Small Theatre Research Articles

Lawrence Alma-Tadema and the nineteenth-century 'periode eye': Classical sources for his Entrance of the theatre (1866) and An exedra (1869)

The Anglo-Dutch artist Lawrence Alma-Tadema (1836-1912) is known for being one of the leading representatives of historical genre painting. His paintings are often set in antiquity that usually transmits a peaceful atmosphere, although they also regularly refer to classical sources that include critical messages. Two key works of Alma-Tadema’s Pompeian period are Entrance of the theatre (1866) and An exedra (1869). These works are paradigmatic of the artist’s in-depth knowledge of classical civilization. He seemed obsessed with the historical accuracy of his paintings, which can be partly explained by the fact that general education at the time was steeped in the classics, and the public’s appreciation of his paintings must have been directly related to what was taught at school. Through a detailed analysis in conjunction with contemporary critical reviews, the author intends to reconstruct the nineteenth-century perspective on Alma-Tadema’s work. The question is how his contemporaries may have viewed his paintings, and how the concept of the ‘period eye’, developed by Baxandall, can be of use. It turns out that, with access to these classical sources, Entrance of the theatre becomes a scathing critique of the vanity and conceit of the wealthy class. Alma-Tadema’s reference to Terence’s comedy Andria convincingly complements a social criticism depicted through a public scene at the entrance of the Small Theatre in Pompeii. Additionally, the inscriptions and monuments that were associated with the famous family of the Holconians in particular, and theatrical patronage in Pompeii in general, must have been of particular interest to Alma-Tadema. This also emerged in An exedra, a scene around a tomb at the Via dei Sepolcri in Pompeii. The result is an image that, beyond a casual daily image from antiquity, also aims to show social injustice through the lost gaze of the enslaved person. These paintings show how Lawrence Alma-Tadema was capable of making numerous references, by layering several meanings and suggestions taken from antiquity. They also constitute a clear example of how he used and combined all his knowledge of classical architecture and fashion available at the time, to elaborate a pictorial narrative that pointed to the core of historical reconstruction.

Expansion and Audience Development Management of the Chinese Original Musical Theatre Market: A Case Study of the Small Theatre Musical “KING’S TABLE”

Expansion and Audience Development Management of the Chinese Original Musical Theatre Market: A Case Study of the Small Theatre Musical “KING’S TABLE”

Scenography of the Unimaginable: Exploring Trauma of Others in 872 days. Voices of the besieged city

The article explores the scenographic rendering of trauma in the theatre performance 872 days. Voices of the besieged city staged by a small theatre, Subbota, in Saint Petersburg, Russia. The performance delves into the complex issues of private narratives of traumatic experiences, which, for decades, were deemed unimportant and even disruptive within the context of victory and glory of The Great Patriotic War. The production is based on memoirs and diaries of witnesses of the Leningrad siege. This study explores the connection between the scenographic ecology and empathic unsettlement, which is understood as a tool of approaching trauma through the experience of the audience. The article analyses how the scenographic rendering of trauma allows for potential representation and understanding of traumatic experience. It further looks at a theatre space as a place for mourning and reflexivity that allows the possibility of working through past trauma to better understand the present.

Watching News in Public: The Rituals and Responses of Newsreel Theater Audiences

abstract: From roughly 1930 to 1950, newsreel theaters played important roles in urban and film cultures. These small (200- to 600-seat) theaters showed hour-long loops of news that patrons could drop into from morning to midnight. Some aspects of the newsreel theater experience extended the rituals of nickelodeon spectatorship of earlier decades, and others predated the post–World War II development of television news consumption. Newsreel theaters allowed patrons to pass the time watching motion picture news, and they became politically charged spaces offering ways for people to watch and react vocally to the news in public as members of groups.

