Unit 3- Final Thoughts

This final unit of theatre history catches us up to present day. More theatrical experimentation led to new and various production experiences. The changing society led to new accomplishments and strides from various emerging communities such as African-American theatre and women’s theatre. New voices led to the theatrical landscape becoming its own melting pot of human experiences. New forms of theatre provoked social change from ordinary people, such as The Open Theatre in the midst of New York City’s Times Square. Even today, contemporary theatre is exciting because of these advances by people- their input creating stimulating new works and experiences.

4/30/13- Female Playwrights

-any non-conflict models that can be used effectively for play structures?

Gertrude Stein, 1874-1946
-stream-of-consciousness writing style
-"The Mother of Us All" (libretto of 1946 opera)

Susan Glaspall, 1876-1948
-"Trifles", 1916
-won Pulitzer Prize
-worked with Federal Theatre Project
-Provincetown Players with Eugene O'Neill

Sophie Treadwell, 1885-1970
-Machinal, 1928 (The Life Machine in London premiere)

Clare Booth Luce, 1903-1987
-congresswoman, ambassador, & playwright
-1936, The Women

Lillian Hellman, 1905-1984
-The Children's Hour
-The Little Foxes
-blacklisted by Hollywood during the McCarthy era

Alice Childress, 1920-1994
-first black woman to produce her play AND direct it
-Trouble in Mind

Lorraine Hansberry, 1930-1965
-A Raisin in the Sun
-first Broadway-produced play written by a woman

Maria Irene Fornes (1930- )
-Mud, 1983
-Fefu & Her Friends, 1977 (rotate around rooms!)
-won 9 Obies (Obie = covers off-Broadway awards)
-mentor of Nilo Cruz
-immigrated from Cuba when she was just 15 years old

Adrienne Kennedy
-Funnyhouse of a Negro
-surrealist writing style

Megan Terry (1932- )
-Viet Rock, 1962

Tina Howe
-Coastal Disturbances
-Tony-nominated, 2-time Pulitzer nominee

Caryl Churchill
-Cloud Nine, 1979
-most famous Feminist playwright of 20th Century
-Vinegar Tom
-influenced by Brecht & Artaud

Marsha Norman, 1947-
-'night, Mother (1983)
-Getting Out, 1977
-Pulitzer winner
-wrote libretti for numerous Broadway musicals
(The Color Purple & The Secret Garden)

Ntozake Shange (1948- )
-For Colored Girls..... , 1975
-Obie winner
-Guggenheim fellow

Wendy Wasserstein, 1950-2006
-Tony & Pulitzer winner
-Guggenheim fellow
-Heidi Chronicles, 1988

Anna Deavere Smith, 1950-
-one woman shows
-Tony & Pulitzer-nominated
-known for many TV & film roles
-Fires in the Mirror, 1992

Paula Vogel
-How I Learned to Drive, 1997
-Pulitzer winner
-KCACTF Award named after her
-The Baltimore Waltz
-Brechtian devices (i.e. Chorus) to prevent audiences from getting too freaked out by subject matters

Beth Henley, 1952-
-Abundance
-Crimes of the Heart
-grad of SMU in Dallas
-Pulitzer winner
-Magic Realism or Realism

Theresa Rebeck, 1959-
-Omnium Gatherum, 2003 (visually difficult, but great play- like No Exit)
-MFA and PhD
-worked on NYPD Blue, Law & Order, & Smash

Omnium Gatherum

Yasmina Reza, 1959-
-Art, 1994
-God of Carnage, 2006
-French playwright
-International award-winner

Suzan-Lori Parks
-Topdog/Underdog
-MacArthur Award
-Pulitzer winner

Lynn Nottage, 1964-
-Ruined, 2008
-Intimate Apparel, 2003
-plays deal with issues in Africa

Rebecca Gilman, 1964-
-The Glory of Living
      -really no catharsis in this piece
-Boy Gets Girl
-hard subject matters

Regina Taylor
-Crowns
-first black woman to play Juliet on Broadway

Julia Jordan, 1968-
-Tatjana in Color, 2004
-writes for As the World Turns

Sarah Ruhl, 1974-
-Eurydice
-Dead Man's Cell Phone
-In the Next Room
-MacArthur fellow & Pulitzer winner

Dead Man's Cell Phone

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Like African-Americans, women have made huge strides in their theatrical accomplishments. Lillian Hellman was a brilliant playwright, having written two of my favorite plays: The Children’s Hour and The Little Foxes. Unfortunately she was blacklisted by Hollywood during the McCarthy era. Anna Deavere Smith is a brilliant playwright and actress. She performs dozens of characters in her one-woman shows that deal with very serious topics in places where something catastrophic has recently occurred. Yasmina Reza and Sarah Ruhl are two of the best & biggest modern female playwrights. They have both already produces multiple hit plays that are currently influencing the landscape of contemporary theatre.

