Unit 12: Greek Theatre

In the live production of Antigone that we saw in London, the vast majority of the audience were students, therefore, they would have come to either see the playwright or the design of the set, this means that actors sometimes do take second place to the designers. With the general public that see plays they will go and see the performance solely based on whom is in the play normally.

The design of the play that we saw was very simplistic in its design and props. The background that was shown was just a plain blackboard which eventually was written on, showing “Erdogan is a dictator”. This then showed the political issues at the time of when the play was set. Furthermore, the props that were used were also simplistic as all that they used were chairs, to symbolise shapes and places. There was barely any colour to the props and background, even the costumes were simple and plain leading up to a point in which Antigone hanged her clothing to a red dress, this became confusing.

The chairs which were being used as set and props throughout the piece became confusing when they started to use them as symbols to a place. They used them as a meeting, a cave and so on and so forth. For example: Antigone created a cave out of the chairs in which in the original story she was left in a cave as punishment, this was also the place in which she committed suicide. She committed suicide several times throughout the performance we saw, she moved as if she was and then she wasn’t going to commit from the prologue and throughout until the end, this then led to the play becoming extremely confusing. Also the blackboard being shown in the background along with a chair and a stage was only used by Antigone when she wrote on the blackboard at the beginning of the play.

The background of the chairs and stage was used by Eurydice and Creon, which then showed hierarchy between themselves and the other characters. Also the lower levels used throughout the piece such as sitting on chairs, standing, on the floor etc.

In the performance that we saw the chairs that were used were their whole set, this meant that everything they needed were made by these chairs.

They used them throughout the performance which meant they used them a staging, props and so on and so forth. During a scene in which the chorus had a meeting with Creon (Panos Savvides), the chairs were used from what I believe as their sole purpose, as chairs. This was shown through the chorus sitting on them and using them just a chairs, but gradually throughout the piece the chairs became more and were used for different things other than their sole purpose. 

In comparison to Ancient Greek Theatre and the play Antigone in which we saw, no chairs would have been used to symbolise the meeting area or the death of Antigone, furthermore, death would not have been shown on stage whereas in the play that we saw we did and also didn’t see Antigone’s (Dorota Krimmel) death.

 

The background for the play in which we saw was extremely basic and I felt as though it could have been used a lot more than it was. The stage was used by one person for the vast majority of the play, and that was the actor whom played Creon.

For example, the most basic design that was shown was the blackboard and the stage, in which was only used to show hierarchy. With the one chair located in the middle of the stage for Creon’s throne, and the basic black background, I felt as though it gave quite a dull look to the design purposes of the performance.

In comparison to Ancient Greek Theatre they would have had a chair to symbolise a throne for the leading character but would not have had a black background with nothing to see, they would have had paintings hanging to show the story and things like that, they also wouldn’t have had blackboards it would have been slate.

 

The stage space for the performance in which we saw was a completely different layout to an original Greek Theatre performance space.

For example, the stage space for the performance that we saw was indoors and the seating was not in a semi-circle as originally shown as it was more one-sided. Furthermore, the place in which we saw the performance in was a studio based theatre, seating around about fifty audience members. This meant that it was very intense as you could hear the action and were extremely close to it.

Originally in Ancient Greek Theatre the performance space would be outdoors and built into the side of a hill with stone seating. This meant that the audience members would have to bring a cushion with them so they would be comfortable whilst the performance was taking place. Furthermore, the seating would have been in the round such as a semi-circle whereas in the performance we saw the seating was L shaped (one sided). Also the small studio theatre in which we saw the performance in seated around about fifty audience members compared to the original capacity of Greek Theatre which seated around about fifteen thousand.

The lighting and sound in which we had during the performance we saw was very minimal which is understandable as originally no technical aspects would have been used.

In the performance we saw we had sound effects of thunder and birds. For the lighting we had it switch from a white spotlight to a white wash on the odd occasion throughout the play which meant that it changed the atmosphere of the play not drastically but it did change the atmosphere.

In comparison to Ancient Greek Theatre the only lighting they would have had would have been natural daylight as plays were performed in March and during the day. Furthermore, there would have been no sound effects used technically other than musical instruments or the voices of the chorus. Also there wouldn’t have been things such as microphones, therefore, they placed buckets and pots of water around the Amphitheatre in order to bounce sound around the theatre in order for every audience member far away or close to hear the sound from the performance from all angles.  Through Proxemics they decided originally the distance between: The actor and the actor, the actor and the stage space and the actor and the audience. This then helped them negotiate the distance between the staging and the audience and how the sound would have been heard.

GREEK NOTES:

Theatres were built on hillsides, also in Ancient Greek theatre had links to religion for their performances such as festivals being held at ‘The Great Dionysia. Patron of the theatre was God Dionysus. Statue also of patron Goddess Athene.

Special effects are were involved in Ancient Greek Theatre. Some of Ancient Greek special effects are: Cranes - used to lift actors, an Ekkyklema used trolley to roll people on and off.

Contemporary: Complicated lighting, projection, amplified/electronic sound, smoke, machinery.