• Κωδικός / Course Code: THES512
• ECTS: 15
• Τρόποι Αξιολόγησης / Assessment:

  10% interactive educational activities, 30% written assignments and 60% final examination

• Διάρκεια Φοίτησης/ Length of Study: Εξαμηνιαία (χειμερινό) / Semi-annual (fall)
• Κόστος/ Tuition Fees: 675 euro
• Επίπεδο Σπουδών/ Level: Μεταπτυχιακό/ Postgraduate

Module Purpose and Objectives

In this module students gain a global insight into the history of Western theatre from its dawn to the late 17^th c. The greatest landmarks in theatre history are looked at here, along with the types of drama and the most important trends and schools, their major representatives, as well as the most notable developments in theatre architecture, scenography, direction, acting etc.

Beyond a historically oriented venture into theatre development, this module includes thorough reading and interpretation of 13 major plays of Western drama from antiquity to circa 1700. The plays are select specimens of world drama, offering students the opportunity to acquaint themselves with telling evidence of dramatic composition from different stages of theatre history. In this way, the two aspects of this unit (theatre history and drama) complement each other.

Module Content

Α. History of Theatre

• The origins of theatre
• Theories on the ritual origins of theatre
• Performative actions: elements and functions foregrounding theatre and ritual
• Ritual performances in Egypt and the Near East

• Theatre and drama in ancient Greece
• The origin of tragedy
• The City Dionysia in the 6^th c.
• Tragedy in the 5^th
• The satyr play
• Greek comedy in the 5^th
• Dramatic festivals in the 5^th
• Play selection and financing
• Actors and acting
• The Chorus in ancient drama
• Music and dance in the ancient drama
• Costumes and masks in the ancient drama
• The architecture of the ancient theatre
• Athenian theatre after the 5^th

• Hellenistic and Roman period

• The Hellenistic theatre
• Aristotle’s Poetics
• New Comedy: antecedents, features, standardization
• Actors and acting
• Costumes
• Theatre architecture
• The mime in ancient Greece
• Roman theatre: prehistory (Etruscan antecedents)

• Drama under the Roman Empire
• Production of spectacles in the Roman theatre
• Roman theatre architecture
• Scenery
• Actors and acting
• Masks and costumes
• Music
• The Byzantine theatre

• Theatre from 500 to 900 AD. Liturgical drama.
• European theatre in the Middle Ages from 500 to 900 AD.
• Liturgical drama
• The staging of liturgical drama
• The Vernacular Religious Drama (in languages other than Latin)
• Performing religious drama
• Staging of liturgical/religious drama
• Audiences and Auditoriums
• Secular forms: farce, liturgical drama, the morality play
• Interludes

• English theatre from the Middle Ages to 1642
• Early Tudor drama
• The University Wits
• Shakespeare and his contemporaries
• Jacobine and Caroline dramatists
• Acting Companies

• Public theatres in England during the 16^th and 17^th
• Private theatres in England during the 16^th and 17^th

• Spanish theatre to 1700
• Religious drama
• Secular drama
• The origins of professional theatre
• Lope de Vega and his contemporaries
• Calderon and his contemporaries
• The Corrales

• Renaissance drama in Italy
• The neoclassical ideal
• The development of theatre architecture
• Commedia dell’arte

• French theatre
• Public theatre, 1595-1629
• The triumph of the neoclassical ideal
• Acting Companies, 1629-1660
• French drama
• The organization of French Acting Companies

 B. List of plays

1. Aeschylus, Seven against Thebes
2. Sophocles, Philoctetes
3. Euripides, Iphigeneia in Tauris
4. Euripides, Cyclops
5. Aristophanes, Clouds
6. Terence, Eunuch
7. G. Chortadjis, Erofili
8. Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet
9. Shakespeare, Macbeth
10. Lope de Vega, Fuente Ovejuna
11. Machiavelli, La Mandragola
12. Molière, Dom Juan
13. Racine, Phèdre

• Κωδικός / Course Code: THES511
• ECTS: 15
• Τρόποι Αξιολόγησης / Assessment:

  10% interactive educational activities, 30% written assignments and 60% final examination

• Διάρκεια Φοίτησης/ Length of Study: Εξαμηνιαία (χειμερινό) / Semi-annual (fall)
• Κόστος/ Tuition Fees: 675 euro
• Επίπεδο Σπουδών/ Level: Μεταπτυχιακό/ Postgraduate

Module Purpose and Objectives

In this unit students gain a thorough and clear understanding of key theoretical concepts associated with the theatrical phenomenon, as well as of the main theoretical trends developed or applied in the area of theatrical creation and practice. Among others, elements of anthropology and semiotics of the theatre and of the stage area, elements of theatre phenomenology, as well as the poststructuralist and deconstructionist approaches to the theatrical phenomenon are being scrutinized. At the same time, this unit provides a succinct yet comprehensive introduction to the discipline of Theatre Studies (directing, acting, audience, dramatis personae, theatrical action etc.).

