Repetition in vocal characterizations and deviant listening perceptions are two major weaknesses of American acting. That is, voices and diction usually sound the same in everything the actors do, but no one perceives it. One reason listening is so deficient is because of the uninformed or incorrect concepts of those who practice or teach acting.…

Contrary to the popular theory that the proscenium type of playhouse was imported from France by the Court of Charles II in 1660, the Restoration playhouse in fact developed from Elizabethan theatres and court masques. These Elizabethan theatres were the private theatres, and were generally small, rectangular, roofed structures where aristocratic…

From 1923 until 1956, Jasper Deeter's Hedgerow Theatre provided the United States with true repertory theatre. This document provides a brief history and description of the theatre, noting prominent actors and actresses who belonged to the company, some of the plays that were presented, and recognition that was given to the theatre. The document…

This paper presents a brief review of the ways in which a church has incorporated art activities, particularly drama, in its ministry. The contents of the paper include a discussion of the initiation of and planning for a church theater, a description of the activities offered as part of the drama program, an overview of the staffing of the drama…

The Swedish ethnic theatre in the United States flourished and provided a vigorous cultural expression among Swedish immigrants for over five decades beginning in San Francisco in 1863. Swedes in Chicago alone produced between 9 and 24 plays per season from 1888 to 1915. All over the United States, Swedish settlements had their own Swedish…

This paper details a step-by-step process for documenting university and college theatre history through the accession and preservation of materials. It offers advice for collecting materials; locating collections; handling materials; using R. Berner's "Manual for Accessing, Arrangement, and Description of Manuscripts and Archives";…

The Asolo State Theatre Company and Florida State University, operating together, provide a professional repertory theatre company, professional theatre training, a laboratory for theatre-related research, and a resource both for innovative teaching in the public schools and for undergraduate training in the humanities. Begun in 1960, this…

The Sunseed Repertory Collective, a touring theatre company, was formed to deal seriously with contemporary--often controversial--social and political issues. The group uses unconventional production techniques, plays in a variety of settings to a wide range of audiences, charges no admission (relying on donations after performances), and prefers…

Influenced by film and television exposure, the student designer tends to be camera oriented and two-dimensional in creating theatrical sets. This paper outlines six visual projects designed to help students develop a selective visual sense for dealing with the three-dimensional aspects of the stage. The projects include the following activities:…

Six months of observation--at two universities, at a drama festival, and with several independent theatre companies--form the basis for this evaluation of theatre in Kenya, Africa. While Kenyan dramas deal with a variety of themes, the majority are topical rather than universal in their treatment of issues. In many, the emphasis is on the…

Personal interviews were conducted with drive-in theatre patrons in an attempt to paint an empirical portrait of a contemporary drive-in movie theatre audience. A total of 607 patrons of one Rochester, New York, drive-in were interviewed by trained college undergraduates using a prepared 33-item questionnaire consisting of open- and close-ended…

Official censorship should not exist in university theatre productions. What censorship does exist is primarily unofficial--often unspoken--and consists of group, authority, and financial pressures on the director and the production staff, influencing them to avoid risks necessary for artistic growth and intellectual development. This sort of…

The London Stage Information Bank (LSIB) is a machine-readable text of "The London Stage, 1660-1800," an 11-volume publication that contains information on plays, entertainments and afterpieces, casts, box-receipts, and contemporary comment compiled from playbills, newspapers, and theatrical diaries of the period. The LSIB can be…

A statewide survey of 60 college, high school, community, and private performance halls by the Massachusetts Council on the Arts and Humanities revealed that most are badly designed and architecturally inflexible. A Council consultant and staffperson personally examined each hall's stage, orchestra pit, dressing rooms, stage-area equipment,…

This paper expresses the need for the federal government, specifically the U.S. Office of Education, to promote the cause of the arts in education. The Office of Education needs to declare that art is an essential part of the common core of education, particularly at this time, when there is growing skepticism concerning the effectiveness of…