My school life in a book

Drama cat

The type of stage used:
The stage used in ancient greek was called and amphitheatre. It was shapped like a bowl. It was on a hill (so they were placed outisde) that way the audience could look down from the hill to the bottom where the stage was. They could hold at least 14,000 people. They built these amphitheatres in such a way that the sound from the actors would bounce off the steps of the seating area and reach the top. Meaning all of the audience could hear the actors speaking. The different parts of the amphitheater consisted of the theatron which is where the audience would sit, the orchestra which is where the chorus would perform, the parodas which is on both sides of the amphitheatre one is for entering the other for exiting. The proskenion which is the actual stage where the actors would perform, the skene is the background for the play.

Characters:
Character types were deciphered on what type of play they were performing, most characters were men, women, gods and goddesses. Sometimes those characters were split in two traits. Them being sad or surprised, some being excited. These emotions the characters wore had them in groups almost like cults. Some god/goddess characters that were in plays from Ancient Greek were

Costumes:
All actors were male so when a female character is portrayed what did they do? Every character and actor had to wear a mask. They covered the whole face with very over the top emotions. This was done so people further back in the theatron could see what type of characters were used in the play. All actors wore them and if the character had two emotions in a scene some of the masks had two designs on each side. What they had to do was turn the mask and Ta da another emotion for that character. Makeup on actors weren't really necessary because of the mask but for touch ups they applied the makeup onto the mask. Wigs were used mostly for female characters but were used for males as well. Some gods and goddesses like Athena, Poseidon and Zeus they had very regal outfits with clean robes with hinted gold in the clothes to make them seem holy.

Acting styles:
Acting styles weren't really developed as they are now but they had 3 main genres. The three genres used in Greek theatre was tradgey, comedy and satyr. Tradgdy had terms tht fell under love, loss, pride, abuse of power and the relationship between god and men. Comedy had terms that fell under satirical and mocked men of power and their foolish vanity. Satyr dealt with inappropriate jokes for younger audiences. It had more of an adult theme with crude and vile storylines. Actual acting styles used were over exaggerated movements.

The intended audience:
Comedy was something for all ages, it had jokes that most would understand and relevant storylines that made it comedic. Tragedy had more of a give off to older audiences with more complex and historical storylines. Tragedy was more of a serious type of drama then comedy. Satyr was DEFINITELY meant for older audiences that could take offensive jokes in a good way.

The purpose of the performance:
The purpose for the performance was in honour of the God Dionysus. Dionysus was the God of wine and fertility. To honour him they had festival around sailing season (around March and April) this meant a wider range of people from all types of places could see the plays. Greeks were competitive and decided that if your play won the competition your name and the plays name would be engraved on the theatre wall. Sometimes other gods/goddesses would be celebrated at the festival of Dionysus but he was the number one God to worship at this time. The festivals where hosted in the city of Dionysia. Play writes such as Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes and Menander got to see their plays being performed and got to compete for Dionysus. All genres where able to be shown at the festival.

Story lines or plots:
'Orestia' by Aeschylus
The play was classified as a Tragedy
This was about a character called Orestes who kills his mother Clytemnestra. In revenge he kills her because of his father Agamemnon. Orestes is pursued and brought to trial and Athena, goddess of wisdom acts as judge to either let him live or die. This brings the narrative between the heroes struggle for doing the right thing, the hero being Orestes.

'Antigone' by Sophocles
The play was identified as a Tragedy and won first prize with this play
This play was about a young lady who refuses to stand by her uncle King Creon. Her brother died when he rose against King Creon in battle and his spirit was left to wonder as he did not receive a proper burial. This tugs on the violations between men and God.

Aristophanes and Menander were more known for the comedic write that poked fun at politicians, philosophers, and fellow artists.

Special effects:
Since ancient Greeks didn't have the technology we have now they had very creative ways to make the plays seem believable. For a god character they had a crane type machine of to the side of the proskenion (deus ex machina= God from the machine). Someone who used this technique a lot was Eruipides, a play write who had a lot of god characters in his plays. Another special effect is when a character died they would fall into a type of carriage and people would push the carriage and 'dead' character of stage to backstage. Some skenes had trapdoors like we do know.

Lighting:
Most plays were held during day time through sunset. It was hard to have a play at night because they didn't have electrical lights. To illuminate light they would have torches with mirrors or something reflective to make it brighter. Other then that they had them mostly during the day where the lighting was optimal because of the bright sun.

Scenery:
The scenery was mostly focused on the skene which ended being the scene background known today. The skene was supposed to be just a building for characters to change their masks. Soon it changed to the background of the plays. Some walls were painted completely to have more of an effect to a scene. Over time as the skene was changed from a small building to huge pillars at some points so people further back in the theatron could see the scenery.

How back then influenced today:
It's funny how little things change a lot down the road. For instinct we still use trapdoors. For flying characters we still use an updated deus ex machina. We use special equipped harnesses for safety. We were also influenced by the amphitheatres, the same type of structure remains except now placed inside with lots of lights and microphones. Styles like over exaggerating goes a long way for people who sit at the back of the audience. It shows how the little movements are brought out for others for all to see

Bibliography :
Witnessed on the 31/08/17 Title: Greek tragedy: setting the stage today, published on the 1/02/08: http://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/greek-tragedy-setting-the-stage-today
Witnessed on the 31/08/17 Title: Skene Ancient Greek theatre, published N/A: https://www.britannica.com/art/skene
Witnessed on the 31/08/17 Title: Ancient Greek Theatre, published on the 25/03/13: http://www.ancient.eu/Greek_Comedy/
Witnessed on the 1/09/17 Title: The First Plays About Gods & Goddesses in Ancient Greek, published N/A: http://classroom.synonym.com/first-plays-gods-goddesses-ancient-greece-14430.html
Witnessed on the 1/09/17 Title: Acting and Greek Theatre: Honoring Dionysus, published on the 4/02/17: http://etc.ancient.eu/culture/acting-greek-theatre-honoring-dionysus/

Witnessed on the 7/08/17 Title: Seshat, The Scribe, published N/A: http://www.crystalinks.com/seshat.html
Witnessed on the 7/08/17 Title: Scribes in ancient Egypt, published N/A: http://www.ancientegyptonline.co.uk/scribe.html
Oxford big ideas, humanities by Mark Easton|Maggy Saldais|Vladimir Dumovic|Geraldine Carrodus|Christian Machar: chapter 10.4 on page