The transformation scene is a theatrical convention of metamorphosis, in which a character, group of characters, stage properties or scenery undergo visible change. Transformation scenes were already standard in the European theatrical tradition with the masques of the 17th century. They may rely on both stage machinery and lighting effects for their dramatic impact.
The masques of Inigo Jones and Ben Jonson settled into a form that had an antimasque preceding a courtly display, the two parts being linked by a transformation scene. [1] The scene is an abstract representation of the royal power of bringing harmony. [2] Comus , the masque written by the poet John Milton, implies a transformation scene heralded by the arrival of the character Sabrina. [3]
Change by theatrical means has been seen as central to the pantomime of the Victorian period. [4] After a long evolution, a transformation scene then became standard at the end of Act 1 or beginning of Act 2 of a pantomime. [5] The convention in the middle of the 19th century was of a long transformation scene, of up to 15 minutes. [6]
In the later 18th century, genres including the harlequinade and masque began or ended with a transformation scene to a temple, drawing to a close with the suggestion of harmony restored. [7] John Rich, earlier in the century, made Harlequin with his slap stick able to transform stage props; and later Joseph Grimaldi as Clown was in charge of transformations. Early pantomime related to and contained the traditional harlequinade by means of a transition in which a group of characters descended from the traditional types from the commedia del arte were transformed and "revealed" as being the key characters in the pantomime of the fairy tale that followed. [8] A production in 1781 of Robinson Crusoe by Richard Brinsley Sheridan is credited with breaking down the rigid separation implied by the transformation, leading to the 19th century view of pantomime. [9]
In 1881, Percy Fitzgerald described the transformation scene of an extravaganza as follows:
First the "gauzes" lift slowly one behind the other – perhaps the most pleasing of all scenic effects – giving glimpses of "the Realms of Bliss", seen behind in a tantalizing fashion. Then is revealed a kind of half-glorified country, clouds and banks, evidently concealing much. Always a sort of pathetic and at the same time exultant [musical] strain rises. ... Now some of the banks begin to part slowly, showing realms of light, with a few divine beings – fairies – rising slowly here and there [in an aerial pyramid]. ... [T]he lights streaming on full, in every colour and from every quarter, in the richest effulgence. [Finally], the most glorious paradise of all will open, revealing the pure empyrean itself, and some fair spirit aloft in a cloud among the stars, the apex of all. Then, all motion ceases; the work is complete; the fumes of crimson, green and blue fire begin to rise at the wings; the music bursts into a crash of exultation; and, possibly to the general disenchantment, a burly man in a black frock steps out from the side and bows awkwardly. Then to shrill whistle, the first scene of the harlequinade closes in, and shuts out the brilliant vision. [These magnificent scenes] are significant of English energy, and cannot be approached in foreign theatres. [10]
The dominance of transformation scenes as spectacular ends in themselves has been attributed to the work of William Roxby Beverly, from 1849. By the 1860s, Beverly's work as a scene painter displaced the costume change bringing in the harlequinade in some productions. [11] The extravaganza became differentiated from the pantomime by, among other things, the centrality of a "magical transformation scene" and the diminishing of the harlequinade clowning. [12] Some British and American Victorian burlesques also retained a transformation scene. [13]
In the later Victorian pantomime, and before the era of the pantomime dame initiated by Dan Leno, a transformation scene revealing Fairyland was the stock ending. As described by Percy Hetherington Fitzgerald, by a slow process a well-lit landscape appears (the "Realms of Bliss"). And in it, fairies are seen, rising from the ground, or hanging in the air. [14] In The Adventures of Philip by William Makepeace Thackeray from the early 1860s, "The Realms of Bliss" is the title of the final chapter, and Thackeray can assume his readers were familiar with the penultimate "dark scene" that precedes it, the entrance of the Good Fairy, and the ultimate wedding of Harlequin and Columbine. [15] [16] An 1886 musical version of Alice in Wonderland , classed as an extravaganza, revealed the Realms of Bliss at the start, darkening only at the end when Alice awakes. [17] Peter Pan is embedded in the pantomime tradition, and in its original stage production of 1904, Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up, ended with a magical transformation scene, returning to Neverland. [18]
Harlequin is the best-known of the comic servant characters (Zanni) from the Italian commedia dell'arte, associated with the city of Bergamo. The role is traditionally believed to have been introduced by the Italian actor-manager Zan Ganassa in the late 16th century, was definitively popularized by the Italian actor Tristano Martinelli in Paris in 1584–1585, and became a stock character after Martinelli's death in 1630.
