DRAM 1101 1st Edition Lecture 4 Outline of Last Lecture I What is a play II How is dramatic action organized a Chronologically b Nonlinear III Ways to understand plays a According to structure i Western literature structure ii Aristotelian structure b According to genre i Tragedies ii Comedies IV Dramaturgy a Vertical axis b Horizontal axis Outline of Current Lecture I Beginnings a Central characters foreshadowing tone style design world of the play plot and the major dramatic question II Climactic structure III Themes IV Endings Current Lecture I Every play teaches its audience how to watch as they watch it Jeffrey Hatcher a Imagine a written play on stage b Plays are meant to be performed so while reading a play envision what it might look and sound like on stage c Read the script out loud i What is the pace rhythm and vocabulary These notes represent a detailed interpretation of the professor s lecture GradeBuddy is best used as a supplement to your own notes not as a substitute ii Is it colloquial or elevated diction iii Are there accents II Beginnings a Plant the seeds for what is yet to come b Beginnings of plays provide cues to the audience as to what its conventions are and how to perceive the performance c Introduce the following components within the first few minutes i Central characters 1 Who are they How many are there ii Foreshadowing of dramatic action 1 What is the plat What do the characters want What is standing in their way iii Tone iv Style 1 Is the world that the play is set in realistic Or is it stylized v Design 1 The set sound lighting and costume design vi World of the play 1 The given circumstances 2 Location a Inside of outside Confined or open space Urban suburban remote rural or pastoral 3 Lighting a Bright or dark 4 Season 5 Real or embellished a There is inevitably some degree of stylization even in a play that takes place in a realistic world necessarily a heightened version of reality 6 Space a Public or private 7 Economic status a Does it take place in an environment of leisure or labor 8 Dynamics of power a Gives us a sense of whose needs are being met and whose are being denied i At the core of every play is what a character wants and that inevitably comes down to power does he have the power to achieve what he wants and if not who does b Where do shifts of power happen c Ultimately what disrupts this world vii Plot 1 Journey through the main character s life from the point where we realize what he wants to the point where he either gets it or does not viii The major Dramatic Question 1 Will X get Y 2 Identify the protagonist a The character who is at the center of the action and whose actions have the most impact on the plot 3 Identify what they want and what obstacles stand in their way 4 Want effort obstacles conflict dramatic action III IV V Climactic structure a Exposition introduction to the conflict rising action climax falling action resolution Thought Themes Ideas a Emerges from its action b The theme is the sum of all conflict and their reciprocal actions c It is inherently reductive to boil a long play down to one theme Endings a Where has the play taken its characters and where has the play taken its audience b How has the world of the play changed i Are there new relationships understandings orders c It is useful to compare the way things ended with the state in which they began