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CHAPTER I
English Restoration drama
I.1 The revival of theatre
History teaches us that a period of stagnation, which can sometimes degenerate into a
critical time and even into a reversal of the original situation, usually follows a deep
socio-cultural evolution.
As Guido Fornelli explains in his work La Restaurazione inglese nell‟opera di
John Dryden1, periods of more flourishing literary expansion usually coincide with a
conniving political rebirth, therefore the rise of great writers appears to be connected
with a general social welfare. In England, Chaucer or Shakespeare during the period
of emerging imperialism and John Dryden in the Restoration age are evident
examples. Going back to such periods of literary expansion, Fornelli, however, adds
that the gap periods, in which literature undergoes a strong slackening, are necessary
to wipe the slate clean to everything which represents the past and its traditions (to
which, however, the English had always been tied) and to begin a new chapter of
one’s history by having a look to the new continental trends.
English drama in the Elizabethan and Jacobean ages had experienced its great
season thanks to the theatrical companies which acted on the royal stage each time so
contributing to the magnificence and cultural opening which became the main
properties of the court.
Less than a year later, in 1642, a Puritan edict closed theatres; that act marked the
beginning of a revolutionary interval which would lead to Charles I’s beheading and
to the establishment of the Puritan rule.
The following twenty years after this event were full of political upsets but poor
from an artistic point of view because of the petition which provided the closing of
1
Guido Fornelli, La Restaurazione inglese nell‟opera di John Dryden, Firenze, Sansoni, 1932.
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playhouses and consequent imprisonment of anyone who had continued to stage any
kind of play.
Many actors took their own way, others emigrated abroad to go on their profession
without restrictions, but some comedians did not accept the Puritan diktat passively
and opposed that abuse with petitions and an hidden attempt of reorganizing the
companies.
The year 1660 decreed the end of this period of austerity, which had considerably
damaged not only theatrical production, but also audience approach towards theatre
itself, and the beginning of a new way of conceiving it. It was the Restoration.
Charles II landed in Dover and brought there the French culture and a project of
rebirth both in sociopolitical and cultural fields.
The king himself took over the reins of theatre and founded two acting companies,
the Duke of York’s Men and the King’s Men. The former was run by William
Davenant and the latter by Thomas, as they both had proved to be faithful to the king
and had distinguished themselves for their admirable qualities in the staging of plays.
However, the king reserved the right to moderate political and religious satire,
while he was more liberal with regard to erotic subjects.
Comedians troubled themselves to stage new plays, but they collided with a
deeply changed situation. Actually, people’s attitude to theatre had been changing
during the years of lack of performances. Theatres, which once overflowed with a
demanding audience, now were empty and the people who enjoyed a play almost
immediately became an elitist middle class, close to the court and the artistic tastes of
the king.
On the other hand, theatres themselves had reduced considerably as they remained
unused and therefore became unusable. At first, companies found that tennis courts
were suitable places for performances, but it was soon necessary to move to much
more suitable places for acting, so in 1674 the new Theatre Royal by the greatest
architect of the Restoration, Christopher Wren, was opened.
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Theatre structure also changed considerably compared to the past, both at
architectonic and formal level.
At formal level, theatre was more and more similar to continental features, which
included a greater separation between audience and actors. This separation was
created by a proscenium jutting out into audience for about five metres of length and
curtain represented a kind of fourth wall which separated those who played from
those who watched the performance.
This proscenium appeared smaller than the Elizabethan one and had some doors
which opened to show a painted scenery so that scene could change without dropping
the curtain and most action could take place in the small, but important, place which
was in front of the proscenium. In the Elizabethan theatre, on the contrary,
perspective was kaleidoscopic, as platform jutted out into the audience and almost
involved it in the action. In the Elizabethan theatre, this participation to the
performance was also created by fixed scenes, which, in the Restoration theatre, were
replaced with movable ones making setting change easier. Actually, the innovation of
movable scenes satisfied the new stage demands of comedians, who wanted to
surprise audience with exotic costumes, special effects, sliding panels and backdrops
which continually changed in comparison with the neutral backdrop of the
Elizabethan drama.
All changes of setting obviously happened under the aware look of audience, which,
however, made lose spontaneity and realism to scene.
A further change, which also meant a greater opening to foreign influences, was
the advent of women on the stage. While, in the Elizabethan theatre, female roles
were unavoidably played by men, now women began to act female roles. The first
women who got on the stage did not shine for their virtues and discretion, but they
were semiliterate members of the lower classes, educated to behave on the stage and
to act so they were not accustomed to face audience; nevertheless, they met with
great success among public.
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This refers to theatre meaning “appearance”. However, at conceptual level, theatre
also underwent a rather remarkable metamorphosis. Actually, in the Elizabethan age,
theatre acquired a very important function of sociopolitical integration. Unlike the
medieval drama, confined to cloisters and reduced to commemorative performances
of great liturgical events, in the second half of the 16th century theatre represented an
urban prerogative, a chance and also a means - maybe exclusive - of expression and
communication of thinking and modus vivendi of middle classes, who had most of
their trades in the city.
Actually, Elizabethan theatre was turned into an independent, not only social but
also economic and artistic, phenomenon. The performance of a play stopped being an
occasional production to change into a permanent activity organized by several
artistic figures, such as director, actor, stagehand and manager and into a legal or real
monopoly of the court aristocracy.
