TAPS 1250 TWENTIETH-CENTURY WESTERN THEATRE AND
PERFORMANCE
Spring 2013. Tuesdays and Thursdays, 1-2:20 p.m. Golub
Introduction:
“History is a nightmare from which I am trying to awaken.” – Stephen Daedelus in
Joyce’s Ulysses
“Periods of happiness…are the blank pages of history.”- G.W.F. Hegel in Lectures on the
Philosophy of History
“It’s a poor sort of memory that only works backwards.” – Lewis Carroll
THIS IS THE STORY OF A LINE THAT WOULD NOT STAY STRAIGHT. (WHAT
IS A TIMELINE, ANYWAY?)
THIS IS THE STORY OF A FRAME AND ITS REFERENCES.
THIS IS THE STORY OF MY CENTURY, AND HOW IT L(I)ED TO YOURS.
THIS IS THE STORY OF THE MOVING IMAGE, OF THE ONGOING
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THEATRE AND FILM
THIS IS ALL A DREAM.
THERE IS NO END TO THIS ANXIETY.
WHAT IF YOU WOKE UP AND FOUND YOURSELF ON A STAGE?
WHAT IF YOU FELL ASLEEP WHILE ON A STAGE?
WHAT IF YOU WOKE UP IN THE AUDIENCE AND SUDDENLY SAW WHAT
WAS REALLY HAPPENING ON THE STAGE? HOW WOULD YOU TELL OTHER
SPECTATORS WHAT IT WAS YOU SAW?
WHO CAN SAY, WHO’S THERE?
This course looks at the broad spectrum of theatre and cultural performance in twentiethcentury Western Europe and the United States, using the stage as a focusing structure and
mechanism and film as its dialogic partner. In the process, we will encounter various
definitions and examples of modernism and the avant-garde, including (but not limited
to) naturalism and realism, symbolism, expressionism, futurism, constructivism, dada and
surrealism, each movement regarded as being experimental in its time. We will consider
the historical contexts, as well as the aesthetic and cultural perspectives and concerns that
constituted the eventful century referred to by Charlie Chaplin and intellectual historians
as “Modern Times.”
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-------------------------Course Requirements:
• Regular class attendance. Missing more than three classes may result in a grade of NC.
• See relevant productions on campus and at local theatres.
•Two take-home short essay exams (to be prepared outside of class; you may use
sources). The first exam will be handed out in class on Thursday, March 7 (Week #7) and
will be due at the beginning of class on Tuesday, March 12 (Week #8). The second exam
will be handed out in class on Thursday, April 18 (Week #13) and will be due at the
beginning of class on Tuesday, April 23 (Week #14). These two exams together will
count for a total of 40% of your final grade for the course.
• One 10 minute oral report to be presented in class from one of the topics listed after
each lecture. You should speak to me to reserve a topic for your report. If you have a
preference, you should plan on talking to me right away. The oral report will be
accompanied by a one-page fact sheet to be turned in to me on the day of the report. It
may be necessary to stagger reports in a way other than noted on the syllabus. I will let
you know as the course develops if and when we need to do this. Topics should be
narrowed appropriately, in conference with me, and wherever possible the report should
contain meaningful reference to a specific historical production. If you prefer, you may
work in combination with another student or students to present a more
creative/performative version of the topic’s material but the presentation cannot last more
than 15 minutes. In such cases, the students who are collaborating on the presentation
will submit one fact sheet for the entire group. Please note too that the listing of more
possible report topics on one date rather than on another in the course outline does not
necessarily mean that more reports must be presented on that day. It just means that I
have listed more report topic options. Generally, there should not be more than two (and
only occasionally three) student reports presented on any given day. The oral report will
count for 30% of your final grade for the course.
• One 8-10 page final paper. This can be a historical/critical paper or an imaginative
written recreation of an historical performance. Whichever option you choose, your final
paper must be accompanied by a bibliography of the sources you consulted in writing the
paper. This final paper is due to me in my office by noon on Thursday, May 2 and will
count for 30% of your final grade for the course.
Required texts available at the Brown Bookstore (BB) on Thayer Street are listed
below. Copies of all required readings will also be placed on 3-hour reserve in the
Rockefeller Library (hereafter RL in the Course Outline).
• Artaud, Antonin. The Theatre and Its Double. Grove Press, 1994.
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• Beckett, Samuel, Waiting for Godot. New York: Grove Press, 2011.
• Braun, Edward. The Director and the Stage: From Naturalism to Grotowski. New
York: A&C Black, 2003.
• Brecht, Bertolt. Brecht on Theatre. New York: Hill and Wang, 1977.
• Caputi, Anthony, ed. Eight Modern Plays. 2nd ed. New York: W. W. Norton, 1991
(1966).
• Cardullo, Bert and Robert Knopf. Theatre of the Avant-Garde 1890-1950. New Haven:
Yale University Press, 2001. (Also available in electronic form through Josiah)
*Jarry, Alfred. Ubu. London: Nick Hern Books, 1997. (This is the complete Ubu trilogy.
I have also put the single play Ubu Roi on Rock course reserve. You are only required to
read Ubu Roi, but may be interested in reading the other two plays as well. With this in
mind, I also ordered the Ubu trilogy).
• Chekhov, Anton, The Essential Plays, trans. Michael Henry Heim. New York: Modern
Library, 2003 (Also available in electronic form through Josiah)
• Etchells, Tim. Certain Fragments: Forced Entertainment. New York: Routledge, 1999.
(Also available in electronic form through Josiah)
• Handke, Peter, Kaspar and Other Plays. New York: Hill & Wang, 1970.
• Houghton, Norris, ed. Seeds of Modern Drama. New York: Applause Books, 2000
(1963).
• Ibsen, Henrik. Four Major Plays. New York: Oxford University Press, 2008.
• Eugene Ionesco, The Bald Soprano and Other Plays. (Includes The Bald Soprano and
The Lesson) New York: Grove Press, 1982.
