Theater Midterm - Flashcards

Q: What is meant by the \"concept\" of a play

the director\'s central idea which focuses his or her interpretation

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Which type of rehearsal occurs near the end of the rehearsal process, as the play comes closer to production time but before the actors apply makeup?

answer

. technical

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Which of the following was one of several directors who not only fostered the development of realist and naturalist dramas but who also opened up the theatre to possibilities of psychological interpretation?

answer

Harley Granville-Barker

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What is meant by the "concept" of a play

answer

the director's central idea which focuses his or her interpretation

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Which of the following INCORRECTLY pairs a director with his or her previous profession?

answer

Mike Nichols: lighting designer

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A tagline is a single statement that can serve as an informal subtitle to the play, stating the core concept of the director.

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True

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A director should possess all of the following EXCEPT a

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capable voice and an athletic physique, both which comprise the actor's instrument.

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Harley Granville-Baker, in his essay "The Art of the Theatre" (1905), compares the director of a play to a captain of a ship in the following lines: "Until discipline is understood in a theater to be willing and reliant obedience to the manager [director] or captain, no supreme achievement can be accomplished."

answer

False

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Stage Left was originally written as a play, but adapted by Austin Forbord into the video form we saw for PBS.

answer

False

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The initial shows where a director can evaluate the production in terms of audience response and institute new changes are known as

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previews

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Small-scale movement on the stage, which an actor performs within the larger pattern of entrances and exits, is called

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business

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What does a director NOT seek in a designer-director collaboration?

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financial independence

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How did the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries' emphasis on rationalism influence the director's role?

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The demand for historical accuracy required the director to conduct comprehensive research, organization, and coordination.

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A producer may be an individual, such as an artistic director, or a partnership of individuals, such as a committee.

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true

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Which of the following is true of the history of the director's role?

answer

There has always been a director but not always an individual specifically charged with that role

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Which of the following directors founded the Théâtre d'Art in Paris in 1890 as a direct assault upon the realist principles espoused by André Antoine?

answer

Paul Fort

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Which of the following tasks belong to the director?

answer

conceptualizing the play and giving it vision and purpose

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The director's work with the designers is generally suggestive and corrective, rather than overtly controlling

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true

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What is the director's primary responsibility?

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to envision the main lines of the production and provide the artistic leadership to realize that vision

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The rhythm of a production, sometimes confused with the speed of the actor's delivery, is called.

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pace

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George II, Duke of Saxe-Meiningen, is generally regarded as the first modern director

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true

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Which of the following is NOT one of the goals of staging?

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to renew interest in the classics

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Which statement best describes the end of the director's involvement with the play?

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The director may still change aspects of the play during previews or the run, but primarily has given over responsibility to the audience

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Which person is responsible for the financial support of the production and, working closely with the director, also contributes to many "directorial" decisions in the production process?

answer

producer

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The timing and placement of a character's entrances, exits, crosses, embraces, and other major movements is calledThe timing and placement of a character's entrances, exits, crosses, embraces, and other major movements is called.

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blocking

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As a response against Stanislavsky's realism, the director Vsevolod Meyerhold evolved a theatre of "biomechanical constructivism" in Moscow.

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true

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What determines the pace of a play?

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the quality and quantity of information conveyed to the audience

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The director spends most of her time doing which of the following tasks?

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coaching the actors

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Which of the following is true of stylizing directors?

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They are unrestrained by rigid formulas with respect to verisimilitude or realistic behavior

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A great directorial concept has the qualities of being generalized, well-established by tradition, intellectually relaxing, designer-oriented, and readily apparent.

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false

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The "core concept" is.

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the director's determination of the most important of the many images, ideas, and emotions that will give the production meaning.

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The directing process encompasses the two phases of preparation and implementation

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true

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hich of the following is a potential theme, using Aristotles' definition of that term?

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To thine own self be true

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The ancient Greek word for director is

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didaskalos, meaning "teacher."

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The role of teacher-director reached its historical pinnacle of influence, albeit anonymously, during the Renaissance and early Restoration periods

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False

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André Antoine is primarily known as a ______ director

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naturalist

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Which of the following is a full and correct citation of a web site in MLA style?

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Altonn, Helen. "Marine Team Sounds Alarm for Reefs." StarBulletin.com. Star Bulletin, 29 Aug. 2008. Web. 17 June 2009

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Which of the following is NOT included in the conceptualization of a play?

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the social history of the playwright

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The interest of the director and intended audience, along with the capability of the director and producer to conceptualize and produce the play, are all criteria for play selection.