Staging was a social phenomenon which originated from mercantile world. So the
modern “show culture”, in which success or failure before audience is decided by the
economic result of a performance, was created.
So the trends of theatrical activity, in which many people of the company were
involved, derived from audience’s tastes and feelings.
Every day there was a large number of performances in London, in the afternoon,
and there was a very strong competition among them in order to gain the greatest
number of spectators.
Middle class also managed to have a class distinction for the admission at theatre,
whose ticket cost a penny for those who wanted to watch the performance by
standing, two pence for those who wanted to sit and three pence for those who
wanted a place of honour, the comfort of some cushions and a strategic position both
to see and to be seen.
Instead, drama, in the Elizabethan age, had turned into the most social of arts. On
the one hand, it was the highest-born and greatest impact art and, at the same time,
the most sensitive one to manners and fashions of the society which supported it.
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Artist was acquiring a new and different social role thanks to the triumph and fame
which also gave him economic success and high ability for social relationships.
So theatre experienced a new identity which greatly joined the world of stage with
the external reality.
Elizabethan theatre believed in the equation WORLD = THEATRE (and vice
versa). This meant that theatre represented life; when actors got inside the character,
they staged situations in which spectators completely identified, as they were fully
involved in the actions and feelings performed. Audience, not being physically
separated from performance, as there were not fourth walls or curtains, did not watch
it, but public participated in it actively. At this point, we can quote the famous words
which Jacques, the character of As you like it, by William Shakespeare, says in this
respect:
“All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits and their entrances;”
( from As you like it, Act II, scene VII, The forest)2
Restoration theatre, on the contrary, modified its canon by changing the equation
in WORLD like THEATRE (and vice versa). Now theatre, according to this new
meaning, did not have the aim of representing the real world, but through canons of
verisimilitude and imitation.
This change meant a different conception that comedians gave to stage, that is a
place where an abstract idea of the concrete world was represented and which was
loaded of symbols and focused on fixed stereotypes. So audience did not identify
with the characters who were pictured on the stage, but it could see them as a
caricature of its vices and virtues and therefore it understood itself and positive and
negative sides of the Restoration society.
2
William Shakespeare, As You Like it (1599), London, Oxford University Press, 1914.
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Among the most representative theatrical figures of Restoration comedy, we can
number “gulls”, who were caricatural characters of neoclassical middle-class society
and “wits”, who, on the contrary, represented normal characters.
Acting style was certainly so influenced by this parodic vision of middle-class
society that it was repeatedly spoken of exaggeration in gestures and voice, in
caricature which often proved to be magniloquent and solemn, even ridiculous.
Then the heroic became the best way to speak ironically by emphasizing the
incredibility of situations and heroic tragedy became the favourite genre of
playwrights.
As Cesare Molinari explains, in his work Storia del Teatro3, we could define
Elizabethan theatre like a theatre in motion, as actors were ordinary mortals and
audience could find its vices and virtues in them easily.
Whereas what characterized Restoration theatre was stagnation, caused by
solemnity of gestures and magniloquence of words; moreover, the parody of middle
class (who, after all, watched performances) was hidden and implicit.
The kinds of dramas and plays performed in this period, which enjoyed a larger
audience, mainly belonged to the genres of heroic tragedy and comedy of manners.
Both genres focused on the Restoration society, but tragedy had a greater fortune
than comedy, as it aimed at representing the events of aristocratic families who
troubled themselves to defend their virtue in settings which were almost always
exotic.
On this point, it was important the introduction of heroic couplet, which, according
to many tragedians of the time, gave a more solemn value to the subject, which was
rather elevated and, above all, it renewed the way of making tragedies, in comparison
with the most natural Elizabethan blank verse.
With regard to development of comedy, instead, playwrights were less prolific,
even though the genre of comedy of manners turned out to be triumphant on London
stages.
3
Molinari, Cesare, Storia del Teatro, Laterza, Venezia, 1996, page 166 and following.
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In comedy of manners, characters also proved to be standardized types, who
embodied the characteristics of middle classes as regards their more conventional
aspects, that is excess, affectation and love for appearance. In conclusion, the hero of
these comedies was the middle-class man who distinguished himself for elegance and
wit, but certainly not for morality.
Among the minor genres which developed during the Restoration, we can also
remember farce and opera. Several authors tried both genres and among them we can
remember Davenant himself, who set several comedies to music, turning them into
real operas, and Thomas Shadwell, who set Davenant and Dryden‟s The Tempest to
music, which, however, represents the heart of our treatment.
As to farce, instead, the authors of this period tried to readapt foreign works by
writers such as Molière and Racine by inserting the set of deceptions, recognitions
and disguises, which was typical of this genre.
Summing up the general picture of the Restoration drama we can briefly summarize,
in a scheme, the characteristics of the Elizabethan theatre comparing them with the
characteristics of the Restoration drama.
ELIZABETHAN THEATRE RESTORATION THEATRE
There are many theatres in London. There are two theatres, respectively the
Drury Lane and the Cockpit, run by
Thomas Killigrew and William Davenant.
Theatre is for everybody; it is a form
of universal performance.
Theatre addresses a middle-class élite.
Women were banned from theatrical
world and men acted female roles.
Women played female roles.
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