• Kane, Sarah, Blasted. New York: Methuen Drama, 2011.
• Müller, Heiner, Hamletmachine. New York: Performing Arts Journal, 2001.
• Parks, Suzan-Lori. The America Play. New York: Theatre Communications Group,
l995.
• Pinter, Harold, Old Times. New York: Grove Press, 1994.
• Shattuck, Roger. The Banquet Years. New York: Vintage Books, l968.
• Shepard, Sam, Buried Child. New York: Vintage, 2006.
• Wilde, Oscar, The Importance of Being Earnest. Simon & Brown, 2012 (Also available
in electronic form through Josiah)
• Wilder, Thornton. Our Town. New York: Samuel French, 2010.
A packet (PK) of additional required reading materials can be ordered at Allegra
Copy Center on Thayer Street (near the corner of Thayer Street). I will also place a
copy of the packet on reserve in the Becker Library (BK) in Lyman Hall, which
must be read in the library during library hours.
Other books on reserve:
Copies of several books not at the Brown Bookstore are on reserve at the Rockefeller
Library. Some of these are noted in the schedule below as recommended readings. Books
of general interest that will also be available on reserve at the Rock include:
• Brockett, Oscar G. and Robert R. Findlay, Century of Innovation: A History of
European and American Theatre and Drama Since 1870
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•Drain, Richard, Twentieth Century Theatre: A Sourcebook
•Dukore, Bernard F., Dramatic Theory and Criticism: from the Greeks to Grotowski
• Knowles, Ric and Joanne Tomkins, W. B. Worthen, eds., Modern Drama: Defining the
Field (on order at the RL)
• Harding, James M., ed., Contours of the Theatrical Avant-Garde: Performance and
Textuality
• Berghaus, Gunter. Avant-Garde Performance: Live Events and Electronic Technologies
• Webber, Andrew J., The European Avant-garde
•Innes, Christopher, Avant Garde Theatre 1892-1992.
•Worthen, William B., Harcourt Brace Anthology of Drama
N.B. Not all recommended readings have been placed on reserve. These are books that
you can find for yourselves in the stacks of the Rockefeller Library (and occasionally, the
John Hay Library) if you are interested in learning more about a particular topic. This
source referral is intended to help you with your research projects in this course but also
beyond.
-------------------------Course Outline
Note: Selections marked with a caret (^) are available at the bookstore. Selections
marked with an asterisk (*) are in the packet available at Allegra Copy Center.
Selections marked with (#) are on reserve at the Rock and, in the case of the course
packet, in the Becker Library. Some plays are available in various translations and in
anthologies. You may read any translation that you can find.
All readings are due on the day that they are listed as relating to that class’s lecture and
discussion topic.
This schedule is subject to change during the course of the semester.
Week #1
Thurs. 1/24: Introduction to the course; Stage Fright/Stage Memory/Stage Death; A brief
modern history of time and space. Film clips: e.g., Hitchcock’s Stage Fright and The 39
Steps.
Week #2
Tues., 1/29: Naturalism: Zola, Dumas fils; early Strindberg. The rise of the stage
director; The Independent Theatre Movement: (France; Germany; England; Ireland;
Scandinavia): Antoine, Brahm, Grein, Shaw, Synge, Hauptmann, Synge, Gorky. Film
Clips: Children of Paradise; Synge (Theatre History).
Required Reading:
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Naturalism arose largely in reaction to melodrama. For some film images of
melodramatic acting, though later than Zola’s day, see:
http://www.iath.virginia.edu/utc/onstage/films/mv03hp.html
• Edward Braun, Director and the Stage,“Meiningen Court Theatre” (chapter 1)
and “Antoine and the Theatre Libre” (chapter 2). ^ #
• Strindberg, August, excerpt from the “Preface” to Miss Julie (1988) from
Dukore, Dramatic Theory and Criticism: from the Greeks to Grotowski, pp. 566574. *
• Strindberg, August, Miss Julie (1888), trans. E. M. Sprinchorn (1961) in
Houghton, pp. 196-243. ^ #
• By way of comparision with Miss Julie, take a look at an earlier naturalistic
play, Emile Zola, Thérèse Raquin (1873) in Houghton, ed., Seeds of Modern
Drama, pp. 19-93. ^#
•New York Times review of Miss Julie at Antoine’s theatre in Paris.
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9507E1DD1731E033A25756C0A
9649C94629ED7CF
Recommended:
• Antoine, André. Excerpt from "The Free Theatre" (1890) from Richard Drain,
ed., Twentieth Century Theatre: A Sourcebook, pp. xvii-xviii. #
• Leo Braudy , “Zola on Film: The Ambiguities of Naturalism.” Yale French
Studies, 42. (1969), pp. 68-88. Accesssible at http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=00440078%281969%290%3A42%3C68%3AZOFTAO%3E2.0.CO%3B2-N
• John Osborne, The Meiningen Court Theatre, esp. pages 18-53 and 141-173. #
• Lukács, George, excerpt from "The Sociology of Modern Drama." (1909) from
Bernard F. Dukore, ed. Dramatic Theory and Criticism, pp. 936-941. #
• Burke, Kenneth, excerpt from "The Container and the Thing Contained" (1945)
from The Grammar of Motives, pp. 3-9, 15-16. #
Thurs., 1/31: Victorian Rationalism/Irrationalism: The Case of Sherlock Holmes and
Dracula; Oscar Wilde and Decadence. Shaw (and Ibsen). Film Clip: Billy Wilder’s The
Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (The Case of the Upside-Down Room)
Required Reading:
• Oscar Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest (1895) ^#
• By way of comparison to another play written in the same year as Earnest, take
a look at Shaw, Candida (1895) in the Caputi, ed. ^ #
Recommended:
• Wilde, Salomé (1893) (available in RL and, most likely, BL stacks)
• Shaw, Man and Superman (1903) (available in RL and, most likely, BL stacks)
Week #3
5
Tues., 2/5: Ghosts: Myth into Realism. Nietzsche, Wagner and Ibsen. Film clips: Ibsen,
Theatre History Mabou Mines’ Dollhouse.