The main objectives of this Module are to enable students to:

• Understand the definition and research scope of Theatre as an academic discipline.
• Cite the basics of the special features of theatre (collective communication, actors, audience, the theatre as semiotic system).
• Know the structural parts of theatre (dramatic discourse, dialogic element, stage directions, acts, scenes, images, tableaux etc.) and the basic functions of theatrical language.
• Understand the main parameters of stage presentation (direction and director’s role, performance and performance theory, costumes, make-up, scenic design, set, stage lighting etc.)
• Know the essentials of the actor’s craft and acting techniques.
• Appreciate the role of the audience and the importance of a play’s reception; know the main components of relevant theoretical approaches.
• Know key components of scenography and stage decor.
• Make convincing and adequate analyses of dramatic characters in conjunction with the concepts of tragic hero, dramatic character and comic type, as well as with the problems of verisimilitude and
• Know the basic components of dramatic action (action and dramatic character, plot-episode etc.).

Module Content

1. The systematics of Theatre Science

• The discipline of Theatre Science
• Subdivisions of the theatrical phenomenon: verbal theatre/text-based theatre, music theatre, physical theatre, puppet and mask theatre, performance
• Brief introduction to the concept of postmodernism

2. Definition of the theatre  

• Attempts to define theatricality (Evreinov, Kutscher, Fischer-Lichte, Münz etc.)
• Boundaries between theatricality and theatre
• Theatre in Education
• Theatre for special groups
• Interactive Theatre
• Community Theatre
• Business Theatre
• Theatre for development

3. Theories of theatricality

• Overview of theatre theories: Aristotle, mimesis, poiesis, catharsis, aesthesis.
• Sociological and communicative approaches to theatre (Goffman, Paul, Dahrendorf, Rapp, Burns, Gadamer etc.).
• Social and theatrical roles
• Sociological models of collective interaction
• Theatricality of society / theatre of life
• Theatre and play
• Semiotic approaches to theatre (Kowzan, Fischer-Lichte, Elam).
• Anthropological approaches to theatre, performance studies
• Phenomenological approaches to theatre
• Psychological / psychoanalytical and feminist approaches to theatre
• Economic approaches (cultural materialism)

4.Theatrical performance as special form of communication

• Communication systems implicit in the theatrical performance
• Role and actor: (a) brief overview of the history of acting and relevant approaches, (b) acting methods of the 20^th (Stanislavski, Brecht, Copeau, Meyerhold, Grotowski, Strasberg, Michael Chekhov etc.)
• Role of spectator and audience: psychological, empirical/sociological, semiotic and esthetic receptions of a performance
• Quantitative and qualitative methods for assessing audience response
• Theatre space and theatre time: typologies of stage arrangement (monotopic and polytopic stage, simultaneity/succession of scenes, environmental theatre), types of theatre time (dramatic time, stage time, real time)
• Performance analysis: methods, groups of sources, questionnaires, approaches.

5. Performance

• Performance-doing or performance-action
• Social/anthropological range of a performance
• Relation between life-performance and theatre-performance
• Reading performance
• Performance and identity

6.  Dramatic text    

• Types of text
• Playwrights and writers of plays
• Play within a play
• Dramatic structures
• Devising a play

7.  Dramatic forms

• Tragedy, comedy, tragicomedy
• Epic theatre/drama
• Documentary and agitprop
• Farce
• Melodrama
• The well-made play
• Dramatic form deconstructed

8.  Acting: the body in space

• Costumes
• The paradox of acting
• Realism in acting
• Psychological gesture
• Creativity and tradition
• Alienation
• Street scene
• Acting in the “holy theatre”
• The mastery of movement
• Speaking a text

1. Directing

• Overview of the history of directing
• The great directors
• The contemporary director
• Stage director and film director
• First tasks
• Before rehearsals
• Rehearsals
• The last lap before the premiere

2. Theatre architecture

• Total theatres
• Stage design
• On stage
• LX-stage lighting
• Running the show