Practice and Contest: Research into Small theatre Movement in Peking

Practice and Contest: Research into Small theatre Movement in Peking

"New" Landscapes in the New Era on the Artistic Exploration of Small Theater Drama—"Star River Hotel"

"New" Landscapes in the New Era on the Artistic Exploration of Small Theater Drama—"Star River Hotel"

La Cantatrice Chauve (The Bald Soprano); La Leçon (The Lesson); Les Chaises (The Chairs)

La Cantatrice Chauve (The Bald Soprano); La Leçon (The Lesson); Les Chaises (The Chairs)

Shaw in America (Bernard Shaw on the American Stage: A Chronicle of Premieres and Notable Revivals)

Shaw in America (Bernard Shaw on the American Stage: A Chronicle of Premieres and Notable Revivals)

The Unknown Adaptation of A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens: Amateur Theatre, Film Avant-garde, and the Magic Lantern

The Unknown Adaptation of A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens: Amateur Theatre, Film Avant-garde, and the Magic Lantern Anna Kovalova (bio) In December 1932, the Rochester Community Players (RCP), one of the oldest continuously operated amateur theatre organizations in America, premiered A Christmas Carol, an adaptation of the famous story by Charles Dickens. This innovative production included scenes “on screen”: Scrooge’s visions of the past were presented as films projected during the performance. These films were made with the involvement of Dr. James Sibley Watson, Jr. and Melville Webber, key figures in the history of American avant-garde cinema. Adaptations of Charles Dickens’s works have become a wide field of study; there are many excellent books and articles on how Dickens has been adapted in theatre and in cinema.1 Some of these works are focused on A Christmas Carol in particular, but none seems to mention the Rochester version. In Dickens Dramatized, by H. Philip Bolton, the fundamental reference for the dramatic versions of Dickens’s works, there is a list of 357 adaptations of A Christmas Carol staged in 1844–1984 (Bolton 237–67), but the RCP adaptation is not included in this list. The same can be said about the list of “Notable Film, Television, and Radio Adaptations of A Christmas Carol” compiled by Richard Kelly (233–37), as well as the more detailed filmography in Fred Guida’s monograph, A Christmas Carol and Its Adaptations (171–232). One might expect that, thanks to the involvement of Watson and Webber, the RCP production would interest historians of the American film avant-garde rather than Dickens scholars. However, although the revolutionary films by Watson and Webber, The Fall of the House of Usher (1928) and Lot in Sodom (1933), have become classics of world avant-garde film, and have [End Page 208] received considerable attention from critics and scholars,2 not much has been written about the directors’ biographies and their other work in cinema.3 The only widely available source on the films of Sibley Watson that mentions the RCP Christmas Carol is the scrapbook compiled by his mother, Emily Sibley Watson, which contains clippings from newspapers and magazines as well as documents related to various productions (“Scrapbook”). The research in the present article on the RCP Christmas Carol is based on newspapers and archival collections in Rochester, and the principal source is the reel of the film preserved at the George Eastman Museum. Unfortunately, this print does not contain any sound records. Thanks to newspapers, we know that the film scenes from the RCP Christmas Carol were talkies: The visions of old Scrooge appear before one’s eyes–scenes of his childhood, his school days and events in his career which haunt his memory as they are recalled in the ghostly visitations. This illusion, which gives realism to the scenes, could not have been done a few years ago, before moving and sound pictures were made practical. (“Christmas Carol to Begin”)4 By investigating this film, I will try to trace its place both in the history of Dickens adaptations and in the American film avant-garde. It was an experimental adaptation that looked both forwards and to the past, a theatre production and a talking film combining the latest technical innovations with traces of archaic forms of media, such as magic lantern projections. The RCP Christmas Carol: Its Creators and History The Rochester Community Players were a part of the Little Theatre Movement in the United States. Since the 19th century, more and more small theatres involving amateurs had opened up, this tendency becoming even stronger in the 1910s and 1920s, when motion pictures began to take a considerable amount of the “big” theatres’ audience.5 “Little theatres” opened up all around the country, and many books were published for people who wished to take part in the movement one way or another.6 Clarence [End Page 209] Stratton’s guide, Producing in Little Theatres, first published in 1921, was in its sixth edition by 1930. In Rochester, NY, there had been various attempts to set up an amateur theatre. In the 1910s there were The Little Theatre of Rochester, founded...

Analysis of Lin Huiyin's Classical Singing in Little Theatre Opera Farewell to Cambridge

Small theatre opera originated from the west, is a new style of opera with the characteristics of The Times, this novel form of artistic expression was introduced into China, in the art world in the end of 2001, playwright Chen Wei created and adapted the "Farewell to Cambridge", is the first small theatre opera to be performed in China. The work takes the May 4th New Culture Movement as the background, showing the struggle of Lin Huiyin, Xu Zhimo and other talents and beauties in ideal and reality, reason and emotion. This paper takes "A Peach Blossom" and "Flying Up by Day" in "Farewell to Cambridge" as the research object, and conducts in-depth research and analysis on the background of the creation of the work, Lin Huiyin's character image building and singing skills of the verse. I hope to improve my understanding and performance ability of this character through theoretical research and singing practice, and apply it in the study and research of future works.

