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=Stagecraft= In Ancient Greece during the time of New Comedy, from which Plautus drew so much of his inspiration, there were permanent theaters that catered to the audience as well as the actor. The greatest playwrights of the day had quality facilities in which to present their work and, in a general sense, there was always enough public support to keep the theater running and successful. However, this was not the case in Rome during the time of the Republic when Plautus would have been writing his plays. Though the debate about this topic has sometimes been hindered by a lack of evidence, scholars have illuminated parts this field, and thus facilitated further research of the subject. What they have found is that while there was public support for theater and people came to enjoy tragedy and comedy alike, there was a notable lack of governmental support. The result was that there was not a permanent theater until Pompey dedicated the first one in 55 B.C.E in the Campus Martius. The lack of a permanent space was extremely influential, and it gives us great insight if we are exploring the history of Roman theater and its ramifications on Plautine stagecraft.

The question of why there were no permanent theaters in Rome until 55 B.C.E. is a puzzling question for contemporary scholars of Roman drama. In their introduction to the Miles Gloriosus, Hammond, Mack and Moskalew say that, “the Romans were acquainted with the Greek stone theater, but, because they believed drama to be a demoralizing influence, they had a strong aversion to the erection of permanent theaters.”  This worry rings true when considering the subject matter of Plautus’ plays. The unreal becomes reality on stage in his work. T.J. Moore notes that, “all distinction between the play, production, and ‘real life’ has been obliterated [Plautus’ play Curculio]”. This must have been a concern for any upstanding citizen, and so a place where social norms were upended could not become an institution lest bad, or at least inappropriate, behavior be reinforced. Obviously the aristocracy was afraid of the power of the theater. They wished to assert control over the medium and went about doing so by making it impermanent. It would have been merely by their good graces and unlimited resources that a temporary stage would have been built during specific festivals.

The Importance of the Ludi
Roman drama, specifically Plautine comedy, was acted out on stage during the ludi or festival games. These plays were acted out during the day on wooden stages. Some were more important to drama - for instance, in his discussion of the importance of the ludi Megalenses in early Roman theater, John Arthur Hanson says that this particular festival “provided more days for dramatic representations than any of the other regular festivals, and it is in connection with these ludi that the most definite and secure literary evidence for the site of scenic games has come down to us.”  Because the ludi were religious in nature, it was appropriate for the Romans to set up this temporary stage close to the temple of the deity being celebrated. S.M. Goldberg notes that, “ludi were generally held within the precinct of the particular god being honored”. But that information only tells us the where and the when. While there has been much debate about for whom these plays were performed, it is clear that certain members of the audience had their own special realms around the stage. T.J. Moore notes that, “seating in the temporary theaters where Plautus’ plays were first performed was often insufficient for all those who wished to see the play, that the primary criterion for determining who was to stand and who could sit was social status”. This is not to say that the lower classes did not see the plays, but simply means that they probably had to stand while watching it. So these plays were performed in public for the public with the most prominent members of the society in the forefront.

As noted above, in the place of these familiar permanent theaters of the late Republic and Roman Empire, Plautus used temporary wooden stages, set up by the aristocracy that provided a performance space for the actors. These wooden structures were shallow and long with three openings in respect to the scene-house - because of the time-constraint on the building process, the stages were significantly smaller than any Greek structure that is familiar to modern scholars. The time limits existed because while the plays were performed during these festivals many other events took place that needed their own space as well. Because theater was not seen as the priority, the structures were built and dismantled within a day. Even more practically, they were dismantled quickly because of the fire-hazard in ancient Rome.

Geography of the Stage
Often the geography of the stage and more importantly the play matched the geography of the city so that the audience would be well oriented to the locale of the play. Moore says that, “references to Roman locales must have been stunning for they are not merely references to things Roman, but the most blatant possible reminders that the production occurs in the city of Rome.”  So, Plautus seems to have choreographed his plays somewhat true-to-life. To do this, he needed his characters to exit and enter to or from whatever area their social standing would befit.

Character and social standing are of the utmost importance when trying to figure out the puzzle that is Plautine stagecraft and stage-space. Two scholars, V.J. Rosivach and N.E. Andrews, have made interesting observations about stagecraft in Plautus: V.J. Rosivach writes about identifying the side of the stage with both social status and geography. He says that, for example, “the house of the medicus lies offstage to the right. It would be in the forum or thereabouts that one would expect to find a medicus.”  Moreover, he says that characters that oppose one another always have to exit in opposite directions. In a slightly different vein, N.E. Andrews discusses the spatial semantics of Plautus; he has observed that even the different spaces of the stage are thematically charged. He states: Plautus’ Casina employs these conventional tragic correlations between male/outside and female/inside, but then inverts them in order to establish an even more complex relationship among genre, gender and dramatic space. In the Casina, the struggle for control between men and women... is articulated by characters’ efforts to control stage movement into and out of the house. So while it seems that there is a place for everyone in the plays of Plautus, no one stays in their place. And what clues us in to these specified realms is the way that the spaces are transgressed.