Required Reading:
•Ibsen, Ghosts (1881) and Hedda Gabler (1890) in Ibsen: Four Plays^#
•By way of comparison to Ibsen’s Ghosts, take a look at Shepard, Buried Child
(1978) ^#
Thurs., 2/7: Stanislavsky, Chekhov and the Moscow Art Theatre. Film clips from: Vanya
on 42nd Street (1990) and Hannah and Her Sisters (1986). Film Clips: Theatre History.
Required Reading:
• Edward Braun, Director and the Stage, “Stanislavsky and Chekhov” (chapter
5), pp. 59-76. ^ #
• Chekhov, Anton, The Seagull (1898), trans. Robert W. Corrigan (1962) in
Houghton, ed., Seeds of Modern Drama, pp. 349-413 ^, or in Chekhov: The
Essential Plays ^#
• Chekhov, Anton, Letters to Maria Kiseleva and Alexei Suvorin in Caputi, ed.,
pp. 459-463 ^ #
• Stanislavsky, Constantin
• "Inner Impulses and Inner Actions" (1916-1920) from Drain, Twentieth
Century Theatre: A Sourcebook pp. 253-257 *;
•Excerpt from Building a Character, Huxley and Witts, pp. 360-362.*
• Briusov, Valery, “Against Naturalism in the Theater,” Cardulo and
Knopf, pp. 72-76. ^ #
• W. B. Worthen, “Chekhov’s Camera: The Rhetoric of Stage Realism” in
Modern Drama and the Rhetoric of Theatre, l992.*
Recommended:
• Chekhov, Anton, The Cherry Orchard (1904) in Chekhov: The Essential
Plays^#
• Chekhov, The Three Sisters (1901), trans. Elisaveta Fen (1951) in Caputi, ed.,
pp. 78- 132. Also in Chekhov: The Essential Plays^#
• Stanislavsky, Constantin An Actor Prepares, pages 33-53, 263-92
• David Richard Jones, "Konstantin Stanislavsky and The Seagull: The Paper
Stage" in Great Directors at Work, pp. 15-77. #
• Styan, Modern Drama, Vol 1, pp. 45-52, 69-9. #
• Paul Gray, “Stanislavski and America: A Critical Chronology.” The Drama
Review, Vol. 9, No. 2. (Winter, 1964), pp. 21-60. Stable URL:
http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0886800X%28196424%299%3A2%3C21%3ASA
AACC%3E2.0.CO%3B2-5
Week #4
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Tues., 2/12: Strindberg and The Ghost Sonata, Yeats, the Mysterium. Film Clip: Carl
Dreyer’s Vampyr.
Required Reading:
• Cardullo and Knopf on Strindberg, pp. 127-133. ^ #
• Strindberg, August, The Ghost Sonata (1907), in Caputi, pp. 183-209 or Cardullo
and Knopf pp. 134-160 ^ #
• Styan, J.L. Modern Drama in Theory and Practice, Vol. 2: Symbolism, pages 2427. *
• Yeats, William Butler, excerpt from "The Play, the Player and the Scene"
(published 1924), from Aughtry, Landmarks in Modern Drama, pp. 392-395. *
• Yeats, William Butler, At The Hawk's Well (1917) from The Collected Plays of
W.B. Yeats (1953). * or Yeats, William Butler, Purgatory (1938), from
Harrington, pp. 33-39. *
Recommended:
• Eszgter Szalczer, “Nature’s Dream Play: Modes of Vision and August
Strindberg’s Re-Definition of the Theatre.” Theatre Journal 53, no. 1, 2001: 3352. Accessible at:
http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/theatre_journal/v053/53.1szalczer.html
• Ibsen, Henrik, The Wild Duck (1884), trans. Dounia B., Christiani . In Caputi,
ed., pp. 3-77. ^ #
Oral Report and Final Paper Topics:
Strindberg’s Chamber Plays
Strindberg’s A Dream Play
Strindberg’s The Road to Damascus
Yeats and the Irish Theatre Movement
Thurs., 2/14: Symbolist Theory and Drama: Continental European version (Mallarmé,
Maeterlinck); Chekhov; Kandinsky; Russian symbolism (Ivanov, Briusov, Blok). Film
Clips: Kandinsky’s Yellow Sound; Dance (Theatre History)
Symbolist Staging: Appia, Craig, Lugne-Poe, early Meyerhold. Film Clips: Appia, Craig
(Theatre History)
Required Reading:
• Daniel Gerould, “The Art of Symbolist Drama” in Doubles, Demons, and
Dreamers. New York: Performing Arts Journal Publication, l985. Pp. 7-13.*
• Appia, Adolph
• excerpt from Music and the Art of Theatre (1899), pages 10-28*
• excerpt from "How to Reform our Staging Practices" (1904) from Drain,
Twentieth-century Theatre: A Sourcebook, pp. 237-239 *
• excerpt from "Actor, Space, Light, Painting” (1919), in Michael Huxley
and Noel Witts, eds., The Twentieth Century Performance Reader, pp, 2124. *
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• Maeterlinck, Maurice, The Intruder (1890) and “The Modern Drama” in
Cardullo and Knopf, pp. 41-61. ^#
• Maeterlinck, Maurice, "The Tragical in Daily Life' (1896) from Dukore, ed.,
Dramatic Theory and Criticism: from the Greeks to Grotowski, pp. 726-731.*
• Richard Beacham, “Prologue” from Adolphe Appia: Theatre Artist, 1-7. *
• Edward Braun, Director and the Stage, “The Symbolist Theatre” (chapter 3), pp.
59-76. ^ #
• Edward Braun, Director and the Stage, “Edward Gordon Craig” (chapter 6), pp.
