Drama

Table of Content

PART 011

PART 0213

References19

Bibliography20

PART 01

The Greek theatre appears to have originated with the open-air circular dancing floor (orchestra), a level space of hard earth constructed for performances of choral lyric, of which one variety, the dithyramb, is according to one tradition the progenitor of Attic tragedy (see 1). All large Greek theatres were open to the sky (but see ODEUM). The arrangement described below, which may be regarded as typical, is based on that of the theatre of Dionysus at Athens (see DIONYSUS, THEATRE OF). In the middle of the orchestra was a thymele or altar of Dionysus, on the steps of which the flute-player who accompanied the chorus probably stood. For the spectators at Athens there was a theatron, 'watching-place', on the slope of the Acropolis above the orchestra. Important spectators sat on seats made of stone at the front of the theatron; the rest sat on backless wooden benches placed on rising terraces of earth, crossed at intervals by passageways for access. Beyond these bare facts the details of the construction of the theatre are very obscure. At each side of the orchestra was a parodos or 'way-in', used by the spectators when they entered the theatre and by the chorus and actors on entering and leaving the orchestra. In later times a convention grew up that when the scene was Athens, characters purporting to come on the scene from the agora or Piraeus should enter from the audience's right, since these places were situated in fact in that direction; coming from the country they entered from the left. At the back of the orchestra was a low platform or stage, perhaps 8 m. (25 ft.) wide and 3 m. (10 ft.) deep, connected by steps with the orchestra. Behind it and extending beyond it on each side was a building, the skene ('tent', 'hut'), containing the dressing rooms, with a wide double door in the façade giving access to the stage. The skene provided the backdrop for the stage, and its roof could serve as a stage for action at a higher level, the setting of the solitary watchman on the palace roof in Agamemnon, for example.

There were two pieces of stage equipment, perhaps used mainly in tragedy (which would account for their being the object of mockery in comedy), the mechane ('machine') and the ekkyklema ('the roll-out'). The mechane was a kind of crane which could swing a character round and into view, particularly when a god is announced as being above the house or coming through the sky. The appearance in this manner of a god who provided a solution in an intractable situation originated the Latin phrase deus ex machina, 'a god on a machine', to describe an unexpected outside intervention which resolves a difficulty. Euripides was thought by some to be over-fond of this expedient for concluding a play. The ekkyklema was a device by which off-stage events in the drama could be revealed to the actors on stage and to the audience; ...