What is theatre?

What is theatre?

 

Good question. What is theatre? What seems like such a basic question can have thousands of annotations drawn from it and can challenge everything you once first believed in. Theatre, to me, used to consist of a scripted piece of drama in which the actors told a story prancing around on stage for an audience. I realise now that if this is the case then I’m not ginger! (I am ginger, so basically what I’m trying to say is that theatre isn’t like that.) Especially once we explored Artaud more thoroughly, I couldn’t have been more wrong. Theatre can be anything once there is someone to perform and someone to watch. Theatre gives others a chance to witness something they may never experience in their own life. Theatre gives others a chance to behave in a way they may never experience in their own life. It’s about leaving yourself as an individual and becoming someone new, someone different with a new life and new beliefs and new attitudes. It’s an opportunity, not a misfortune. It’s a passion, not a job.

 

Theatre doesn’t have to be performed in a traditional stage with big red curtains and chairs below. Theatre can be performed anywhere, and that’s the beauty of it. Theatre can be educating, entertaining, frightening, ect or all of those words together. Actors or directors or playwrights can perform with the intention of changing or rectify the audiences’ mind set or views on certain issues. It’s wrong to put a label on theatre because it’s pretty much impossible. Theatre is open to interpretation and you can make it anything you wish it to be.