A drawing room play is a type of play, developed during the Victorian period in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. They set middle-class characters confronting a social problem of the time with a comedic twist. [1] The play is formed from a blend of three parts: part well-made play, part society drama, part comedy of manners. [2] Exponents of this style include Henrik Ibsen, Arthur Wing Pinero, George Bernard Shaw, Oscar Wilde, Edward Martyn and George Moore. [1]
The name drawing room play has its origins in the upper and middle classes of Victorian society, who with time on their hands, enacted amateur plays for the pleasure of their families in the drawing room. [3]
The style was later revisited by playwrights such as Noël Coward and J. B. Priestley; with in turn John Osborne and the Angry young men, in reaction to the revival, creating kitchen sink dramas. [4]
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? is a play by Edward Albee first staged in October 1962. It examines the complexities of the marriage of middle-aged couple Martha and George. Late one evening, after a university faculty party, they receive unwitting younger couple Nick and Honey as guests, and draw them into their bitter and frustrated relationship.
In English literature, the term comedy of manners describes a genre of realistic, satirical comedy of the Restoration period (1660–1710) that questions and comments upon the manners and social conventions of a greatly sophisticated, artificial society. The satire of fashion, manners, and outlook on life of the social classes, is realised with stock characters, such as the braggart soldier of Ancient Greek comedy, and the fop and the rake of English Restoration comedy. The clever plot of a comedy of manners is secondary to the social commentary thematically presented through the witty dialogue of the characters, e.g. The Importance of Being Earnest (1895), by Oscar Wilde, which satirises the sexual hypocrisies of Victorian morality.
The well-made play is a dramatic genre from nineteenth-century theatre, developed by the French dramatist Eugène Scribe. It is characterised by concise plotting, compelling narrative and a largely standardised structure, with little emphasis on characterisation and intellectual ideas.
The Garrick Theatre is a West End theatre, located in Charing Cross Road, in the City of Westminster, named after the stage actor David Garrick. It opened in 1889 with The Profligate, a play by Arthur Wing Pinero, and another Pinero play, The Notorious Mrs. Ebbsmith, was an early success at the theatre. In its early years, the Garrick appears to have specialised in the performance of melodrama. The theatre later became associated with comedies, including No Sex Please, We're British, which played for four years from 1982 to 1986.
Theatre Intime is an entirely student-run dramatic arts not-for-profit organization operating out of the Hamilton Murray Theater at Princeton University. Intime receives no direct support from the university, and is entirely acted, produced, directed, teched and managed by a board of students that is elected once a semester. "Students manage every aspect of Theatre Intime, from choosing the plays to setting the ticket prices."
This page describes the production history of the Stratford Festival.
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? is a 1966 American drama film directed by Mike Nichols in his directorial debut. The screenplay by Ernest Lehman is an adaptation of Edward Albee's 1962 play of the same name. It stars Elizabeth Taylor as Martha, Richard Burton as George, George Segal as Nick, and Sandy Dennis as Honey. The film depicts a late-night gathering at the home of a college professor and his wife.
The Shaw Festival is a major Canadian theatre festival in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, the second largest repertory theatre company in North America. Founded in 1962, its original mandate was to stimulate interest in George Bernard Shaw and his period, and to advance the development of theatre arts in Canada.
Remy Bumppo Theatre Company is a theater in Chicago known for productions from playwrights such as George Bernard Shaw and Tom Stoppard. Marti Lyons serves as the company's Artistic Director.
Soulpepper is a Toronto, Ontario-based theatre company founded to present classic plays. The following is a chronological list of the productions that it has staged since its inception.
The Vancouver Playhouse Theatre Company was a regional Canadian theatre company, producing plays from 1962 to 2012. The following is a list of the productions that have been staged since its inception to its final season of 2011–2012.
Theatre Calgary is theatre company in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, established as a professional company in 1968. The following is a chronological list of the productions that have been staged since its inception as Musicians and Actors Club (MAC) from 1964 to 1968, and Theatre Calgary from 1968 onwards.
The Citadel Theatre is the major theatre-arts venue in Edmonton, the capital city of Alberta, Canada. This is a chronological list of the productions staged there since its opening night on November 10, 1965.
Chichester Festival Theatre, located in Chichester, England, is one of the United Kingdom's flagship theatres with an international reputation for quality and innovation. The following is a chronological list of the Chichester Festival production history of productions that have been staged since its inception.
This production history of the Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre (RMTC) is a chronological list of the Mainstage, Warehouse, and Regional Tour productions that have been staged since RMTC's inception.
Michael Rudman was an American theatre director.
The Asolo Repertory Theatre is located in Sarasota, Florida. It was originally a summers-only operation called The Asolo Comedy Festival. In 1963 it began to be referred to as The Asolo Theatre Festival. Starting in the fall of 1966, when it went into year-round operation, the name was changed to The Asolo Theater Company. Starting in 2006, it became The Asolo Repertory Theater, familiarly known as The Asolo Rep.
The Harold Pinter Theatre, known as the Comedy Theatre until 2011, is a West End theatre, and opened on Panton Street in the City of Westminster, on 15 October 1881, as the Royal Comedy Theatre. It was designed by Thomas Verity and built in just six months in painted (stucco) stone and brick. By 1884 it was known as simply the Comedy Theatre. In the mid-1950s the theatre underwent major reconstruction and re-opened in December 1955; the auditorium remains essentially that of 1881, with three tiers of horseshoe-shaped balconies.
Maxim Mazumdar was an Indo-Canadian playwright and director. He is known for his one-man show, Oscar Remembered, which tells the story of the Irish playwright Oscar Wilde as seen from the perspective of his lover and nemesis, Lord Alfred Douglas.
Errikos Belies was a Greek poet, novelist and translator.