Pierrot is a stock character of pantomime and commedia dell'arte, whose origins are in the late seventeenth-century Italian troupe of players performing in Paris and known as the Comédie-Italienne. The name is a diminutive of Pierre (Peter), via the suffix -ot. His character in contemporary popular culture — in poetry, fiction, and the visual arts, as well as works for the stage, screen, and concert hall — is that of the sad clown, often pining for love of Columbine, who usually breaks his heart and leaves him for Harlequin. Performing unmasked, with a whitened face, he wears a loose white blouse with large buttons and wide white pantaloons. Sometimes he appears with a frilled collaret and a hat, usually with a close-fitting crown and wide round brim and, more rarely, with a conical shape like a dunce's cap.
Mother Goose is a character that originated in children's fiction, as the imaginary author of a collection of French fairy tales and later of English nursery rhymes. She also appeared in a song, the first stanza of which often functions now as a nursery rhyme. The character also appears in a pantomime tracing its roots to 1806.
The masque was a form of festive courtly entertainment that flourished in 16th- and early 17th-century Europe, though it was developed earlier in Italy, in forms including the intermedio. A masque involved music, dancing, singing and acting, within an elaborate stage design, in which the architectural framing and costumes might be designed by a renowned architect, to present a deferential allegory flattering to the patron. Professional actors and musicians were hired for the speaking and singing parts. Masquers who did not speak or sing were often courtiers: the English queen Anne of Denmark frequently danced with her ladies in masques between 1603 and 1611, and Henry VIII and Charles I of England performed in the masques at their courts. In the tradition of masque, Louis XIV of France danced in ballets at Versailles with music by Jean-Baptiste Lully.
Harlequinade is an English comic theatrical genre, defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as "that part of a pantomime in which the harlequin and clown play the principal parts". It developed in England between the 17th and mid-19th centuries. It was originally a slapstick adaptation or variant of the commedia dell'arte, which originated in Italy and reached its apogee there in the 16th and 17th centuries. The story of the Harlequinade revolves around a comic incident in the lives of its five main characters: Harlequin, who loves Columbine; Columbine's greedy and foolish father Pantaloon, who tries to separate the lovers in league with the mischievous Clown; and the servant, Pierrot, usually involving chaotic chase scenes with a bumbling policeman.
Queen Mab is a fairy referred to in William Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet, where "she is the fairies' midwife". Later, she appears in other poetry and literature, and in various guises in drama and cinema. In the play, her activity is described in a famous speech by Mercutio published originally in prose and often adapted into iambic pentameter, in which she is a miniature creature who performs midnight pranks upon sleepers. Being driven by a team of atomies, she rides her chariot over their noses and "delivers the fancies of sleeping men". She is also described as a midwife to help sleepers "give birth" to their dreams. Later depictions have typically portrayed her as the Queen of the Fairies.
In Greek mythology, Comus is the god of festivity, revels and nocturnal dalliances. He is a son and a cup-bearer of the god Dionysus. He was represented as a winged youth or a child-like satyr and represents anarchy and chaos. His mythology occurs in the later times of antiquity. During his festivals in Ancient Greece, men and women exchanged clothes. He was depicted as a young man on the point of unconsciousness from drink. He had a wreath of flowers on his head and carried a torch that was in the process of being dropped. Unlike the purely carnal Pan or purely intoxicated Dionysos, Comus was a god of excess.
Jean-Gaspard Deburau, sometimes erroneously called Debureau, was a Bohemian-French mime. He performed from 1816 to the year of his death at the Théâtre des Funambules, which was immortalized in Marcel Carné's poetic-realist film Children of Paradise (1945); Deburau appears in the film as a major character. His most famous pantomimic creation was Pierrot—a character that served as the godfather of all the Pierrots of Romantic, Decadent, Symbolist, and early Modernist theater and art.
