Test your basic knowledge |

Theatre Basics

Subject : performing-arts
Instructions:
  • Answer 50 questions in 15 minutes.
  • If you are not ready to take this test, you can study here.
  • Match each statement with the correct term.
  • Don't refresh. All questions and answers are randomly picked and ordered every time you load a test.

This is a study tool. The 3 wrong answers for each question are randomly chosen from answers to other questions. So, you might find at times the answers obvious, but you will see it re-enforces your understanding as you take the test each time.
1. Elmer Rice; about a man named Mr. Zero Who is fired from his job and replaced by an adding machine






2. French philosopher and playwright; The Flies (1943) & No Exit (1944)






3. Play by Wole Soyinka; celebrates Nigerian independence but also warns against returning to Nigeria's violent past






4. All lines are sung - usually to grand classical music; Madama Butterfly (1904)






5. A form of musical entertainment featuring bawdy songs - dancing women - and sometimes striptease






6. Book - music - and lyrics






7. Kabuki borrowed many of these movements to make Kabuki acting highly stylized and almost puppet-like






8. Comic interludes performed during the intermissions of opera






9. Life has no purpose and they confused and antagonized audiences by refusing to adhere to a coherent set of principles - mirroring the madness of the world






10. Holds that human beings are naturally alone - without purpose or mission - in a universe that has no God






11. Composed and produced by Bob Cole - lyrics by Billy Johnson; story of a con man and used minstrel stereotypes and spoofed Chinatown; in one scene a young black man sings about he and his date were denied entry to a nightclub cuz He was black and this






12. French physicist - mathematician - and philosopher - expressed the essence of Romanticism






13. Holds that human beings are naturally alone - without purpose or mission - in a universe that has no God






14. A German poet - director and playwright who challenged traditional ideas about theatre; became a communist after watching policement shoot 4 unarmed civilians; The Life of Galileo (1938) - Mother Courage and her Children (1939) & The Caucasian Chalk






15. Wrote plays about the rugged lives of Irish peasants using their dialect; Riders to the Sea (1904) & The Playboy of the Western World (1907)






16. Included comic scenes - dance interludes and sentimental ballads all based on white stereotypes of black life in the South






17. No protagonist; deals with a family of characters who tell many stories at once; the fact that characters on stage take no action may inspire audience members to be motivated for the opposite in real life






18. Theatre was not seen as being of value to society - so plays were not an important part of:






19. Contemporary form of Sanskrit Theatre - dramatized version of the Hindu epic poems Ramayana and Mahabharata






20. An extreme form of realism; an acurate 'documentary' of everyday life - including its seamy side






21. Romanian-born French playwright best categorized as a hilarious absurdist; The Bald Soprano (1949) & Rhinoceros (1959)






22. Most famous American expressionist playwright who won Nobel Prize for Literature (1936); A touch of the Poet (1935) - The Iceman Cometh (1939) - A Long Day's Journey into Night (1956) & A Moon for the Misbegotten (1952); The Hairy Ape (1952)

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23. Studied the history of class conflict






24. The German equivalent to Diderot; was a playwright - critic - and Enlightenment philosopher Who wrote tragedies and comedies about the middle-class; his greatest play was Nathan the Wise






25. A robust and spectacular version of Noh; named after the characters for 'song' - 'dance' - and 'skill'; created by a woman named Okuni - owner of a brothel






26. Uses rock music - the rock and roll of the 1950s (Grease) - the psychedelic rock of the 1960s (Hair) or contemporary pop and rock (Rent)






27. Two types of traditional Japanese theatre






28. A permanent - professional theatre outside NYC; founded in 1947 by Margo Jones; stage new plays alongside commercial hits and historical plays; appeal to the intellectual audiences that Hollywood seldom serves






29. One of the most famous Sanskrit dramas - a love story in seven acts written by the playwright Kalidasa






30. A true-to-life interior containing a room or rooms with the fourth wall removed so that the audience has the feeling of looking in on the characters' private lives






31. Recorded conversations of slum dwellers in Dublin and used their words verbatim in his plays

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32. Where more experts agree that human beings came into existence






33. Most famous American expressionist playwright who won Nobel Prize for Literature (1936); A touch of the Poet (1935) - The Iceman Cometh (1939) - A Long Day's Journey into Night (1956) & A Moon for the Misbegotten (1952); The Hairy Ape (1952)

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34. French Enlightenment playwright; was an inventor and thinker who spent countless hours at the leading intellectual salons of France; most famous plays are The Barber of Seville - and The Marriage of Figaro - his plays reflect the attitudes of the Enl






35. More serious plot and theme; West Side Story (1957)






36. Divided into fatalist - hilarious and existentialist






37. The men who play female roles are called:






38. Spoken lines of dialogue as well as the plot






39. Exposed the squalid living conditions of the urban poor and explores scandalous topics like poverty - venereal disease and prostitution; 'Sordid Realism'






40. Russian playwright whose play The Lower Depths (1902) took look at people living in cellar of Moscow flophouse






41. By Swedish Playwright August Strindberg; fourteen-act play that follows the disconnected logic of a dream






42. Term used to describe performances that mix theatre - visual arts - music - dance - gesture and rituals; often use multimedia effects - sounds and lighting effects to make a point and allow the audience to understand its deeper implications; often re






43. A medley of the show's songs played as a preview; usually the beginning of a traditional musical; lets the audience know that it's time to stop talking because the performance is about to begin






44. The first 'talkie' movie; featured white actor Al Jolson in blackface performing in a minstrel show






45. Sell over $1billion worth of tickets annually - majority of those are for musicals






46. The first all-black show to pay at a top Broadway theatre






47. This happened for the first time during the Restoration






48. Most famous surrealist and was a French writer and director; studied Asian religions - mysticism - and ancient cultures; declared theatre should should wake the nerves and heart; argued that proscenium arch theatres create a barrier between the audie






49. Argued that the prime function of playwrights is to expose the social and moral evils of their time






50. Unstructured theatrical events on street corners - bus stops and anywhere else people gathered