French Neoclassism, British Restoration, and early 18th Century Theatre

French Neoclassism, British Restoration, and early 18th

Century Theatre

Brief History Lesson - France• From 1550-1620 much civil strife and wars

– Not many professional companies, theatres were rented and fees charged.

– Farces became popular• In 1625 Cardinal Richelieu comes to power and in 1635 he

establishes the French Academy - a prestigious literary academy to maintain purity of the French culture, language, and literature

• In 1645 Giacamo Torelli is hired to redesign the court theaters. After this, there were always at least 2 professional theatre companies in Paris and often more.

• With the decline of religious strife and the establishment of the Academy educated men began to write plays.

• Neoclassicism is still the determining factor of whether a play is “good” or not.

• Plays written in rhyming couplets (verse) most of the time.

French Playwrights• Pierre Corneille (1606-1684)

– Founder of French tragedy (although he wrote 6 comedies)

– Most famous play Le Cid (1637) was based on Spanish folklore. The story revolves around the love 2 people have for one another - 1 father insults the other and then in a subsequent dual the father of the daughter is killed in a dual by the son of the other. In the end the King allows the 2 to marry - with a wedding date set for a year after the final scene.

– According to Neoclassical ideals this is NOT a good play: Unities are observed (takes place in a single play) and there is Unity of Action (no subplots) BUT while Unity of Time is observed, Verisimilitude is stretched (too much happens in 24 hours), Decorum is violated (the heronine agrees to marry the man who kills her father - something no respectable woman of her class would do).

QuickTime™ and a decompressorare needed to see this picture.

French Playwrights• Jean Racine (1639-1699)

– Tragic Dramatist and rival to Corneille– Most famous play Phedre (1677) which not only

established him as a peer to Corneille, but established him with the younger generation as the leading French Dramatist

– Story line to Phedre: Elaborating on the aftermath of the Trojan War, Andromaque shows Hector's widow, Andromache, caught in the crosscurrents of passion. Her captor, King Pyrrhus, forces a marriage with her, abandoning his fiancee, Hermione, who then instigates his assassination at the hands of her love-maddened suitor, Oreste.

QuickTime™ and a decompressor

are needed to see this picture.

French Playwrights- Moliere• Real name: Jean Baptists Poquelin

(1622-1673), born to a rich family, he drops the family social class to pursue a career on the stage (at age21)

• Marries actress Madeleine Bejart to create the L’Illustre Theatre (later joined by her brother and sister)

• Considered France’s leading comedic playwright • Both an actor and playwright who headed his own

theatrical troupe by 1660• Wrote most of the plays the troupe performed. • Played in the court of Louis XIV



Moliere (continued)• Influenced by commedia,Roman comedies, and early

French farce• Less witty then English restoration - more farcical and

“slapstick-y”• Clever verbal elegance and wit often overshadowed by

farcical business and visual gags (people came to see bits)

• Most famous plays:– School for Wives (1662)– The Miser (1668)– Tartuffe (1669)– Imaginary Invalid (1673) : Moliere (playing the lead)

dies a few hours after performing. Denied rites by the church (he was an actor), the King interceeds and grants him a Christian burial.

French Actors

• Highly oratorical/declamatory in style• Actors probably supplied their own

contemporary costumes • The careers of actors of either sex was

seen as morally wrong by the Chruch and actors were excommunicated.

• Actors took stage names that often described the typical roles they played

French Theaters • Both public and private • Often placed in existing structures (like tennis courts) that

were extremely narrow and the facilities for sets and scene changes were non-existent

• Performances took place twice a week starting at 2 or 3pm. Several works would be presented (a comic prologue, a tragedy, a farce, and finally a song)

• Nobles might sit on the side of the stage during the performance

• Spectators were notably vocal during performances• The place directly in front of the stage (without seats called

the “parterre” was reserved for men, but being the cheapest tickets was usually a mix of social groups. Elegant people watched the show from the galleries. Princes, musketeers, and royal pages were given free entry. “Honest” woman did not go to the theater until after 1630.

Brief History Lesson - England• Before 1642 - the royalty supported the theatre.• In 1642 the Puritan Revolution happens - Charles I is

beheaded and Oliver Cromwell takes over the country’s leadership.

• From 1642-1660 Theatre is outlawed as “immoral” (in England only)

• Charles II (Charles I’s son) returns from exile in France and is restored to the throne in 1660. He had lived in the court of Louis XIV and helped bring the styles of Italy and France to English Theatre.

• This type of theatre was designed primarily for the aristocracy and as a blacklash to the Purtian “ideal.