77-94. ^ #
• Craig, Gordon
• "The Actor and the Ubermarionette" from On the Art of the Theatre
(1907), 54-94 *
• excerpt from "Rearrangements" (1915), from Drain, 17-18 *
• Fuller, Loïe, excerpt from "Light and Dance" (1908), from Drain, ed., pp. 245247.*
• Duncan, Isadora, "Depth," from Drain, pp. 248-249 *
Recommended:
• Styan, J. L., Modern Drama in Theory and Practice, Vol. 2, pp. 1-35 #
• Cardullo, Bert, “En Garde!: The Theatrical Avant Garde in Historical,
Intellectual, and Cultural Context” in Cardullo and Knopf, pp. 1–39 ^ #
• Arthur Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Idea, published in German in 1819
and influential on Neitzsche and Wagner and modern art (available in RL stacks)
• Maeterlink, The Blind, see http://brownblind.blogspot.com/2007/02/here-isdraft-of-script-we-will-be.html
• Maeterlink, Pélleas and Mélisande (1892)
• Fratisek Deak, Symbolist Theater (1993)
• Eszgter Szalczer, “Nature’s Dream Play: Modes of Vision and August
Strindberg’s Re-Definition of the Theatre.” Theatre Journal 53, no. 1, 2001: 3352. Accessible at:
http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/theatre_journal/v053/53.1szalczer.html
• Paul Marqueritte, Pierrot: Assassin of His Wife (1882), in Doubles, Demons,
and Dreamers, edited by Daniel Gerould. 45-50. New York: Performing Arts
Journal Publication, l985.*
• Friedrich Nietzsche, excerpt from Richard Wagner in Bayreuth (1876). *
•Wagner, Richard, excerpt from "The Art-Work of the Future" (1849), from
Dukore, ed., pp. 786-791.*
• Kandinsky, Wassily, The Yellow Sound (1909) and "On Stage Composition
(1912)" in Cardullo and Knopf, pp.169-186. ^ #
• Appia’s full Music and the Art of the Theatre, translated by Corrigan and Dirks
#
• Richard C. Beacham, Adolphe Appia, Theatre Artist
• Beacham, ed. Adolphe Appia: Essays, Scenarios and Designs
• J. Michael Walton, ed., Craig on Theatre (1983)
• Laurence Senelick, Gordon Craig’s Moscow Hamlet
• Christopher Innes, Edward Gordon Craig.
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Oral report and final paper topics:
Ruth St. Denis, Ted Shawn, and Delsarte
Mary Wigman in the Theatre
Productions of Maeterlinck's plays
Productions of Strindberg's Dream Plays
Chekhov and Symbolism
Wilde's Salomé in production
Strindberg’s dream plays and their influence on Ingmar Bergman
Craig's influence as a designer and editor
Craig and Stanislavsky and Hamlet at the MAT
Mask magazine: it's advocacy and its impact
Kandinsky as a painter and theatre artist
Loïe Fuller; Isadora Duncan
Emile Jaques-Dalcroze, Eurythmics and Appia
Wagner's Bayreuth and the Modern Theatre
Week #5
Tues., 2/19: NO CLASS. LONG WEEKEND.
Thurs., 2/21: World War I and German Expressionism in theatre and film:
Büchner, Kaiser, Toller. Film Clips: The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari; Fritz Lang’s
Metropolis; Gunter Berghaus’s production of Kokoshka’s Murderer the Woman’s Hope;
Guy Madden’s Careful.
Germany in the 1920s: Weimar Culture (Wedekind and Lulu), Bauhaus. Film Clips: Fritz
Lang’s M; G.W. Pabst’s Lulu; Wedekind (Theatre History); Bauhaus (Theatre History).
Required Reading
• J. L. Styan, Modern Drama, vol. 3, pp. 1-46. #
• Büchner, Georg, Woyzeck (1836, first performed, 1909). You may read this in
any translation. One translation will be put on RL reserve.
• Frank Wedekind, Lulu.#
• Wedekind, Frank, Spring Awakening (1891, produced 1906)#
(We will attempt to put copies of both of these plays on reserve in RL and BL.)
Recommended:
• Expressionist Anthologies edited by Mel Gordon and Walter Sokel#
• Kokoshka, Oskar, Murderer the Women's Hope (1907/1909/1916), trans.
Michael Hamburger from Walter H. Sokel, ed., Anthology of German
Expressionist Drama, pp. 17-21. #
• Peter Jelavich, Munich and Theatrical Modernism #.
• Oskar Schlemmer, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Farkas Molnár, The Theatre of the
Bauhaus (1961)
Oral report and final paper topics:
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Nietzsche and Expressionism
Expressionism and Surrealism
The Reception of The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
Expressionism on Stage and in the Visual Arts
Ernst Toller
Reinhardt and Expressionism
Expressionism in German Cinema
Expressionism in Vienna and Germany
Oskar Kokoshka and Murder, The Hope of Women
Reinhardt and Expressionism
Week #6
Tues., 2/26: The Birth of the American Avant-Garde, ca. 1910-1930: Overview of
American Drama: George Pierce Baker, Susan Glaspell, Elmer Rice, the Theatre Guild,
the New Stagecraft, The Provincetown Players and early (and expressionist) Eugene
O’Neill. The Harlem Renaissance. Film clips: Edison’s Kinescope; Early American Film;
Ziegfeld Follies; Showboat; Fanny Brice; Eddie Kantor; Bert Williams; Shuffle Along;
Ethel Waters; The Harlem Renaissance; O’Neill’s The Emperor Jones (Theatre History)
Required Reading:
• J. L. Styan, Modern Drama, Vol 1, pp. 109-147.*
• J. L. Styan, Modern Drama, Vol. 3, pp. 97-121.*
• Ira A. Levine, excerpt from Left Wing Dramatic Theory in the American
Theatre, pp. 151-176.*
• Eugene O’Neill, The Emperor Jones *
•Langston Hughes, The Em-Fuehrer Jones *
• James V. Hatch, "Introduction" From James V. Hatch and Leo Hamalian, eds.
