THE ELIZABETHAN

THEATRE

Lecturer Dr. Oana-Alis Zaharia

 1.EARLY MODERN VIEWS ON THEATRE

 Shakespeare’s plays - written and meant for

performance.
 Study his plays not only as literary texts but also as
blueprints for a live performance  understand the
broader cultural context in which they were written and
performed.
 The Elizabethan period saw the birth and meteoric
growth of England’s commercial theatres.
 Prominent dramatic authors /playwrights: William
Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, Cristopher Marlowe, Thomas
Kyd, John Webster, Thomas Dekker, Francis Beaumont
and John Fletcher.

 The English Renaissance, or the Early Modern period,

spanning the late sixteenth and early seventeenth
centuries, is firmly identified in the cultural imagination
with a flourishing outpouring of arts, sciences,and
intellectual exploration.
 Yet the same historical moment that saw the explosive rise
of the theatre, also saw some of history’s most furious
attacks on the theatre.
 Condemnations in sermons and treatises and politicians
banished playhouses to the outskirts of the city of London,
and eventually closed them altogether in 1642.
The opposition of the City Fathers.

 Complaints against the theatre:

 The crowds that gathered caused disturbance; they

attracted criminals and prostitutes and they spread
infectious diseases.
Acting was not a ‘respectable’ profession
Actors - untrustworthy people.
Female roles were played by boys  confusing sexual
identities
 Actors endangered the stability of class divisions by
flouting/disregarding sumptuary laws by wearing robes
intended only for kings or other nobles.

sumptuary laws – Elizabethan regulations that restricted

according to social class and income the types of fabric, the
colours and styles of clothing people could wear.

the theatre was seen to show social rank to be merely

conventional and, thus, to teach a subversive message.
 Religious complaints:

 the theatre encouraged the immorality so often

dramatized in the plays’ contents: murder, lust, incest,
and adultery – COPYCAT EFFECT

 the theater’s claim to teach and improve its

spectators, and to do so more pleasurably than
preachers could, threatened to make the latter
redundant.

 the theater competed with the church for both

attendance and moral authority.
  1577- John Northbrooke - people “shame not to say
and affirm openly that players are as good as
sermons, and that they learn as much or more at a
play than they do at God’s word preached.”

 Despite Puritan objections, theatre companies received the

patronage of the court and the aristocracy.

 By supporting the theatre, monarchs shared in and took

credit for its fame and glamour, thus protecting the
institution until the Civil War broke out in 1642.
 TOPICALITY – was another significant feature
of the early theatre, a way of exploring current
political and social issues in a time without
newspapers.
- The most pointedly political theatre was
staged at London’s Law School, the Inns of
Court. Even though these performances were
not “public” in the same way as those at the
Theatre or the Globe, nor “private” (meaning
restricted to those who could pay a substantial
entrance fee), like those at Paul’s or Blackfriars,
they did reach their own specialist audience of
lawyers, judges, diplomats, and courtiers, often
including the monarch.
One important staging at the Inner Temple was
the first English tragedy, Gorboduc, in January
1562.

- A courtier’s report of the event survives,

including his comments on the effective dumb
shows that begin each act, and on the play’s
topicality in arguing the case for Elizabeth to
marry and provide an heir for the throne—this
was indeed daring, given the Queen’s presence
in the audience.
The use of plays to influence audiences
ideologically is part of the argument about the
creation in 1583 of the Queen’s Men, an elite
troupe of players who performed in England,
Scotland, Ireland, and Europe as possible
intelligence-gatherers and promoters of
Protestant politics.
 2. OUTDOOR THEATRES

Contexts of playing
Elizabethan theatre - a collaborative medium that involved
playwrights, actors, playhouses, sets, costumes, and
audiences .
 Prior to 1567 plays were performed in inn-yards and in the
great halls of noblemen's houses, of the Inns of Court, or of
Oxford and Cambridge Colleges.
 1567 - The Red Lion in Stepney, the first known purpose -
built playhouse erected by John Brayne.
 J. Brayne
 1576 - First Blackfriars
 1577 -The Curtain
 1587 - The Rose
 1595 – The Swan
 1599 – The Globe. It is here that Shakespeare’s company, The
Chamberlain's Men, performed his plays.
Acting companies sought the protection of aristocrats. The Lord
Chamberlain in 1594 was Henry, Lord Hunsdon, Chamberlain to Queen
Elizabeth.
- Aristocratic patronage could protect players from the city of London
authorities, who were usually eager to curtail their activities.
THE GLOBE
3. THE STRUCTURE OF AN
ELIZABETHAN THEATRE
A view from the audience’s
perspective
Costumes = the most important and
expensive item , the real thing
- The symbolic structure of the stage
+ various uses of the stage (bear baiting, cock fights)
Presentational acting- to yield to more mimetic acting

The Groundlings - the audience that stood in the open yard around the stage (also
called the pit)
-Stage-gallery interaction (especially-groundlings)
-the “apron” stage /proscenium

 Shakespeare himself made reference to the form of the Elizabethan theatre in the
Prologue to his play Henry V
“Pardon, gentles all,
The flat unraised spirits that hath dared
On this unworthy scaffold to bring forth
So great an object. Can this cockpit hold
The vasty fields of France? Or may we cram
Within this wooden O the very casques
That did affright the air at Agincourt?” (Henry V)
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