Theatre of Ancient Rome

Drama 1

Fall 2003

Roman History

• There are two main periods in Roman history– 500BCE-27BCE—The Republic– 27BCE-476AD—The Empire

• Romans liked festivals and had many types of entertainment. Festivals were called ludi Romani.

• In Caesar’s time, there were more than 100 holidays per year!

Roman Entertainments

• Gladiators—fought each other and sometimes wild animals.

• Condemned prisoners and Christians (remember, Rome is not Christian yet) were thrown to wild animals.

• Naumachina—the floor was flooded with water for mock navy battles.

• Chariot races—the most popular form of entertainment

Competitive Entertainments

• Theatre as we know it (comedy, tragedy, etc) had to compete with these other forms of entertainment (gladiators, chariot races, etc).

• Romans had a great blood-lust. They adored violence. So, oftentimes, theatre lost.

• All Roman entertainment (including theatre) used much violence and weaponry. Oftentimes, prisoners were used and killed during a performance.

Spaces for Entertainments

• The Circus—an oblong arena– The Circus

Maximus was in Rome and held 180,000 spectators

– Chariot races were held in a circus

• The Amphitheatre—a circular arena (audience on all sides)– The Coliseum– Gladiator battles,

Naumachina, and wild animal battles were fought in amphitheatres

Roman Theatre Architecture

• Permanent buildings were slow to develop.• The first permanent Roman theatre was

built at Pompei in 75 BCE• Theatres sat between 10,000 and 40,000

people. This is less than Grecian theatres, but still very large.

• Theatres were built on level ground—not hillsides as in Greece.

Roman Theatre Architecture

• The orchestra was a half-circle (rather than a circle as in Greece).

• Romans added the first stage, the pulpitum, that was raised 5 feet above the level of the orchestra and reached by staircases.

• The permanent scene house was called the scaenae frons (rather than skene in Greece)– 3 stories (rather than

2)– Minimum of 3 doors

(rather than maximum)

– Very ornate building with columns, niches, statues and gilding

Roman Theatre Architecture

• The passages into the theatres were similar to Greek paradoi, but they were covered and called vomitoria.

• Romans designed a ceiling called the auleum that jutted out over the stage. It did not cover the audience or the orchestra.

• Romans also added a curtain (around 133 BCE) that was hung off of the edge of the auleum and dropped into a trough (ditch) at the edge of the stage.

Roman Tragedy and a Tragic Playwright

• Roman tragedies were mostly translations of Greek tragedies. They were not as important to Roman theatre history as comedy was.– Seneca (5BCE-65AD)—re-wrote 5-act plays

with choral interludes, had many violent actions and frequent use of ghosts and magic

– The Trojan Women, Oedipus, Medea

• Closet dramas are plays not meant to be performed in front of an audience.

Roman Comedy

• Roman comedy was based on Greek new comedy (the ones Menander wrote) with a few important changes.– The chorus was abandoned.– The musical elements associated with the

chorus were scattered throughout the play.– All of the action took place on the street.– The plays dealt with affairs of the well-to-do

middle class and every day domestic affairs.

Roman Comic Playwrights

• Plautus (254BCE-184BCE)—re-wrote 21 plays including The Menaechmi and The Pot of Gold that were all versions of Greek plays. He was more concerned with making audiences laugh than with plot and characterization.

• Terence—wrote 6 plays including The Eunuch and The Brothers. Was actually a freed slave who had been educated by his master. He is the first black playwright. His works were written for the upper class and had careful construction and fine characterization.

A New Type of Theatre

• The fabula Atellana (Atellan farce) had stock characters (characters that represent a stereotyped role—the beggar, the miser, etc—and remained the same from theatre to theatre. Music and dance were very important. They emphasized buffoonery, trickery and cheating. They had rural settings. They were short farces (slapstick comedy) that became popular around the 1st century BCE

More New Types of Theatre• Mime—female roles

were played by WOMEN! – Romans were the

first to use women on stage

– Actors did NOT wear masks

– Subjects were drawn from urban life

– Language was frequently indecent

• Pantomime—a silent, interpretive dance similar to mime today.– Performed by a lone

actor who played many roles indicated by a mask with a CLOSED mouth

– There was chorus that narrated the story

– Story lines were serious and drawn from mythology

Roman Masks

• Masks for tragedy were greatly exaggerated (as opposed to those from Greek comedies).

• Some masks were designed with one cheerful and one serious side as a way of indicating a character’s change in mood without a change of mask.

• Pantomime actors’ masks had closed mouths.

• Mime actors did not use masks.

Roman Comic Costumes

• Costumes for comedies used everyday dress. If it was a Greek comedy, Greek costumes were worn (chiton, kothornos, onkos). If it was a Roman comedy, Roman costumes were worn.

• Roman dress was typically a toga—actually a cloak, not just a sheet wrapped around you.

More Roman Costumes

• Roman tragedies were similar to comedies, except that the toga had a purple border.

• Mime actors wore a tunic with a hood that could be used for disguise.

• Pantomime costumes were baggy and allowed for freedom of movement since they actors had to dance. They consisted of a tunic and a cloak.

Fabula Atellana Costumes and Masks

• Each of the stock characters had his own standardized mask and costume.

• These remained the same between theatre groups.– All “beggars” in all theatres were dressed the

same and had the same mask.– Likewise with all the other characters.

• They were exaggerated forms of country dress.

Roman Critic

• Horace—Roman, wrote The Art of Poetry. – He became a rule-maker.– His rules were:

• A 5-act play standard• No more than 3 actors on stage at a time

• As you can see, neither critic’s rules are still in use today.

A Typical Roman Theatre

Scaenae frons and pulpitum

Outside view of a theatre

Ground plan of a Roman theatre

Scaenae frons detail

Vomitoria and details of scaenae frons