Theatrical legend to this day maintains that Thespis exists as a mischievous spirit, and disasters in the theatre are sometimes blamed on his ghostly intervention. Actors were traditionally not people of high status, and in the Early Middle Ages travelling acting troupes were often viewed with distrust. In many parts of Europe, actors could not even receive a Christian burial, and traditional beliefs of the region and time period held that this left any actor forever condemned.
However, this negative perception was largely reversed in the 19th and 20th centuries as acting has become an honored and popular profession and art. Part of the cause is the easier popular access to dramatic film entertainment and the resulting rise of the movie star — as regards both their social status and the salaries they command. The combination of public presence and wealth has profoundly rehabilitated their image.
In the past, only men could become actors in some societies. In the ancient Greece and Rome[1] and the medieval world, it was considered disgraceful for a woman to go on the stage, and this belief continued right up until the 17th century, when in Venice it was broken. In the time of William Shakespeare, women's roles were generally played by men or boys.
The British prohibition was ended in the reign of Charles II who enjoyed watching female actors (actresses) on stage. Stanislavsky and the Moscow Theater were among the first founders of what is now considered Method Acting. Meyerhold and his theory on biomechanics and physicality was a revolutionary idea back in early 20th century Russian theater.
Since then, Americanized forms of these theories brought about by Lee Strasberg, Stella Adler, and other variations brought about by Sanford Meisner and Viola Spolin can be seen. Shakespeare is believed to have been commenting on the acting style and techniques of his era when Hamlet gives his advice to the players in the play-within-the-play. He encourages the actors to “speak the speech.
..as I pronounced it to you,” and avoid “saw[ing] the air too much with your hand” , because even in a “whirlwind of passion, you must.
..give it smoothness.
” On the other hand, Hamlet urges the players to “Be not too tame neither.” He suggests that they make sure to “suit the action to the word, the word to the action”, taking care to “o'erstep not the modesty of nature.” As well, he told the players to not “.
..let those that play your clowns.
..laugh, to set on some quantity of barren spectators to laugh too,” which Hamlet considered to be a “villainous” and “pitiful” tactic.
The English critic Benedict Nightingale discussed and compared great classical actors of the long dead past, and the present, and their magical effects upon audiences, in this 1983 article from the New York Times, available online [2]. Shakespeare's time, for instance, men and boys played all roles, including the female parts. This was the case until the Restoration of the theater in 1660, the first occurrence of the term in the OED being by Dryden in 1700.
In Japan, men (onnagata) took over the female roles in kabuki theatre when women were banned from performing on stage during the Edo period. However, some forms of Chinese drama have playing all the roles. Today, women sometimes play the roles of prepubescent boys, because in some regards a woman has a closer resemblance to a boy than does a man.
The role of Peter Pan, for example, is traditionally played by a woman. The tradition of the principal boy in pantomime may be compared. An adult playing a child occurs more in theater than in film.
The exception to this is voice actors in animated films and television programmes, where boys are generally voiced by women, as heard in where the voice of Bart Simpson is provided by Nancy Cartwright. Opera has several 'pants roles' traditionally sung by women, usually mezzo-sopranos. Examples are Hansel in , and Cherubino in The Marriage of Figaro Mary Pickford played the part of Little Lord Fauntleroy in the first film version of the book.
Linda Hunt won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in The Year of Living Dangerously , in which she played the part of a man; this was the only Oscar ever awarded for playing a role of the opposite sex. Having an actor play the opposite sex for comic effect is also a long standing tradition in comic theatre and film. Most of Shakespeare's comedies include instances of cross-dressing, such as Francis Flute in , and both Dustin Hoffman and Robin Williams appeared in hit comedy films where they were required to play most scenes dressed as women.
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum stars Jack Gilford dressing as a young bride, among other slapstick comedy. Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon famously posed as women to escape gangsters in the Billy Wilder film Theatrical legend to this day maintains that Thespis exists as a mischievous spirit, and disasters in the theatre are sometimes blamed on his ghostly intervention.
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