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true

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Which of the following require a citation in an academic paper, essay or answer?

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all the above

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Live performance is a term that encompasses theatre, film, television and new media

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False

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Class requirements include seeing how many live plays?

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two

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Drama comes from the Greek dran, which means

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to do

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What is our class using as the formal definition of "theatre?"

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That body of artistic work in which actors portray characters in a live performance of a scripted play

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While both theatre and sport are public spectacles, theatre differs from sports activities because:

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theatre has a pre-ordained ending

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Which mode of performance acknowledges the audience—as in the case of the nightclub performer who sings, dances, jokes, and responds overtly to applause?

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the presentational mode

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Performance is a strictly theatrical phenomenon

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false

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The English word for person comes from the Latin word for

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mask

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Theatre comes from theatron, which means:

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seeing place

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Which of the following is true of the relationship between the play script and the performance?

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the script is a silhouette or outline of the play itself, which fully exists in performance only

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The distinctive feature of theatre, which separates it from other arts, is that theatre employs:

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impersonation

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Play" and "performance" are interchangeable terms

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false

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What is plagiarism?

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when a student misrepresents the work of another as his or her own

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You can earn extra credit in this class by attending additional plays and writing a report on them.

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true

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How does a theatrical performance differ from a video or a filmed performance?

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The theatrical performance is live, with the audience and performers, who are aware of each other and mutually interact in their shared presence.

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Our outcomes and objectives for this class come from San Francisco State's learning outcomes for GE, and from the National Association of Schools of Theater's standards

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true

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Theatre signifies all the following EXCEPT

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the stage and backstage spaces

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theatre is an art because it:

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structures meaning without providing dogma

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Online classes are easier than face-to-face classes

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false

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The audience is NOT a part of the definition of conventions of the theatre

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false

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What is the difference between plot and story?

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. Plot refers to the structure of events; story refers to a narrative of what happens in a play.

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The purging or cleansing of the audience's pity and terror at the climax of a tragedy is called

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catharsis

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The six components of a play which Aristotle lists, in order of importance, are:

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plot, character, theme, diction, music, and spectacle

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According to Aristotle, it is impossible to break down the elements that make tragedy effective

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false

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The visual aspect of the play, including the scenery, costumes, lighting, make-up, and the over-all look of the stage are included known as in the element

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spectacle

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In Greek tragedy, the central character

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undergoes a change that leads to his or her demise

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The final scene, action, or lines in a play devoted to bringing the play to a new level of harmony or understanding, perhaps even resolution, after the climax is called the

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denouement

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In Western drama, a full-length play has historically been designated as one that:

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lasts two to three hours, typically

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A play that dramatizes the key events in the life of a king or head of state, such as Shakespeare's Henry IV, is called:

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a history play

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The Greek term for the "carrier of the action" in a tragedy is

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protaganist

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Which one of the following is part of the time-based horizontal axis of dramaturgy?

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a pre play

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Aristotle's term for the play's abstracted intellectual content is "thesis."

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false

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Comedies that use a more bleak humor in dealing with serious themes are known as

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dark comedies

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Background information, presented within the play that the audience must possess in order to understand the action of the play is called:

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exposition

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In a Greek play, the lead character that moves the action forward is opposed by a figure called the antagonist.

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true

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Genre means category or kind

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true

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Processions and the Ancient Greek proagon are two examples of ways in which theatre artists publicized their plays in ages past.

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true

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The agreement between the audience and the actor, which includes a whole set of tacit understandings that form the context of playwatching, is called:

answer

convention

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The major organization for theatre companies in San Francisco is called:

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theater bay area

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Which element of drama refers not only to the pronunciation of spoken dialogue but also to the literary nature of the play's text, including its tone, imagery, articulation, and use of such literary forms as verse, rhyme, metaphor, jest, apostrophe, and epigram?

answer

diction

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Which element describes the play's use of rhythm and sounds, either by way of instrumental composition or the orchestration of such noises as muffled drumbeats, gunshots, special effects, and vocal tones?

answer

music

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In play construction, the single action that initiates the major conflict of the play is called

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inciting incident

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Which of the following is true about the differences between tragedy and comedy?

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Tragedy typically deals with great people, whereas comedy deals with ordinary people

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After what era did the image of the playwright move from that of theatrical co-worker to that of the isolated observer and social critic?

answer

romanticism

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This playwright speaks of "two selves, the public and private self, the worlds that people juggle a lot of time just from being out there in the world," and whose works, such as Wrecks, reflect this statement

answer

Neil LaBute

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Which playwright has branched out into writing librettos and adaptations of musicals for shows such as Aida and Tarzan?

answer

David Henry Hwang

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A play in which every character possesses an independence of intention and expression, and whose motivation appears sensible in the light of our general knowledge of psychology and human behavior, possesses

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depth of characterization.