Lost Plays of the Harlem Renaissance, 1920-1940, pp. 9-20.*
• W.E.B DuBois,., "Program Note for Krigwa Players: A Little Negro Theatre,
Season of 1926," from James V. Hatch and Leo Hamalian, eds. Lost Plays of the
Harlem Renaissance, 1920-1940, pp. 449-450. *
• Langston Hughes, "The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain" (1926) from
Hatch and Hamalian, eds., pp. 408-412. *
Recommended:
• Glaspell, Susan. Trifles (1916), in Harcourt Brace Anthology of Drama#
• Mordecai Gorelik, New Theatres for Old (1940/1962)
• Elmer Rice, Street Scene (1928), from Burns Mantle, ed., The Best Plays of
1928-1929, pp. 26-53.
• Lee Simonson, The Stage is Set (1932)
Oral report and final paper topics:
The syndicate and American theatrical production
The tradition of Melodrama and American Realism
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Ibsen, Strindberg, and America
David Belasco and naturalistic staging
The Provincetown Players in relation to the tradition of realism
Women dramatists at the Provincetown Players and on Broadway
Steele Mackaye and the Delsarte system in America
The Little Theatre movement
Edison's kinescope, early film and its impact on the tradition of theatrical realism
Vaudeville, Minstrelsy, and the Musical Review in the early 20th century
The staging of Showboat
Maxwell Anderson and the theatricality of the Sacco and Vanzetti case.
The audience of the Harlem Renaissance Theatres
Langston Hughes as playwright
W. E. B. DuBois and the stage
Zora Neale Hurston, Hughes and The Mulebone Controversy
Bert Williams, Black Minstrels and the Stage
Irish Theatre and the Harlem Renaissance
Women in the Harlem Renaissance and/or Black Theatre Movement
Thurs., 2/28: Surrealism and Dada: Jarry, Duchamp, Breton, Apollinaire, Lorca, Tzara,
Dali, Louis Feuillarde’s Les Vampires. Also, Film Clips: Surrealism: Miro; Lorca
(Theatre History).
Required Reading:
• Jarry, Ubu Roi (1896); Tzara, Tristan, The Gas Heart (1920) and Dada
Manifesto (1918) in Cardullo and Knopf, pp. 265-289. ^ #. The complete Ubu
trilogy is available in a separate edition that I also ordered for the class.
• Listen to Marie Osmond performing Hugo Ball’s Karawane
http://ubu.artmob.ca/sound/ball_hugo/Marie-Osmond_Hugo-Ball_Karawane.mp3
See other “reconstructions” at http://www.ubu.com/sound/ball.html
Recommended:
• Mel Gordon, ed., Dada Performance (1987)
• “Alexis,” “A Visit to the Cabaret Dada” (1920), from Joel Schechter, ed,
Popular Theatre: A Sourcebook, (2003), pp. 186-188
• Dickerman, Leah and Matthew S. Witkovsky, The Dada Seminars
• Annabelle Melzer, Latest Rage the Big Drum: Dada and Surrealist Performance
(1980/1994)
• Richter, Hans, Dada: Art and Anti-Art, pp. 11-64. #
• Richard Hulsenbeck on Dada in Germany in Dadas on Art, pp. 45-56.
N.B. There are a great many published sources on surrealism, many of which
should be available in the RL.
Oral report and final paper topics:
Ball, Tzara, Dada and the Cabaret Voltaire
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Futurist Performances and their reception
André Breton, Surrealism and Politics from the mid-20s
The Women of Surrealism and Gender
Federico García Lorca’s “Impossible Theatre”
Surrealism and the films of Luis Buñuel
Robert Wilson and Surrealism
Dada in Berlin
Week #7
Tues., 3/5: Artaud and the Theatre of Cruelty; Film clip: Carl Dreyer’s The Passion of
Joan of Arc). Also, Film Clip: Artaud (Theatre History) and audio tape of Artaud.
Required Reading:
• Edward Braun, The Director and the Stage, chapter on Artaud, pp. 180-190. ^ #
• Antonin Artaud, The Theatre and Its Double, pp. 7-113. ^ #
• Antonin Artaud, Spurt of Blood (1925) in Cardullo and Knopf, pp. 378-381. ^ #
Recommended:
• Styan, J. L., Modern Drama, Vol. 2, pp. 105-117; 145-156
• Christopher Innes, Avant Garde Theatre 1892-1992.#
Oral reports and final paper topics:
Michel de Ghelderode and Artaud
Artaud and the Balinese Theatre
Artaud's production of Shelley's The Cenci
Roger Blin and the links between Artaud and Genet
Peter Brook and Charles Marowitz’s Theatre of Cruelty Workshop
Artaud and Grotowski
Artaud and Surrealism
Thurs., 3/7:
First take-home exam is handed out in class.
Italian and Russian Futurism and Constructivism: Marinetti, Mayakovsky, Meyerhold’s
biomechanics and constructivist productions of the 1920s, Eisenstein and the montage of
attractions.
Cubism and the landscape play: Picasso and Gertrude Stein; Vakhtangov’s Fantastic
(Imaginative) Realism; Film Clips: Georges Braque and Cubism. Vakhtangov’s
Turandot (Theatre History).
Required Reading:
• Roselee Goldberg, “Futurism.” From Performance Art, pp. 11-30.*
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• F. T. Marinetti, F.T., excerpt from "The Variety Theatre" (1913), from Drain,
pp. 171-174 *
• Prampolini, Enrico, excerpt from "Futurist Scenography" (1915), from Drain,
pp. 23-24. *
• Futurist Plays and Manifestos by Umberto Boccioni, Francesco Cangiullo,
Filippo Marinetti, Emilio Settinelli, and Bruno Corra, and commentary in
Cardullo, pp. 187-206. ^ #
• F. T. Marinetti; Francesco Cangiullo; Gianni Calderone; Victoria Nes Kirby,
and Michael Kirby. “Marinetti’s Short Plays.” The Drama Review: TDR 17, No.
