Without
art, the crudeness of reality would make the world unbearable.
– GEORGE BERNARD
SHAW
From the early days of human history, we humans have gathered around fires and shared stories; stories of family and friends, of history and wars and battles, of fantasies and love. We created myths and gods to explain the unexplainable. This ancient and erstwhile act of story telling had created unbreakable bonds amongst us, brining all the human beings on this planet together. Some records say, that we humans have been doing this since thirty thousand years ago!
In the 6th century BCE, a group of men on the hillsides near Athens, Greece, were singing praises to their god. All of a sudden, one of them stepped out and claimed that he is their god, and started acting and talking like one. The God was Dionysus, the god of fertility and wine; and the man was Thespis from Icaria, believed by tradition to be the world's first actor. And that was the birth point of theatre, which today has transformed into a language which the blind can see and the deaf can hear.
There were few philosophers who were against the art of theatre. For instance, one of the greatest philosophers of ancient times, Plato, completely hated the idea of impersonating. He felt acting was just a refined form of lying.
Around 1500, when the period of renaissance surfaced, most of the colonies and countries across the globe began to develop a distinct style of theatre. And it was around 1600, when Shakespearean theatre rose to brilliance. In the 18th century, number of colonies in America that were strong and established enough to pursue theatre began to increase, and actors came from England. In the early years of the 20th century, a few people with new technology discovered how effective the quality of light was for photography, and began a film community in Hollywood. And very soon, doomsayers and crystal-gazers began to predict the death of theatre and felt that theatre would never succeed in competing with the film performances. Pioneers and common people thought that the art of theatre had reached its end point. But then, the future proved everybody wrong. Theatre flourished, still flourishes, and doesn't show the slightest sign of vanishing.
Theatre is the basic form of acting and improvising. All the great artists and movies of today's world had had their roots in theatre. In theatre, you have live audience, and you dare not make a mistake in your performance when you are onstage. But in films, its a different story. You can take as many shots as you want, and it isn't a live audience that you have got. There are a few complexities of theatre art; for example, a painting might last for centuries, and so does a work of literature or a piece of sculpture; but a play lasts only for a few hours, and then exists only in the minds of the audiences and the artists who had created it. Film actors take several takes, and their performances are safe and secure in the tape or film. But that's not the case with stage actors.
One more thing that escalates theatre to a step higher than films is that theatre involves live emotions. Even though the stage actors do the same show over and over again, they cannot exactly repeat it. Human emotions and personalities change day by day. Actors too have good days and bad days just like everyone else. And it is these emotions that might affect the performance of the actors, since theatre is live. How one actor performs affects the performance of few other actors as well, as theatre acting works like a chain reaction. All these factors keep theatre fresh and challenging.
Another complexity in theatre is the audience. There are different types of audiences. Some have great powers of perception, some stimulate and motivate the actors, some are dumb and give nothing, while some others may prove to be a disturbance and distraction. In the actual sense, audience can make or break a performance. Stage actors may rehearse to an empty auditorium, but they would never perform to one. The audience completes the artistic transaction. Hence the underlying statement; whether you want to excel in theatre or in films, if you want to be a great actor, join theatre.
Be the PLAY, Be the ACTOR, Be the AUDIENCE; that is how one can master the marvellous art of acting!
