Theatrical Genres

Masks

comedy and tragedy

No (serious) and Kyogen (comedic)

The category into which a play falls

asks basic question about human behavior

Traditional and modern

5th century Greece, 16th-17th century England, and 17th Century France

Tragic heroes and heroines, tragic circumstances, tragic irretrievability, acceptance of responsibility, tragic verse, and effect of tragedy

an extraordinary person

universe seems to trap the hero or heroine in a fateful web

Characters are put in a situation which there is no honorable way to escape and they must go forward to meet their fate.

Character accept responsibility for his actions and willingly suffers

Deals with lofty and profound ideas and can best be expressed through poetry

in defeat, the men and women of tragedy triumph

Tragedy that deals with common man

They are written in prose

emotions, tension, and thoughts not expressed directly in the text

Serious drama of any period that incorporates heroic or noble figure and other features of traditional tragedy, but differs in having a happy ending or a basic optimism of the world even when the ending is bad.

refers to people of the middle or lower class rather than aristocracy

often deals with problems of the family or home rather than great affairs of state

comes from greek, means ‘music drama’ or ‘song drama’; Exaggerated theatre, and sometimes appears laughable;strives to fright or horror

- Audience is drawn into the action
- issues are clear-cut and there is a strong delineation of right and wrong
- Characters are clearly recognizable as good or bad
- Action is exaggerated, with the characters always living in danger and on the edge of calamity
- Strong emphasis on suspense

- Suspension of natural laws
-Contrast between social order and the individual
-Comic Premise

verbal humor,Comedy of characters, Plot complications

a humorous use of words with the same sound but different meaning

a word that sounds like the right word but actually means something quite different

Farce, burlesque, satire, domestic comedy, comedy of manners, comedy of ideas

plot complications and also broad physical humor and stereotyped characters

Relies on physical humor as well as occasional vulgarity

Uses wit, irony, and exaggeration to attack or expose evil and foolishness

Usually deals with family situations and is found most frequently in today's television situation comedies

concerned with pointing up the foibles and peculiarities of the upper class

A comic technique to debate intellectual propositions

the point of view is itself mixed; the prevailing attitude, is a synthesis of the serious and comic