In about 600 BC Arion
of Corinth wrote down
formal lyrics for the
dithyramb.
Some time in the next
75 years, Thespis of
Attica added an actor
who interacted with the
chorus.
This one actor was
called the protagonist.
Thespis walked
around Athens
pulling a handcart,
setting up a kind of
one man plays, where
he showed the bad
behavior of man. The
word for actor,
“thespian”, comes
from his name.
Thespis
The "inventor of tragedy"
was born in Attica, and
was the first prize winner
at the Great Dionysia in
534 BC.
Thespis was an important
innovator for the theater,
since he introduced such
things as the independent
actor (as opposed to the
chorus) as well as masks,
make up and costumes.
Athenian Drama Competitions
In 534 BC, the ruler of Athens, Pisistratus,
changed the Dionysian Festivals and instituted
drama competitions.
In the next 50 years, the competitions became
popular annual events.
During this time, major theatres were
constructed , notably the theater at Delphi, the
Attic theater and the Theater of Dionysus in
Athens.
Greek Amphitheatres
The Theater of
Dionysus, built at the
foot of the Acropolis
in Athens, could seat
17,000 people.
During their heyday,
the competitions drew
as many as 30,000
spectators.
The words theater
and amphitheater
derive from the
Greek word
theatron, which
referred to the
wooden spectator
stands erected on
the hillsides.
Amphitheatres
Artistic replica of the
Theater at Dionysus
Current day Theater at
Dionysus
Delphi Theater
reconstruction
and current day
ruins
How plays were performed
Plays were performed in
the daytime.
Since women were not
allowed to take part, male
actors had to play female
roles.
The playing of multiple
roles, both male and
female, was made
possible by the use of
masks.
The masks prevented
the audience from
identifying the face of
any actor with one
character in the play.
The masks had
exaggerated facial
expressions, different
lengths and color
hair,and helped the
audience identify the
sex, age, and social rank
of the characters.
The Skene?
The theater of Dionysus
in the earliest days of
tragedy must have
consisted of only the
most basic elements.
All that was required
was a circular dancing
area for the chorus at
the base of a gently
sloping hill, on which
spectators could sit and
watch the performance.
On the other side of the
orchestra facing the
spectators there probably
stood a tent in which the
actors could change their
costumes (one actor
would play more than one
part).
This is suggested by the
word skene which means
'tent', and was used to
refer to a wooden wall
having doors.
The Skene and Seating
The wall was painted
to represent a palace,
temple or whatever
setting was required.
The wall, which
eventually became a
full-fledged stage
building, probably
acquired this name
because it replaced
the original tent.
The construction of the
wooden skene (cf. our
theatrical terms "scene"
and "scenery") and of a
formal seating area
consisting of wooden
benches on the slope,
which had been
hollowed out, probably
took place some time
toward the middle of the
fifth century.
Greek Theater
Mechanical Stage Devices
One device is the
ekkyklema “a wheeledout thing”, a platform on
wheels rolled out
through one of the
doors of the skene, on
which a tableau was
displayed representing
the result of an action
indoors (e.g., a murder)
and therefore was
unseen by the
audience.
The other device is
called a mechane
“theatrical machine”, a
crane to which a cable
with a harness for an
actor was attached.
This device allowed an
actor portraying a god
or goddess to arrive on
scene in the most
realistic way possible,
from the sky.
Flying Actors?
The mechane deposited
the actor on top of the
skene so that he as a deity
could address the human
characters from an
appropriately higher level.
This device was not
exclusively limited to use
by divine characters, but
was employed whenever
the plot required any
character to fly.
Actors
The actors in tragedy were hired and paid by
the state and assigned to the tragic poets
probably by lot.
By the middle of the 5th century 3 actors
were required for the performance of a
tragedy. In descending order of importance of
the roles they assumed they were called the
protagonist “first actor”, (a term also applied in
modern literary criticism to the central
character of a play), deuteragonist “second
actor” and tritagonist “third actor”.
Actors
The protagonist took
the role of the most
important character in
the play while the other
2 actors played the
lesser roles. Since most
plays have more than 2
or 3 characters
(although never more
than 3 speaking actors
in the same scene), all
3 actors played multiple
roles.
The fact that the chorus
remained in the orchestra
throughout the play and
sang and danced choral
songs between the
episodes allowed the
actors to exit after an
episode in order to
change mask and
costume and assume a
new role in the next
episode without any
illusion-destroying
interruption in the play.