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One-act
A one-act play is a play that has only one act, as distinct from plays that occur over several acts. One-act plays may consist of one or more scenes. The 20-40 minute play has emerged as a popular subgenre of the one-act play, especially in writing competitions. One act plays make up the overwhelming majority of fringe theatre shows including at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. The origin of the one-act play may be traced to the very beginning of recorded Western drama: in ancient Greece, ''Cyclops'', a satyr play by Euripides, is an early example. The satyr play was a farcical short work that came after a trilogy of multi-act serious drama plays. A few notable examples of one act plays emerged before the 19th century including various versions of the Everyman play and works by Moliere and Calderon.Francis M. Dunn. ''Tragedy's End: Closure and Innovation in Euripidean Drama''. Oxford University Press (1996). One act plays became more common in the 19th century and are now a standard ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Krapp's Last Tape
''Krapp's Last Tape'' is a 1958 one-act play, in English, by Samuel Beckett. With a cast of one man, it was written for Northern Irish actor Patrick Magee (actor), Patrick Magee and first titled "Magee monologue". It was inspired by Beckett's experience of listening to Magee reading extracts from ''Molloy (novel), Molloy'' and ''From an Abandoned Work'' on the BBC Third Programme in December 1957. It is considered to be among Beckett’s major dramas. History First publication In a letter to a London bookseller Jake Schwartz on 15 March 1958, Beckett wrote that he had "'four states, in typescript, with copious notes and dirty corrections, of a short stage monologue I have just written (in English) for Pat Magee. This was composed on the machine from a tangle of old notes, so I have not the Manuscript, MS to offer you." According to Ackerley and S. E. Gontarski, Gontarski, "It was first published in ''Evergreen Review'' 2.5 (summer 1958), then in ''Krapp's Last Tape and Embers ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
A Memory Of Two Mondays
''A Memory of Two Mondays'' is a one-act play by Arthur Miller. He began writing the play in 1952, while working on ''The Crucible'', and completed it in 1955. Based on Miller's own experiences, the play focuses on a group of desperate workers earning their livings in a Brooklyn automobile parts warehouse during the Great Depression in the 1930s, a time of 25 percent unemployment in the United States. Concentrating more on character than plot, it explores the dreams of a young man yearning for a college education in the midst of people stumbling through the workday in a haze of hopelessness and despondency. Three of the characters in the story have severe problems with alcoholism. Paired with the original one-act version of ''A View from the Bridge'', the first Broadway production, directed by Martin Ritt, opened on September 29, 1955, at the Coronet Theatre, where it ran for 149 performances. The cast included Van Heflin, J. Carrol Naish, Jack Warden, Eileen Heckart, and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arthur Miller
Arthur Asher Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005) was an American playwright, essayist and screenwriter in the 20th-century American theater. Among his most popular plays are '' All My Sons'' (1947), '' Death of a Salesman'' (1949), ''The Crucible'' (1953), and '' A View from the Bridge'' (1955). He wrote several screenplays, including '' The Misfits'' (1961). The drama ''Death of a Salesman'' is considered one of the best American plays of the 20th century. Miller was often in the public eye, particularly during the late 1940s, 1950s and early 1960s. During this time, he received a Pulitzer Prize for Drama, testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee, and married Marilyn Monroe. In 1980, he received the St. Louis Literary Award from the Saint Louis University Library Associates. He received the Praemium Imperiale prize in 2001, the Prince of Asturias Award in 2002, and the Jerusalem Prize in 2003, and the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
August Strindberg
Johan August Strindberg (; ; 22 January 184914 May 1912) was a Swedish playwright, novelist, poet, essayist, and painter.Lane (1998), 1040. A prolific writer who often drew directly on his personal experience, Strindberg wrote more than 60 plays and more than 30 works of fiction, autobiography, history, cultural analysis, and politics during his career, which spanned four decades. A bold experimenter and iconoclast throughout his life, he explored a wide range of dramatic methods and purposes, from naturalistic tragedy, monodrama, and historical plays to his anticipations of expressionist and surrealist dramatic techniques. From his earliest work, Strindberg developed innovative forms of dramatic action, language, and visual composition. He is considered the "father" of modern Swedish literature and his '' The Red Room'' (1879) has frequently been described as the first modern Swedish novel. In Sweden, Strindberg is known as an essayist, painter, poet, and especially noveli ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Act (theater)
An act is a major division of a theatrical work, including a play, film, opera, ballet, or musical theatre, consisting of one or more scenes. The term can either refer to a conscious division placed within a work by a playwright (usually itself made up of multiple scenes) or a unit of analysis for dividing a dramatic work into sequences. The word ''act'' can also be used for major sections of other entertainment, such as variety shows, television programs, music hall performances, cabaret, and literature. Acts and scenes An act is a part of a play defined by elements such as rising action, climax, and resolution. A scene normally represents actions happening in one place at one time and is marked off from the next scene by a curtain, a blackout, or a brief emptying of the stage. The elements that create the plot of a play and divide it into acts include the exposition, which sets up the rest of the story by giving basic information. Another element is the inciting incid ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Play (theatre)
