history of theatre
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The History of Theatre
Earliest reference to a competition for tragedies in Ancient Greece
524 BC
Greek playwright Euripides born. Wrote more than 90plays;18 still exist
about 484BC
Greek playwright Aristophanes writes “The Frogs”
about 405BC
Greek Dramareaches Rome
about 338 BC
re-built in stone in Athens,Greece
Theatre of Dionysus about 300 BC
First stone theatre built in Rome
55BC
740 AD
First Chinese Drama school founded
1300s
Mystery Play cycles emerge inEurope
about 1370
Nō style of theatrestartsin Japan
Earliest record of Commedia dell’Arte in Italy
1545
Spanish playwright Lope de Vega born. Probably wrote more plays than anyone else – more than 300
1562
1564
William Shakespeareborn in
Stratford upon Avon
1567
First public theatre opens in England
late 1500s
First indoor theatresin Western Europe
late 1500s
First Operacomposed in Italy
William Shakespeare writes “Romeoand Juliet”
about 1595
1598
The Globe theatre built in London. Shakespeare acted and his plays were performed here
Japanese theatre style Kabuki starts
1603
Ben Jonson (English) writes “Volpone”
1606
William Shakespeare
dies in London
1616
1637
First opera house opens in Venice, Italy
Theatres in England were closed bythe Puritans
1642-1660
Samuel Pepys records in his diary that he saw a Pulchinella (Punchand Judy) showin London
1662
1660s
Women act for thefirst time on the English stage
French playwright
Molière writes “Le Misanthrope”
1666
1671
Paris Opéra opens – and burns down two
years later
Aphra Benn, first known English female playwright, writes “The Rover”
1677
English playwright William Congreve writes “The Way
of the World”
1700
German playwright Goethe begins the play “Faust”
about 1773
1788
La Scala opera house opens in Milan, Italy
Gas lighting first used in London’s theatres
1817
1871
Giuseppe Verdi writes the opera “Aida”
Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen writes “A Doll’s House”
1879
1881
First electric lightsused in theatre(Savoy, London)
Swedish playwrightAugust Strindberg writes
1888
“Miss Julie”
Russian playwright Anton Checkhov writes “The Three Sisters”
1901
Romanian playwright Eugène Ionesco born. Wrote many surreal plays, such as “Rhinoceros” (1960)
1912
German playwright Bertolt Brecht writes “Mother Courage and Her Children”
1941
English playwright John Osborne writes “Look Back in Anger”
1953
Irish playwright Samuel Beckett writes “Waiting for Godot”
1953
American playwrightArthur Miller writes “TheCrucible”
1953
English playwright Harold Pinter writes“The Caretaker”
1960
English playwright Tom Stoppard writes “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead”
1967
1968
Stage censorship abolished in Great Britain
1969 Andrew Lloyd-Webber
and Tim Rice (British) write the musical “Jesus Christ – Superstar!”
1973
Sydney opera house opens in Australia
“Bombay Dreams”opens - the first London musical with anall-Asian cast
2002