Pantomime is a type of musical comedy stage production designed for family entertainment. It was developed in England and is performed throughout the United Kingdom, Ireland and in other English-speaking countries, especially during the Christmas and New Year season. Modern pantomime includes songs, gags, slapstick comedy and dancing. It generally combines gender-crossing actors and topical humour with a story more or less based on a well-known fairy tale, fable or folk tale. Pantomime is a participatory form of theatre, in which the audience is encouraged and expected to sing along with certain parts of the music and shout out phrases to the performers.
An extravaganza is a literary or musical work usually containing elements of Victorian burlesque, and pantomime, in a spectacular production and characterized by freedom of style and structure. It sometimes also has elements of music hall, cabaret, circus, revue, variety, vaudeville and mime. Extravaganza came, in the 20th century, to more broadly refer to an elaborate, spectacular, and expensive theatrical production.
This is a selected list of W. S. Gilbert's works, including all that have their own Wikipedia articles. For a complete list of Gilbert's dramatic works, see List of W. S. Gilbert dramatic works.
Anne Isabella, Lady Ritchie, eldest daughter of William Makepeace Thackeray, was an English writer, whose several novels were appreciated in their time and made her a central figure on the late Victorian literary scene. She is noted especially as the custodian of her father's literary legacy, and for short fiction that places fairy tale narratives in a Victorian milieu. Her 1885 novel Mrs. Dymond introduced into English the proverb, "Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for life."
Dumbshow, also dumb show or dumb-show, is defined by the Oxford Dictionary of English as "gestures used to convey a meaning or message without speech; mime." In the theatre the word refers to a piece of dramatic mime in general, or more particularly a piece of action given in mime within a play "to summarise, supplement, or comment on the main action".
The Forty Thieves is a "Pantomime Burlesque" written by Robert Reece, W. S. Gilbert, F. C. Burnand and Henry J. Byron, created in 1878 as a charity benefit, produced by the Beefsteak Club of London. The Beefsteak Club still meets in Irving Street, London. It was founded by actor John Lawrence Toole and others in 1876, in rooms above the Folly Theatre, King William IV Street. It became an essential after theatre club for the bohemian theatre set, such as Henry Irving, Toole, John Hare, W. H. Kendal, F. C. Burnand, Henry Labouchère, W. S. Gilbert and two hundred of their peers. It soon moved to Green Street. The Club occasionally performed amateur plays for their own amusement and to raise funds for charities.
Harlequin and the Fairy's Dilemma, retitled The Fairy's Dilemma shortly after the play opened, is a play in two acts by W. S. Gilbert that parodies the harlequinade that concluded 19th-century pantomimes.
Harry Payne and Frederick Payne were members of a popular Victorian era of British pantomime entertainers. They were billed as The Payne Brothers.
Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance: a play, opera, mime, ballet, etc., performed in a theatre, or on radio or television. Considered as a genre of poetry in general, the dramatic mode has been contrasted with the epic and the lyrical modes ever since Aristotle's Poetics —the earliest work of dramatic theory.
Frederick John D'Auban was an English dancer, choreographer and actor of the Victorian and Edwardian eras. Famous during his lifetime as the ballet-master at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, he is best remembered as the choreographer of many of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas.
Harlequin Cock Robin and Jenny Wren; or, Fortunatus and the Water of Life, the Three Bears, the Three Gifts, the Three Wishes, and the Little Man who Woo'd the Little Maid was a pantomime written by W. S. Gilbert. As with many pantomimes of the Victorian era, the piece consisted of a story involving evil spirits, young lovers and "transformation" scenes, followed by a harlequinade.
Féerie, sometimes translated as "fairy play", was a French theatrical genre known for fantasy plots and spectacular visuals, including lavish scenery and mechanically worked stage effects. Féeries blended music, dancing, pantomime, and acrobatics, as well as magical transformations created by designers and stage technicians, to tell stories with clearly defined melodrama-like morality and an extensive use of supernatural elements. The genre developed in the early 19th century and became immensely popular in France throughout the nineteenth century, influencing the development of burlesque, musical comedy and film.