Commedia dell'arte

Commedia dell'arte (Italian, meaning "comedy of professional artists") was a form of improvisational theater which began in the 16th century and was popular until the 18th century, although it is still performed today. Traveling teams of players would set up an outdoor stage and provide amusement in the form of juggling, acrobatics, and, more typically, humorous plays based on a repertoire of established characters with a rough storyline, called Canovaccio.

The influence of the Commedia

The commedia dell'arte, with its stock situations and stock characters and improvised dialogue, has shown the way to many other forms of drama, from pantomime and Punch and Judy - which features debased forms of the commedia characters (see below) - to the modern animated cartoon, situation comedy, and even professional wrestling. Richard Strauss used several of the characters in his opera Ariadne auf Naxos. The characters and tropes of the commedia have also been used in novels, notably Scaramouche, the 1921 historical novel by Rafael Sabatini, but also in more recent sword and sorcery and literary works, such as Michael Moorcock's Jerry Cornelius stories that culminate with the Guardian prize-winning The Condition of Muzak.

Related Topics:
Stock characters - Pantomime - Punch and Judy - Animated cartoon - Situation comedy - Professional wrestling - Richard Strauss - Ariadne auf Naxos - Trope - Novel - Scaramouche - 1921 - Historical novel - Rafael Sabatini - Sword and sorcery - Michael Moorcock - Jerry Cornelius - Guardian

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Aspects of commedia dell'arte also passed into the silent tradition of mime. The Bohemian actor Jean-Gaspard Deburau (1796 -1846) brought the new forms of mime to Paris in the 1830s. He standardized the French image of Pierrot.

Related Topics:
Mime - Jean-Gaspard Deburau - Pierrot

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~