"The text of a play is rather like the script of a film; the script is not the film, and the play text is not the performed play." Shakespeare’s intention was not total control over the play but "that it be implemented by actors."
(Sylvan Barnet, "Shakespeare: An Overview,"
in Signet Henry V, xlvi)

Drama is a script, words that can be reproduced. But every live performance is unique, and any record of it is incomplete. The bare text of the drama is supplemented by the visual and aural presence of actors (and, in film, by the camera and soundtrack). Drama leaves room for the actors to add to the script, to enliven it.

Handout: 4 versions of the "balcony scene" performed (2.1)

1. First Folio text (printed 1623)

2. 1753 performance

3. 1947 acting edition

4. 1996 screenplay

– What action does each dramatic scene emphasize?

– What technologies does each performance use?

– What does each version record about the performance of that scene?

–What does each version leave unrecorded, as choices for actors?

Shakespearean drama is less about characterization than about characters’ relationships. Relationships develop between characters within each scene, change each time a set of characters reappears through the play, and are contrasted when different characters appear in adjacent scenes. Echoes between scenes show that even contrasting relationships have deep similarities.

For example, Romeo and Juliet famously explores both love and hatred, the fragile marriage of Romeo and Juliet and the long feud of the two clans. The relationships appear to contrast, but both are shown to be powerful bonds. The lovers’ relationship in the balcony scene (2.1) echoes Romeo’s relationship with Tybalt in the fight scene (3.1). In both cases, new commitment creates new debts.

Echoes are created through language:

balcony scene (2.1.167-68; p. 75):

Romeo: "O wilt thou leave me so unsatisfied?"

Juliet: "What Satisfaction canst thou have to night?"

fight scene (3.1.71-75; p. 117):

Romeo to Tybalt:

"And so, good Capulet, which Name I tender

As dearly as mine own, be satisfied."

 

Satisfy (from L satis, enough + facere, to make):

1. to fulfill one’s needs, expectations, or desires

2. to comply with certain conditions or rules

3. to convince or answer someone’s doubts

4. to pay a debt

 

Satisfaction

1. a bringing of pleasure

2. a repayment of obligation

3. a reparation of insult

 

Echoing relationships are then further emphasized by staging, which visually links (or contrasts) related characters.

–blocking (position on the stage)

–proximity (touching, pulling, hitting)

–costume (color, shape)

–pose and gesture