First Actresses (in England)• Considered novel and risque (especially in the

physical seduction scenes)

• In comedy - daringly suggestive comedy scenes became especially common.

• In tragedy - She-tragedy - tragic plays that focused on sufferings of an innocent and virtuous woman.

• Breeches Roles - actresses appeared in male clothes to play a witty heroine who is in hiding or who wants the freedom usually afforded to men.

Restoration Comedy of Manners

• Witty Dialog• Sophisticated sexual behavior of a highly

artificial and aristocratic society• “Virtue” comes from succeeding in catching a

lover or cuckolding a husband without getting caught

• “Honor” comes from reputation, not integrity• “Witty” - saying things in clever ways• Use of names to show character personality

traits (example: Mrs. Malaprop from “mal”=French for “ill” -- “ill appropriate”

English Playwrights of the Restoration

• William Congreve (1670-1729) - The Way of the World (1700)

• William Wycherly (1640-1715) - The Country Wife (1675)

• George Etheridge (1637-1691) - She Would If She Could

Plot Line of The Country Wife• Horner's impotence trick provides the main plot and the

play's organizing principle. The upper-class town rake Horner mounts a campaign for seducing as many respectable ladies as possible, first spreading a false rumour of his own impotence, in order to be allowed where no complete man may go. The trick is a great success and Horner has sex with many married ladies of virtuous reputation, whose husbands are happy to leave him alone with them. The Country Wife is driven by a succession of near-discoveries of the truth about Horner's sexual prowess (and thus the truth about the respectable ladies), from which he extricates himself by quick thinking and good luck. Horner never becomes a reformed character, but keeps his secret to the end and is assumed to go on merrily reaping the fruits of his planted misinformation, past the last act and beyond.

18th Century - Sentimentalism

• Characterized by over-emphasis or arousing sympathetic responses to misfortune

• Begins in England 1690s to 1730s

• Viewpoint at this point: people are good, their instincts let them retain goodness.

• Comedies pulled their characters from the rising middle class.

• Conservative, sentimental, moralistic

English Comedy Playwright

• Oliver Goldsmith (1731-1774) - wrote “laughing comedies” – Born in Ireland, son of a clergyman– Perennially in debt and addicted to gambling– Most famous play She Stoops to Conquer

(1773):Wealthy country man Mr. Hardcastle arranges for his daughter Kate to meet Charles Marlow, the son of a wealthy aristocrat, hoping the pair will marry. Unfortunately Marlow is nervous around upper-class women, yet the complete opposite around the lower-class females. On his first acquaintance with Kate, the latter realizes she will have to pretend to be common, to make marital relations with the man possible. Thus Kate stoops to conquer, by posing as a barmaid, hoping to put Marlow at his ease so he falls for her in the process.



English Comedy Playwright

• Richard Sheridan (1751-1816)– Born in Dublin to a fairly wealthy

family - mom playwright and novelist and dad a sometime actor-manager and author

– Became a member of Parliament in 1780– 2 Plays considered “most famous”– The Rivals (1775)– School for Scandal (1777)



English Playwrights - Serious

• Joseph Addison (1672-1719) – Father was Dean of Lichfield– Educated at Oxford– Most famous play Cato: The action of the

play involves the forces of Cato at Utica, awaiting the arrival of Caesar just after Caesar's victory at Thapsus (46 B.C.). The sons of Cato, Portius and Marcus, are both in love with Lucia, the daughter of Lucius, a senatorial ally of Cato. Juba, prince of Numidia, another fighting on Cato's side, loves Cato's daughter Marcia. Meanwhile, Sempronius, another senator, and Syphax, general of the Numidians, are conspiring secretly against Cato. In the final act, Cato commits suicide, leaving his supporters to make their peace with the approaching Caesar—an easier task after Cato's death, since he has been Caesar's most implacable foe



18th Century Staging• 2 doors in the proscenium opening on to

the apron• Most of the acting was done on the

apron• Theatre seating increased• Still gallries and boxes• Stock sets were used, lit by candle-light• Costumes were elaborate and

contemporary

18th Century Theatre (cont)• “Lines of business” - actors would play 1 kind of

role and seldom stray from it

• Companies used “possession of parts” - an agreement that when an actor joins a company he “owns” a particular role

• “Playing for points” was very common: getting applause and doing an encore after particular speeches; as you can imagine, this wasn’t very realistic

• The repertory system was commom: rotating a large number of plays.

Documents

French Neoclassism, British Restoration, and early 18th Century Theatre