Theatre I Spring Semester TOT Review

Elizabethan theatre (named for Queen Elizabeth 1 of England) flourishes with playwright William Shakespeare.

534 BCE Thespis, who is credited with introducing the first actor, wins the first contest for drama in Athens, Greece.

471 BCE Playwright Sophocles introduces the third actor in tragedy and writes Antigone.

Entr'acte - similar to the overture, an instrumental number performed by the orchestra at the beginning of a second act.

Traveling troupes of actors begin wandering Britain and Europe, Theatre began to flourish in India and Asia too.

In 3100 BCE (Before Common Era), the Egyptian Coronation Festival play celebrates the accession to power of a Pharaoh.

Score - the written melodies / notes of music, created by a composer.

I-Kher-nefert, the first director and actor mentioned in recorded history, produces the Abydos Passion Play in what era?

Religious theatre performances, called Miracle plays, are performed throughout Europe in 1100’s. 

One of the oldest ancestors of musical theater. Originated in Italy at the beginning of the Baroque era.

179 BCE First wooden theatre built in Rome, 80 BCE First Roman amphitheatre built at Pompeii.

Ballad is the plot and the general spoken dialogue; often devised by someone other than the composer or lyricist.

Pantomime introduced in Roman theatre. Actors dressed in ordinary clothes, without wigs and masks, performed as mimes.

In China, Noh and Kabuki theatre develop with masked actors and puppets performing plays.

The person who designs the dance movements in a show is the . . .

335-323 BCE Philosopher Aristotle writes The Poetics which sets the standards for tragedy.

The overture is a separate instrumental number played at the beginning of an opera or musical.

Intermission is a period of rest between acts of a show, the house lights are raised, the audience can move about.

65 BCE First permanent Roman theatre built of stone.

Playwright Sophocles adds a second actor and writes The Persians, the earliest surviving Greek play.

The earliest recorded plays were Egyptian tablets dating back to 2000 BCE.

Theatre also excels in Germany and in 1660 women are allowed to perform on stage.

Ballad - a type of song, usually strophic, which relates a story over the course of several verses.

55 tablets/plays, called the Pyramid Texts, were found in tombs and pyramids from the Egyptian period.

Musical comedy is an European-derived genre which developed in the late 19th century.