4 (1973), pp. 113-125. Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=00125962%28197312%2917%3A4%3C113%3AMSP%3E2.0.CO%3B2-F
• Highly recommended: Berghaus, Gunter. Avant-Garde Performance: Live
Events and Electronic Technologies, pp. 31-47 *#
• Edward Braun, Director and the Stage, “Meyerhold: Theatre as Propaganda”
(chapter 9). ^ #
• Meyerhold, excerpts from Meyerhold on Theatre [Out of print], pp. 98-103;
122-128; 204-205. *
• Worrall, Nick. “Meyerhold’s Production of The Magnificent Cuckold.” The
Drama Review (TDR) 17, no. 1, 1973. *
• Okhlopkov, Lee Strasberg, Sidney Kingsley, Molly Haskell, Jay Leyda.
“Meyerhold's Bio-Mechanic Exercises (A Photographic Series).” The Drama
Review: TDR, Vol. 17, No. 1, Russian Issue. (Mar., 1973), pp. 113-123.
http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=00125962%28197303%2917%3A1%3C113%3AMBE%28PS%3E2.0.CO%3B2-S
•To see actors rehearsing Meyerhold’s biomechanics, go to:
http://max.mmlc.northwestern.edu/~mdenner/Drama/directors/stan2.mov
• Alain Piette, Alain. “Crommelynck and Meyerhold: Two Geniuses Meet on the
Stage. Modern Drama 39, l996.
• Gerould, Daniel. “Eisenstein’s Wisseman.” The Drama Review: TDR 18, No. 1,
1974), pp. 71-76. Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=00125962%28197403%2918%3A1%3C71%3AE%22%3E2.0.CO%3B2-P
• Eisenstein, Sergei. “Montage of Attractions.” The Drama Review: TDR, Vol.
18, No. 1, 1974), pp. 77-85. Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=00125962%28197403%2918%3A1%3C77%3AMOAF%22S%3E2.0.CO%3B2-K
• Golub, Spencer. “Charlie Chaplin: Soviet Icon.” In The Performance of power:
Theatrical Discourse and Politics. Edited by Sue-Ellen Case and Janelle Reinelt.
Iowa Citiy: University of Iowa Press, l991.*
• Arnold Aronson, chapter 1, American Avant-garde Theatre. *
• Gertrude Stein, Dr. Faustus Lights the Lights, in Cardullo, 425-449. ^ #
• Gertrude Stein, “Plays” in Cardullo, 450-465. ^#
• Gertrude Stein, Stein reading “If I Told Him: A Complete Portrait of Picasso.”
On Ubuweb: http://media.sas.upenn.edu/pennsound/authors/Stein/1935/SteinGertrude_If-I-Told-Him.mp3
• Gertrude Stein “Miss Furr and Miss Skeene” from Geography and Plays,
rendered by Warren Burt on Ubuweb:
http://www.ubu.com/sound/softpalate_stein.html
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Recommended:
• The Theatre of Meyerhold: Revolution on the Stage, by Edward Braun
• Crommelynck’s play The Magnanimous Cuckold (on order at the Rock)
• Banu, Georges, “Mei Lanfang: A Case Against and a Model for the Occidental
State (1986), from Asian Theatre Journal, 3, 2 pp. 153-171
• Alma Law and Mel Gordon, Meyerhold, Eisenstein, and Biomechanics : Actor
Training in Revolutionary Russia
•Paul Schmidt, “A Director Works with a Playwright: Meyerhold and
Mayakovsky.” Educational Theatre Journal, Vol. 29, No. 2. (May, 1977), pp.
214-220. Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=00131989%28197705%2929%3A2%3C214%3AADWWAP%3E2.0.CO%3B2-M
• Meyerhold, Vsevlod. “Meyerhold Speaks: Observations on Acting and
Directing.” The Drama Review: TDR, Vol. 18, No. 3. (Sep., 1974), pp. 108-112.
Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=00125962%28197409%2918%3A3%3C108%3AMSOOAA%3E2.0.CO%3B2-9
Oral report and final paper topics:
Meyerhold's productions of The Magnanimous Cuckold and Tarelkin’s Death
Bio-Mechanics and Meyerhold's evolving aesthetic
Mayakovsky's Mystery Bouffe and The Bedbug
Mayakovsky’s Mayakovsky: A Tragedy
Michael Chekhov and Acting; Tairov and Constructivism; Okhopkov and
Theatrical Space; Bulgakov and Stalin; The crime of "formalism" or “modernism”
in the USSR; Soviet Socialist Realism
Picasso, Arp and the Cubists in relation to Performance
Vakhtangov's production of Turandot
Gertrude Stein and Virgil Thomson’s Four Saints in Three Acts
Gertrude Stein and Richard Foreman
Week #8
Tues., 3/12:
First take-home exam is handed in at the beginning of today’s class
American Social Drama of the 1920s and 1930s, Part 1: The Harlem Renaissance (tent.),
Clifford Odets and The Group Theatre. MAT in America, Michael Chekhov, Richard
Boleslavsky and the American Laboratory Theatre. Film Clips: The Stock Market Crash;
The Cradle Will Rock; The Living Newspaper; Harlem in the 1930s; The Harlem Unit of
the Federal Theatre Project; The Yiddish Theatre; The Group Theatre (Theatre History)
No Required Reading for This Week: This is subject to change.
Oral Report and final paper topics
MAT in the U.S.
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Productions of Russian plays in the U.S.
Michael Chekhov’s Career in the U.S.
The Group Theatre and Stanislavsky
The effect of realism on the American musical comedy
Screwball Comedy and the Depression
The first performance of Odets’s Waiting for Lefty
Thurs., 3/14: American Social Drama of the 1920s and 1930s, Part 2: The Great
Depression and the Federal Theatre Project The Living Newspaper, Orson Welles and the
Mercury Theatre. Film Clips: Early American Cinema; Charlie Chaplin’s Modern Times
(Theatre History).