ЛИМИНАЛЬНАЯ НАРРАТОЛОГИЯ ДРАМАТУРГИИ АЛЕКСЕЯ СЛАПОВСКОГО

In the dramaturgical work of A. Slapovsky, realistic and unrealistic artistry is synthesized, revealed in a wide representational field of various stadium states and situations. At the same time, the balance between the different semantic and emotional components of the studied poetics is clearly visible. Heterogeneity of motivation and plot, “simultaneity” of characters, recursiveness of chronotope are signs of liminal narratology of A. Slapovsky. All the plays of the book “The Truest Love” are classified by the playwriter himself – “plays for large theaters” and “plays for small theaters” – which is due to their duration. However, it is the ambiguity and a certain illusory nature of what is happening on the stage that seems important. The material for this research is the play “The Poor Millionaire”, characterized by deliberate schematism and determinism. The unity of the “liminal” multicomponence is achieved, among other things, by the introduction of the integrating action of the leading character, which becomes an element of the paratext with the corresponding coordinating functionality and is usually correlated with the figure of the author. The general idea of isomorphism of language, text and the world in the process of analysis suggests the idea of a possible project comparison of representational systems of different, but related, dramatic epochs. Slapovsky’s oeuvre as a phenomenon is characterized by a complex of liminality in its binary, discrete and, at the same time, heterogeneous artistry. This complex correlates with the narratology of the image, with characterology, the study of which leads the author to generalizations of universal significance.

Mārupītē nogrimusī kurpe: ilgtspējas aspekti ekoteātrī Latvijā

The aim of this article is to explore environmentally conscious theatre practices in the Latvian performing arts scene in the period 2019–2022. Firstly, the article provides an insight into the concepts of ecotheatre and ecoscenography according to theatre scholars Una Chaudhuri, Theresa J. May, Lisa Woynarski, Tanja Beer, and Sofia Pantouvaki and their theoretical perspectives. Secondly, the paper identifies the current internal position on sustainability issues within those Latvian theatres which take into account sustainable practices through ecotheatre production process. Thirdly, the article highlights those ecotheatre case studies which demonstrate a sustainability-based approach to performance production. With the rise of environmental issues, the role of performing arts in shaping the ecological consciousness of society is growing. Therefore it is crucial not only to look at the eco-narratives of theatre productions but also to analyse the process of making performances and the related sustainability aspects. Despite the fact that theatre has historically developed an anti-ecological character, there are increasing signs of a shift in thinking among theatre professionals worldwide, towards an awareness of the potential environmental impact of the production and performance. In Latvia too, the last decade – from 2012 to 2022 – has seen an increase in ecotheatre productions that not only use ecodramaturgical materials as their basis but also incorporate sustainability-based practices in the process of creating these productions. The research, rooted in descriptive and comparative methods, shows that small theatre companies are more open and ready to introduce sustainability principles into their theatre activities. The focus on identifying and mitigating ecological impacts in the Latvian theatre scene is currently an individual choice of the artist, lacking a systematic approach to the process of creating performances. With the growth of original drama works about the relations between human and nature, new forms of performance are also entering the theatre repertoires, which allow to address sustainability aspects in the process of performance creation. Considering ecotheatre as a form of environmental activism, it is also important to respect the principles of sustainability in the production of ecotheatre performances, which is why theatre professionals should aim for a systematic approach to sustainability in the production of a performance.

