I
Building or space in which performances are given before an audience.
It contains an auditorium and stage. In ancient Greece, where Western theatre began (5th century BC), theatres were constructed in natural hollows between hills. The audience sat in a tiered semicircle facing the orchestra, a flat circular space where the action took place. Behind the orchestra was the skene . The theatres of Elizabethan England were open to the sky, with the audience looking on from tiered galleries or a courtyard. During this period the main innovation was the rectangular thrust stage, surrounded on three sides by spectators. The first permanent indoor theatre was proscenium arch. Baroque European court theatres followed this arrangement, elaborating on the interior with tiered boxes for royalty. Richard Wagner 's Festspielhaus in Bayreuth, Ger. (1876), with its fan-shaped seating plan, deep orchestra pit, and darkened auditorium, departed from the Baroque stratified auditorium and reintroduced Classical principles that are still in use. The proscenium theatre prevailed in the 17th–20th centuries; though still popular in the 20th century, it was supplemented by other types of theatre, such as the thrust stage and theatre-in-the-round . In Asia, stage arrangements have remained simple, with the audience usually grouped informally around an open space; notable exceptions are the nō drama and kabuki of Japan. See also amphitheatre ; odeum .
II
Live performance of dramatic actions in order to tell a story or create a spectacle.
The word derives from the Greek theatron ("place of seeing"). Theatre is one of the oldest and most important art forms in cultures worldwide. While the script is the basic element of theatrical performance, it also relies in varying degrees on acting, singing, and dancing, as well as on technical aspects of production such as stage design . Theatre is thought to have its earliest origins in religious ritual; it often enacts myths or stories central to the belief structure of a culture or creates comedy through travesty of such narratives. In Western civilization, theatre began in ancient Greece and was adapted in Roman times; it was revived in the medieval liturgical dramas and flourished in the Renaissance with the Italian commedia dell'arte and in the 17th–18th centuries with established companies such as the Comédie-Française . Varying theatrical forms may evolve to suit the tastes of different audiences (e.g., in Japan, the kabuki of the townspeople and the nō theatre of the court). In Europe and the U.S. in the 19th and early 20th centuries theatre was a major source of entertainment for all social classes, with forms ranging from burlesque show s and vaudeville to serious dramas performed in the style of the Moscow Art Theatre . Though the musical s of Broadway and the farce s of London's West End retain their popular appeal, the rise of television and movies has eroded audiences for live theatre and has tended to limit its spectators to an educated elite. See also little theatre .
III
[c mediumvioletred] (as used in expressions)
Abbey Theatre
American Ballet Theatre
Apollo Theatre
black theatre
civic theatre
Drury Lane Theatre
epic theatre
Globe Theatre
Group Theatre
little theatre
Living Theatre The
Mariinsky Theatre
Kirov Theatre
Maryinsky Theatre
Moscow Art Theatre
music hall and variety theatre
Noh theatre
No theatre
repertory theatre
Royal National Theatre
Theatre Guild
Theatre of the Absurd
Theatre of Cruelty
Theatre of Fact
{{link=documentary theatre">documentary theatre
theatre in the round