Abstract
How do we know we are watching theatre and not simply observing the world around us? In The Contrast, Royall Tyler’s play of 1787 (usually considered the first American comedy), the good-hearted but simple character Jonathan is tricked into going to the theatre – an activity that he perceives as immoral, but of which he has had no experience. Questioned afterward, he comments on the peculiar architecture to be found in New York City that permits one to peer into neighbouring buildings, and acknowledges that he would not mind having a bit of cider with one of the individuals he observed. It is an amusing conceit precisely because of its metatheatricality. As a theatrically competent audience we may laugh at a naïf who is unaware of the presence of a frame and thus perceives the on-stage action as an extension of his own world, no matter how peculiar. The situation in this play serves to demonstrate that without a frame there can be no theatre.
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Notes
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© 2006 Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited
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Aronson, A. (2006). Avant-garde scenography and the frames of the theatre. In: Ackerman, A., Puchner, M. (eds) Against Theatre. Performance Interventions. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230289086_2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230289086_2
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