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Based off of Bertolt Brecht's Mother Courage, Lynn Nottage's play Ruined transposes the action to a brothel in the Democratic Republic of Congo

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true

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A play that relates in some fashion to the current personal concerns of the audience is said to possess gravity.

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false

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The plays of Tony Kushner look at the hidden violence that can lie beneath seemingly stable human relationships, as in Bash, which is set within the context of the Church of Latter-Day Saints.

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false

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Scenes of forced conflict are important because

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climactic scenes define a play's structure

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Which of the following is true of playwriting in bygone days?

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Playwriting was considered so technically demanding a craft that playwrights spent long in-house apprenticeships as "company men," learning their skills through continual exposure in theatrical rehearsal and performance.

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A linear plot proceeds by

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the point-to-point storytelling of events linked in chronological, cause-effect continuity.

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James Barrie's fantastical play Peter Pan deals with characters that are wholly appropriate to their imaginary situation and internally consistent in their actions within the context of the play. Since it may be said to make a picture of a wholly consistent world, this play possesses

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credibility.

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An independence of thought and vision is perhaps the playwright's most important characteristic.

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true

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Which New York-born, Louisiana-raised, playwright (b. 1956) wrote a masterpiece of modern drama, Angels in America, which deals with the AIDS crisis, sexuality, gender, and politics?

answer

Tony Kushner

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All of the following are signs of good characterization EXCEPT

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the character appears as a pawn in the playwright's grand design and exists only to symbolize something.

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When a playwright has managed to make every scene, incident, character, and word deliver an impact, he or she has satisfied the dramatic demand for

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intensity.

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The quality of a play that describes the way the playwright creates a world in which every detail fortifies our insight into the play is called richness.

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true

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Whose plays are noted for intensely realistic writing and almost musical, rhythmic dialogue?

answer

david mamet

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The quality of stage dialogue that makes it achieve maximum impact when spoken and which requires the playwright to be attentive to the audial shape of language, including the meaning of the dialogue and the rhythm of sound, is called stageability

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false

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The playwright's skill at condensing a story that may spans many days or years of chronological time into a theatrical time frame is called

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compression

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Which playwright demonstrates a commitment to issues global human rights, as shown in Ruined?

answer

Lynn Nottage

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The term "playwright" refers to

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a person who constructs and composes a play as a wheelwright makes a wheel

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A screenwriter, as well as a playwright, Neil LaBute's contribution to today's theatre is a return to highly romantic dialogue, at times written in poetic verse

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false

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The playwright works with two fundamental tools

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dialogue and physical action

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The quality of a play that refers to a continual stream of information is called progression

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False

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One difference between the playwright in Shakespeare's time and the contemporary playwright is that

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the playwright no longer functions as a director but is now considered an independent artist

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Which quality of character began in realism and grew to become the dominant aspect of the theatrical experience by the mid-twentieth century, most notably in the plays of Chekov, Williams, and Miller?

answer

the psychological dimension of character

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Which of the following is the most accurate statement of the audience's response to the drama?

answer

. Intrigue draws us into the world of the play; credibility keeps us there.

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The audience's demand for internal consistency in a play, in which the characters, the situation, and the theatrical context are combined to generate the action, creates credibility

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true

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All of the following could be considered contributors to an interesting audible shape to dialogue EXCEPT

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well structured grammar

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The core element of every play is

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action

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A play that deals with an issue of serious and lasting significance in humanity's spiritual or intellectual life beyond the mere attempt to imitate profundity is said to possess

answer

gravity

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What aspects of the play do not need to be written at all?

answer

a character's improvisational behavior

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The quality of a play that creates suspense by making us wonder what will happen next is called curiosity

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false

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a play in which events are connected to each other in strict, chronological, cause-effect continuity, and in which dramatic experience attempts to convey a lifelike progression of experience through time, is classified as

answer

continuous in structure and linear in chronology

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The type of performing that asks the actor to enter the mind of the character being played is

answer

representational acting.