A play is a form of drama that primarily consists of dialogue between Character (arts), characters and is intended for theatre, theatrical performance rather than mere Reading (process), reading. The creator of a play is known as a playwright. Plays are staged at various levels, ranging from London's West End theatre, West End and New York City's Broadway theatre, Broadway – the highest echelons of commercial theatre in the English-speaking world – to Regional theater in the United States, regional theatre, community theatre, and academic productions at universities and schools. A stage play is specifically crafted for performance on stage, distinct from works meant for broadcast or cinematic adaptation. They are presented on a stage before a live audience. Some dramatists, notably George Bernard Shaw, have shown little preference for whether their plays are performed or read. The term "play" encompasses the written texts of playwrights and their complete theatrical renditio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edward Albee
Edward Franklin Albee III ( ; March 12, 1928 – September 16, 2016) was an American playwright known for works such as ''The Zoo Story'' (1958), ''The Sandbox (play), The Sandbox'' (1959), ''Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?'' (1962), ''A Delicate Balance (play), A Delicate Balance'' (1966), and ''Three Tall Women'' (1994). Some critics have argued that some of his work constitutes an American variant of what Martin Esslin identified as and named the Theater of the Absurd. Three of his plays won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and two of his other works won the Tony Award for Best Play. His works are often considered frank examinations of the modern condition. His early works reflect a mastery and Americanization of the Theatre of the Absurd that found its peak in works by European playwrights such as Samuel Beckett, Eugène Ionesco, and Jean Genet. His middle period comprised plays that explored the psychology of maturing, marriage and sexual relationships. Younger American playwr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pariah (play)
''Pariah'' () is a one-act play written by August Strindberg. Origins Strindberg wrote ''Pariah'' along with his play ''Creditors'' in the town of Holte, Denmark during the winter of 1888–1889. He was in Denmark to create a theatre of his own, following the example he admired of the Théâtre Libre in Paris, which had been founded two years earlier. Strindberg’s theatre would present naturalistic plays, and the artistic director would be his wife, Siri von Essen. It was to be called “The Scandinavian Experimental Theatre”, and then was renamed “Strindberg’s Experimental Theatre”. Beset with disasters, not the least of which was the censorship of his play, '' Miss Julie'', the theatre had a tumultuous and extremely brief history. The theatre premiered in Holte on March 9, 1889 with a triple bill: ''Pariah'', ''Creditors'', and ''The Stronger''. The evening was a success, with applause and curtain calls. Even harsh critics were won over, with the exception of a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eugène Ionesco
Eugène Ionesco (; ; born Eugen Ionescu, ; 26 November 1909 – 28 March 1994) was a Romanian-French playwright who wrote mostly in French, and was one of the foremost figures of the French avant-garde theatre#Avant-garde, French avant-garde theatre in the 20th century. Ionesco instigated a revolution in ideas and techniques of drama, beginning with his "anti play", ''The Bald Soprano'' which contributed to the beginnings of what is known as the Theatre of the Absurd, which includes a number of plays that, following the ideas of the philosopher Albert Camus, explore concepts of absurdism and surrealism. He was made a member of the Académie française in 1970, and was awarded the 1970 Austrian State Prize for European Literature, and the 1973 Jerusalem Prize. Biography Ionesco was born in Slatina, Romania, Slatina, Romania. His father belonged to the Romanian Orthodox Church, Orthodox Christian church. His mother was of French and Romanian heritage. According to some sources, he ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Line (play)
''Line'' is a 1967 one-act play by Israel Horovitz, his first play produced. It is an absurdist drama about 5 people waiting in line for an event (what event it is, is never made clear—several of the characters' stated expectations contradict the others). Each of the characters uses their wiles in an attempt to be first in line, getting more and more vicious as the play continues. A revival of ''Line'' is the longest-running Off-Off-Broadway show on the boards, having played continuously at the 13th Street Repertory Theatre from 1974 to 2018. After 43 years of the revival (the original production opened at LaMama in 1967), the show closed January 1, 2018 at the 13th Rep in a production directed by Jay Michaels and produced by Mary Elizabeth Micari. Characters * Fleming - A baseball fan, he has been waiting all night at the front of the line (apparently for tickets to a baseball game). He is rather slow-witted and easily manipulated out of first place. * Stephen - A young han ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Clevinger's Trial
''Clevinger's Trial'' is a 1973 short dark comedy play in one act by Joseph Heller. ''Clevinger's Trial'' is based on Chapter 8 of Heller's 1961 novel '' Catch-22''. It is excerpted from the 1971 play '' Catch-22'', being cut from the original version of ''Catch-22'' to shorten that play's running time and published as a separate one-act play, running about 15 minutes. The play is a satire of institutional justice. The action, which is a close copy of the same scene in the novel ''Catch-22'', concerns a kangaroo court court-martial A court-martial (plural ''courts-martial'' or ''courts martial'', as "martial" is a postpositive adjective) is a military court or a trial conducted in such a court. A court-martial is empowered to determine the guilt of members of the arme ... of air cadet Clevinger on various nonsensical charges. Lieutenant Scheisskopf (English: Shithead) is both prosecutor and defender, and also one of the judges and Clevinger's commanding officer. During t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
A Marriage Proposal
''A Marriage Proposal '' (sometimes translated as simply ''The Proposal'', ) is a one-act farce by Anton Chekhov, written in 1888–1889 and first performed in 1890. It is a fast-paced play of dialogue-based action and situational humour. A young man Lomov comes to propose to his neighbour Natalya but they keep on fighting over various topics. Plot synopsis ''Ivan Vassilevitch Lomov'', a long-time neighbour of ''Stepan Stepanovitch Chubukov'', has come to propose marriage to Chubukov's 25-year-old daughter, ''Natalya Stepanovna''. After he has asked and received joyful permission to marry Natalya, she is invited into the room, and he tries to convey to her the proposal. Lomov is a hypochondriac (worry about illness, palpitations in this case), and, while trying to make clear his reasons for being there, he gets into an argument with Natalia about The Oxen Meadows, a disputed piece of land between their respective properties, which results in him having " palpitations" and numbn ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
