History - Lone Star College

A Little History
Three Types of Spaces
  Proscenium – The picture frame stage where the
audience watches the actors through a
opening.
  Thrust – Stage sticks out and the audience sits on
three sides.
  Arena – Audience on all sides
Greek Theatre
  Theatron – Steep seating area that surrounded the stage on three sides.
  Orchestra – Circular playing area.
  Skene – The stage house from which actors made their entrances
  Paraskenia – Long high walls, extended on each side of and parallel to
the Skene.
  Proskenium – A columned arch at the rear of the platformed stage,
right in front of the Skene.
  Eccyclema – wagon used for many things
  Periaktoi – Three sided walls with different scenes on each side
  Machina – A machine used to make the Greek gods come and go.
Roman Theatre
  As with most things Roman they took the Greek
stage and evolved it.
  Mainly they took all the separate parts of the
Greek theatre and made it one building called
the Scane Frons
  News Flash – Rome fell and so did theatre for
about 500 years
Medieval Theatre
  Pageant Wagon – stages mounted on wagons,
toured around the country side
  The plays performed on these stages were
moralistic tails or Biblical stories.
  Secrets – special effects stage scenery used to
put on these plays
1500-1650
  More modern recreations of Greek and Roman
theatres.
  Forced Perspective – a Painting style that
increases the apparent depth of an object
  Raked Stage – Stage that is higher in the back
than front
  Stock Scenery – General location scenery
  Drop – Large cloth onto which a scene is
painted
1650-1900
  Stages got fancy
  Apron – flat extension of the stage floor in front of the
proscenium
  Borders – Cloth drops hung above the stage to hide the above
stage area
  Elevator Trap – 4x4 or 4x6 area of the stage that could raise
and lower actors or scenery
  Elevator Stage – Large area that could lift whole sets
  Revolving Stage – Large disc built into the stage floor that
turned on a central axis
  Concentric revolving stage - turntable inside another turntable