N

N

홍해성과 스키지소극장(築地小劇場)

Hong Haesung was the first professional director in Korea and deserves to be called the father of modern drama who established the actor training and theater production system. While studying in Japan, Hong Haesung joined the Sukiji Small Theater, which was established to professionally perform modern plays, studied acting and directing along with acting activities, and worked as an executive member. There have been many studies on Hong Haesung by domestic researchers so far, but there are few results of research based on records of Hong Haesung's acting activities and directing classes at the Sukiji Theater. Hong Haeseong worked as an actor at the Skijiso Theater for about 6 years, and during that time, he thoroughly learned the Skijiso Theater's theater production system, actor training system, and realistic directing techniques. After the death of Osanai Kaoru, he decided to return to Korea after the troupe was divided. After returning to Korea in June 1930, he was actively involved in the transplantation of modern theater to Korea through activities such as the Drama Arts Research Society. He participated in the establishment of the ‘Oriental Theater’, and as a director, established a framework for accepting Western modern plays and a theater production system. contributed greatly to the opening. This paper examines the actor’s theory and stage directing classes at the Sukijiso Theater, as well as the documents that received realistic directing techniques from Osanai Kaoru. the memoirs of the actors at the time, and the materials introduced in a collection of critical reviews published in newspapers and magazines, etc.

Prince(ss) Charming of the Japanese Popular Theatre

Prince(ss) Charming of the Japanese Popular Theatre

“You Gotta Accentuate the Positive”: Japanese American Affirmation and Resilience in The Camp Dance: The Music and the Memories

“You Gotta Accentuate the Positive”: Japanese American Affirmation and Resilience in <i>The Camp Dance: The Music and the Memories</i>

Doric Foot and Metrological Implications of the Ancient Theatre of Makyneia, Western Greece

Understanding the length and subdivisions of ancient length units is necessary for Archaeology, Architecture, and engineering, among other fields. These metrological units derive from anthropocentric concepts (fathom, cubit, foot, finger, etc.) and hence their metrological characteristics are variable and unknown for various ancient civilizations. The Roman length units are well determined, but the ancient Greek units are not. A rule sculpted in a metrological relief recently permitted the recognition of the Doric foot as having a length of 327 mm, but the broader use and divisions of this length unit remain unknown. In this article we present evidence of use of the Doric foot from the modeling of an ancient, atypical small theatre of the 4th–3rd century B.C., at Makyneia, on the western Greece mainland. It was found that this structure was designed using the Doric foot and its division in 24 (or even 12) digits. This result from a small provincial town indicates that the Doric foot was in broad use in architectural and engineering works of the ancient Greek World, and this result may be used to solve various problems of that era.

Ramayana's royal thesis to form of Khon performance: A case study of Khon Scene Ramayana story: Ronnapak Asurin Indrajit

Articles of royal drama Ramayana to form Khon performance: a case study of Khon Scene Ramayana story: Ronnapak Asurin Indrajit, it is a qualitative research in the form of conservation research with an objective to study the history development of the show forms and elements of the Khon Scene performance Ramayana story: Ronnapak Asurin Indrajit from Ronnapak Chubson to Ravana gave his name. The study tools were structured interview forms and participatory observation content analysis and summarize the discussion descriptive presented in an academic format and in show form. The results of the research showed that the performance of the Khon Scene Ramayana story: Ronnapak Asurain Indrajit is an improvement from the Ramayana drama. His Majesty King Buddha Yodfa Chulalok (King Rama 1) Volume 1 is a Khon script used for performances by Ajarn Panya Nittayasuwan, edited by Ajarn Seree Wangnaitham. Next Ajarn Charan Poonlarp has adapted the Khon script of Ajarn Panya Nittayasuwan to make the chapter more concise with the time limitation of the show which is exhibited at the publicity event for the public to see Artist - Silpakorn (Mr. Somrak Nakpluem) at the National Theater (Small Theater) on September 21, 2007, presenting the performance in the form of Khon Scene which is divided into performances that use the scene to indicate the location, use dialogue, dance according to the lyrics and the song Na-phat in the story uses a chimney orchestra to play along with the performance which standing costume of performers. The research team has been transferred the dance movements and performance styles from experts and applied to the theory of the process of transferring dance moves to students in the field of Thai Dramatic Arts Studies, department of Dramatic Music, faculty of Fine and Applied Arts Rajamangala University of Technology Thanyaburi and then presented in the form of academic papers and performances.

Damage and Renewal at the Württembergische Staatstheater, Stuttgart

AbstractThe dual theatre complex of the Württembergische Staatstheater in Stuttgart sustained serious damage during the Second World War. While the larger theatre was eventually able to be repaired, the smaller theatre was destroyed, leading to a multi-phased and controversial process to determine how best to replace it. Many of Stuttgart's citizens publicly pleaded that the smaller theatre should be reconstructed according to its original design, in order to restore its historical beauty and its integrity with the complex. The company's Intendant and numerous architects, however, took a more modern approach that manifested in a variety of proposed designs, including that by Hans Volkart, which opened in 1962. Countering the binary represented by ‘faithful reconstruction’ on one end (Vienna, Munich) and by completely modern designs on the other (West Berlin, Cologne), the case of Stuttgart perhaps serves as a better metaphor for the compromises of continuity and change in post-war culture.