No Required Reading for This Week: This subject to change.
Oral report and final paper topics
The American Theatre and Marxism in Depression
The genesis and program of the Federal Theatre Project
Welles, Houseman and the Mercury Theatre
Week #9
Tues., 3/19: Brecht, Piscator, epic theatre. Film clips: Brecht (Theatre History); Leni
Reifenstahl’s Triumph of the Will (Theatre History); ( Hans-Jurgen Syberberg’s Our
Hitler (1977).
Required Reading:
• Brecht, Bertolt, Brecht on Theatre, pp. 6-9, 43-51, 57-62, 91-99, 136-47, 23638, 179-205. ^ #
• Brecht, Bertolt, Mother Courage (1941) in Caputi, ed., pp. 347-402.^ #
• Edward Braun, The Director and the Stage, chapter on Piscator, pp. 145-161.^#
• Piscator, Erwin, excerpts from The Political Theatre, pp. 20-25;30-36; 71-77;
81-84; 91-98; 118-123185-188; 213-215; 254-69. *
• Edward Braun, The Director and the Stage, chapter on Brecht, pp. 162-179.^#
Recommended:
• Brecht
• Baal (1923)
• In the Jungle of the Cities (1923)
• Man Is Man (1926)
• J. L. Styan, Modern Drama, vol 3, pp. 1-75; 128-149
• Christopher Innes, Erwin Piscator's Political Theatre: The Development of
Modern German Drama
• Maria Ley-Piscator, The Piscator Experiment (1967)
• John Willet, The Theatre of Erwin Piscator: Half a Century of Politics in the
Theatre; John Fuegi, Bertolt Brecht: Chaos According to Plan
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• Benjamin, Walter, excerpt from "What Is Epic Theater" (1939), from Huxley
and Witts, Twentieth-Century Performance Reader, pp. 64-70.
• J.L. Styan, Modern Drama, Vol 3, pp. 150-184
• Denis Calandera, Excerpt from “Karl Vanentine and Bertolt Brecht,” from Joel
Schecter, ed., Popular Theatre: A Sourcebook, pp. 188-191, 198-199
• David Richard Jones, "Bertolt Brecht and the Couragemodell 1949" in Great
Directors at Work, pp. 78-137.
• John Willett, The Theatre of Bertolt Brecht (1959)
• John Fuegi, Bertolt Brecht: Chaos, According to Plan (1987).
• Brecht's Modellbuchs for Mother Courage and Galileo in Becker.
Oral report and final paper topics:
The Berliner Ensemble
Specific Brecht Productions
Brecht and the East German government
Brecht's legacy in England
Brecht in the USA
Brecht as director
Piscator's Production of The Good Soldier Schweik
Piscator and Documentary Theatre
Theatre at the Bauhaus, Expressionism and Brecht
Brecht’s lehrstucke
The reception of The Three Penny Opera.
Brecht in exile.
Expressionism and Brecht
Thurs., 3/21: Thornton Wilder, Luigi Pirandello and Metatheatre. Film Clips: Pirandello
(Theatre History); The Wooster Group’s production of Our Town (Route 1 and 9) .
Required Reading:
• Pirandello, Luigi. Six Characters in Search of an Author (1921) in Caputi, pp.
210-256. ^ #
• Styan, J. L., Modern Drama, Vol. 2, pp. 76-84; 91-105. *
• Pirandello, Luigi, "Preface" to Six Characters in Search of an Author (1925)
from Charles Edward Aughtry, ed., Landmarks in Modern Drama, pp. 469-478.*
• Thornton Wilder, Our Town ^
Oral Report and final paper topics
Thornton Wilder and Gertrude Stein
Nikolai Evreinov and Luigi Pirnadello
The Wooster’s Group’s production of Our Town (Route 1 and 9)
Week #10: March 26 and March 28: NO CLASS. SPRING BREAK.
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Week #11
Tues., 4/2: American Theatre and Culture in the 1940s and 1950s: Hellman, O’Neill,
Williams, Miller (and August Wilson), the Actors Studio, the bomb, the Cold War and
TV. Film clips: the Marx Brothers, Screwball Comedy (His Girl Friday), O’Neill’s Long
Day’s Journey into Night (Theatre History); Film noir (Kiss Me Deadly).
No Required Reading This Week
Recommended:
You should be familiar with at least one play by Tennessee Williams, one play by
Arthur Miller and one play by August Wilson.
Oral report and final paper topics:
Melodrama and Film noir
Screwball comedy as an American comedy of manners
Arthur Miller, McCarthyism and The Crucible
Arthur Miller, August Wilson and the Common Man’s History
Lillian Hellman’s melodramas
Thurs., 4/4: Post World War II Theatre and Drama: Existentialism and Absurdism in
Europe (Ionesco, Genet, Mrozek); Anger and After in the U.K. (Osborne, Pinter, Bond).
Required Reading:
Ionesco, The Lesson and The Bald Soprano (Two one-act plays) ^
Pinter, Old Times ^
Oral report and final paper topics:
Sartre, Camus and Existentialism
Sartre’s plays
Sartre’s Saint Genet
Richard Schechner’s production of Genet’s The Balcony
Mrozek’s Tango
Beckett’s influence on Pinter
The Suez Crisis and the Angry Young Men of British Drama
Week #12
Tues., 4/9: Beckett. Film clips: Buster Keaton; Chaplin’s Limelight (Theatre History);
Laurel and Hardy; Waiting for Godot (Zero Mostel and Burgess Meredith) (Theatre
History).
Required Reading:
• J. L. Styan, Modern Drama, Vol 2, pp. 124-137.*
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• Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot, http://samuelbeckett.net/Waiting_for_Godot_Part1.html.
