TH 210 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Hersham And Walton Motors, Sign Language, Greek Chorus
Theatrical Conventions Lecture #1
How to Read a Play
What is the “precipitating event”?
What is the central Action?
Stakes
3 Simple Rules
Does the Character(s) Change?
Audience Expectation (is the play exciting?)
Images (what do you SEE when you imagine the play?)
NYTIMES Article—Cellphones?
View Clip of Tony Kushner (Who is He?)
What is the Great Power of Theatre's "inability" to create illusion?
Marketing—what is the objective?
Define Theatrical Conventions:
Types of Conventions:
Language
Characters - types
Movement
Realism versus Abstract
Conventional versus Unconventional
Sleep No More - Unconventional Models
Willing suspension of disbelief
Why do Humans Pretend?
What do actors do as a convention of the stage?
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Conventions
Narrator
Multiple roles
Costume changes
Set Changes
Locations
4th Wall - What is it?
Breaking the 4th Wall--examples
Soliloquy--Is this breaking the fourth Wall?
Theatre of One – Breaking the convention of Space
Presentational Versus Representational - Define
Greek Chorus: functions?
Musical Theatre
Duration
Conventions vary from Country to Country
And Historically
Séance
How to Read a Play
1. precipitating event: proposals you forward to understand the story
-action that propels forward
-lord of rings: calm and then something that intrudes on that world bilbo's world
broken cuz has a visitor and gandalf wants to go on an adventure
-red riding hood adventure is universal and like a lot of hero's journey
2. Action Journey: what happens? What journey do characters take
-red riding hood changes across culture
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Images (what do you see when you imagine the play?) View clip of tony kushner (who is he?) Theatre of one breaking the convention of space. How to read a play: precipitating event: proposals you forward to understand the story. Lord of rings: calm and then something that intrudes on that world bilbo"s world broken cuz has a visitor and gandalf wants to go on an adventure. Time of play in that world should correspond to real time and tensions argued by aristotle. What is at stake in the world of the play. Easiest way to breakdown a scene is to ask a few simple questions. Simple rule: each one of those things has to have high stakes for the story to be interesting to be interesting for us. More interesting when there"s a person who wants the opposite of them in the story: precipitating event, action, stakes, expectations, images.