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What alternate meaning of "presence" explains the power of the actor beyond virtuosity?

answer

projection of an aura of magic and the divine

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The dual meanings of this word explain both its physical, common definition and its more religious meaning, "spirit stimulus."

answer

inspiration

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What is "The Method?"

answer

an American acting style derived from the Russian actor-director Konstantin Stanislavsky's self-proclaimed system

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Konstantin Stanislavsky, founder of the Moscow Art Theatre (1898), said "You must live the life of your character on stage." Which style of acting does this statement describe most closely?

answer

the representational mode of acting

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The term mimesis means

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mimicry

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In his first published work, Stanislavsky states that the "prime task" of the actors is to "create the

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inner life of the character."

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Directed stage actions that are precisely scripted physical behaviors worked out in blocking are called

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stage business.

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What are the two fundamental notions of acting?

answer

What are the two fundamental notions of acting?

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The actor's instrument is his or her

answer

self

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What description best characterizes our current relationship to virtuosity?

answer

It is making a comeback since the heyday of the Method in the mid-twentieth century

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Which faculty keeps the actor within established bounds and at the same time ensures artistic agility?

answer

discipline

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Actors who studies human behaviors from a broad range of historical periods, countries, and social classes, so as to apply them when creating characters from a variety of dramatic styles, demonstrates a technique of the _________ mode of acting.

answer

. presentational

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Most auditions consist of performing

answer

. one- or two-minute monologues from plays or short narrative cuttings from novels, stories, or poems which display a contrast

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Which two writers best exemplify the range of difference between external and internal approaches to assuming a character?

answer

. Diderot and Stanislavsky

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The three main elements of the actor's approach are

answer

goals, tactics, and researching the style of the play and mode of performance.

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The term "subtext" refers to

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a character's unspoken and undescribed goals

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Today, the debate over inside or outside styles of acting

answer

. is largely diminished, with Stanislavsky and classical techniques both emphasized..

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Which of the following does the director NOT typically look for in an audition?

answer

Actor's personal experiences paralleling those of the character

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Why did the Greek actor Polus, when playing the role of Electra, bring the ashes of his dead son onstage with him?

answer

He wanted to cry real tears lamenting the "death" of his character's brother.

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Which person is responsible for the building and operation of stage machinery and scenery; scheduling lighting and industrial crews; moving scenery in and out of the theatre; and establishing policies and directives for scene shifting?

answer

technical director

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What kind of scenery uses evocative visual images to make a visual statement about the production's intended mood or theme?

answer

metaphorical

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Realistic costuming took over when which of the following became a major guiding principle in drama?

answer

historical accuracy

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Which invention brought lighting to the stage in its modern form and made lighting a more controlled part of the drama?

answer

the gaslight

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Makeup, like costuming, is

answer

both ceremonial and illustrative

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What kind of scenery attempts to depict, in great detail, a specific time and place in the observable world where the play's events are presumed to take place?

answer

. realistic

question

Turntables, elevators, hoists, cranes, rolling carts, and wagons, which are all used as scenic elements to accompany and support the dramatic action, are collectively called

answer

. stage machinery

question

Which of the following is NOT a postmodern design element?

answer

furniture taken directly from people's homes

question

Which of the following is true of the history of lighting in scene design?

answer

Even before the advent of electricity, designers attempted to manipulate lighting with candles, oil lamps, and reflective surfaces.

question

The order and process of developing a design for a play could be summarized by the following steps:

answer

reading the play, researching, imagining, creating a physical presentation, collaborating, approving for the budget, ensuring viability, implementing

question

Which of the following types of stage is completely surrounded by audience?

answer

arena

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A plan or series of plans showing the placement of each lighting instrument—its type, wattage, size, wiring and connection to a dimmer, and color is called

answer

a light plot.

question

In describing dramatic space as "psycho-plastic," which "scenographer" (Europe's most celebrated in the 20th century) said "The goal of a designer can no longer be a description of a copy of actuality, but the creation of its multidimensional model?"

answer

Joseph Svoboda

question

During performances, the person fully in charge of overseeing the execution of the show is the

answer

production stage manager

question

The theatricalist use of lighting in Brecht's didactic theatre calls for

answer

the lighting instruments being exposed and placed in full view of the audience

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Which is an example of stereophonically located sound design?

answer

an airplane flying overhead from left to right

question

The type of set that fostered a uniquely architectural theory of theatre was

answer

the theatre of the fourth wall removed

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The picture frame stage reached its highest realization in the

answer

baroque period

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The ancient and original use of costume was to

answer

separate the actor from the audience.

question

Which kind of stage consists of a bare room able to adapt to a variety of staging possibilities?

answer

black box

question

The development of _____ fostered the great period of scenery design.

answer

the artificially illuminated indoor theatre

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