Theatre Buildings

Theatre Buildings. The provision of permanent roofed buildings specially erected for the performances of plays came comparatively late in theatrical history. Greek open-air theatres evolved from the ritual dithyramb performed round the altar of Dionysus, which took place in front of the temple, and later on a site cut out of a neighbouring hillside. This provided a natural auditorium of rising tiers of seats which extended a little more than halfway round a circular orchestra, or playing-place, backed by a low stage with a stage-wall (skênê) behind. This formed one wall of the dressing-rooms and storage rooms and was pierced by doors through which the actors came on stage. It also housed the machinery which worked the crane by which the god (the deus ex machina) finally appeared from heaven to resolve the complications of the plot. All that is known of Greek theatres in the 5th century BC, the age of the great classical tragedies and comedies, has had to be inferred from the ruins of those that still exist, many of which have been subsequently altered, rebuilt, and finally abandoned. Some, such as that at Epidauros, have been refurbished and are used for annual festivals of Greek classical plays. The only things which seem certain about the early theatres are that the audience sat first on wooden benches and then on stone; that the chorus occupied the circular orchestra; that a raised stage was provided for the actors, of which, in classical times, there were never more than three; and that the acoustics of these early theatres were perfect, as can be verified by anyone visiting them today: the slightest whisper from the orchestra can be heard clearly by people in the topmost seats.

In the great Hellenistic theatres which replaced the simpler ones of early times, the stage was raised, often to a height of several feet, and the stage-wall became more elaborate. Columns supported a stage-roof, and the ramps which led up to the stage were built over a colonnade (the proskênion = proscenium).

The Roman theatre, unlike the Greek, was built on the flat. The early ones were of wood and have disappeared. Later ones, in stone, still exist. The much-diminished orchestra was little more than a semicircle terminated by an elaborate stage-wall (scaenae frons) often three storeys high, in front of which was the stage, usually about 5 ft. above ground level. This was separated from the auditorium by a curtain which descended into a trough. The exterior of the theatre, which rose in a series of colonnades to a great height, was solidly constructed, and, in the case of amphitheatres used for chariot-races and gladiatorial combats, which had a circular arena, was also completely circular. The destruction of the Roman Empire saw the collapse of organized theatre. When it was reborn in liturgical drama, plays were first given in churches and later in the open air, either in front of the church door, which provided an excellent stage-wall, or on raised platforms erected in the market-place. In England biblical plays were often acted on pageants. The Renaissance, which was in full flower in Italy while other countries still clung to their medieval traditions, brought about a great change in the design of theatres. For the first time plays were produced indoors, often on stages temporarily set up in a nobleman's hall or palace. The illustrations in late 15th-century editions of Terence's plays show the Renaissance stages on which they were acted. They combined elements of medieval staging with what had been learned of classical staging from the newly discovered works of Vitruvius, and provided models which, in various combinations, developed into the theatres which we know today (see TERENCE-STAGE). The main innovation in 16th-century Italy was the proscenium arch, which framed the elaborate stage-picture provided for a courtly entertainment. This is still a permanent fixture in many theatres, and it is only in recent times that theatres have been built without a proscenium wall. The rise of opera and ballet in Italy led to the evolution of the horseshoe-shaped auditorium characteristic of opera-houses all over the world and typified by the 1589 theatre at Sabbionetta and the 1619 Teatro Farnese at Parma, while the academic tradition of the classical play under the influence of Vitruvius culminated in the great Teatro Olimpico at Vicenza, first used in 1585, with its superb scaenae frons. During the 16th century new theatres were built all over Europe. At first each country had its own style. The early French theatres, such as the Hôtel de Bourgogne (1548), were long and narrow, with a space in front of the high stage—originally intended for the ball which followed the spectacle—rising tiers of seats, and galleries at the side. Many of the early theatres, up to the time of Molière, were adapted tennis-courts, but the Court theatres followed the Italian pattern, with a centrally placed dais—later a Royal Box—for the accommodation of the king and queen. The Vigaranis' 1660 Salle des Machines showed the influence of Palladio. In Spain the early theatres followed the pattern of the open-air stages erected in the public squares, with a stage raised on scaffolding and spectators at the windows and on the balconies of the houses all round. This was somewhat similar to the open-air Elizabethan playhouse, which at the Restoration, and even earlier, gave way to the indoor theatre on Italian lines, though retaining in the small theatres, even in Georgian times, some purely English characteristics, with rows of boxes behind and on both sides of a central pit with benches, and a large forestage with proscenium doors on each side. On the Continent the constant moving around of Italian architects and stage designers, notably the Bibienas, led to the adoption everywhere of the operatic tradition, with baroque and rococo decorations which lingered on until the 19th century. In 1876. Wagner introduced a new concept into his opera-house at Bayreuth, doing away with ornate decorations and replacing the hierarchy of pit, boxes, and galleries by a single fan-shaped auditorium with a steep rake. This, particularly in later adaptations, was not always successful, but something of its influence lingered on into the 20th century and was apparent in the buildings which proliferated throughout the USA, particularly the Chicago Opera House, built in 1929. Even more radical ideas were developed by Reinhardt, for whom Hans Poelzig converted a circus into the Groβes Schauspielhaus, Berlin. Reinhardt's concept of Theatre for the Masses survived chiefly in the Soviet Union where a number of vast indoor amphitheatres were built. The next step was inevitably towards the complete arena, as visualized in 1926 by Walter Gropius. His unrealized Totaltheatre, intended for Piscator, was oval in plan with a steep, 2,000-seat auditorium wrapped around a forestage backed by a proscenium stage.

The Groβes Schauspielhaus and the Total-theater embodied ideas that were a crucial influence on later experiments with theatre-in-the-round and flexible staging, as were Norman Bel Geddes's schemes of the 1920s and 1930s. Another theme has been the open or thrust stage. A development of the 1970s was the small ‘workshop’ theatre, either added to an existing theatre (though not necessarily in the same building) or incorporated in a new theatre complex. Britain's National Theatre (1976) incorporates such a workshop in the Cottesloe Theatre.

The search for the perfect theatre building still continues. A theatre, once built, is difficult to get rid of, and many out-of-date theatres remain which resist adaptation and are the despair of their directors.

(See also BOOTHS; CORNISH ROUNDS; FAIRS; INNYARDS USED AS THEATRES; PRIVATE THEATRES.)