Greek TheatreGreek Theatre

Greek FestivalsGreek Festivals Festivals honored Olympian gods Ritual Competitions Olympics: Apollo

Athletics Lyric Poetry

Drama: Dionysos Dithyrambic Choruses Tragedy Comedy

Greek TheatreGreek Theatre 6th - 4th century bce Originated in festivals honoring

Dionysos Tragedy:

Aeschylus (524-456 bce) Sophocles (496-406 bce) Euripides (480-406 bce)

Comedy: Old Comedy: bawdy and satiric

Aristophanes (c. 485- c.385 bce) New Comedy: social situations:

Menander (342-292 bce)

Theatre Festivals There were two festivals during which dramatic

productions were staged. The Greater Dionysia took place at the end of

March or the beginning of April Three days were given over to theatrical

competition. Three playwrights each took part in the

contests: Each tragedian put on a trilogy in the morning and each comic writer put on one comedy in the afternoon.

The festival at Lenaes,staged at the end of January or the beginning of February, placed its emphasis on comedy

Theatre at Epidaurus

Curved seats may have aided acoustics.

ACTORS No tragedy used more

than 3 actors All actors were male Costumes included

character masks, and, in later years, raised boots

Acting must have more expressive than realistic

Greek TheatreMasks

THE CHORUS: the voice of the citizens

ORIGINS of TRAGEDY Tragedy, derived from the Greek words tragos (goat) and ode

(song), told a story that was intended to teach religious lessons Arose from dithyrambic choruses: The dithyramb was an ode to

Dionysus. It was usually performed by a chorus of fifty men dressed as satyrs -- mythological half-human, half-goat servants of Dionysus. They played drums, lyres and flutes, and chanted as they danced around a statue of Dionysus.

In the 6th c. bce Thespis of Attica added an actor who interacted with the chorus. This actor was called the protagonist.

In 534 BC, the ruler of Athens, Pisistratus, changed the Dionysian Festivals and instituted drama competitions. Thespis won the first competition in 534 BC.

Tragic Tetralogies Each tragic dramatist had to present

a trilogy of tragedies: connected narratively or dramatically

The entire trilogy was performed in one day.

The trilogy was followed by a satyr play - mocking and lightening the seriousness of the tragedies

A Tetralogy, then, is a series of 4 plays: 3 tragedies and one satyr play

TRAGIC STRUCTURE

4-5 alternating scenes and choral odes, including the

PROLOGOS: Introductory scene PARADOS: Entry of chorus

EPISODEION STASIMON

PAEAN: a hymn of praise to the gods

EXODOS: final scene

EPODE: final ode.

ARISTOTLE’STHREE UNITIES

Aristotle’s On Tragedy is usually considered the first piece of Western dramatic criticism. In it, he proclaimed that tragedy must follow the 3 unities: UNITY OF TIME: one day UNITY OF PLACE: one setting UNITY OF ACTION: one plot

AESCHYLUS 525-456 bce

General in Persian Wars -- fought at Marathon, Salamis, Platea

Fierce proponent of Athenian ideals

The first of the great Athenian dramatists, was also the first to express the agony of the individual caught in conflict.

Credited with adding the second actor

Only extant trilogy: The Oresteia Agamemnon The Libation Bearers The Eumenides

SOPHOCLES 496 - 406

bce Wrote over 100 plays,

but only seven survive Credited with adding the

third actor Known as actor as well

as dramatist Most interested in

human dynamics THEBAN PLAYS:

Oedipus the King Oedipus at Colonnus Antigone

EURIPIDES c.480-406 bce

The last of the three great Greek tragic dramatists -- 17 plays survive

Explored the theme of personal conflict within the polis and the depths of the individual

Disgust with events of Pelopennesian War brought about disillusionment with Athens

Men and women bring disaster on themselves because their passions overwhelm their reason

TRAGIC ACTIONARETE, ARISTEIA: excellence

HUBRIS: arrogance

HAMARTIA: fatal mistake

PERIPETEIA: reversal of fortune

ANAGNORISIS: understanding

KATHARSIS

ORIGINS of OLD COMEDY Arose from komos : songs of revelry,

charms to avert evil, prayers for fertility sung to Dionysus

Chorus dressed ludicrously Audience responded to choral komos

and were gradually admitted into chorus

Chorus became two-part group with antiphonal song

CONVENTIONS of OLD COMEDY

Scene set on Athenian street

“Events seldom occur – they are merely talked about”

Masks and fantastic costumes

Satiric of contemporary events and public figures

Bawdy

COMIC STRUCTURE

Komos: final choral song and exit in wild revelry

4-5 alternating scenes and choral odes

illustrating the outcome of the agon

Prologos: introductory scene

Parados: entry of 24 member chorus dressed in fantastic

costumeAgon: argument “just prior to the agon, the leader of the chorus always asks

one contender to present his argument, and it is this contender who always loses”

Parabasis: chorus’s great song

Episodeion Stasimon

ARISTOPHANESc. 448 - 380 BCE

30+ plays; 11 extant; 6 first prizes

Plays include Clouds Wasps Birds Lysistrata Frogs (Lenaia 405)

Critique of Euripides & Socrates: reactionary conservative; social critic

Plato's epitaph for Aristophanes : “The Graces, seeking a shrine that could not fall, discovered the soul of Aristophanes.”

New Comedy By 317 BC, a new form had evolved that

resembled modern farces: mistaken identities, ironic situations, ordinary characters and wit.

Basic plot: Boy meets girl, complications arise, boy gets girl – ends with betrothal or marriage.

5 act structure: acts divided by interludes performed by the chorus

Stock characters: young lovers, parasite, lecherous old men, clever servants, etc.

Social rather than political satire

MENANDER 342-292 bce

1905 a manuscript was discovered in Cairo that contained pieces of five Menander plays, and in 1957 a complete play, Diskolos (The Grouch, 317 BC), was unearthed in Egypt.

Menander’s comedy with its emphasis on mistaken identity, romance and situational humor, became the model for subsequent comedy, from the Romans to Shakespeare to Broadway.

Parts of Menander’s comedies found their way into plays by

Roman playwrights: Plautus and TerenceShakespeare's Comedy of ErrorsStephen Sondheim's A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum.

The End