Andrews makes note of the fact that power struggle in the Casina is evident in the verbal comings and goings. In fact the words of action and the way that they are said are quite important to stagecraft. The words denoting direction or action such as abeo (“I go off”), transeo (“I go over”), fores crepuerunt (“the doors creak”), or intus (“inside”), which signal any character’s departure or entrance, are standard in the dialogue of Plautus’ plays. These verbs of motion or phrases can be taken as Plautine stage direction since no overt stage directions are apparent. Often, though, in these interchanges of characters, in Plautine adaptations of Greek originals, there occurs the need to move on to the next act. Plautus then might use what is known as a “cover monologue”. About this S.M. Goldberg notes that, “it marks the passage of time less by its length than by its direct and immediate address to the audience and by its switch from senarii in the dialogue to iambic septenarii. The resulting shift of mood distracts and distorts our sense of passing time.”  And so one method Plautus used to stage the play within the text was to change the meter and type of speech, which clued in the audience to the coming of the next act.

Relationship with the Audience
The small stages had a significant effect on the stagecraft of ancient Roman theater. Because of this limited space, there was also limited movement. Greek theater allowed for grand gestures and extensive action to reach the audience members who were in the very back of the theater. However the Romans would have had to depend more on their voices than large physicality. There was not an orchestra available like there was for the Greeks and this is reflected in the notable lack of a chorus in Roman drama. The replacement character that acts as the chorus would in Greek drama is often called the “prologue.”

Goldberg says that, “these changes fostered a different relationship between actors and the space in which they performed and also between them and their audiences.”  Actors were thrust into much closer audience interaction. Because of this, a certain acting style became required that is more familiar to modern audiences. Because they would have been in such close proximity to the actors, ancient Roman audiences would have wanted attention and direct acknowledgement form the actors.

That relationship between the actor and his audience was a very important one. Not only was the job of the actor in relation to the audience closer than it had ever been, but the relation of the audience to the stage was much closer. Because there was no orchestra, there was no space separating the audience from the stage. The audience could stand directly in front of the elevated wooden platform. This gave them the opportunity to look at the actors from a much different perspective. They would have seen every detail of the actor and hear every word he said. The audience member would have wanted that actor to speak directly to them. It was a part of the thrill, and, to this day, is still a thrill for audiences enjoying comedy or any type of theater.

Plautine stagecraft is a lot more than just stage directions, theater mechanisms and costumes. Most of what we consider traditional stagecraft is still slightly mysterious with respect to Roman drama. The impermanence of early Roman theater undoubtedly affected what theater meant to Plautus’ society - it was something that had not reached the mainstream in the way that we think of mainstream today. That temporary nature was, in a way, done to control the threat posed by depictions of subverted order, even in comedy, maintained by the upper class. However, it’s affect on contemporary and future theater is unmistakable and the significance of audience-actor interaction that is so essential to Renaissance theater during the time of Shakespeare is first seen in these temporary theaters. Despite its limitation, therefore, Early Roman theater was another important step in the evolution of stagecraft.

=Stock Characters=

Plautus’ range of characters was created through his use of various techniques, but probably the most important is his use of stock characters and situations in his various plays. He incorporates the same stock characters constantly, especially when the character type is amusing to the audience. His devotion to comedy led him to creating characters that were as humorous as possible despite the repetition or shifts in personality. As Walter Juniper wrote, “Everything, including artistic characterization and consistency of characterization, were sacrificed to humor, and character portrayal remained only where it was necessary for the success of the plot and humor to have a persona who stayed in character, and where the persona by his portrayal contributed to humor.”  By sacrificing the characterization for humor’s sake, Plautus’ characters are not terribly deep, only showing the traits for their stock character type.

For example, in  Miles Gloriosus, the titular “braggart soldier” Pyrgopolynices only shows his vain and immodest side in the first act, while the parasite Artotrogus exaggerates Pyrgopolynices’ achievements, creating more and more ludicrous claims that Pyrgopolynices agrees to without question. These two are perfect examples of the stock characters of the pompous soldier and the desperate parasite that appeared in Plautine comedies. In disposing of highly complex individuals, Plautus was supplying his audience with what it wanted, since “the audience to whose tastes Plautus catered was not interested in the character play,” but instead, wanted the broad and accessible humor offered by stock set-ups. The humor Plautus offered, such as “puns, word plays, distortions of meaning, or other forms of verbal humor he usually puts them in the mouths of characters belonging to the lower social ranks, to whose language and position these varieties of humorous technique are most suitable,” matched well with the stable of characters.