4/25/13- Hispanic Theatre

3 Primary Forms since 1970
-Puerto Rican/Nuyorican (/Dominican)
-Chicano/Mexican
-Cuban

Chicano/Mex-American
-El Teatro Campesino (farm workers' theatre)
    -cultural arm of United Farm Workers (enacted events inspired by lives of audience)
Luis Valdez- Zoot Suit
Gente de Teatro (based in Houston!)

Cuban-American Writers
-Maria Irene Fornes (Fefu & Her Friends.... perception)
-Manuel Martin
-Ivan Acosta
-Nilo Cruz
-Mario Pena
-Dolores Prida
-Omar Torres

Miguel Pinero
-cofounder of Nuyorican Poets Cafe
-"Short Eyes"

Jose Rivera
-first Puerto Rican playwright/screenwriter to be Oscar-nominated

Asian-American Theatre
-David Henry Hwang---- M. Butterfly

4/23/13- African-American Theatre

What constitutes it?
-writer? story? characters? actors? audience? producing theatre?

Samuel Hay's Two General Directions
1. The Black Experience

• characters off the streets, out of joints and drives
• themes directed towards African-Americans
• language of ordinary folks dressed up with poetry, music & dance

2. The Black Arts (like Tyler Perry)

• characters as model humans & historical figures
• themes notices and understood by white people

African Grove Theatre, 1821

-James Hewlitt

William Wells Brown

-first play published by an African-American, this comic 1858 melodrama depicted 2 types of African-Americans: cliche and respectable, put together

Ira Aldridge, "The African Roscius" (Roscius = Thespian)

(Minstrel shows- both races)

The Black Vaudeville song and dance team

-Bert Williams and George Walker ("In Dahomey")

Eubie Blake, 1883-1983

-ragtime and musicals

"Shuffle Along"

Charles Sydney Gilpin & Paul Robeson as "Emperor Jones"

-I want a Black actor to play this Black role (even though Broadway was also segregated)

Harlem Renaissance (1920s thru early 1930s)

-a celebration of creativity

-Langston Hughes (1902-1967)

-Negritude- we're doing our things, our way

Porgy & Bess, 1935

-written for black by whites (Gershwin)

Voodoo Macbeth, 1935

-The USA Work Program created jobs for people (Group: The Negro Unit)

-directed by Orson Welles

-took the Scottish Play and set it in Haiti for supernatural awareness

Voodoo Macbeth

"Swing Mikado" and "Hot Mikado"- versions of Rodgers & Hammerstein shows

Carmen Jones

-first Rodgers & Hammerstein show written for an all-black cast

Negro Repertory Company

-Androcles

-Lysistrata

DC: Howard Theatre

1943- Robeson was first time a black actor played Othello, opposite Uta Hagen as Desdemona

American Negro Theatre (1940-1944)

-biggest alum: Harry Bellafonte

Black Arts Movement (mid60s- mid70s)

"the artistic sister of the Black Power Movement"

Afro-Centricity- shift from Negro/black to African-American heritage

New Lafayette Theatre (1968-early 70s)

-to give whites a view

LeRoi James/Amiri Baraka (1935- )

-Dutchman, 1964

-modeled like Ionesco's "The Lesson"

Lorraine Hansbery

-first African-American to have show on Broadway

-"A Raisin in the Sun"

Ensemble Theatre in Houston, Texas!!

Ntozake Shange

-"For Colored Girls..."