Auf die Tour! Jüdinnen und Juden in Singspielhalle, Kabarett und Varieté: Zwischen Habsburgermonarchie und Amerika by Susanne Korbel

Reviewed by: Auf die Tour! Jüdinnen und Juden in Singspielhalle, Kabarett und Varieté: Zwischen Habsburgermonarchie und Amerika by Susanne Korbel Steven Cerf Susanne Korbel, Auf die Tour! Jüdinnen und Juden in Singspielhalle, Kabarett und Varieté: Zwischen Habsburgermonarchie und Amerika. Vienna: Böhlau Verlag, 2021. 270 pp. The high-spirited, three-part title of this important study is telling. Susanne Korbel aptly views this revised form of her Jewish Studies doctoral dissertation from Graz University as part of a complement to the intense, decades-long scholarship of Viennese turn-of-the-twentieth-century high literary culture. Because of her clearly argued thesis and her focus on the mobility of the traveling Jewish women and men vaudevillians between Vienna, Budapest, and New York City, Korbel firmly underscores the stark differences between centripetal turn-of-the-twentieth-century Viennese “high art” and its centrifugal “popular art” counterpart. The first of the study’s five chapters begins with Korbel’s emphasis on the ever-increasing access to the mobility of railway transportation from Eastern Europe to Vienna and Budapest during the five decades prior to World War I—which contributed to the two million Eastern European Jews settling in the western urban centers of the Habsburg monarchy. She immediately points to the personalized stories about this increasingly accessible railway travel and their capacity to provide shared material for an ever-increasing number of Jewish vaudevillian performers and for their ever-growing numbers of coreligionist audience members—who increasingly had the free time and [End Page 188] spending money to dedicate to entertainment. This ever-increasing Jewish visibility, both on the stage and in the audience, also led, as a consequence, to further interaction between Jews and non-Jews. The ten-page conclusion of this first chapter clearly details the recent scholarly cultural studies research in which Korbel anchors her research. The second and third chapters follow logically in dealing with the respective neighborhoods of Vienna, Budapest, and New York in which the Jewish newcomers from the East were settling and examines the striking cultural similarities of the ever-growing numbers there of popular cultural venues such as music halls, cabarets, and small theaters. The increasing traveling troupes, as a consequence, found ever-burgeoning numbers of welcoming coreligionist audiences in these new cultural venues in such predominantly Jewish-populated areas as the Leopoldstadt, the Elisabethstadt in Budapest, and the Lower East Side in New York (which were often located in close proximity to synagogues). And the multi-linguistic makeup of these newly arrived audiences would invariably be drawn by a typical two-to-three-hour program of selections often offered in at least two different languages— Yiddish from the East and the predominant language spoken in that city. Instead of only performing to exclusively sectarian audiences, Korbel convincingly argues, using facts and figures, that these vaudeville revues often brought together audiences of diverse ethnic backgrounds—thus serving as a socially integrating force. The study’s meatiest portion, Chapter 4, comprising over one-third of the book, deals with the actual mobility of performers “hitting the road.” Beginning with her discussion of the variety-trade press and its array of advertisements for the ever-increasing number of artistic management agencies, modes of transportation, and the accommodation locations for performers— including the listing of the actual vaudevillian performances, Korbel sees the leading publication in this area as the Internationale Artisten Revue, founded in 1894. And she views the power of this variety trade paper and many others circulating in the field as reflecting the doubling number of vaudevillian performances in Vienna and in Budapest and the quadrupling of them in New York by the turn of the century. The second half of this chapter deals with the key participants of turn-of-the-century Yiddish-language vaudeville and their gender-related roles: women were increasingly replacing the earlier female impersonators, gender-bending roles were beginning to come into vogue, the scurrilous anti-Semitic [End Page 189] rumors linking vaudeville theater to prostitution were being debunked, and, alas, some of the Jewish performers found their tragic end in the Holocaust. Korbel wisely traces the assertive role of the vaudevillian solo soubrette, in part, to the actively...