The Clever Slave
In his article "The Intriguing Slave in Greek Comedy," Philip Harsh gives evidence to show that the clever slave is not an invention of Plautus. While previous critics such as A.W. Gomme believed that the slave was “ [a] truly comic character, the devisor of ingenious schemes, the controller of events, the commanding officer of his young master and friends, is a creation of Latin comedy,” and that Greek dramatists Menander did not use slaves in such a way that Plautus later did, Harsh refutes these beliefs by giving concrete examples of instances where a clever slave appeared in Greek comedy. For instance, ion the works of Athenaeus, Alciphron, and Lucian there are deceptions that involve the aid of a slave, and in Menander’s Dis Exapaton there was an elaborate deception executed by a clever slave that Plautus mirrors in his Bacchides. Evidence of clever slaves also appears in Menander’s Thalis, Hypobolimaios, and from the papyrus fragment of his Perinthia. Harsh acknowledges that Gomme’s statement was probably made before the discovery of many of the papyri that we now have. While it was not necessarily a Roman invention, Plautus did his own style of depicting the clever slave. With larger, more active roles, more verbal exaggeration and exuberance, the slave was moved my Plautus further into the front of the action. Because of the inversion of order created by a devious or witty slave, this stock character was perfect for achieving a humorous response and the traits of the character worked well for driving the plot forward.

The Lusty Old Man
Another important Plautine stock character, discussed by K.C. Ryder, is the senex amator. A senex amator is classified as an old man who for some reason contracts a passion for a young girl and who, in varying degrees, attempts to satisfy this passion. In Plautus these men are Demaenetus (Asinaria), Philoxenus and Nicobulus (Bacchides), Demipho (Cistellaria), Lysidamus (Casina), Demipho (Mercator), and Antipho (Stichus). Periplectomenos (Miles Gloriosus) and Daemones (Rudens) are regarded as senes lepidi because they usually keep their feelings within a respectable limit. All of these characters have the same goal, to be with a younger woman, but all go about it in different ways as Plautus could not be too redundant with his characters despite their already obvious similarities. What they have in common is the ridicule with which their attempts are viewed, the imagery that suggests that they are motivated largely by animal passion, the childish behavior, and the reversion to the love-language of their youth. This is a type, like the clever slave, which is fertile ground for comedy simply because of the nature of the character, and that is exactly why Plautus returned to it so many times.

Female Characters
There is often an inconsistency when it comes to the role designations given to female characters in Plautus’ plays. To examine this it is important to understand where these role designations come from. The original manuscripts contained no prefaced list of character names as most new editions now have. Instead, the manuscripts sometimes have character names in the headings, or at other times we learn the role designation of the character through the play itself - a character will be described before entering the stage or another character will address him by name.

In examining the female role designations of Plautus, Z.M. Packman found that they are not as stable as their male counterparts: a senex will usually remain a senex for the duration of the play but designations like matrona, mulier, or uxor at times seem interchangeable. Most free adult women, married or widowed, appear in scene headings as mulier, simply translated as “woman”. But in Plautus’ Stichus the two young women are referred to as sorores, later mulieres, and then matrona, all of which have different meanings and connotations. Although there are these discrepancies, Packman tries to give a pattern to the female role designations of Plautus. Mulier is typically given to a woman of citizen class and of marriageable age or who has already been married. Unmarried citizen-class girls, regardless of sexual experience, were designated virgo. Aniclla was the term used for female household slaves, with Anus reserved for the elderly household slaves. A young woman that is unwed due to social status is usually referred to as meretrix or “courtesan.” A lena or adoptive mother maybe a woman own these girls.

Unnamed Characters
Like Packman, George Duckworth uses the scene headings in the manuscripts to support his theory about unnamed Plautine characters. There are approximately 220 characters in the 20 plays of Plautus. 30 are unnamed in both the scene headings and the text and there are about 9 characters who are named in the ancient text but not in any modern one. This means that about 18% of the total number of characters in Plautus is nameless. Most of the very important characters have names while most of the number of unnamed characters are of less importance. However there are some abnormalities -  the main character in Casina is not mentioned by name anywhere in the text. In other instances, meanwhile, Plautus will give a name to a character that only has a few words or lines. One explanation is that some of the names have been lost over the years and for the most part, major characters do have names.