-writes "choreopoems"- poetry to be staged with wonderful movement

Adrienne Kennedy

-"Sleep Deprivation Chamber"

-best known: "Funnyhouse of a Negro"

Suzan-Lori Parks

-Venus

-365 Days/365 Plays

-In the Blood

-Topdog/Underdog (Pulitzer Prize-winning play of 2002)

August Wilson (1945-2005)

-wrote a play for each decade, to give insight into African-American history with each family

"Fences"

George Wolfe 

-The Colored Museum

-dark comedy dealing with biting issues
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African-Americans have made huge strides in their own theatre culture in America; they have come a long way from the Minstrel shows of long ago. I particularly enjoy the Voodoo Macbeth production, which was directed by Orson Welles for Broadway. Suzan-Lori Parks’ Topdog/Underdog, a Pulitzer Prize-winning play, is a perfect example of how far African-Americans have come. One of the biggest African-American playwrights in the last century was August Wilson. His play, Fences, stands as one of the most widely-known African-American plays. I love that Wilson captures history with every play that he has written.

4/18/13- Svoboda & Grotowski

Josef Svoboda
most important person in 21st Century theatre technology & design
considered himself a "scenographer"
Laterna Magika
Black Theatre Prague- Black Light Performance
Prague Quadrennial- Theatre Design Olympics

Svoboda's design work
ScenEGOgraphy: The Stage Designer as Author

Svoboda

Lee Breur (with group Maboo Minds)
what makes theatre work or not work?
Red Horse Animation
animations are semi or autobiographical
experimented with Bunraku-style puppets
The Gospel at Colonus- embellishing the Chorus part of Oedipus

Jerry Grotowski
1933-1999
Book of Articles: "Towards a Poor Theatre"
"we can't compete with film, so why do we try?"
get theatre back to most organic thing it can be: just the audience, actors, creativity & imagination
Most Famous: "The Constant Prince"
"Poor Theatre"- artists get rid of tools; use your own body/voice to create visual moments and experiences
"Akropolis"- Quality of Movement

4/16/13- The Open Theatre

The Open Theatre 1963-1973

Founder: Joseph Chaikin (1935-2003)
auteur- "director is god"
collaborator- shepherd guiding the process
Chaikin believed in a Wheel, not a Pyramid hierarchy
Famous for "The Serpent", 1967
Very politically-conscious
"The Terminal" (another outline scenario)

Chaikin

Jean-Claude van Itallie
"America Hurrah!"
-The Interview (great show; Part 1)
-TV
-Motel

La Mama (Gray Shapeless Monster)--- Experimental Theatre

Joe Chaikin & Sam Shepard, 1984
-Shepard was the "it" playwright in 80s/90s
-Chaikin had a stroke, so Shepard stepped in
"Tongues", 1972
Shepard- Magic Realism

• like Labyrinth or Pan's Labyrinth
• includes overly violent movies like Machete or Django Unchained

Shepard's "Buried Child"

-Fool For Love

Shepard

Bread and Puppet- indoor & outdoor theatre

-humongous puppets

-feed audiences (break bread together)

Richard Schechner

-radical stagings of classical material

-Dionysus in '69

-Yokastas Redux, 2005

-explorer of environmental theatre

1968- Britain disbanded censorship

-first time since 1574 (that makes it 394 years!)

The WOOSTER GROUP

-"Chronology"

-Deconstructive Theatre

-Route 1 & 9- a deconstructed Our Town

Founding Member: Willem Dafoe

-LSD....Just the High Points (deconstructed The Crucible)

Dafoe

4/11/13- The 60's & 70's in Theatre

Pulitzer Prize Winners: Modern Masters of Drama
(O'Neill, Williams & Miller)

Alan Kaprow's "18 Happenings in Six Parts" (1959)
-experimental theatre!
-we can do theatre anywhere
Words, 1961
(sometimes called "happenings")
(Even haunted houses are meta-theatrical activities)

The Living Theatre
founded by: Julian Beck & Judith Malina
"The Strike Support Oratorium", NYC 1974
agit-prop (agitational propaganda = protests)
Tableaux- very dramatic still picture (even curtain calls count)
Chaikin and Gary Goodrow in The Connection, 1960
Frankenstein, 1975

Malina & Beck

The Living Theatre's Seven Imperatives

1. In the Street: outside of the cultural and economic limitations of institutionalized theatre.
2. Free: Performance for the proletariat, the Lumpenproletariat, the poor, the poorest of the poor, without admission charge.
3. Open Participation: Break thru, Unification: Collective Creation.
4. Spontaneous Creation: Improvisation: Freedom.
5. Physical life: Body: Sexual Liberation.
6. Change: Increase of Conscious Awareness: Permanent Revolution: Unfixed (Flexible, Free) Ideology.
7. Acting as Action.