• Samuel Beckett, Not I, http://www.english.emory.edu/DRAMA/beckettnoti.html
• Samuel Beckett, Mp3 of Text for Nothing 8,
http://ubu.artmob.ca/sound/aspen/mp3/beckett.mp3
• Martin Esslin, “The Theatre of the Absurd” in Cardullo, 499-502. ^ #
Recommended:
• Samuel Beckett, Happy Days in Caputi. ^ #
• Arthur Adamov, The Invasion in Cardullo. ^ #
• Other materials on Beckett at http://www.samuel-beckett.net/#x4.
Oral report and final paper topics:
Beckett, Joyce, and Proust
Beckett’s Eleutheria and his development as a playwright
Beckett as novelist and the landscape of the plays
Beckett as director
Beckett’s later plays
Endgame and Arrabal’s The Architect and the Emperor of Assyria
Thurs., 4/11: America in the 1960s, Part 1: Vietnam (Rabe, Kopit), Styles of Black
Radical Will (Kennedy, Baraka, Gordone). Film Clips: Bread and Puppet Theatre
(Theatre History).
Required Reading:
Adrienne Kennedy, Funnyhouse of a Negro (1962)#
Leroi Jones (Amiri Baraka), Dutchman (1964)#
Charles Gordone, No Place to Be Somebody (1967)#
Oral report and final project topics:
Susan Sontag’s criticism
Vietnam War Plays
The evolution of Leroi Jones
Adrienne Kennedy and the movies
The plays of Ed Bullins
The Black Theatre Movement of the 60s and the Harlem Renaissance
Week # 13
Tues., 4/16: America in the 1960s, Part 2: Off-Broadway. The Living Theatre, the Open
Theatre, the Performance Group, Happenings, environmental Theatre. Film Clips:
Spalding Gray (Theatre History); The Performance Group’s Dionysus in ’69. Polish
Theatre: Polish Romanticism, Witkiewicz, Gombrowicz, Rozewicz, Kantor, Grotowski
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and Poor Theatre. Film Clip: Grotowski’s Polish Laboratory Theatre (Theatre History);
The Theatre of Tadeusz Kantor.
Required Reading:
• Theodore Shank, selections on the Living Theatre in American Alternative
Theatre, pp. 1-37. *
•Beck, Julian, excerpt from "Storming the Barricades" (1965), from Kenneth H.
Brown, The Brig (1963), pp. 6-35 *
• Malina, Judith, excerpt from "Directing The Brig" (1964), from Brown, The
Brig, pp. 83-87. *
• Interview with Julian Beck and other sound materials on Ubuweb at
http://www.ubu.com/sound/beck.html.
Oral report and final paper topics:
Ellen Stewart and Café La Mama
San Francisco Mime Troupe
El Teatro Campesino
Café Cino
The Performance Group’s Dionysus in 69
Joe Papp and the Public Theatre
Edward Albee, The Zoo Story and The American Dream
Edward Albee and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Witkiewicz, politics, and the project of a “pure theatre”
Witkiewicz and the cabaret inferno
Gombrowicz and the romantic grotesque
Grotowski and Polish romanticism
Taduesz Kantor’s The Dead Class
Tadeusz Kantor’s post-surrealist theatrical theory
Thurs., 4/18:
Second take-home exam is handed out in today’s class.
Mabou Mines, Richard Foreman. Robert Wilson and Heiner Müller. Film Clips: Richard
Foreman and Robert Wilson productions.
Required Reading:
• Theodore Shank, selections on Robert Wilson and Richard Foreman in
American Alternative Theatre, pp. 123-135, 155-70. *
• Michael Kirby, “Richard Foreman’s Ontological Hysteric Theater” TDR
• Richard Foreman, excerpts on his writing process from Reverberation
Machines, pp. 190-221. *
• Richard Foreman’s Strong Medicine on Ubuweb at :
http://www.ubu.com/film/foreman.html
• Richard Foreman, “Program Notes for Pearls for Pigs” TDR 42, no 2.
• Müller, Hamletmachine^#”
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• Theodore Shank, selections on Robert Wilson and Richard Foreman in
American Alternative Theatre, pp. 123-135, 155-70. *
Week #14
Tues., 4/23:
Second take-home exam is handed in at the beginning of today’s class.
Suzan-Lori Parks (The America Play); Sarah Kane (Blasted); The Wooster Group, Forced
Entertainment and the Facsimile Real.
Required Reading:
• Suzan-Lori Parks, The America Play, in The America Play and Other Works. ^ #
• Sarah Kane, Blasted ^#
• David Savran, Breaking the Rules, pp. 9-45; 169-197. *#
• Wooster Group, Emperor Jones, DVD, view at the Media Library (We will try
to upload this to a class webpage).
• Gerald Rabkin, “Is there a Text on this Stage:
Theatre/Authorship/Interpretation.” Performing Arts Journal 9, No. 2/3 (1985),
pp. 142-159. Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=07358393%281985%299%3A2%2F3%3C142%3AITATOT%3E2.0.CO%3B2-2
• Kermit Dunkelberg. “Confrontation, Simulation, Admiration: The Wooster
Group's Poor Theater.” TDR: The Drama Review 49, Number 3 (2005). URL:
http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/the_drama_review/toc/tdr49.3.html
• David Savran. “The Death of the Avantgarde.” TDR: The Drama Review 49, 3
(2005). http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/the_drama_review/toc/tdr49.3.html
•Tim Etchells, Certain Fragments. ^ #
Oral Report and Final Paper Topics
•Suzan-Lori Parks’s Venus and the black female body
•Sarah Kane: After “Anger” the “New Brutalism”
•Theatre in the Age of Terrorism
•The Theatre of Reza Abdoh
Thurs., 4/25:
Catch-up day.
Week #15
Tues., 4/30: READING PERIOD. Catch-up day, if needed.
Thurs., 5/2: NO CLASS. Final papers/projects are due to me in my office (room 210
Lyman Hall) by noon.
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