THEATRE TODAY
Chapter 10
Theatre today exists on the stage...not on power point presentations
or in a textbook...
It is being performed right now...
HAMILTON on Broadway (NYC)
In the world’s great cities...
Tokyo
São Paulo
Onstage at schools...
On great stages...
...and small ones.
It is waiting to be explored...
Theatre is a business...
Weekly Grosses
On Broadway
...and an art...
What is happening in the
theatre today that will last into
the future?
Theatre reflects its time...
THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE DOG IN THE NIGHT-TIME on Broadway, 2015
Race
Book of Mormon
A flash mob dance?
Street theatre
Addressing social issues
Or political issues
Nicholas Kent’s GUANTANAMO (2004), Tricycle Theatre, London
Street Theatre in New Zealand
about the Falun Gong
Postmodern experiments
Postmodern
theatre is
self-referential
and a blend
of the
representational
and the
presentational
as in the musical
URINETOWN,
produced on
Broadway
beginning
in 2001
But it is not really new...
Tom Stoppard’s ROSENCRANTZ AND GUILDENSTERN ARE DEAD (1966)
Or experimental...
Neil Simon’s LAUGHTER ON THE 23rd FLOOR (1996)
Postmodernism explores discontinuity,
derived from the Dada Movement from 1916
The Drowsy Chaperone, 2006
Beckett’s ROCKABYE
Comment upon its own
conventions
Caryl Churchill’s CLOUD 9
A nonlinear theatre
In THE INVENTION OF LOVE,
2 actors play the same
character at two stages in
his life...
The narrator in THE GLASS MENAGERIE
moves forward and backward in time...
ANGELS IN AMERICA moves
freely through time
I AM MY OWN WIFE (2003)
In the U.S., the 21st century
theatre is an OPEN Theatre
Joseph Chaikin’s
OPEN THEATRE
produced influential
experimental works
off Broadway in the
1960s and 70s such
as Jean-Claude Van
Itallie’s THE SERPENT
The Propeller is an all-male acting company directed by Edward
Hall. Pictured here, their production of THE TAMING OF THE
SHREW from 2006. It toured in London, Perth (AU), New York
and Hong Kong following its opening in Stratford on Avon.
Today’s Theatre is diverse
El Teatro Campesino has a long
history in the American West.
Lorraine Hansbury
1959
VIET ROCK
Omaha’s MAGIC THEATRE long championed the
works of Megan Terry.
Ntozake Schange
David Henry Hwang
M Butterfly, 1988
Nilo Cruz is Cuban born and
won the Pulitzer in 2003
Sarah Ruhl enjoys a strong
career as a playwright
The Vibrator Play, 2009
The Clean House, 2004
Eurydice, 2006
EURYDICE at ESU Theatre - 2011
2008
Passion Play, 2010
STAGE KISS, 2014
Today’s theatre is global
Critic Marvin Carlson uses the term MACARONIC
(originally a mixture of Latin and early Italian and
the source of our term macaroni) Many plays in
Our time use multiple languages...
ZOOT SUIT by Luis Valdez
was originally produced by
El Teatro Campesino
Theatre de Soleil produced LE DERNIER
CARAVANSERAIL (The Last Caravan) at Lincoln
Center in 2005 in French and English.
Tony Kushner’s HOMEBODY/KABUL
(2004)
A Theatre of Difference
Mart Crowley’s BOYS IN THE BAND (1968)
Martin Sherman’s BENT (1979) pictured
ANGELS IN AMERICA (1992)
Deaf West Theatre presents
BIG RIVER (2003)
Pippin, 2009
Deaf actors in SPRING AWAKENING (2015)
Additional attributes of
Theatre Today
Nontraditional Casting
Spectacular Theatre
Verbatim Theatre
(My Name is Rachel Corrie pictured)
Dangerous Theatre
Theatre of Community
Movement Art and
Dance-Theatre
Dance Theatre
Susan Stroman’s CONTACT (2000)
Pilobolus Dance
Mummenschanz
Matthew Bourne’s CARMAN
England’s NATIONAL THEATRE (2002)
Solo Theatre
Lily Tomlin
Anna Deveare Smith in LET
ME DOWN EASY (2008)
Eric Bogosian in TALK RADIO (1987)
3 leaders in theatre today
Robert Wilson
Peter Brook
Julie Taymor
Theatre Today
Where can you find it?
New York City
Broadway
Off Broadway and Off-off Broadway
Regional American Theatre (non-profit)
Steppenwolf (Chicago)
Guthrie Theatre (Minneapolis)
American Repertory Theatre (Boston)
Mark Taper Forum (Los Angeles)
Seattle Repertory Theatre
Arena Stage (Washington, DC)
Theatre Today
Where can you find it?
Theatre Today
Where can you find it?
International Theatre
National Theatre, RSC (UK)
Comedie Francaise (Paris)
Stratford Festival (Canada)
International Theatre Festivals
Edinburgh (Scotland, UK)
Amsterdam (Netherlands)
Spoleto (Italy)
Conclusions about Theatre Today?
We cannot draw conclusions because the
theatre is current...it is a process that is
ongoing.
The ancient Heraclitis said “We cannot
step twice in the same river; when I
step in a river for a second time,
neither I nor the river are the same.”