Community – life of group more important than the individual Teenage gangs, religious organizations, congregations, military, some teams Collective – individual most important, uses group to further individual’s goals Produce collectives, theatre today, cities, self gov’t
Alexander Pope “the proper study of mankind is man.”
Humans have very basic needs:
1. Food 2. Shelter 3. Mate to procreate 4. Grouping for shelter Greek farmers may have used stone rings to thrash wheat – where the circle or orchestra came from with dancing and singing
Greek: Theatron: orchestra, dancing circle; Thymele, altar; parados, where chorus came in; skene, stage house; proskene, in front of stage house where actors performed.
Greek theatre had masks, music, instruments, costumes, tragedy, comedy, chanting, and singing
Roman: half circle; connected seating to stage house; auditorium, hearing place
3 best known Greek playwrights – Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides
Rome liked Greek culture brought back a captured slave Livius Andronicus who became the Father of Roman Literature = could translate Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey 1. Rome collapsed no more central gov’t 2. Barbarians came 3. Growth of Christian Church
No theatres built for 1000 yrs. (476 AD to 1500 AD) all mimests excommunicated I 5 C
Medieval wagons bought theatre to town squares or Mansion (Fr. word for house) stages made of pageant wagons lined up
Elizabethan England gave us verse drama, language, literature, ballad opera, and exploration with circle globe theatre groundlings = audience that stood in the circle for one pence with least expensive tickets
Italian Renaissance gave us opera, commedia dell’Arte, and proscenium arch earliest built theatre with a proscenium arch that is still standing is Teatro Farnese built in